2016

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Aug132016

CINEMA Bourne again, but still lost: Jason Bourne

MUSIC CINEMA & BOOKSAugust 13, 2016

Jason Bourne is the latest chapter in the series of acclaimed spy thrillers that began with 2002’s The Bourne Identity. In the first film we were introduced to Jason Bourne (Matt Damon), fished out of the Mediterranean with bullets in his back and no memory of who he was, but with an extraordinary – and deadly – set of skills. These skills come in handy as he and those he’s with are targeted by ruthless killers and government agencies. In due course he discovers he was part of Treadstone – an experimental CIA black-ops program to create elite, and untraceable,…

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Aug132016

MUSIC Davis biopic sadly miles off the mark

MUSIC CINEMA & BOOKSAugust 13, 2016

Miles Ahead, the recently released film based on the life of Miles Davis, was very far from a filmic success. But it suggested some interesting questions. The film concentrated heavily on the troubled relationship between Miles and his wife Frances, his infidelities, his drug habit and the chaos of his life. Don Cheadle as Miles Davis in the film Miles Ahead. So here are the questions. First, how many African-Americans males have trouble with their relationships, a drug habit and a chaotic, uncontrolled life? Answer: many, probably numbering in the millions. Second question. How many African-American males played the trumpet…

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Jul302016

BOOK REVIEW A significant first novel

MUSIC CINEMA & BOOKS, UncategorizedJuly 30, 2016

A DISTANT PROSPECT by Annette Young Distant Prospect Publishing, Lorn, NSW491 pagesPrice: paperback $US19.95; hardback $US36.95Available at Amazon and at www.adistantprospect.com Reviewed by John Young This is a fascinating novel, set in Sydney in the 1920s. The central character, Lucy Straughan, is a teenage girl partly crippled as a result of polio. She and her father are Irish, and had moved to Australia some years earlier, after the tragic death of Lucy’s mother. When Lucy begins attending a Catholic school at Strathfield she at first finds it hard to fit in, and is subjected to teasing and bullying from certain…

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Jul302016

CINEMA No man on the mean roads of the Outback: Goldstone

MUSIC CINEMA & BOOKSJuly 30, 2016

The detective as knight-errant is a key character in the modern imagination. He enters into the story to solve the mystery and thus restore order. Aaron Pedersen as Jay Swan. Such stories are tragedies told backwards, for the protagonist is not the detective but the victim, as the great Ross MacDonald, author of the Lew Archer stories, argued. The detective acts as a sort of a Greek chorus, one who in discovering the truth, reveals it to the audience. But the detective is not just the discoverer – he is also the avenger, the agent of Nemesis, who enacts…

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