"Skylight" (MTC)

At times I could feel both leads acting, though overall both were good (Colin Friels and Anna Samson). Worked the trick of making me imagine both myself in the characters' place and parallels to my own life, though more in terms of emotional timbre than actual situation.

(w/ Erandathie) 

Parks and Recreation season 7

A pretty sweet ending, complete with Bill Murray.

(seasons 1-3, 4, 5, 6)

Elbow - The Take Off and Landing

Another Elbow album full of songs like cathedrals. Nice.

Tegan and Sara - Love You to Death

Another sheerly terrific, racingly heartfelt record full of highlights in similar vein to Heartthrob, though perhaps a touch sleeker. Part of this happy convergence with which I associate Chvrches, latter day Taylor Swift, before them Robyn (in the vanguard) and others, each act with their own history and trajectory which both subliminally and actually colours where they've landed just now; on Love You to Death, "Faint of Heart" and "Stop Desire" are two of the most delightful, both with great chorus spikes.

Donnie Darko

For me, at least, I think that movies can provide a truer reflection (or refraction) of my experience of the world than any other form of art. Even though it was books that I first took to, music that then lodged most deeply during my most impressionable teenage and early young adult years, and theatre and (visual) art that often prompt the most complex and profound responses in me now, it's movies that - as a form - come closest to the phenomenological in what they offer: immersively experiential, and therefore emotional, associative and intellectual all mixed.

So: Donnie Darko. This was one of my favourite films back when I first saw it - several times - but then it kind of waned in my mind over the probably more than a decade during which (a) I didn't watch it again and (b) a whole lot of other stuff happened, and I began thinking of it - when I thought of it at all - as a film that I used to like, with that liking maybe fixed to a specific point in time for me (a recent rewatching didn't especially shake that, although it reminded me of some of the reasons why I'd liked it so much). But watching it again last night - on a big screen - it all came rushing back, right from the opening scene, and I was caught up in its magic the whole way through. It doesn't need parsing - this is just a great film, which has always affected and resonated with me, and still does.

(w/ David - a 15th anniversary screening at Nova)

"Max and Olive" (Potter, Melbourne Uni) - second trip

After my first visit, I found that I couldn't stop thinking about this exhibition, even (especially?) amidst what turned out to be a very intense week. So I went again the following weekend.

 

(w/ Al)

"Double Indemnity" (MTC)

Slick enough, but I'm not sure I would've got much out of this if I'd been familiar with the source book or its film adaptation. Committed performances and a twisty story made for an engaging evening but all in all it seemed a touch on the thin side, like there wasn't much to it.

(w/ Meribah)

Sarah Thornton - Seven Days in the Art World

Enjoyable in its tour through the various scenes in the world of contemporary art - auction (Christie's), 'crit' (art school seminar involving peer feedback - California Institute of the Arts), art fair (Basel), prize (Turner), magazine (Artforum), studio (Takashi Murakami's), biennale (Venice) - and associated actors including dealers, collectors, curators, critics, auction house experts and, indeed, artists.

Explicitly takes an 'ethnographic' approach which perhaps enabled access but may also account for the somewhat lack of a point - or, more accurately, a perspective or critical view - to much of the description; also largely missing (by design, but still very noticeably) is anything much about the relevance of the qualities of the art itself. Also drags a bit in some of the latter chapters.

All up, despite fascinating topic and a sense of being grounded in the reality of what it describes, not as good as another in somewhat similar vein that I read a few years back.

How to Vote Progressive in Australia: Labor or Green? edited by Dennis Altman and Sean Scalmer

Interesting topic; timely publication. Some contributors obviously have a dog in this race (ie current ALP and Greens MPs) and others address the question from a range of perspectives. Notably, I'm pretty sure that all accept the Greens will be a significant part of the political landscape for the foreseeable future (which is certainly how it seems, but hasn't seemed a cert - or near enough to - until relatively recently).

10 Cloverfield Lane

Tight and suspenseful, each successive plot point something of a surprise when it eventuates even though it had been signalled earlier as a possibility - the film plays fair by laying it out like this but still bites because you don't know which of the possible paths it will take. Made even better by the realisation that, as this piece lays out more or less uncontrovertibly, the film is fundamentally about domestic abuse, and all of its pieces fit together in support, including the final act and ultimate choice on which the film ends; also that the main character is played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead aka Ramona from Scott Pilgrim!

"Max and Olive" (Potter, Melbourne Uni)

As in Dupain and Cotton - active at the same time, and entwined to the extent of having been briefly married to each other. Focuses on their respective work in the 1930s, with a few from the 40s. Very good.

"There's no particular subject that I prefer - the light is why I take photographs" - Olive Cotton

(on tour from the NGA)

Eleanor Friedberger - New View

Relaxed, somewhat retro-leaning singer songwriter fare, with melodies that weave around and often emerge late in the piece though without the experimental flair of the Fiery Furnaces. Not bad.

Tennessee Williams - The Glass Menagerie / Malthouse

Memory takes a lot of poetic license. It omits some details; others are exaggerated, according to the emotional value of the articles it touches, for memory is seated predominantly in the heart.

Tennessee Williams is one of those figures who has something of a hold over my mind. Thanks to extemporanea, it's possible to reconstruct that the last time - and the main previous time - that I experienced him with particular sharpness was a good seven years ago; but in the perpetual netflix of my unconscious, he's always flickeringly there on distant rotation.

Yes, I have tricks in my pocket, I have things up my sleeve. But I am the opposite of a stage magician. He gives you illusion that has the appearance of truth. I give you truth in the pleasant disguise of illusion.

Having re-read the text just before seeing the Malthouse's current production (Eamon Flack), including Williams' extended production notes, I was well primed for what turned out to be a faithful staging, with the addition of the 'screen device' that is written into the play text working well with play's themes and feeling, as well as being very of the moment (in fact the last play I saw, the current Miss Julie, used video and projection in a similar way although to different effect), and Tom's presumed homosexuality much more clearly suggested than in the subtext of the play as written.

The play is memory. Being a memory play, it is dimly lighted, it is sentimental, it is not realistic. In memory everything seems to happen to music. That explains the fiddle in the wings.

Good set, lighting, acting (Harry Greenwood, Luke Mullins, Pamela Rabe, Rose Riley - all contriving to look of the period). It didn't quite catch fire but still, pretty darn fine.

"I don't suppose you remember me at all."

(w/ Ash)

Ryan Adams - 1989

Well I like both Ryan Adams and Taylor Swift, but - as this track by track cover album made me appreciate - for different reasons I guess. Adams is sincere here, translating Swift's songs into wistful alt-country troubadour vein, but unfortunately for the most part it doesn't really work - Swift is a quality songwriter but she writes for the 'pow' of her own style and without that delivery and production, affairs are a bit dull, even something of a downer. Exceptions: "Out of the Woods", "This Love", "I Know Places"; not sure why, but those are the three that have come to life for me a little in these first couple of listens.

Also, a good review: ... during a performance in Nashville, Adams, who had discussed his annoyance at being confused with the singer Bryan Adams, performed an elegant acoustic cover of that singer’s 1984 megahit “Summer of ’69.” He didn’t appear to be joking. Instead, he placed the song, as he does with Swift’s music, immediately within his own emotional register. It sounded like a Ryan Adams song. The audience, which in the light of day might be inclined to mock the vanilla middle-American soft rock of Bryan Adams, sang along. It knew all the words.

(1989, the original)

Scott Pilgrim vs the World

Michael Cera in the most non-George Michael Bluth of Michael Cera roles.*

Three of the most interesting youngish female actors going around at the time (film came out in 2010, six years ago): Brie Larson, Alison Pill, Anna Kendrick.

Smaller roles from Aubrey Plaza and Mae Whitman (aka Ann from Arrested Development).

An enjoyable turn from Kieran Culkin, who looks kind of like Tom Hiddleston to me.

Vegan powers!

Flash and sparkle, garage rock and everything pop, attitude and heart. Just right.

(last time; soundtrack)

* Edit for confusing syntax. This was meant to mean "the most Michael Cera role of all Michael Cera roles, apart from George Michael Bluth", and not "the Michael Cera role that is most unlike George Michael Bluth". Obviously.

X-Men: Days of Future Past

I've dipped in and out of the X-Men series, though it looks like I've managed to watch all of the first three (apparently without any of them having left a particularly strong positive impression) and I reckon I've seen most of First Class on tv along the way. So I've picked up enough for Days of Future Past's time-travelling bringing together of the two sets of X-men (younger/older: McAvoy/Stewart, Fassbender/McKellen) to make sense, but not been immersed enough for the emotional beats to hit fully home; still, this was good.

The Jungle Book

Quite the enjoyable romp. Rightly confident in its animal and jungle CGI, and pings along nicely story-wise too. Plus a top shelf voice cast - notably Bill Murray as Baloo, Christopher Walken as King Louie, Ben Kingsley as Bagheera (although I couldn't place it till the credits).

(w/ Rob and Laura)

Steve Carr - A Manual for Small Archives / others (CCP)

Three sets of works here but only Steve Carr's grabbed me. "Range" (bisected customised golf balls), "Smoke Bubble", "Watermelon" (a video ending with a satisfying bang):

(w/ trang)

Community season 6

Right on form, and if this is how it ends (as seems likely, that memetic "and a movie" notwithstanding) then it's on a good note, and one that feels like a proper ending, with many of the joys that the show has offered throughout its run, now coloured a maybe slightly darker hue by the passage of time. As an aside - it's impressive in these last couple of seasons how well the show survives the departure of some key cast members and integrates new ones.

(1-3 (again), 4 (again), 5)

"Miss Julie" (MTC)

I've learned to go for these 19th and early 20th century European playwrights in picking my subscriptions at the start of each year, because however loosely or closely adapted the stagings turn out to be, they often offer an experience that other art doesn't and which feels quintessentially of the theatre. In the case of "Miss Julie", the effect was hard to pin down - it has an impact, and drew me thoroughly in, yet at the same time felt elusive due to its frame of reference being somewhat floating, not clearly moored in milieu nor therefore perspective (the live video projections of the action being played out within the glass box of the kitchen set worked for me, though).

Also, it's interesting reading about Strindberg and this play in particular after the fact of seeing it (especially Alison Croggon's take), and comparing that against my own (uninformed at the time) experience - not being aware of the misogyny or the ways in which Kip Williams (also responsible for last year's great "Love and Information" and the all-female "Lord of the Flies" from a couple of years back) has reshaped it for this current staging.

(w/ Meribah - also, by coincidence, my theatre companion for both of those previous two Williams-directed plays!)