A study of 22 James Bond films has found that the amount of violence depicted has doubled since the original Bond movie was released in 1962. The study’s authors have said the finding raises concerns but…
- Senior Lecturer, The University of Melbourne
Some trips get ruined by natural disasters, acts of terrorism, Tiger Airlines. For me, my first solo trip was ruined by Nickleback. Back in 2002 I visited The Continent. And wherever I went during that…
In one of the last scenes of The Master, cult leader Lancaster Dodd (Philip Seymour Hoffman) sings On a Slow Boat to China. The romantic connotations aside, the ordeal of so long a journey perfectly encapsulated…
I’m a stickler for immersing myself in local literature while in foreign lands. It goes without saying therefore, that while in London recently I soon sourced a copy of the Daily Mail. Buttressed by stories…
There’s a hilarious scene in Joe Meno’s novel Hairstyles of the Damned (2004) where the teenaged protagonist, Brian, tried to seduce a Catholic schoolgirl by playing REO Speedwagon. Hilarious just as much…
Among the many fascinating points made in Will Schwalbe’s The End of Your Life Book Club, was the tendency for readers to link together the books they read in a similar period. To identify parallel themes…
Whenever I use the term “literati”, I’m being facetious and describing a Melbourne writer’s culture that I find peculiar at best and laughably pretentious at worst. When I came across The End of Your Life…
Some of my best friends are dairy farmers. Okay, one is. Then there was that dodgy romp with a milker at her wedding. Country air brings out the worst in me. Anyhow. My friend, the dairy farmer, rang me…
I’ve never been a fan of the phrase “jumped the shark”. Not because I think it’s overused - although I definitely think it is - but I find the premise a bit stupid. In brief, it comes from the 1977 Happy…
My day started out happily with some accidental comedy. On the tram I saw a man who I thought was perhaps the most gorgeous I’d seen. I kept staring - curious, because I’m never attracted to strangers…
It’s not spoiling anything to reveal that the crux of Looper is that Little Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and Big Joe (Bruce Willis) meet: it’s a) the reason for Gordon-Levitt’s stupid facial prosthetics…
Saturday night, the credits rolled and my companion turned to me and said, “So what did you think?” My head still shaking in dismay, I replied, “It reminded me of the first film I made.” I then started…
Daily, my mum’s cousin devours Il Globo. Not for the articles - I’m not entirely sure she can read Italian - but for the death notices. And regularly, excitedly, she’ll call Mum with the “untimely” deaths…
As far as flavours of the month go, this is one I can delight in. One I can Turkish delight in. Boom boom. Waiting for Taken 2 to start and there was a preview for the new Bond film, Skyfall. Filmed in…
Mid 20s HR professional Catherine finds herself in the perfect relationship. Hunky Lee is gorgeous and devoted and protective. Apparently he’s everything a woman could want in a bloke. At least until he…
Courtney Cox shocked America in 1985 when she became the first person to say “period” on TV. Period, at least, in the context of menstruation and not punctuation. Flash forward a couple of decades and…
My favourite Freudian idea is omnipotence of thought. It explains everything from superstition to lucky charms to OCD and it’s what’s “new” about cash cows like The Secret. That our thoughts are powerful…
I’m relatively convinced that it’s comparison that’s at the root of all unhappiness. Comparisons wreck relationships and equally do they ruin pop culture. I’m voracious when it comes to films, to books…
Being a teetotaller, there wasn’t the option to brace myself for reading Laid Bare with something fortifying. So I did my equivalent and downed my Sisterhood Soundtrack: Pat doing We Belong, Kate with…
A few years ago I joined a book club. This ill-conceived lark lasted just the one episode but happily proffered a handful of anecdotes. My favourite was the ice-breaker. Having myself repeatedly assigned…
I don’t like people leaving my life. By ‘don’t like’ I mean hate. This situation is based on a variety of personality quirks, notably rampant sentimentality and a distaste for change. For a normal person…
One of my favourite picture books as a kid was The Jolly Postman (1986). Sparking a manic inquisitiveness that I’d later horn into a career, the book followed the route of - surprise, surprise - one very…
Some of my favourite films – Marnie and Elegy and Secretary and Mammoth and Happiness – each have single-word titles. Pretending however, that I went to see Vulgaria because I had hopes that it would reach…
It’s a pretty safe bet that if a film is going to include my favourite Frank Black song, involve an ill-fated love affair, run for under two hours and completely destroy my mascara, then I’m going to like…
As a woman, as a woman who menstruates, as a woman who menstruates and has written a book about menstruation, I’m easily sold that charity One Girl’s efforts to buy pads for girls in Sierra Leone is admirable…
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