Went to the Astor Theatre for a double shot of 80s action classics. I haven’t watched The Terminator in forever and I’ve never seen RoboCop, and it’s to the latter’s credit that it kept me awake and engaged well past my normal bedtime. Also, I got to pet the Astor’s resident cat, a big fluffy sweetie, so that’s a nice bonus.
I’ve read and loved a few Maugham novels without realising that he also excelled at short stories. This is the first one of a four volume collection, which I’ll no doubt complete one day as I love both short stories and Maugham’s brilliant writing. As in any collection, the quality varies somewhat, but most entries are great little gems of economical, elegant storytelling.
The thirty stories contained in the volume are grouped together by geography, as they move from the islands of the Pacific Ocean to England, France, Spain and back to Borneo. They vary wildly in length – some stories take up forty pages and others stop at four – and in tone, with some stories light-hearted and dryly comical, almost resembling a witty punchy epigram, while others are almost luridly tragic.
I first saw Gogol Bordello almost exactly eight years ago, and that was honestly one of the most fun and memorable gigs I’ve been to. So when this rowdy transcontinental gypsy-punk eight-piece collective showed up in Melbourne once again, I jumped at the chance to catch them in concert.
Yeah I was one of the many people who went to see The Dark Knight at the cinema without ever watching Christopher Nolan’s first installment in his dark and gritty Batman trilogy. Almost thirteen years later is still better than never I guess.
A brutal and confessional break-up record; excellent second album from a genre-mashing sister duo.
No I’m not talking about the large subspecies of brown bear inhabiting North America, but rather the American indie rock band, whose live show at the Melbourne Zoo grounds I got to enjoy.
I finally watched the film considered by some to be Citizen Kane of bad movies, Tommy Wiseau’s infamous The Room. Yes I can see why it’s become a cult classic instead of sinking into the obscurity many other, less inspired terrible movies are usually consigned to.
