YOUR NATIONAL CULTURE GUIDE Matt Johnson returns with the … · 2018. 10. 29. · Li, Dolph...
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14 THE AUSTRALIAN, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 2018 theaustralian.com.au/arts ARTS AUSE01Z01MA - V1 Johnson: that impassioned bari- tone, those chiselled looks the so- cial conscience he poured into lyrics that railed against war mon- gering, inequality and greed. “This is the day your life will surely change,” he intoned on the band’s 1983 debut, Soul Mining, a classic that paved the way for a sound as much rock and blues as post-punk. Today, sitting in a vast living space colonised by books, boxes and recording gear, blinds closed to tone down the furnace outside, he says life hasn’t changed — at least not on a global level. Wars are still being waged. The underprivileged are still being abused. Now there’s climate change: “It amazes me how many people are going about oblivious to what is unfolding around them.” He gestures towards a shuttered window. “People need to put down their phones and galvanise.” “Put down your phones” is a directive he issues from the stage, during a set of 24 songs cherry- picked from albums including the righteously angry Mind Bomb, re- leased in 1989, the same year the The toured Australia, wowing crowds, being drunk and silly on late-night chat shows. “We want an old-school audience,” says Johnson, an intense yet amiable father of two. “I want to see peo- ple’s faces, not a load of screens. For any performer, that connec- tion with the audience is oxygen.” Johnson threw his all into re- inforcing the sincerity of lyrics such as “Let the bums count their blessings while the rich count the money” from the political single Heartland, which was slapped with logue; 2000’s acclaimed NakedSelf — kept coming. For a long while he felt stuck. Not for nothing is last year’s documentary about John- son titled The Inertia Variations, after a work by English poet John Tottenham. Johnson read the poem from the Royal Albert Hall stage: “You would think by now people would know better than to ask me what I have been doing with my time / And you would think by now I would have come up with any answer that would silence them.” A new authorised biography details the emptiness that wal- loped him once he had finished pouring himself into recording sessions, after travelling the world to make authentic, soul-baring art for his fans. He tells me how he had sat at home watching a tele- vision screening of Infected, the feature-length film he had spent three years creating, issuing it alongside the eponymous album. He waited for the phone to ring. It didn’t. “Eventually I understood that the joy comes in the creation,” he says with a shrug. “So going forward to 2018 and being in this band … I’m older. We’re having a laugh. I’m enjoy- ing the moment.” Johnson only ever wanted to work in music. The third of four sons born to publicans in Strat- ford, east London, his earliest mu- sical memories include the Beatles wallpaper in his shared bedroom and muffled sounds of bands play- ing in the pub — The Two Pud- dings — below. Not just any bands; The Two Puddings was one of the best live music venues in the East End and Johnson’s Uncle Kenny was one of London’s top live music promoters. “The Small Faces, the Kinks, before they were famous … We could hear them if we sat on the stairs. When I was 12 I learned to play boogie woogie on the pub’s old Joanna” — Cockney rhyming slang, he adds with a twinkle, for upright piano — “then picked up a guitar at 14 and formed my first band.” Aged 15 he left school, which he hardly went to anyway, and got a job in a recording studio in edgy, characterful Soho. Aged 17 he put an ad in the hallowed New Musical Express, a shout-out for musicians influenced by the Residents, Syd Barrett, Throbbing Gristle and Velvet Underground. The The began as an electronic duo: “I paid my dues playing various venues and kept songwriting; my father was a big influence in my self-edu- cation. He was very well read. Sar- tre. Trotsky. Graham Greene. George Orwell was his favourite.” He leaps up and fetches a book titled Tales from The Two Pud- dings, filled with stories and pho- tos of uncles and aunts and immediate family including his elder brother Andrew, whose death in 2016 prompted Johnson to revive the The; and his father Eddie, who died earlier this year, aged 86, just as the band was about to play Stockholm. “Dad would have wanted me to continue,” says Johnson, whose new song about death, We Can’t Stop What’s Com- ing, took on added poignancy; it will feature on a new studio album due for release next year. Having returned, Johnson’s muse is staying faithful. He has set up a record label, broadcasts on his own Radio Cineola, has a publish- ing company called 51st State Press and has channelled his flair for mixed-media into a series of lovingly crafted CD/book releas- es. A boxed set features the film Tony by his younger brother Ger- ard, for which Johnson did the soundtrack; and Moonbug, a doc- umentary on the Apollo astro- nauts with music by the The. I ask who buys them and he flashes a grin. “Asian housewives,” he quips. “You’d be surprised.” There are more projects to come, he says. But for now, be- tween concern for our overheat- ing planet and a longstanding need to talk about gentrification, globalisation, extremism, it is the The, and Australia, that are on his mind. “I hope they’ll sing along and dance.” A smile. “In fact, I tell people they have to sing along. If I forget the words I just have to read their lips.” The The performs at the Sydney Opera House today and tomorrow, and at the Melbourne Festival on Thursday and Friday. The The’s frontman hopes Australian audiences will sing along and dance JANE CORNWELL No contest in the saviour stakes There are critics who regard the 1998 film The Avengers as a crime against cinema, if not humanity itself. But while much of the ridicule stems from the appearance of Sir Sean Connery as a mad-scientist villain dressed in a teddy-bear costume, the actor is still in credit. Connery has saved the planet in his roles more times than any other actor, researchers say. The former Edinburgh body- builder and milkman never both- ered to develop an Irish accent for his Oscar-winning performance as an Irish-American cop in The Untouchables. But frankly, when you’ve thwarted 13 bids to subvert the world order as we know it in films spread across four decades, and been named the Greatest Living Scot into the bargain, why would you? Connery began res- cuing humanity from doom and destruction in 1962 with his Protecting our way of life comes easily to the original 007 BEN HOYLE Political satire trumped by reality One of Britain’s leading satirists has declared himself redundant. Armando Iannucci says the rise of Donald Trump and other populist politicians who regard themselves as entertainers means that he now advocates voting instead. “Trump is a self-basting satir- ist,” Iannucci says. “Just read him and you have found the joke about him. It comes out in what he says, which leaves people like me slightly redundant other than just to point it out.” Iannucci, 54, creator of tele- vision shows and films such as The Thick of It and The Death of Stalin, told the Cliveden Literary Festival in Britain that politics has “moved beyond satire”. “The best, most powerful, re- sponse against people like them is to vote against them, rather than just to make jokes,” he says. “I worry that to make jokes you kind of accept them on a par with Thatcher and Major and Blair and I think we have gone beyond that. We have gone into a world where these people think they are un- touchable and the only way to touch them is by voting them out, so I would far rather concentrate on that.” Iannucci says he is not making “much stuff about the present day”, with his latest project being an adaptation of Dickens’s David Copperfield. Despite his scathing portrayal of politicians in The Thick of It and the HBO series Veep, Iannucci says that none of those he sati- rised were “criminals; they are fundamentally OK as people”. He sympathised with their predica- ment and reveals that Clement Attlee, Tony Blair and Barack Obama were three figures that he respected. While not naming others be- yond Trump, Iannucci says that the “current brand are their own entertainers”. “That is how Trump sees himself, he is ob- sessed with figures and ratings. He is obsessed with a measurable popularity, so to maintain and achieve that popularity he has to do something very day to make a headline,” he sats. THE TIMES Let’s stop laughing and start voting, says Armando Iannucci DAVID SANDERSON Matt Johnson was born and raised in the East End of London, where — after stints in Sweden, Spain and New York — he lives again now. East London isn’t what it was, of course. Corner shops and pubs with sawdust floors and upright pianos and have given way to lux- ury towers and shiny office blocks. Proud workin- class folk are being edged out by hipster millennials, who swarm past Johnson’s front door in Shoreditch, E1, unaware that the dapper old dude they see coming and going was frontman for one of the most acclaimed bands of the 1980s. “My family goes back genera- tions to this part of London,” Johnson, 57, tells me when we meet on a blazing summer’s day, a chemical heat that saps and wilts and creates a queue in the pop-up juice bar outside his home. “I’m one of the few original East End- ers left.” Johnson has spent the last dec- ade fighting the area’s encroach- ing gentrification, sitting on committees, lobbying MPs, re- storing the 19th-century building he owns. But then his muse re- turned and there was no time to waste; wasting time, he admits, is his specialty. Putting the The back on the road was a risk that paid off: venues including the Royal Albert Hall sold out. Reviewers raved: “Johnson may not have sung pub- licly for (18) years but there’s little doubt he’s been practising his scales in private,” declared The In- dependent. This week, Australia will get to relive such catchy, pre- scient anthems as Sweet Bird of Truth and Armageddon Days are Here (Again) as Johnson and a quartet of crack musicians remind us how timeless, how relevant, these songs are. The The was always Matt Keanu Reeves. Harrison Ford and Will Smith came fourth and fifth. Milla Jovovich was the most deadly actress, with 1296 kills in the Resident Evil series — though most of them were zombies. Other actors in the top five are Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Chow Yun- fat. To be considered in the killer category, actors must have re- ceived combat and weapons training. THE TIMES breakthrough role as James Bond in Dr No, the first film adapted from Ian Fleming’s novels. He prevents the mysterious Julius No, a rogue atomic scien- tist, from using a nuclear-pow- ered radio beam to override US missile launching systems and hold the world to ransom. Con- nery provided a similar service as 007 in six more Bond films. Re- searchers from Movies4Men, the action film channel, say his 13 res- cue acts put him three clear of Bruce Willis and four ahead of Sean Connery as James Bond in Goldfinger, left, and with Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade Matt Johnson returns with the definite article Matt Johnson has put the The back on the road, playing at such prestigious venues as the Royal Albert Hall, below, and tonight at the Sydney Opera House HELEN EDWARDS a radio ban. There were long-form videos involving death-defying stunts and recording sessions fuelled by sleeplessness and magic mushroom tea. When Johnson’s younger brother Eugene died sud- denly in 1989, aged 24, midway through the band’s world tour, then his mother not long after, Johnson quit. “Everything felt irrelevant,” he’s said. Johnson was always an anti- pop star. Recruiting mates such as ex-Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr to work on 1992’s Dusk helped. But the gaps between releases — 1995’s Hanky Panky, a leftfield take on Hank Williams’s back cata- ‘People need to put down their phones and galvanise’ MATT JOHNSON NOW SHOWING Zama (M) Argentinian director Lucrecia Martel’s new film, Zama, is set in 1790 in a little colonial backwater on the Amazon. The central character is Don Diego de Zama (Daniel Gimenez Cacho, pictured above), a magistrate representing Spanish justice who is conscious of the fact his appointment to this out-of-the-way place is a kind of humiliation. To Zama’s frustration, the local governor constantly frustrates his requests and demands for a transfer, refusing to send the required letter to the king in Madrid, and when the hapless Zama is discovered to be writing a book — on government time — he’s punished by being forced to move from his already primitive accommodation to more squalid premises on the outskirts of the community. He responds by joining a band of soldiers who are hunting down a legendary outlaw. As a protagonist, Zama is not exactly an easy figure to understand or warm to. Yet this handsome film, beautifully photographed by Portuguese cinematographer Rui Pocas, is more than just an esoteric exercise in exotica. It’s a stark vision of a corrupt society. DAVID STRATTON hhhkj Johnny English Strikes Again (PG) Rowan Atkinson stars in Johnny English Strikes Again, the third film in the comic espionage series in which he is a combination of James Bond and Mr Bean. As the title suggests, this movie is about English coming in from the cold. We first see him teaching geography — and spycraft — at an English school. But when a cyber attack reveals the identity of every British spy, the government has to call agents out of retirement. The Prime Minister (Emma Thompson) is about to host a G12 summit. It is English who must save the world from the cyber terrorists. He is joined by his tech-savvy comrade cum manservant Bough (Ben Miller). The PM is unconvinced the empire can be rescued by Her Majesty’s Secret Service. So she reaches out to a young Silicon Valley tech billionaire (Jake Lacy). This movie is directed by David Kerr and it’s his first go at the series, though the scriptwriter, William Davies, has been there from the start. Kerr sensibly sticks more or less to the format. There are times when what is obvious is also what is needed, and this is one of them. STEPHEN ROMEI hhhjj QUEENSLAND MUSIC The Louis Armstrong Legacy Jazz singer Herb Armstrong presents Louis’s favourite songs accompanied by 16-piece band the Art Deco Dance Orchestra. Home of the Arts. Paradise Showroom, 135 Bundall Road, Surfers Paradise. Tomorrow, 7.30pm. Tickets: $28-$30. Bookings: (07) 5588 4000 or online. Duration: 2 hr 30 min, including interval. VICTORIA EXHIBITION Mandela — My Life: The Official Exhibition Culled from the archives of the Johannesburg-based Mandela Foundation, this exhibition includes documents and memorabilia, plus a suite of paintings by South African artist John Meyer depicting Mandela’s life from childhood to world renown. MIRIAM COSIC Melbourne Museum. Touring Hall, 11 Nicholson St, Carlton. Daily, 10am- 5pm. Tickets: $17.90-$32. Bookings: 13 11 02 or online. Until March 2019. TASMANIA MUSIC The Joy of Mozart Violinist Emma McGrath performs Mozart’s Violin Concerto No 3. The program also includes Haydn’s Symphony No 44, Mourning, Korngold’s Much Ado about Nothing Suite and Brahms’s Tragic Overture. Federation Concert Hall. 1 Davey St, Hobart. Friday, 7.30pm. Tickets: $33- $99. Bookings: 1800 001 190 or online. NSW STAGE Leigh Sales: Any Ordinary Day Walkley award-winner Leigh Sales discusses her book Any Ordinary Day with Annabel Crabb. Investigating how the brain manages grief and fear, Sales’s book is a mix of scientific research and interviews with those who have faced extreme hardship. Seymour Centre. Corner of City Road and Cleveland Street, Chippendale. Today, 6.30pm. Tickets: $30-$35. Bookings: (02) 9351 7940 or online. SOUTH AUSTRALIA STAGE Faith Healer Francis Hardy tours Ireland, Scotland and Wales with his wife, preaching his ability to cure the ill. Judy Davis directs this play, written by Brian Friel, which explores themes of nostalgia and faith. Adelaide Festival Centre. Space Theatre, King William Street. Tonight, 6.30pm. Tickets: $30-$84. Bookings: 131 246 or online. Until October 13. Duration: 1hr 40min. NORTHERN TERRITORY STAGE Lisa Wilkinson Journalist and television presenter Lisa Wilkinson (above) will step on stage at the Darwin Entertainment Centre. Moving from print media to radio and television, Wilkinson will discuss stories from her media career. Darwin Entertainment Centre. The Playhouse, 93 Mitchell Street, Darwin City. Today, 5.30pm. Tickets: $20. Bookings: (08) 8980 3333 or online. WESTERN AUSTRALIA EXHIBITION 2018 Fremantle Arts Centre Print Award The 43rd annual Fremantle Arts Centre Print Award presents a selection of artists’ books and prints from emerging and established Australian artists. Fremantle Arts Centre. 1 Finnerty St, Fremantle. Daily, 10am-4pm. Free entry. Inquiries: (08) 9432 9555 or online. Until November 4. YOUR NATIONAL CULTURE GUIDE CHRISTIE GOODWIN Jason Isaac, centre, in Iannucci’s The Death of Stalin
Transcript of YOUR NATIONAL CULTURE GUIDE Matt Johnson returns with the … · 2018. 10. 29. · Li, Dolph...
14 THE AUSTRALIAN, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 2018theaustralian.com.au/arts ARTS
AUSE01Z01MA - V1
Johnson: that impassioned bari-tone, those chiselled looks the so-cial conscience he poured intolyrics that railed against war mon-gering, inequality and greed. “Thisis the day your life will surelychange,” he intoned on the band’s1983 debut, Soul Mining, a classicthat paved the way for a sound asmuch rock and blues as post-punk.Today, sitting in a vast living spacecolonised by books, boxes andrecording gear, blinds closed totone down the furnace outside, hesays life hasn’t changed — at leastnot on a global level.
Wars are still being waged. Theunderprivileged are still beingabused. Now there’s climatechange: “It amazes me how manypeople are going about obliviousto what is unfolding aroundthem.” He gestures towards ashuttered window. “People needto put down their phones andgalvanise.”
“Put down your phones” is adirective he issues from the stage,during a set of 24 songs cherry-picked from albums including therighteously angry Mind Bomb, re-leased in 1989, the same year theThe toured Australia, wowingcrowds, being drunk and silly onlate-night chat shows. “We wantan old-school audience,” saysJohnson, an intense yet amiablefather of two. “I want to see peo-ple’s faces, not a load of screens.For any performer, that connec-tion with the audience is oxygen.”
Johnson threw his all into re-inforcing the sincerity of lyricssuch as “Let the bums count theirblessings while the rich count themoney” from the political singleHeartland, which was slapped with
logue; 2000’s acclaimed NakedSelf— kept coming. For a long whilehe felt stuck. Not for nothing is lastyear’s documentary about John-son titled The Inertia Variations,after a work by English poet JohnTottenham. Johnson read thepoem from the Royal Albert Hallstage: “You would think by nowpeople would know better than toask me what I have been doingwith my time / And you wouldthink by now I would have comeup with any answer that wouldsilence them.”
A new authorised biographydetails the emptiness that wal-loped him once he had finishedpouring himself into recordingsessions, after travelling the worldto make authentic, soul-baring artfor his fans. He tells me how hehad sat at home watching a tele-vision screening of Infected, thefeature-length film he had spentthree years creating, issuing it
alongside the eponymous album.He waited for the phone to ring. Itdidn’t. “Eventually I understoodthat the joy comes in the creation,”he says with a shrug.
“So going forward to 2018 andbeing in this band … I’m older.We’re having a laugh. I’m enjoy-ing the moment.”
Johnson only ever wanted towork in music. The third of foursons born to publicans in Strat-ford, east London, his earliest mu-sical memories include the Beatleswallpaper in his shared bedroomand muffled sounds of bands play-ing in the pub — The Two Pud-dings — below. Not just anybands; The Two Puddings was oneof the best live music venues in theEast End and Johnson’s UncleKenny was one of London’s toplive music promoters.
“The Small Faces, the Kinks,before they were famous … Wecould hear them if we sat on thestairs. When I was 12 I learned toplay boogie woogie on the pub’sold Joanna” — Cockney rhymingslang, he adds with a twinkle, forupright piano — “then picked up aguitar at 14 and formed my firstband.”
Aged 15 he left school, which hehardly went to anyway, and got ajob in a recording studio in edgy,characterful Soho. Aged 17 he putan ad in the hallowed New MusicalExpress, a shout-out for musiciansinfluenced by the Residents, SydBarrett, Throbbing Gristle andVelvet Underground. The Thebegan as an electronic duo: “I paidmy dues playing various venuesand kept songwriting; my fatherwas a big influence in my self-edu-cation. He was very well read. Sar-
tre. Trotsky. Graham Greene.George Orwell was his favourite.”
He leaps up and fetches a booktitled Tales from The Two Pud-dings, filled with stories and pho-tos of uncles and aunts andimmediate family including hiselder brother Andrew, whosedeath in 2016 prompted Johnsonto revive the The; and his fatherEddie, who died earlier this year,aged 86, just as the band was aboutto play Stockholm. “Dad wouldhave wanted me to continue,” saysJohnson, whose new song aboutdeath, We Can’t Stop What’s Com-ing, took on added poignancy; itwill feature on a new studio albumdue for release next year.
Having returned, Johnson’smuse is staying faithful. He has setup a record label, broadcasts on hisown Radio Cineola, has a publish-ing company called 51st StatePress and has channelled his flairfor mixed-media into a series oflovingly crafted CD/book releas-es. A boxed set features the filmTony by his younger brother Ger-ard, for which Johnson did thesoundtrack; and Moonbug, a doc-umentary on the Apollo astro-nauts with music by the The. I askwho buys them and he flashes agrin. “Asian housewives,” hequips. “You’d be surprised.”
There are more projects tocome, he says. But for now, be-tween concern for our overheat-ing planet and a longstandingneed to talk about gentrification,globalisation, extremism, it is theThe, and Australia, that are on hismind. “I hope they’ll sing alongand dance.” A smile. “In fact, I tellpeople they have to sing along. If Iforget the words I just have to readtheir lips.”
The The performs at the Sydney Opera House today and tomorrow, and at the Melbourne Festival on Thursday and Friday.
The The’s frontman hopes Australian audiences will sing along and dance
JANE CORNWELL
No contest in the saviour stakes
There are critics who regard the1998 film The Avengers as a crimeagainst cinema, if not humanityitself.
But while much of the ridiculestems from the appearance of SirSean Connery as a mad-scientistvillain dressed in a teddy-bearcostume, the actor is still in credit.
Connery has saved the planetin his roles more times than anyother actor, researchers say.
The former Edinburgh body-builder and milkman never both-ered to develop an Irish accent forhis Oscar-winning performanceas an Irish-American cop in TheUntouchables. But frankly, whenyou’ve thwarted 13 bids to subvertthe world order as we know it infilms spread across four decades,and been named the GreatestLiving Scot into the bargain, whywould you? Connery began res-cuing humanity from doom anddestruction in 1962 with his
Protecting our way of life comes easily to the original 007
BEN HOYLE
Political satire trumped by reality
One of Britain’s leading satiristshas declared himself redundant.Armando Iannucci says the rise ofDonald Trump and other populistpoliticians who regard themselvesas entertainers means that he nowadvocates voting instead.
“Trump is a self-basting satir-ist,” Iannucci says. “Just read himand you have found the jokeabout him. It comes out in what hesays, which leaves people like meslightly redundant other than justto point it out.”
Iannucci, 54, creator of tele-vision shows and films such as TheThick of It and The Death of Stalin,told the Cliveden Literary Festivalin Britain that politics has “movedbeyond satire”.
“The best, most powerful, re-sponse against people like them isto vote against them, rather thanjust to make jokes,” he says.
“I worry that to make jokes youkind of accept them on a par with
Thatcher and Major and Blair andI think we have gone beyond that.We have gone into a world wherethese people think they are un-touchable and the only way totouch them is by voting them out,so I would far rather concentrateon that.”
Iannucci says he is not making“much stuff about the presentday”, with his latest project beingan adaptation of Dickens’s DavidCopperfield.
Despite his scathing portrayalof politicians in The Thick of It andthe HBO series Veep, Iannuccisays that none of those he sati-rised were “criminals; they are
fundamentally OK as people”. Hesympathised with their predica-ment and reveals that ClementAttlee, Tony Blair and BarackObama were three figures that herespected.
While not naming others be-yond Trump, Iannucci says thatthe “current brand are their ownentertainers”. “That is howTrump sees himself, he is ob-sessed with figures and ratings.He is obsessed with a measurablepopularity, so to maintain andachieve that popularity he has todo something very day to make aheadline,” he sats.
THE TIMES
Let’s stop laughing and start voting, says Armando Iannucci
DAVID SANDERSON
Matt Johnson was born and raisedin the East End of London, where— after stints in Sweden, Spainand New York — he lives againnow.
East London isn’t what it was,of course. Corner shops and pubswith sawdust floors and uprightpianos and have given way to lux-ury towers and shiny office blocks.Proud workin- class folk are beingedged out by hipster millennials,who swarm past Johnson’s frontdoor in Shoreditch, E1, unawarethat the dapper old dude they seecoming and going was frontmanfor one of the most acclaimedbands of the 1980s.
“My family goes back genera-tions to this part of London,”Johnson, 57, tells me when wemeet on a blazing summer’s day, achemical heat that saps and wiltsand creates a queue in the pop-upjuice bar outside his home. “I’mone of the few original East End-ers left.”
Johnson has spent the last dec-ade fighting the area’s encroach-ing gentrification, sitting oncommittees, lobbying MPs, re-storing the 19th-century buildinghe owns. But then his muse re-turned and there was no time towaste; wasting time, he admits, ishis specialty.
Putting the The back on theroad was a risk that paid off:venues including the Royal AlbertHall sold out. Reviewers raved:“Johnson may not have sung pub-licly for (18) years but there’s littledoubt he’s been practising hisscales in private,” declared The In-dependent. This week, Australiawill get to relive such catchy, pre-scient anthems as Sweet Bird ofTruth and Armageddon Days areHere (Again) as Johnson and aquartet of crack musicians remindus how timeless, how relevant,these songs are.
The The was always Matt
Keanu Reeves. Harrison Fordand Will Smith came fourth andfifth.
Milla Jovovich was the mostdeadly actress, with 1296 kills inthe Resident Evil series — thoughmost of them were zombies.Other actors in the top five are JetLi, Dolph Lundgren, ArnoldSchwarzenegger and Chow Yun-fat. To be considered in the killercategory, actors must have re-ceived combat and weaponstraining.
THE TIMES
breakthrough role as James Bondin Dr No, the first film adaptedfrom Ian Fleming’s novels.
He prevents the mysteriousJulius No, a rogue atomic scien-tist, from using a nuclear-pow-ered radio beam to override USmissile launching systems andhold the world to ransom. Con-nery provided a similar service as007 in six more Bond films. Re-searchers from Movies4Men, theaction film channel, say his 13 res-cue acts put him three clear ofBruce Willis and four ahead of
Sean Connery as James Bond in Goldfinger, left, and with Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Matt Johnson returns with the definite article
Matt Johnson has put the The back on the road, playing at such prestigious venues as the Royal Albert Hall, below, and tonight at the Sydney Opera House
HELEN EDWARDS
a radio ban. There were long-formvideos involving death-defyingstunts and recording sessionsfuelled by sleeplessness and magicmushroom tea. When Johnson’syounger brother Eugene died sud-denly in 1989, aged 24, midwaythrough the band’s world tour,then his mother not long after,Johnson quit. “Everything feltirrelevant,” he’s said.
Johnson was always an anti-pop star. Recruiting mates such asex-Smiths guitarist Johnny Marrto work on 1992’s Dusk helped. Butthe gaps between releases —1995’s Hanky Panky, a leftfield takeon Hank Williams’s back cata-
‘People need to put down their phones and galvanise’MATT JOHNSON
NOW SHOWINGZama (M) Argentinian director Lucrecia Martel’s new film, Zama, is set in 1790 in a little colonial backwater on the Amazon. The central character is Don Diego de Zama (Daniel Gimenez Cacho, pictured above), a magistrate representing Spanish justice who is conscious of the fact his appointment to this out-of-the-way place is a kind of humiliation. To Zama’s frustration, the local governor constantly frustrates his requests and demands for a transfer, refusing to send the required letter to the king in Madrid, and when the hapless Zama is discovered to be writing a book — on government time — he’s punished by being forced to move from his already primitive accommodation to more squalid premises on the outskirts of the community. He responds by joining a band of soldiers who are hunting down a legendary outlaw. As a protagonist, Zama is not exactly an easy figure to understand or warm to. Yet this handsome film, beautifully photographed by Portuguese cinematographer Rui Pocas, is more than just an esoteric exercise in exotica. It’s a stark vision of a corrupt society.
DAVID STRATTON hhhkj
Johnny English Strikes Again (PG) Rowan Atkinson stars in Johnny English Strikes Again, the third film in the comic espionage series in which he is a combination of James Bond and Mr Bean. As the title suggests, this movie is about English coming in from the cold. We first see him teaching geography— and spycraft — at an English school. But when a cyber attack reveals the identity of every British spy, the government has to call agents out of retirement. The Prime Minister (Emma Thompson) is about to host a G12 summit. It is English who must save the world from the cyber terrorists. He is joined by his tech-savvy comrade cum manservant Bough (Ben Miller). The PM is unconvinced the empire can be rescued by Her Majesty’s Secret Service. So she reaches out to a young Silicon Valley tech billionaire (Jake Lacy). This movie is directed by David Kerr and it’s his first go at the series, though the scriptwriter, William Davies, has been there from the start. Kerr sensibly sticks more or less to the format. There are times when what is obvious is also what is needed, and this is one of them.
STEPHEN ROMEI hhhjj
QUEENSLANDMUSIC
The Louis Armstrong Legacy Jazz singer Herb Armstrong presents Louis’s favourite songs accompanied by 16-piece band the Art Deco Dance Orchestra. Home of the Arts. Paradise Showroom, 135 Bundall Road, Surfers Paradise. Tomorrow, 7.30pm. Tickets: $28-$30. Bookings: (07) 5588 4000 or online. Duration: 2 hr 30 min, including interval.
VICTORIAEXHIBITION
Mandela — My Life: The Official ExhibitionCulled from the archives of the Johannesburg-based Mandela Foundation, this exhibition includes documents and memorabilia, plus a suite of paintings by South African artistJohn Meyer depicting Mandela’s life from childhood to world renown.
MIRIAM COSICMelbourne Museum. Touring Hall, 11 Nicholson St, Carlton. Daily, 10am-5pm. Tickets: $17.90-$32. Bookings: 13 11 02 or online. Until March 2019.
TASMANIAMUSIC
The Joy of MozartViolinist Emma McGrath performs Mozart’s Violin Concerto No 3. The program also includes Haydn’s Symphony No 44, Mourning, Korngold’s Much Ado about Nothing Suite and Brahms’s Tragic Overture.Federation Concert Hall. 1 Davey St, Hobart. Friday, 7.30pm. Tickets: $33-$99. Bookings: 1800 001 190 or online.
NSWSTAGE
Leigh Sales: Any Ordinary DayWalkley award-winner Leigh Sales discusses her book Any Ordinary Day with Annabel Crabb. Investigating how the brain manages grief and fear, Sales’s book is a mix of scientific research and interviews with those who have faced extreme hardship. Seymour Centre. Corner of City Road and Cleveland Street, Chippendale. Today, 6.30pm. Tickets: $30-$35. Bookings: (02) 9351 7940 or online.
SOUTH AUSTRALIASTAGE
Faith HealerFrancis Hardy tours Ireland, Scotland and Wales with his wife, preaching his ability to cure the ill. Judy Davis directs this play, written by Brian Friel, which explores themes of nostalgia and faith. Adelaide Festival Centre. Space Theatre, King William Street. Tonight, 6.30pm. Tickets: $30-$84. Bookings: 131 246 or online. Until October 13. Duration: 1hr 40min.
NORTHERN TERRITORYSTAGE
Lisa WilkinsonJournalist and television presenter Lisa Wilkinson (above) will step on stage at the Darwin Entertainment Centre. Moving from print media to radio and television, Wilkinson will discuss stories from her media career.Darwin Entertainment Centre. The Playhouse, 93 Mitchell Street, Darwin City. Today, 5.30pm. Tickets: $20. Bookings: (08) 8980 3333 or online.
WESTERN AUSTRALIAEXHIBITION
2018 Fremantle Arts Centre Print AwardThe 43rd annual Fremantle Arts Centre Print Award presents a selection of artists’ books and prints from emerging and established Australian artists.Fremantle Arts Centre. 1 Finnerty St, Fremantle. Daily, 10am-4pm. Free entry. Inquiries: (08) 9432 9555 or online. Until November 4.
YOUR NATIONALCULTURE GUIDE
CHRISTIE GOODWIN
Jason Isaac, centre, in Iannucci’s The Death of Stalin
