Wentworth – TV Review

A soap opera set in a woman’s prison… what could be better? I’m a bit young for the original Prisoner: Cell Block H which ran from 1979 to 1986 (though I’ve seen some best moments from it), so when it was essentially rebooted as Wentworth a few years ago, I was ready to get on board. So good, so ridiculous, the corruption, the violence, the very stupid decisions. There have been several storylines which have made me angry (not least the whole ‘man abuses woman, women eventually ends up in a relationship with said man’ which is appalling and should never be used), but most are your stock standard soap fare. It was good when eventually some indigenous characters were introduced to the main cast (especially when the wonderful Leah Purcell joined the cast), though the cast remains very caucasian-heavy. I felt like Season 7 was starting to drag a bit, but it definitely kicked back into life Season 8. Though the closing image of the season shows that we are about to drop back into the utterly insane in Season 9.

Lantana (2001) Film Review

Based on the play Speaking in Tongues by Andrew Bovell, Lantana is a relationship film that shows a series of couples going through difficulties. To go into more detail would take a lot away from the gradual unwinding of the stories.

The film won a lot of awards at the time, and it’s really not hard to see why. The script is tight in the way of many films based on good plays. The cast of the film is extremely strong – although that’s not hard to tell with these names: Geoffrey Rush, Anthony LaPaglia, Kerry Armstrong and Barbara Hershey. The story unwinds in small grabs and throughout, my mind was twisting and turning, trying to figure out what had happened, or what was happening. It is truly a fabulous film.