Broken Bells (self titled)

Weird weird Weird!! One of the most bizarre music couplings ever would have to be that of Broken Bells - Danger Mouse and James Mercer of The Shins. I really had no idea what to expect when this puppy came sliding through my letterbox.

Somehow though, this seemingly mismatched pair work. With a style that they describe as "melodic, but experimental too" (thanks Wikipedia) they manage to bring a fresh sound to the airwaves.

A little bit of synth, a little bit of trumpet, some strings, some beats and yes... melody. You don't have to be an old, grumpy man with his brown pants pulled up to his saggy nipples waving a stick at some damned nuisance kids to know that the art of the melody has all but vanished from a lot of music these days. Broken Bells have a huge melodic focus and I for one am more than a little grateful.

The first single and first track on the disc is The High Road which, after a somewhat schizophrenic keyboard introduction settles into a good catchy road-trippy song with Vaporize picking up the pace a little but allowing the vocalist a little more room to strut his stuff.

The Ghost Inside is one of my picks from the album being catchy, having a little wail in the vocals and showing up the playful (dare I say whimsical) nature of their mix of instruments. Sailing to Nowhere is similar, if a little more laid back in it's tempo and relegating any guitar work to the back of the track. This is a pretty relaxed and chilled out album with plenty to offer the listener. Trap Doors is a little more heavy on the vocals but still manages to retain their unique style and strong melody.

In many ways the album has a very retro feel to it, but it's also looking forward as it messes around with mixes and instruments and ultimately creates something surprising, entertaining and a good kind of different. It's not a sound you will have heard much of before and it's one I could listen to a lot more of. This has the potential to become one of my favourite albums of the year.


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4 repaired bells

That Face

Opening night, opening night! Call me what you may, there really is nothing like an opening night. The glitz. The glamour. My mother! Yes, after many months, maybe years of nagging I gave in and invited dear old mum to the theatre.

We were attending That Face, the newest Silo Theatre production on at the Herald Theatre. Mum was excited. I was... well I was going! Isn't that enough?!

It turns out that That Face is about a fractured family set to implode at any second. (Yes. Mum was a bold choice of plus one, had I done my choosing knowingly!) The cause for the fractures is Martha, our matriarch and drunken schizophrenic egotist played gloriously by Jennifer Ward-Lealand. Think Patsy Stone... gone wrong!

Martha's drinking has lead to divorce from now absentee-dad Hugh (Andrew Grainger) and a serious rebellious streak in children Mia (Chelsie Preston Crayford) who is on the verge of expulsion after a hazing goes wrong, and Henry (Dan Weekes) who has dropped out of school to become an artist under his mother's expert tutelage.

Also in the cast are Edith Poor as Alice and the divine Rose McIver as Izzy - troublesome schoolmate to Mia and lover to Henry. (You may recognise Rose from her excellent performance as Lindsey in The Lovely Bones)

The first thing I want to highlight is the excellent standard of performance from all of the actors. Ward-Lealand is absolutely amazing as our flawed mummy dearest with intense and sensitive turns from Weekes and Preston Crayford as the two wrecked children. Grainger drips with ex-patriotism flying in from Hong Kong to buy/save the day. And Rose McIver... Well biased though I am, she just shines with charisma and adds a wicked side to the play.

Excellent performances are aided by an excellent script from then-19 year old Polly Stenham whose age must surely have lead to the realistic "voices" that the teenage characters have. She writes adults with a surprising maturity and it's no wonder the script earned not only accolades but praise.

The whole package comes with interesting lighting and staging as well and has been brought together by director Shane Bosher.

The play is raw and intense; a glimpse into a world where alcohol and money can both cause and solve problems. While providing some entertainment, expect to appreciate this rather than to enjoy it - things can get that way when you strip down the human condition and lay it bare. There is some foul language and plenty of foul characters.

Personally I go to the theatre to experience new ideas and have my emotional and mental boundaries pushed. Mum doesn't, but though she'd never admit it, she had tears in her eyes afterwards.

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4 empty pizza boxes

From Here to There

Mummy I want to be a ballerina when I grow up! As promised in my Mao's Last Dancer review, I have now attended the ballet.

From Here to There is the first season in the 2010 calendar of the Royal New Zealand Ballet. A collection of three short works with two intermissions, the performance might well be considered a beginners class to ballet - not a bad place for a novice like myself to start.

I surprised myself (I often do) with how quickly I was able to start analysing the performances of the dancers and the company as a whole. While I suppose I am lucky enough to have seen a number of performances of varying types so I at least have a point of reference to start from, those who know me well will attest to the fact that it does not often take long for the critic within me to surface.

I was also surprised (though not by myself) at how much I enjoyed my night. There were some ensemble issues at times and a few wobbly moments from a number of individuals, but overall I was entertained and enthralled.

Being the virginal ballet attendee that I am, I have chosen to group each segment of the concert by the music that accompanied it and also to refer to them as acts. Both decisions I have made are probably incorrect. If you are greatly offended I offer the following remedy: please write to me with your name & address, and I will send you a $5 Telecom phone card so that you can call somebody who cares.

The first act was set to music from Francis Poulenc which, for some reason, reminded me of a fairytale. I believe in conversation during intermission I likened the act to being a little like Benjamin Britten's A Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra - it's a little bit quirky, but demonstrates a number of different elements of the medium, ballet in this case. The costumes, stage and lighting are sparse and subtle with clever use of curtains drifting across the stage allowing dancers to appear from nowhere.

The second act is sublime. Choreographed by New Zealander Andrew Simmons and set to the haunting music of Philip Glass - dance and score become one. It is a perfect melding of music and dancer. The audience held our collective breaths as the piece played itself out in front of our eyes, brilliantly staged and lit so that shadows danced on the walls as dancers twirled centre stage. It is this act that will sell you on the concept of ballet. Judging from the vocal and prolonged applause others felt the same way.

There was an audible gasp from the audience as the curtain rose on act three revealing a solitary dancer dressed in what I'm going to call Carmen Red in the centre of a walled in stage of Bright Star Purple. The act was set to Bach's well known Concerto 1 in D minor and beautiful and fluid demonstrating well the elegance and poise of the dancers, but the true highlight had come and gone in act two.

If you're anything like me (which I hope for your sake you're not) then reading the programme is like looking at the inside of the lid of a box of chocolates, scanning your eyes and fingers over the list of dancers and picking out the one you want for yourself. I'm terrible - I do it at most plays and operas too.

But it isn't only the ridiculously crafted bodies that you should go along for. Ballet really is an art form full of emotion, grace and poise. I am now sold - the ballet can tell stories, can move and affect you. Have a look at The Edge website and you'll see how this evening's entertainment is actually far more affordable than you might have thought.

I for one will be pinching my pennies to try my hand at a full ballet later on this year either with Carmen (with the same music as Bizet's divine opera) or Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker.

Take a chance. You might surprise yourself.

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4 incredibly sexy dancers

PS You'll have all noticed how incredibly restrained I've been when it comes to the subject of the dancers themselves. So that the record is clear - I want one. Who wouldn't?! A bendy ballet boy or girl of your very own...? You know you would.

The Men Who Stare At Goats

Funny thing about George Clooney, he's never really done a "commercial" film outside of the Ocean's trilogy. Sure there was his ill-fated turn Batman, but even that was a bit of a risk given the unpopular post-Burton renormalisation the franchise was going through. For the most part he picks interesting, dare I say, arthouse films. Take for example Good Night, and Good Luck; Michael Clayton; Up in the Air; Syriana and anything with the Cohen Brothers. Yet somehow the man is a true A-List celebrity.

How does he do it? Well obviously unfading good looks help. He's self-deprecating, a little charming and seems like the kind of guy you could have a beer with or a tumble in the sheets with (depending on your preference). He's also a pretty good actor as it turns out.

The Men Who Stare at Goats is a pretty good film, but it's an excellent example of how Clooney can carry something on his own.

The film itself is a little like a Wes Anderson start-up project. By that I mean it's a little nutty, bit crazy, a touch mad, and partly doo-lally, but it's also laced with wry humour both in the dialogue and in the background. It's a little undercooked however almost like the first film from an excellent director who has yet to completely find his own style and rhythm (yes the metaphor comes full circle).

It's all a little confused and not helped by Ewan McGregor and his oft-criticised American accent, however the film has a charm of it's own and there are enough funny moments to keep you occupied looking (and hoping) for more.

Clooney and Jeff Bridges make the film. Their performances are both subtle and slapstick at the same time and they are a delight to watch. Kevin Spacey is alright if a little overblown for a film of this kind.

Don't go in expecting the second coming, but prepared to enjoy a quirky psychedelic ride man.

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3 daisy chains

Law Abiding Citizen

DISCLAIMER: You'd be hard pressed to find two actors I dislike more than Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler.

That being said, I went along to Law Abiding Citizen with a quiet excitement. I know a few people who saw this back in November and the buzz was quite good.

What a lot of rot!

I have a feeling that this may be the worst film I've seen in around 12 months. The acting was terrible, the supposedly thought provoking premise was an obvious truism and the characters all unlikeable.

The idea is that Gerard Butler is a man wronged by the wheelings and dealings of the legal system - personally I don't think justice was too far off the mark. He spends the next 10 years concocting his revenge - a plan that will make those responsible for his injustice both learn and pay. The target? The judge, smooth talking attorney Jamie Foxx, the criminals directly responsible and anyone else even remotely involved. They are to pay in blood. (cue dramatic music)

It is a cunning plan. Blackaddian almost. One which we're lead to believe has been conceived and executed by one of the smartest men in espionage. PROBLEM. How does one of the smartest, most forward thinking men on the planet, then meet the end that this film forces upon him? Let's face facts... he doesn't. It's just an example of a poorly constructed plot which needed a quick conclusion.

I'm at a loss to continue. What more can I say? There was one solitary moment of originality - a cell-phone bomb that was both surprising and really quite cool.

I believe the R18 rating this film received was a bit harsh, but in any case I struggle to see who above or below 18 years of age would really enjoy this film.

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1 two-hour block of my life I'll never get back.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Today after weeks of waiting, I went to watch The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. A friend of mine at work loves the book and heaps of people had told me the film was awesome. Despite it being rather early in the day and my being jet-lagged up to the eyeballs, I was excited.

In this instance though, I'm afraid I have to march against the crowd. It left me cold. It just didn't do it for me at all.

To me, this is what a Scooby Doo episode would be if it were R-rated and in Sweedish. Far from the complex, twisty-turny tale of intrigue, betrayal and suspicion, the story was less captivating than a jar of mayonnaise.

Yes there were some quite graphic rape scenes, but having seen Antichrist and Shortbus I feel I was pretty well prepared and when considered in that company, they were pretty tame.

The characters weren't particularly well rounded and I really couldn't see why relationships played out the way that they did.

For some reason, the subtitles really bugged me this time. I've seen hundreds of foreign language films in everything from German to Spanish, French to Elvish, but for some reason I found fault with it in this case. Perhaps simply because I didn't find the film remarkable and could just have easily have watched a identically mediocre English film of the same genre.

Oh... and they made very little mention of the dragon tattoo. It seemed to have very little significance when it came to either the girl or the plot.

Having gone in expecting to enjoy the film and intending to read the second and third books in the series, I left flat and almost desperate enough to go out and buy a new vampire book.

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2 unmet expectations

Mao's Last Dancer

God help me I do love a good premiere. Don't judge. I like a little excitement, glitz and glamour. Sue me!

So, quite happily, I gave up the chance to see Shutter Island and toddle along to the premiere with a friend. A few stars, a few drinks, I was helpless really. (as a side note I'm desperate to see Shutter pretty soon though. Am hearing great things)

Mao's Last Dancer is a very special film. The story of a young boy growing up in Mao's China, plucked from his family at a young age to train in a national ballet school. After years in this oppressive, if eventually rewarding environment, he is discovered by a touring American ballet director and invited to visit the US as a guest dancer at the Houston Ballet.

It's a very simple story and, truth be told, a very simple film; one that sticks to the basics and has no aspirations of being grander than it is. As a result, it's incredibly powerful and moving. I know that both myself and my charming plus one had pools in our eyes during the gorgeous emotional climax.

I must confess that though a fan of the opera, classical music, the theatre, poetry... (basically anything considered upper-class and wanky) I have never really "gotten" ballet. That changed with this film. The beauty, elegance, strength, control and passion of the art shone through and I'm hoping to be able to attend a ballet-proper later this year.

The performances from Chi Cao as the grown up Li Cunxin and Bruce Greenwood as Ben Stevenson were excellent and true and both were superb casting choices.

This is not a film that will break box office records, but it is a film worthy of its ticket price and richly rewarding for those who attend.

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4 1/2 demi-pliés