Never Let Me Go

Book written by Kazuo Ishiguro (2005) Film directed by Mark Romanek (2010) Ishiguro, Romanek, please let us go, you heartless bastards.  Not since Chris Lilley killed Pat Mullins (We Can Be Heroes: Finding the Australian of the Year of the Year, ABC TV, 2005)  have we at TVC been rendered sleepless by an afflicted fictional character. And we could laugh at Pat. Laugh at any of the characters in Ishiguro’s book or Romanek’s film of the book and you will go straight to hell. It is best perhaps to watch Romanek’s realisation before reading Ishiguro’s pitiless novel. The film transforms…

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A Picnic in the Folly – Step 1

June 5, 2015 | Posted by Lesley Jakobsen | Annabel Lee, AUSTRALIANIA, CRAFT, Crochet |

 Some day soon I shall have a picnic (with cakes and champagne) in the folly, deep within the TVC gardens.  First, practise the decoration…

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Cards Against Humanity – The Rolling Stones

November 7, 2014 | Posted by Peter Jakobsen | LIFE, Modern Music, MUSIC, Ulalume |

Tired?  Beat?  Beyond blue?  Why not Play Cards against Humanity?  It is pure evil and a great way to relax. Note that the rumoured hidden (ultra un-PC) answer card, said to be secreted in the lid of the box, only features in limited editions.  The standard answer cards are offensive enough! Adelaide is calming down after the Rolling Stones hit town.  They performed a very tight and exultant set at the Adelaide Oval (see: “The greatest game of football ever played”).  Not 24 hours later we had an electrical storm to rival that of Key Largo so I guess the…

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Picnic at Hanging Rock

(dir. Peter Weir) (1975)         St. Valentine’s Day, 1900.  The young ladies of Appleyard College are treated to a picnic at Hanging Rock, a volcanic pile in the heart of the Victorian countryside, near Mount Macedon.  There is twittering around the teacups, too much cake and Australian sunshine, and whilst the party are having an al fresco siesta, people go missing.  But while the film has aspects of a whodunit or a thriller, it cannot be categorised because it simply transcends classification.  As F.R Leavis said of Wuthering Heights, you can call this a sport. Totally magical,…

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Annabel Lee, Miranda & Stevie

Annabel Lee, Miranda, Stevie, and Lesley (image by Stephen Reid)

Greetings and a warm welcome to  Lesley’s blog,  the part of The Varnished Culture which is girly, crafty and sort of ethereal.  Our muses are Stevie Nicks, Joyce Carol Oates  and Lily Cole.  Our poem is “Annabel Lee”  –  a poem by Edgar Allen Poe – Stevie  does an otherwordly,

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