Culture

  • A treat from Africa

    Sebe Valanga Khoza and Safika Larrikin Entertainment Reviewed by Norm Dixon Sebe is South African exile, now resident in Australia, Valanga Khoza's debut album. It showcases Khoza's lyrical traditional and contemporary African folk music.

  • Fairy floss with minimal saccharine

    Bye Bye Love Directed by Sam Weisman Starring Matthew Modine, Randy Quaid and Paul Reiser Reviewed by Barry Healy Bye Bye Love could be the Four Weddings and a Funeral of 1995 — a well-played comedy piece that mixes poignancy about

  • Book documents abuses on Bougainville

    Book documents abuses on BougainvilleSYDNEY — Sixty-five Bougainville solidarity activists gathered at the state parliament theatrette on May 1 for the launch of Human Rights Abuses Against the People of Bougainville

  • Doing battle with straw dolls

    The New Victorians: A Young Woman's Challenge to the Old Feminist Order By Rene Denfeld Allen & Unwin, 1995. 339 pp., $19.95 (pb) Reviewed by Carla Gorton Critiquing "establishment" feminism has become the recipe for guaranteeing

  • Funky tropicalismo

    Big Noise — the Mambo Inn compilation Various artists Hannibal/Rykodisc through Festival Reviewed by Norm Dixon One of the refreshing aspects of the world music craze has been its growing popularity among the more aware and open-minded

  • The last flight of Pan Am 103

    Lockerbie: The Maltese Double Cross Produced and directed by Allan Francovich The Cutting Edge, SBS TV, Tuesday, May 16, 8.30pm (8 in SA) Previewed by Peter Boyle On December 21, 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 blew up over the village of

  • How sweet the morning

    Before Sunrise Reviewed by Jane Schneider Before Sunrise is at best a charming love story exploring the bittersweet character-forming aspects of fly by night affairs. A couple meet on a train and spend an evening in Vienna together. What

  • Caribbean warmth in Birmingham

    Caribbean warmth in Birmingham Jamaica by Night Andy Hamilton World Circuit through Larrikin Entertainment Reviewed by Norm Dixon Hailing from Port Maria, a little fishing village on Jamaica's north coast, and a resident of industrial

  • Orton on stage in Melbourne

    Orton on stage in Melbourne The Ruffian on the Stair By Joe Orton Starring Dales Stevens, Alan King and Guy Phillips The Stage, 231 Smith St, Fitzroy, until May 20 Reviewed by Kelly Jean The subjects of Joe Orton's works were

  • Feared by the bad, loved by the good

    Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw By Stephen Knight Blackwell, 1994. 308 pp., $24.95 (pb) Reviewed by Phil Shannon The Robin Hood legend has been popular for around 600 years. Amongst the latest to revive the tradition, as

  • Dr Strangelove lives!

    Two unnervingly hawkish Pentagon documents prepared for the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, and acquired recently by Greenpeace under the Freedom of Information Act, positively seethe with gung ho enthusiasm for a nuclear brawl,

  • The uncensored Shelley

    Shelley: The Pursuit By Richard Holmes Harper Collins, 1995. 830 pp., $49.95 (hb) Reviewed by Phil Shannon In 1819, Percy Bysshe Shelley was collecting his mail from England at a post office in Rome. When his name was called out, a