The Husband Poisoner: Suburban women who killed in post-World War II Sydney. “Shocking real-life stories of murderous women who used rat poison to rid themselves of husbands and other inconvenient family members.” After World War II, Sydney experienced a crime
Read more...
War movies – by which I mean depictions of military adventures in the Middle East this century – are not my cup of tea. Like my parents and grandparents (whose experience of World War Two was so painful they avoided
Read more...
Redfern rising: the story of Aboriginal activism in the 1970s. By Adam Phelan New book explores the people, places and achievements at the centre of Aboriginal activism and self-determination in the 1970s. Redfern: Aboriginal activism in the 1970s is published
Read more...
James Comey: Boy Scout or Partisan Hack? When Director Billy Ray bluntly told James Comey “Well, sir, you got him (Trump) elected,” while pitching him a mini-series The Comey Rule, it turned my mind to events in November 2016. James
Read more...
Walking in Styx Creek. A teenage Throsby and a gathering of oddball mates took to walking the drains around Newcastle at night, decades ago. We were – nearby locals soundly asleep at those wee small hours would have been comforted
Read more...
Map to find Meaning in Ageing. A new guide co-designed with seniors is the focus of a crowdfunding campaign by not for profit Meaningful Ageing Australia. The Map of Meaning and Ageing: a self-reflection guide, is the next phase for
Read more...
University lecturer’s film to premier at international Film Festival. A new feature film by the University of Newcastle’s Dr Stuart McBratney, Don’t Read This on a Plane, will premiere at the Dances with Films festival in Los Angeles on 29
Read more...
In the genre of Movies Most Likely to Bore People to Tears, Mamoru Oshii’s animé adaptation of Hiroshi Mori’s novel stands well against Kubric’s 2001~A Space Odyssey. Now that I have your attention, if you came here to read a
Read more...NFSA Presents Online Screening of Sunday Too Far Away. Enjoy a free, online screening of iconic Australian film Sunday Too Far Away (1975), followed by a special Q&A with producer Matt Carroll. The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia
Read more...
Review: The Beach, created and directed by Warwick Thornton. By Brooke Collins-Gearing Senior Lecturer, University of Newcastle. Filmed by Thornton’s son Dylan River… Every shot is a living, breathing piece of artwork. Watching Warwick Thornton’s The Beach is a journey
Read more...
The National Film and Sound Archive (NFSA) presents a free online screening of Storm Boy. ‘Wild things should be free’ – Storm Boy, 1976 The original 1976 classic, now digitally restored, will have a free virtual screening on Friday 15
Read more...
…all the lonely misguided people in this dark city … experts at avoiding reality. And with good reason. I’m not sure any of us wants to know what goes on out there at 3 am in some stink-ridden alley. God
Read more...
Hot chips by the beach, Romper Room on Channel 3, a job at the steelworks and live music at the Star Hotel. A crowded Newcastle Beach, the old pavilion, and Royal Newcastle Hospital. Photograph by Ron Morrison. That was “Our
Read more...
You might be interested to hear from someone who watched 2001: A Space Odyssey at the big-screen theatre when it was a new release. It was not only a great experience and everything you might imagine, it was DOUBLY so.
Read more...
Bruce Beresford’s 1991 film Black Robe, the first feature film co-produced by Australia and Canada, has been digitally restored by the National Film and Sound Archive’s NFSA Restores program. The new digital print will premiere at Melbourne International Film
Read more...
Who doesn’t long for the good old days when we could not only insult at will, but the recipients could take it in good spirit. And I’m not talking about bullying. It’s all in the attitude of the giver, not
Read more...
When we touched the moon the universe paused. When we created a mind, God stirred. A formidably smart tech boss, Nathan, invites his lowly coder Caleb to Turing test a living doll. The location is remote and houses two humans
Read more...
I was in the old country – you know, the one that burned the capitol of the U.S.A. to the ground some century or so ago – and was perusing the local stage offerings. Charmed, to say the least, I
Read more...
The sun is harsh in Mexico City. Highlights burned, shade evil dark, and saturation in the eye of the beholder. As usual, our friends the film critics have been too long in the hot sun – and forgot to remove
Read more...
Great Dane tale darkens ciné Illuminati doorway. Dogville caught U.S. film reviewers like stunned dogs in headlight glare. Intangibles of a great film winked elusively through the directed downplay of Dogville’s staid delivery. Patrons shifted uneasily, personal prejudices starkly mirrored
Read more...