Archive

The Evolution of the Side-Scroller

Posted 2:12pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Damien Khalsa

Platforms: All Some of the very first role-playing and action games were side-scrollers – well, the first ones that weren't entirely text-based, at least. They became popular ith both game developers and gamers. The developers liked side-scrollers because they allowed them to Read more...

The Hedgehog

Posted 2:09pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Sarah Baillie

Directed by Mona Achache (4/5) The Hedgehog is an endearing film about the unlikely friendship which develops between three neighbours living in a luxury apartment building in Paris: Paloma, an 11-year-old girl; Renée, the concierge; and Mr. Ozu, an intriguing, friendly Japanese Read more...

A Single Man

Posted 2:08pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Kavi Chetty

Directed by Tom Ford (4.5/5) Tom Ford’s directorial debut A Single Man is, above all else, an aesthetic splendour. Based on the Christopher Isherwood novel of the same name, the story follows a day in the life of George Falconer (Colin Firth), a gay English professor, coping Read more...

Dear John

Posted 2:07pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Jane Adcroft

Directed by Lasse Halström (2.5 /5) Okay, confession time: I own The Notebook on DVD, I cry every time I watch A Walk to Remember, and I didn’t think Nights in Rodanthe was that bad. So when I heard that yet another Nicholas Sparks’ novel, Dear John, was being adapted for Read more...

Anything For Her

Posted 2:06pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Marissa Liu

Directed by Fred Cayaye (4.5/5) Anything For Her grips you from the very beginning. The film opens with a middle-aged man, Julien (Vincent Lindon), sitting in his car in the middle of the night, panting and covered in blood, staring panic-stricken at the back seat. The story then jumps Read more...

Press Pass: 40 Years of Award-Winning New Zealand Photography

Posted 1:54pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Georgie Fenwicke

By Geoff Dale Publisher: HarperCollins (3/5) At first glance, Press Pass appears to be a book that would reside comfortably on a coffee table. However, primary assumptions, as Elizabeth Bennet and George W. Bush can attest, oft deceive. Here instead is a book of substance and history Read more...

Message from an Unknown Chinese Mother: Stories of Loss and Love

Posted 1:52pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Anne Ford

by Xinran Publisher: Chatto and Windus. (4.5/5) In this beautiful and moving book, Xinran retells stories told to her by women in China when she worked as a radio journalist in the late 1980s and 1990s. This time is known by the Chinese government as the ‘Reform and Read more...

Simon Kaan, Anna Muirhead, Bryce Galloway (The Blue Oyster )

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Emily Palmer

Until May 15   The first of three works to be encountered in the Blue Oyster Gallery Space this month is Dunedin artist Simon Kaan’s The Asian. Kaan transforms the gallery into The Asian restaurant, complete with pictures on the wall, a television in the corner, and the Read more...

LTT Review: He said … She said … They said …

Posted 1:31pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Erica Newlands

Coordinated by Simon O’Connor, Jordan Watts, and Anna Wood Written by Jeff Heneberry, Angela Band, Anna Woods, Emily Butler Monroe, and Abby Howells Directed by Joanne Bond, Vickie Cross, Paul Rothwell, Abby Howells, and Jordan Watts Starring Maryse Ridler, Joanne Bond, Susanna Mangos, Alex Read more...

In-Compass: A play about NAvigaTION

Posted 1:30pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Jen Aitken

Directed by Erica Newlands Performed/Created by Rua McCallum, Nylla Ah-Kuoi, Jennifer Aitken, Emere Leitch-Munro, Lyndon Katene, Martyn Roberts, Clare Thomson, and Charlotte Walkens (4/5)     This play was part of Newland’s exploration of “the ways in which Read more...

Bleeding Through

Posted 1:09pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Walker McMurdo

Bleeding Through Rise Records (3/5) Bleeding Through’s brand new self-titled record combines the best aspects of tough-guy hardcore and polished, melodic heavy metal. Riffs vary beyond the traditional “chugga chug chug” fare, and guitar solos are well-timed and dynamic. Read more...

Groove Armada Black Light

Posted 1:07pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Simon Wallace

Cooking Vinyl (3/5) As impeccably-timed as much of their back catalogue, Groove Armada’s sixth full length, Black Light, sees the duo channeling mid-‘80s synth-pop reference points to make the inevitable ‘dark’ album. Currently operating sans-frontman, the Read more...

Splinter Cell Retrospective

Posted 12:56pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Damien Khalsa

Platforms: PC, PS2, PS3, Xbox, Xbox 360, Gc ith the recent release of Splinter Cell: Conviction, the newest addition to the Splinter Cell (SC) series, I would like to take a walk down memory lane with one of my favourite video game series. Though the first Splinter Cell was not Read more...

Crude

Posted 12:49pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Daniel Hunter

Directed by: Joe Berlinger (4/5) Latin America has a long history of being bent over the desk by the United States when it comes to resource exploitation. Crude offers the viewer a poignant yet stark account of this very act. For the most part, Crude is set in the beautiful Amazonian Read more...

Good Hair

Posted 12:47pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Max Segal

Directed By Jeff Stilson (4/5) Comedian Chris Rock explores conventional beauty and in particular the idea of Good Hair in this hilarious, compelling, and star-studded documentary. You have to give Rock and director Jeff Stilson credit for broaching the highly sensitive topic of how Read more...

The Missing Person

Posted 12:47pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Max Segal

Directed By Noah Buschel (4.5/5) In The Missing Person, writer and director Noah Buschel takes a nostalgic look at the classic film noir genre, but with a twist. This is a private-eye story playfully set in the present day. Private detective Rosow (Michael Shannon) wakes up in a Read more...

Top 5 Secondhand Bookstores in Dunedin

Posted 12:19pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Jonathan Jong

I can’t remember the last time I bought a book from a chain bookstore. With several online shopping options (check out goodbooksnz.co.nz: it’s often cheaper than Amazon, and proceeds go to Oxfam), and UBS so close, there seems to be little reason to leave campus for books. Besides, even Read more...

Blue Oyster Art Project Space

Posted 12:09pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by April Dell

Dunedin’s dynamic art scene owes much to the efforts of establishments like the Blue Oyster Art Project Space. Nestled in the basement of the Moray Chambers building, down a rather inconspicuous, dark, graffitied alleyway off Moray Place, you’ll find the Blue Oyster gallery. This modest, Read more...

Against the Tide: Back pain treatment – the breakthrough by Robin McKenzie

Posted 4:01am Wednesday 23rd June 2010 by Kathy Young

Publisher: Dunmore Publishing 3/5 My first introduction to the McKenzie Method was when I hurt my back and upper leg a year ago while running. I have had recurrent back pain for years, but serious training tipped it into an intolerable degree of pain. The physiotherapy clinic talked me Read more...

Martin Thompson - 5 New Works ( Brett McDowell Gallery )

Posted 3:56am Wednesday 23rd June 2010 by Critic

Hours of meticulous labour, complete concentration, and mathematical genius are the artistic virtues currently on display at the Brett McDowell Gallery. New Zealand artist Martin Thompson is showing his five newest works, which exhibit his fanatical obsession with systemised geometric drawing, his Read more...