Archive

The Most Beautiful Man in the World

Posted 2:52pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Katie Hayes

Author: Jill Marshall Publisher: Penguin ( 4/5)     The blurb on the back of this book promised me a “pole dancer from Taranaki,” a beautiful man to be found “floating face-down in [a] Hollywood pool,” and “a tangled web of lies, sex and Read more...

Solar

Posted 2:52pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Kathy Young

Author: Ian McEwan Publisher: Jonathan Cape Rating: 3/5 Fans of Ian McEwan, prepare to be disappointed. Solar may be the closest McEwan has gotten to a rush job. Indeed, I was dismayed, and about halfway through I kept wondering if McEwan had actually written the book himself. Read more...

Eternal Life: A New Vision

Posted 2:50pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Deane Galbraith

Author: John Shelby Spong Publisher: HarperCollins (0/5) Bishop John Spong is Christianity’s version of the Dalai Lama: a purveyor of an earnestly inoffensive spirituality, which possesses all the substance and fibre of lukewarm parsnip juice. Spong dismisses fundamentalist Read more...

Thinking of Answers – Questions in the Philosophy of Everyday Life

Posted 2:49pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Jonathan Jong

Author: A. C. Grayling Publisher: Bloomsbury (4/5) I must admit to not being A. C. Grayling’s biggest fan: we’re in opposing camps on many issues. However, I do appreciate his role as a public intellectual, bringing philosophy (or critical thinking, if you prefer) to the Read more...

Dick Frizzell: Works on Paper

Posted 2:47pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Hana Aoake

Milford Gallery Until May 19 Dick Frizzell is a prominent and highly successful New Zealand artist, based in Hawke's Bay, whose notorious artistic appropriations have become ‘Kiwi’ pop-culture icons. His work is characterised as being incredibly adaptive from one style mode to Read more...

Preview: Alice in Cappingland

Posted 2:37pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Lady Kathryn Schrader

Directed by Thom Adams, Alex Wilson and Dianne Pulham Written and acted by an ensemble cast Teachers College Auditorium, Union St May 12-22, 7.30 pm $15 Student $20 public – onlineshop.ousa.org.nz The Capping Show, notorious for its painful puns and topical sketch comedy, as well as a Read more...

LTT Review: Shared Agendas Thursday 6-5-2010

Posted 2:36pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Jen Aitken

Co-ordinated by Ali East and Martyn Roberts (3/5) This performance was the fourteenth Shared Agendas event. Shared Agendas provides an annual forum for a cross-disciplinary, improvised exchange between musicians, dancers, actors, performers, and techies. James Reedy explains that the work Read more...

The Return of the Super Sharp Shooter

Posted 2:18pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Martyn Pepperell

In 2006, DJ Zinc (Government name: Benjamin Pettit), one of the true legends of jump-up jungle drum and bass, found himself heading towards a crossroads of sorts. “With drum and bass, around 2006, it became hard to find music that sounded cutting edge,” he says, speaking down the Read more...

The Chills (Live at the Empire)

Posted 2:17pm Sunday 11th July 2010 by Sarah Baillie

he recently reopened Empire tavern on Princes Street has “special memories” for Martin Phillips of The Chills, as it is one of the regular venues the band played at during the heyday of Flying Nun bands in Dunedin. The only remaining member of The Chills’ original line-up, Martin Read more...

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...

Play

Posted 4:23am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by Jen Aitken

Written by Samuel Beckett Directed by Benjamin Blakely Allen Hall Lunchtime Theatre March 4 and 5, 1pm A man, a wife, and his mistress individually reflect on their love triangle from the confines of three urns. They are interrogated in a never-ending cycle until they are shadows of Read more...

My Name is Rachel Corrie.

Posted 4:22am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by Jen Aitken

Directed by Stuart Young Starring Nadya Shaw Bennett Allen Hall Theatre March 3 – 6 at 7.30pm, Sunday March 7 at 4pm Taken from the writings of Rachel Corrie and edited by Alan Rickman and Katharine Viner, this piece of documentary theatre, directed by the head of the Theatre Studies Read more...

HOMEGROWN - February 20, 2010 Wellington

Posted 3:21am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by Tim Suggate

4/5 Glazed eyes, smiles, and high-fives all round. Midway through their bone-jarring set, Laughtan Kora stops and asks the Homegrown crowd, “How good it is to live in this beautiful country called Aotearoa?” And he’s right, our little nation in the middle of the South Read more...

Sacha Vee EP (Independent)

Posted 3:20am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by Dave Eley

4/5 Dutch/West Indian neo-soul artist Sacha Vee is a distinctive vocalist who is making waves in the New Zealand music scene. Alongside soulful collaborations with Pacific Heights, Oval Office, and P-Bass Expressway, she has been focusing on her own original sound. 2009 saw the release of her Read more...

The Brian Jonestown Massacre Who killed Sgt Pepper?( A Records)

Posted 3:19am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by James Barlien

4/5 Who killed Sgt. Pepper? by The Brian Jonestown Massacre is a breathtaking album, and despite what may have been said of Anton Newcombe in the past, he has undeniable talent.    The album is a step forward from their previous work, as shown by the opening track ‘Tempo Read more...

Various Artists Womad New Zealand: Sounds Of the Planet 2010 (Shock Records)

Posted 3:17am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by Phoebe Harrop

3/5 If WOMAD were a person, it would probably be a pot-smoking, prayer-chanting, bongo-playing hermaphrodite with knee-length dreads and no shoes. It’s no surprise, then, that this year’s WOMAD compilation is about as eclectic as it’s possible to be, encompassing all reaches Read more...

The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks

Posted 2:59am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by Henry Feltham

Publisher: Abacus Rating: 4.1/5 The Wasp Factory is the kind of book that publishers love. It's weird enough to be lumped into that bracket of ‘Modern Classics’, along with books like The Crying of Lot 49, Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow, and other oblique, semi-mysterious titles Read more...

The Death of a Mafia Don by Michele Giuttari (Translator: Howard Curtis)

Posted 2:55am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by Tien-Yi Toh

Publisher: Abacus Rating: 2/5   The Death of a Mafia Don centres on the investigation of a series of attacks and murders for which the Mafia appear to be responsible. As the investigation unravels, with every new lead or suspect, a corresponding Mafioso corpse is found. Despite the Read more...

An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar - Taryn Simon

Posted 2:52am Tuesday 18th May 2010 by Critic

American photographer Taryn Simon aims to reveal the guarded secrets that lie beneath the surface of American identity and the daily functioning of American life. This exhibition showcases a selection of photographs from Simon’s four-year project in which she plays detective, gaining access Read more...

Clash of the Titans - Directed by Louis Leterrier

Posted 3:02am Monday 10th May 2010 by Aleks Vuckovic

(1.5/5) In the spirit of the current Hollywood trend to only regurgitate remakes and superhero movies, we finally get a re-hash of the 1981 film Clash of the Titans. This version for the new decade fails to be anything more but a clichéd, unoriginal, and boringly predictable action Read more...

Cop Out - Directed by Kevin Smith

Posted 2:26am Monday 10th May 2010 by Elona Buckingham

(4/5)   Finally, a Kevin Smith film that’s not a tedious rom-com! Cop Out is an ‘80s-style buddy/cop film and succeeds at being an awesome one. It’s also his first film for which Smith has not written the script; I found this out post screening and am shocked that he Read more...

The Theory of Light and Matter - Andrew Porter

Posted 2:20am Monday 10th May 2010 by Anne Ford

Publisher: The Text Publishing Company (3.5/5)   Andrew Porter’s debut collection of short stories won the 2007 Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction in the United States. Written from different perspectives, including male and female, young and old, rural and urban, Read more...

The Group - Mary McCarthy

Posted 2:16am Monday 10th May 2010 by Kathy Young

Publisher: Hachette (4.5/5)   I’ve got to admit, first of all, to being a big Sex in the City fan. So, I was pleased to see Candace Bushnell’s introduction of this newly re-released version of a classic, dare I say, feminist novel first published in 1964. It spent two Read more...

Strangers in Death - J. D. Robb

Posted 2:15am Monday 10th May 2010 by Sue Hui Ong

Publisher: Piatkus (5/5)   Strangers in Death is the first book in a long time that has hooked me into reading it nonstop, compelling me to avoid other tasks just to satisfy my curiosity. I was intrigued to read my first futuristic crime novel (being an avid Poirot fan) and I was not Read more...

Science vs. Religion? Intelligent Design and the Problem of Evolution - Steve Fuller

Posted 2:06am Monday 10th May 2010 by Caitlyn O’Fallon

(1/5)   In light of Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss’ visits here, it seemed appropriate to critically evaluate some putatively rigorous work by dissenting voices. In Science vs. Religion? Fuller argues for “the centrality of intelligent design in motivating the scientific Read more...

Wayne Barrar - An Expanding Subterra

Posted 1:50am Monday 10th May 2010 by April Dell

Dunedin Public Art Gallery Until Sunday June 27 An Expanding Subterra is a photographic investigation into the private spaces of artificial underground worlds. This collection of works from Barrar’s seven-year international project presents a bizarre and unsettling subterranean existence Read more...