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Arts

Film  |  Theatre  |  Art  |  Opera  |  Music  |  Television  |  Festivals

Welcome to ABR Arts, home to some of Australia's best arts journalism. We review film, theatre, opera, music, television, art exhibitions – and more. Reviews remain open for one week before being paywalled.

Sign up to ABR Arts and receive longform arts criticism to your inbox every fortnight on Tuesdays. And if you are interested in writing for ABR Arts, tell us about your passions and your expertise.

 

Recent reviews

Gilgamesh 

Opera Australia and Sydney Chamber Opera
by •
30 September 2024
Mitchell Riley as Enkidu and Jeremy Kleeman as Gilgamesh (photograph by Daniel Boud)
These are the opening lines of what has been described as the ‘first great work of literature’, created more than four thousand years ago in Mesopotamia – modern-day Iraq. The origins of the epic poem Gilgamesh are unclear. It was written in Akkadian cuneiform on clay tablets, and found in the ruins of the library of the Assyrian King Ashurbanipal (c.650 BCE); the literary style suggests an oral origin sung by bards before being transcribed. ... (read more)

Bad Boy 

fortyfivedownstairs
by •
30 September 2024
Nicci Wilks as Will (photograph by George Jefford)
Bad Boy is the second work in a series of what playwright Patricia Cornelius and director Susie Dee have called ‘visceral dramatic monologues’. The first, RUNT (2021), centred on the unnamed homunculus of the play’s title, portrayed with memorable physical intensity and dexterity by Nicci Wilks. ... (read more)

The Critic 

Transmission Films
by •
30 September 2024
'The Critic: Fear and loathing at the cinema' by Barnaby Smith

The Critic begins with a voice-over in Ian McKellen’s gravelly yet sonorous tones. After defining the term ‘critic’ (‘judge’, according to its Latin and Greek etymology), he declares, ‘The drama critic is feared and reviled for the judgement he must bring, but the truth is imperative, the critic must be cold and perfectly alone. Only the greats are remembered.’

... (read more)

Confidenza (★★★★★), Parthenope (★★) and Comandante (★★★★★)

Italian Film Festival
by •
26 September 2024
Parthenope (courtesy of St. Ali Italian Film Festival)
Confidenza, Daniele Luchetti’s latest film, adapted from Domenico Starnone’s novel (2019), was translated as ‘trust’ for this year’s Italian Film Festival, which features an exceptional line-up. ... (read more)

The Conversation

by •
20 September 2024
Gene Hackman in The Conversation (courtesy of Palace Films)
In the opening shot of Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation – one of the great opening shots in cinema – a slow, telescopic zoom scans the lunchtime crowd on a sunny day in San Francisco’s Union Square. As if by accident, the camera settles on Harry Caul (Gene Hackman), a middle-aged man in a grey raincoat whom we may not have even noticed if it weren’t for a busking mime sidling over and beginning to mimic his movements. ... (read more)

Oscar 

The Australian Ballet
by •
16 September 2024
Callum Linnane as Oscar (photograph by Simon Eeles)
Arriving at the Oscar première on 13 September felt like attending an Oscars ceremony. The foyers of Melbourne’s historic Regent Theatre were filled with artists, journalists, photographers, politicians, dauntingly tall drag queens, and streams of gay couples who may have been first-timers at the ballet. ... (read more)

The Substance 

Madman Entertainment
by •
16 September 2024
Demi Moore as Elisabeth (courtesy of Madman Entertainment)
Here is news: the screen industry treats women like garbage. This insight, such as it is, powers writer-director Coralie Fargeat’s second feature film, The Substance, which is set in an unnamed city that is clearly a version of Los Angeles, at an unnamed time that bears resemblance to the 1980s. ... (read more)

Hamlet 

Melbourne Shakespeare Company
by •
09 September 2024
‘Hamlet: Melbourne Shakespeare Company’s shadowy and romantic Hamlet’ by Diane Stubbings

Watching the denouement of Melbourne Shakespeare Company’s Hamlet, I was reminded of David Edgar’s 1980 stage adaptation of Charles Dickens’s The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby. Ensconced within the travelling theatrical company of Mr Vincent Crummles, Nicholas and his hapless companion Smike are cast in a production of Romeo and Juliet, Smike as the apothecary and Nicholas (of course) as Romeo.

... (read more)

Così Fan Tutte 

State Opera of South Australia
by •
06 September 2024
Sky Ingram as Fiordiligi (photograph by Andrew Beveridge)
Così Fan Tutte – the third and last of Mozart and Lorenzo da Ponte’s collaborations – followed Le nozze di Figaro (Vienna, 1786) and Don Giovanni (Prague, 1787). This was a time of increased penury and loss for Wolfgang and Constanze (two children died during the writing of writing Così) but also one of almost unfathomable creativity for Mozart, who wrote his three last symphonies within a matter of weeks. ... (read more)

Last Summer 

Potential Films
by •
02 September 2024
Léa Drucker as Anne and Olivier Rabourdin as Pierre (courtesy of Potential Films)

Catherine Breillat’s Last Summer is a remake of a 2019 Danish film called Queen of Hearts, May el-Toukhy’s feature about a woman who embarks on a sexual relationship with her teenage stepson. This adaptation follows the original closely, down to specific scenes and lines of dialogue. 

... (read more)
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