Australian films accounted for just 1.3% of the country’s gross movie revenues last year, even as the total Australian box office take rose 5%, sparking fears that the local film industry is in serious danger of collapse. “The highest-grossing Australian film was the Paul Hogan-Michael Caton comedy Strange Bedfellows which took $4.8million and the critically acclaimed drama Somersault with $2million. In comparison, Shrek 2 took $50million. American films were even more dominant than in the previous year, taking $780million or more than 85 per cent of box office.”
Tag: 01.28.05
Activists Call For Eastwood Spoiler
The film critics’ code of never revealing surprise twists of a movie is coming under fire this week as disabled-rights activists launch a nationwide push for critics to condemn what they describe as the horrifying ending of Clint Eastwood’s latest film. Million Dollar Baby has won accolades from many of the critics now being targeted, but none have yet revealed the controversial fate which befalls lead actress Hilary Swank’s character at the film’s conclusion.
Still Clapping After All These Years
Steve Reich turns 70 next year, and as the music world gears up to celebrate the ever-changing, never-at-rest composer, the man himself shows no sign of realizing that he’s supposed to be in the twilight of his multifaceted career. “His ideas emerge in a swift current of words, formed by the crisscrossings of different streams of thought – not unlike his music, in which ideas are introduced, examined, juxtaposed, pursued, rediscovered.”
Casting Stones
The UK’s National Trust is lashing out at the government for what it says is “an ominous silence” surrounding the Trust’s plan to preserve Stonehenge by diverting auto traffic away from the historic site. The government has been considering such proposals for half a century, and the Trust fears that what appeared to be an impending agreement has been moved to the back burner yet again.
More Space? How About More Art?
Certainly, the Tate Modern has earned the right to expand its gallery space with five years of tremendous success as London’s hottest contemporary art museum. But will there really be enough art to fill all that additional space? “Of immediate and growing concern is the oft-repeated criticism that Tate Modern’s collection looks thin and impoverished compared with the scale and grandeur of its monolithic home, [and the museum’s director] has in the past lamented the virtual non-existence of an acquisitions budget for the institution.”
The Passion Of The Bach – Well, Some Of It, Anyway
Next month, conductor Roger Norrington will stage a recreation of Felix Mendelssohn’s famous 1829 performance of Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion, which many scholars consider to have been the catalyst for the widespread 19th-century revival of Bach’s music. But fans of the famous choral work may be shocked by what they hear: “Huge numbers of the meditative arias and chorales have gone. The story line is there, but I suppose [Mendelssohn] thought people just couldn’t handle four hours, three-and-a-half hours, or whatever it is.”
Dame Helen Of Poetry
Helen Vendler has been one of the most prominent poetry critics over the past 40 years. “Whole sectors of the poetry world have complained about the limits of her sensibility. She doesn’t like experimentation, one complaint goes. Her attitude toward poetry is too academic, says another. At the same time, somewhat paradoxically, literary scholars often consider Ms. Vendler far out of touch with their profession. Her approach is, so to speak, rigorously untheoretical: A poem speaks to her, or it doesn’t, and the critical essay is Ms. Vendler’s preferred medium of reply.”