— ‘For the Union Dead’ by Robert Lowell

After the success of his first play 2,000 Feet Away, Griffin Theatre Company asked Australian-born playwright Anthony Weigh to create more. Co-produced by the Sydney Theatre Company, his second play Like a Fishbone is set to stage from 16 July to 7 August at the Wharf 1 Theatre.

Vibewire is awarding double passes for 5 lucky contributors to see this production while it’s here in Sydney.

Inspired by the noise and construction of the Freedom Towers (a replacement for the Twin Towers) during a visit to New York in 2006, Anthony Weigh’s play explores the difficulties in memorialising a tragedy.

A mother’s response to the design of the 9/11 memorial is mirrored in Like a Fishbone. In the aftermath of a school massacre, an architect plans to design a memorial in remembrance of the people lost. Her design and her perspective are challenged upon the arrival of a grieving mother.

The meaning of memory and faith is debated between these two strong characters, their encounter unravelling secular and spiritual points of view.

Intrigued? All you need to do to have a chance to win is think back to an encounter that changed your life. Write about your experience (200 words or less) or send in an artwork reflecting that encounter and a description of how it influenced you.

Send your submissions to editor@vibewire.org using the subject line:  Like a Fishbone Competition – Your Name

Entries close Monday, 19 July

Our friends at Niche Productions have given us an A Tribe Called Quest Gift Pack to give to one lucky reader!

Send an email to editors@vibewire.org and in 140 characters or less tell us why this prize should be yours. (”Spaces” count as characters!) Alternatively you can send us your response by Direct Messaging @vibewire on Twitter, or by sending a message to Lucy Wire on Facebook.

The gift pack includes the ATCQ best of CD, poster and stickers.

You have a few weeks to dream up a creative response – the winner will be announced on the Vibewire Facebook Fanpage on Friday 30th July.

The legendary A Tribe Called Quest are heading our way for their long-awaited, first ever Australian tour. Without a doubt, A Tribe Called Quest are the biggest, most seminal hip-hop group in history, with legions of fans all over the world. Originating in 1985, the group signed to Jive Records and released five studio albums from 1989 – 1998 before disbanding. Since 2004 the trio have reformed to play a handful of shows across the US and now The Tribe are heading down under – they play the Hordern Pavilion in Sydney on Wednesday August 11 and Festival Hall in Melbourne on Thursday August 12.

You can book VIP tickets to ‘A Tribe Called Quest’ here.

In celebration of the Sydney Film Festival Vibewire held a film review competition. The brief was simple; you get 200 words with which to write an intriguing and engaging review of any movie at all. In contrast, the prize was epic; a double pass to a marathon screening of this year’s finalists in the Dendy Awards for Australian Short Film. While the competition was strong, there had to be winners and the portal team are proud to announce the three winners for our silver screen competition. Congratulations to Carla Cutrone, Aravind Balsubramaniam and Rachel Weiner.

We have included their reviews below for your reading pleasure.

Sandlot Kids – Carla Cutrone

Sandlot Kids, released in 1993, is an all time classic film about Scotty Smalls, a young boy who moves into a new neighbourhood with his mum and stepfather whom he awkwardly calls ‘dad’. It’s the 1958 summer break and Smalls finds himself attracted to a group of local boys who play baseball daily down at The Sandlot. The field backs onto an old mans house, where behind the fence lives ‘THE BEAST’ a ball-devouring child-eating dog. With the exception of their ringleader Benny, who takes Smalls under his wing, the boys poke fun at Smalls, who knows nothing about baseball, believing Babe Ruth is a girl and unable to catch a simple fly-ball or even throw. There is the snobby rival ball team, the ultra babe lifeguard down at the local pool, not to mention a disgustingly humorous night out at the traveling fair.  But the main story begins in the second half of the film where a ball signed by Babe Ruth gets hit over the fence and into the drooling jaws of ‘THE BEAST’. Babe Ruth comes to Benny in a dream (the super 90’s effects used to make the dream are a must see) which the boys conclude is an omen.  This is when the adventure begins; using body leavers, robots, vacuum cleaners, to get that ball back.

Gosford Park – Aravind Balsubramaniam

Robert Altman’s Gosford Park (2001). Another brilliant ensemble piece, but this time combining a Dickensian exploration into the pre WWII British social class system. Showcasing a cast of British heavyweights including Michael Gambon, Maggie Smith, Helen Mirren and Stephen Fry the film  journeys through comedy and eventually culminates in a murder case reminiscent of an Agatha Christie novel.

Gosford Park, a 1930’s country estate owned by Sir William McCordle (Michael Gambon) and his depressed wife Lady Sylvia (Kristin Scott Thomas) plays host to an evening of shooting. The guests of nobility arrive with their servants, and it is here that the film’s fixation on class takes effect. Upstairs the rich guests idle along the drawing room, listening to Ivor Novello (Jeremy Northam) on the piano, wining and sprawling themselves in an air of exquisiteness. The palatial setting is arranged and looked after intricately and delicately by the servants. Downstairs apart from the constant shuffle of feet, adjustments of hemlines and shoe shining a politics exists, where there is bickering and gossip.

The thirty roles bring to the table a number of crystal clear performances such as those from Helen Mirren and Clive Owen.

Altman offers over two hours of carefully sewn plot with as many characters in a seamless manner allowing a progression from one group of characters to the next without dwelling on one type of politics.

The Red Shoes – Rachel Weiner

A curtain draws open. Its thick fabric, red and rich, ripples to reveal a man. This man – a shoemaker (Leonide Massine) begins to ‘chasse’, ‘pas-de-bouree’ and ‘pirouette’; a pair of ballet shoes held in each of his hands.

She (Moira Shearer) suddenly appears. Her body is lyrical and lucid, and her steps are as striking as the stringed instruments that provide a melody, her song. “What is it to move? What is it to dance? What is it that happens what one’s entire bodily being becomes, quite simply, entranced?”

The attraction between the girl and the shoemaker is, it just is. Beauty and passion are intertwined, and the ballet shoes force red to meet red: the girl’s scarlet lips (and hair) to the poisoned ballet shoes of the shoemaker. These ballet shoes are too much to resist and as the girl slips into the shoes, her ‘ballet’ (and the world of the ballet, ‘The Red Shoes’) is changed forever.

A surreal world opens to her every imagination, and she, along with her prince are forever transformed.  A world of intense colour, shadow and light appear, taking the girl into the depths of a beyond unknown.  This is a world she is unable to decipher as a reality, and a world she is unable to grasp in totality.

The Red Shoes is quite simply, a masterpiece.

Watch this space for a great review of the Dendy Australian Short Film Awards written by one of our winners.

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 Sydneysiders are set to be seduced by the silver screen when the 57th annual Sydney Film Festival begins on 2 June.

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To celebrate, Vibewire Youth Inc. and Sydney Film Festival are offering contributors the chance to win one of five double passes to a marathon screening of this year’s finalists in the Dendy Awards for Australian Short Films on Sunday, 13 June.

Sponsored by Dendy Cinemas for 22 years, these celebrated awards have launched and aided the careers of many Australian filmmakers. Last year’s winner in the Best Live Action category Miracle Fish went on to receive an Oscar nomination—a testament to the world-class quality of Australian filmmaking.

Finalists in this year’s awards will screen in sessions throughout the festival alongside the FOXTEL Australian Documentary Prize finalists, but 5 lucky winners will get the chance to see them all screened back to back in one gala event!

All you have to do to win is send us a short (less than 200 words) review of your favourite film. We’re looking for reviews that are intriguing and creative—not just a plot summary! Make us smile, and we’ll give you something to smile about too: a double pass to a marathon night of vibrant Australian film.

Send your submissions to editor@vibewire.org using the subject line: SFF Competition – Your Name

Entries Close Tuesday, 8 June.

To help get the creative vibes going, here’s a taste of this year’s stellar line-up:

Pop (Live Action)

When a young boy (Jack Dawes) reluctantly joins his father (Angus Sampson) on a rabbit hunt deep in the Snowy Mountains, their relationship is put to the test.

A Parachute in Siberia (Live Action)

A sense of disconnection, reflected in the parallel narratives of two cosmonauts returning to earth, haunts this story of a couple (Anthony Phelan and Noni Hazelhurst) facing their last moments together.

The Adjustable Cosmos (Animation)

A fantastical adventure played out in a jewelled cosmo house inside a great crystal sphere.

Bad Language (Live Action)

Bill (Chris Asimos) makes an unusual bet with the fractious regulars at his uncle’s suburban Kafenois (a men’s club, café and gambling den all in one) and words fly in more than language.

Deeper Than Yesterday (Live Action)

Selected for Critics’ week at Cannes this year, this original drama focuses on a group of submariners who’ve been underwater for three months and whose humanity is beginning to fracture.

Glenn Owen Dodds (Live Action)

G.O.D spells Glenn Owen Dodds and this deity isn’t quite what we’ve been led to believe. Stars David Wenham in the titular role.

How to Lose Weight in 60 Seconds (Animation)

Don’t miss this valuable advice from a little red creature.

The Kiss (Live Action)

Based on an original story by Peter Goldsworthy: on a hot summer’s night, two girls (Nicole Gulasekharam and Briony Kent), fuelled by hormones and alcohol, take a leap that will change their lives.

The Lost Thing (Animation)

In a world of rivets and drabness, a boy befriends a fantastical red creature that appears to be totally lost: based on the writer-director Tan’s prize winning children’s book.

Suburbia (Live Action)

Based on true events, an unsettling tale from the urban sprawl starring Don Hany as a man trying to make sense of what he’s heard and seen.

For more information about the 2010 Sydney Film Festival program click on the icons below.

Now is your chance. You simply need to see The Eclipse…and enter this latest Vibewire Writing Competition! It is as easy as…typing multiple ‘x’s on your mobile phone…

Irish playwright, director and writer Conor McPherson has crafted his latest film, The Eclipse, around the fear of the unknown, the challenges of love and the desired release from the grasp of grief.

Vibewire has 8 double passes to giveaway to the sneak preview of The Eclipse,

courtesy of Jump Street Films.

Here is how you can score one for yourself and a mate:

1. Study the picture below of a scene from The Eclipse…read the meaningful expressions on the actors faces. Feel their passion.

2. Using only 5 sentences, describe in either dialogue or prose exactly what you think is happening in this scene.

What are the characters saying or thinking? Is one of them a ghost? Who is calling? It is entirely up to you and your imagination!

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He stands between a cardboard box and a bin. He is holding a cheap yellow plastic brush. It’s the sort you get from K-Mart. There’s a solitary strand of red hair caught between the bristles. It stands out like spinach in teeth. He disentangles the strand and holds it up to the light. It shimmers and dances.

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When they first moved in a year ago, he did most of the heavy lifting, while she turned the place into a home – putting up happy snaps, dusting off furniture and placing an inordinate number of throw pillows on their bed. As he hauled the last heavy box inside, he noticed her by the TV, methodically brushing her coccyx-length hair. It was mesmerising. He caught her eye, she stopped brushing and gave him a kiss on the cheek. ‘We made it,’ he thought to himself. He smiled at her, knowing she was thinking exactly the same.

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Her departure was a long time coming. Even still, it came as a shock. Sex was the first thing to go. For some bizarre reason, co-habitation had diminished their attraction to one another. Their interactions were now limited to trivial arguments, punctuated by “Remember when…” conversations – reminiscences of a pleasant past. By no means were they out of love. They just couldn’t live together anymore. Domesticity didn’t agree with them. An argument about the TV remote and, ultimately, about why they had no future together, brought things to a head. She left the next day in a loud, ugly whirlwind of tears, feeble apologies and childish name calling.

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He gently places the hair in the box, atop his clothes. He tosses the brush in the bin.