Author Archive: Guest Reviewer
The National Gallery, London
Photo by Rudolph Schuba
192 years ago today, the National Gallery opened its doors to a public hungry for culture. Over the 2 centuries since, it has amassed a hoard of art to savour. The Brits were imperialists all right, but the National’s collection developed more by osmosis than through seizure of art hoards via conquest (compare and contrast, arguably, the case of the Elgin Marbles). They started back in the pack compared to the Louvre and the Hermitage but made up for it coming down the straight. For a small example, if you want to see these in the flesh… …
Continue Reading →The Dead Pool
The Dead Pool (by the Dead Sea) (photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/government_press_office/6339649891/)
DISCLAIMERS TVC Dead Pool does not nominate celebrities we necessarily want dead. Nominations do not reflect any actual knowledge, nor do they represent imputations upon a nominee’s lifestyle, health, or associates. TVC Dead Pool © is designed as a parlour game only, and no distress, inconvenience or dread is intended. TVC declares that its past Dead Pool performance has attained 87% correct outcome. But there’s only a 50% chance that is correct. Please post comments below, and remember to speak well of the possibly soon=dead… By the way, what’s going on? We’ve famous musicians dropping like flies! Bowie, Cohen,…
Continue Reading →O, Donna!
We at TVC are prone to elegiac reveries from time to time, against which we struggle man-and-womanfully. But we here, assessing Donna Tartt, must raise a flag of salutary concern about what appears to be the author’s not-so gentle decline. Exhibit “A” – The Secret History Look, it’s a tad superficial, a smidge orotund, and so rich in faux classicism that one clutches the stomach, but this is arguably a wonderfully entertaining and evocative novel, rich, romanticist and vivid. But its also a pudding full of cliches and second hand tropes, which may be why no film-maker has ever managed to re-heat…
Continue Reading →Machu Picchu
"I swear too much" (Lisa McCune as Gabby)
(Dir. Geordie Brookman) (SA State Theatre Company, 16 April 2016) (written by Sue Smith) By Guest Reviewer Emma Machu Picchu, a destination dreamt about at Uni and never realised. Two young architects, who are madly in love with each other and the possibilities of life ahead, see their dream shattered and their love tested. The play starts with the couple projected about 25 years forward. Conversing while driving home from a health retreat, they reveal the complacency & irritation that comes with time spent together, the competing directions of their architectural interests, and the stresses of life. The romantic beginning and…
Continue Reading →Rams (dir. Grímur Hákonarson)
This is a review by our perceptive guest reviewer Melanie. Thank you Melanie! Bleak but beautiful, amusing yet gut wrenching, this simple tale of running sheep on the harsh and barren rocky highlands of Iceland is a deeply moving experience. Two brothers, both sheep farmers on the same land but with one brother in the family farm house and the other next door – haven’t spoken for 40 years. But their competitiveness gives way to compassion when a disaster forces them together. It’s slow and atmospheric but that just adds to the beauty of the piece. It’s hard to identify…
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