Labia you dumb mole

I know I've blogged about this film before, but I watched again last night and shit it's funny.

In case you havent seen it, Hercules Returns is pretty much the best Australian film ever. It's about these people who try to reopen an old Melbourne cinema - The Picture Palace. But on opening night they are sabotaged by the local multiplex owners who swap the English version of Hercules for the Italian one. So they set about re-dubbing the film - and it's hilarious.

Victoria Fires

Time for a special mention of the bush fires that have destroyed large chunks of the state of Victoria including areas around Melbourne and the farm of the parents of one of my former colleagues.

There are some amazing and horrific images online here. They capture the scale and terror of these fires. You get an idea of the heat generated by the fires through the images of the cars with melted alloy wheels.

When I was in Canberra I had a look around some of the areas there that had been effected in the past by bushfires. Whole suburbs of Canberra were wiped out about 4 years ago, and the flames were moving so fast that they were actually travelling faster than the fire trucks could move.

You can help by donating (as I have just done) to the Victorian RSPCA here.

Back in Black... Ice

The last couple of days of been listening to AD/DC's new album Black Ice on the way to work. To be blunt you could call it a standard paint-by-numbers Acca Dacca effort - the tracks could just about be off any album featuring the new vocalist, Brian Johnson. I do like how he is forever known as the 'new' vocalist - it has been 29 years since Bon Scott died and they made Back in Black with Johnson!

But hey, Black Ice and the Acca Dacca formula kinda works - so why change? Maybe too many bands try to 'evolve'? Angus still pulls out amazing new riffs and AC/DC know what they do kicks ass - so why mess with it?

Mind you, I did have a laugh at how the formula has reached over into the track names - four tracks feature the word 'rock' - Rock N Roll Train, She Likes Rock N Roll, Rock N Roll Dream and Rocking All the Way. Apparently it rocks.

Check out the track below - Skies on Fire, you'll get the idea.

Hey it's a world cup in rugby code - I'll take it!

The Kiwi league team pulled off what is unquestionably the upset of the century for Rugby League last night by toppling the Kangaroo's in the league world cup final. It was only 12 or so months ago when I attended the centenary test in Wellington where we got pummeled 50 odd nil (i did steal a souvenir ball though that day so it wasnt all bad). All throughout this 'World Cup' I had been bitching about what a joke it was and that only one team could win and that the whole thing was really a play off between England and New Zealand to see who would have the honour of losing the final to Australia. But I was sooo wrong and as the Sun Herald in Sydney have said - the Joke (of a tournament) became the Choke! Finally I have something to throw back at the Aussies when they bring up choking at world cups!

The All Blacks also went well against Wales and are only one win away from another Grand Slam. The most impressive thing so far is that in the three Grand Slam tests (Scotland, Ireland and Wales) and the Hong Kong test against the Wallabies, is that the All Blacks haven't conceded a single try - would be great to see them hold that against England this week. But anyway, aren't we just loving all the Haka hijinks - first we had Tipoki, Howlett etc doing a haka to the All Blacks before the Munster game and then we had the Wales stare down contest - loving it!

The Phoenix also did their darnedest to butcher a win against Newcastle tonight - with two red cards against Newcastle before half time you would assume victory was inevitable - especially since the star Phoenix recruit, Fred from DC United and formerly of the Victory (MVP of the 2006 A-League), was playing. But oh no - we had to fuck up as many opportunities as possible before spluttering to victory late in the game. I shouldn't be quite so harsh I know - but I'm losing enough hair as it is!

Speaking of harsh I could take the easy option and bag the NZ Cricket team for not taking their opportunity to beat Australia when they had the chance. But I'll be honest - I had incredibly low expectations and I actually thought the performance was an improvement - I'll explain what I mean in a second. But basically we don't have the batsmen to beat Australia - we have the bowlers - but not the batting so our chances were always fairly remote. How and Redmond are clinging on to their slots for dear life. Of the two (and I know Im kinda biased) How does look the most likely to get a score - but like Daniel Flynn - he needs to deliver on that at some point. Redmond is hopeless and out of his depth - but really we've tried all the other options (Bell/Papps/Cumming) so he may as well hang around. Ryder and Taylor look good but need to protect their wickets more, McCullum isn't a number 5 and doesn't look comfortable there - he should drop back to 7 with Flynn stepping up to 5 and being pushed for runs. I know Grant Elliot is only there to make up the numbers but he is just painful to watch and should not be there - he can't bat and he can only barely bowl - so why bother? Why not just throw Kyle Mills back in at 8 - at least he can bowl and his 15 or 20 runs late in the innings would be more use than another 6-ball duck.

But anyway as I said, I thought it was an improvement and I say that because we actually dominated a whole days play (day 1), which I can't remember us doing for a long time against Australia. We put Australia in, bundled them out for a low score and then didnt lose a wicket - all you could ask for out of day 1 of a test. Honours were split on day 2, we won the last session having lost the first and second sessions badly. Day 3 was Australia's and was enough to take the test. But despite a poor day 3 it was still better than the last time we faced Australia in a test. During that series we might do ok during the odd session - but we could never maintain that pressure throughout a whole day. We would either start well by picking up wickets only to butcher the game with a poor second session - with Symonds, Ponting or Gilchrist piling on runs or we would have another middle order collapse if we were batting. Either way we would be unable to maintain the pressure we had built up into the next session. But in Brisbane for a whole day we had the foot on the throat of Australia and we were competitive. So yeah its still disappointing to lose again, but it showed progress and hopefully during the next series against them we can start winning consecutive whole days... and who knows if we can start scoring runs - maybe even a test.

Australia Day?

Well maybe Australian Labor Party Day might be more accurate. As we close in on election day, both parties seem to be ripping off the ALP.

Yesterday National Leader, John Key, launched his new schools policy which he said would "add rungs to the ladder of opportunity". Hmmm now that sounds familiar huh? Well that's probably because the 'Ladder of Opportunity' was Mark Latham's slogan throughout his ill fated 2004 campaign. I know Key is no fan of history, but surely he realises the wheels well and truly came off the 2004 ALP campaign (and Latham's career) not long after launching the catchphrase? Tempting fate a bit...

But anyway Key isn't the only one to be caught red handed stealing pages from the playbooks of recent ALP campaigns. Labour released its new TV ad yesterday, with an unsubtle and very personal - I can't trust you, John Key - message. But again this seemed familiar to many political hacks. Where have we seen a young mother talking direct to camera, criticising a tory leader while feeding their baby?? That's right - Australia!



Still I guess its better than stealing ideas from this guy or this Alaskan candidate. WTF? I know.

Weekend of wins

Well other than Warriors - but they were always going to come up short.

But anyway having sat through some absolute shockers this year the Phoenix finally delivered on their promise at the weekend, the Lions defended the Ranfurly Shield (even if it was close) and Hawthorn won the AFL... you're wondering why I care that Hawthorn won right?

Well I ended up going down to Four Kings (the redeveloped Lab Bar) to watch the the AFL Grand Final with some of the Aussies and I have to say it was a gas. There were around a hundred fans there (who knew there were Aussie Rules followers in Wgtn?) and most seemed to be wearing Geelong scarves and jerseys so I backed the underdogs - the Hawthorn Hawks, who ended up winning after a large third quarter.

While I was at Four Kings (and admittedly after a few lagers) I put my money where my mouth was and put $10 on the Phoenix to beat the number one ranked A League side Sydney FC - meaning I banked $46! We're currently planning on watching the NRL final at the Four Kings too - they have a great set up with a row of 10 or so lazy boys in front of a wall of big screen TVs, booths with private screens (70 screens in total) and a solid range of beers. I hadnt been there before but its definitely a great place to watch the footy.

The Umbilical Brothers

I spent the evening at the Umbilical Brothers excellent first ever show in Wellington.

If you aren't familiar with the brothers - they are a pair of Australian comedians who combine Michael Winslow style sound effects with mime. Their tap dance routine was awesome as was most of the show. Below are a couple of clips - the first is the tap dance and the second is the 'Klaus' Solo Show' from their European humour bit.





The brothers have a couple of other dates on this tour, and will be back early next year with their other show - if you get a chance you should check them out.

Satisfaction

I've just got in from a bit of a boys night down at my old work place. It was fair to say I was tempting fate to spend the evening watching the Bledisloe Cup with a bunch of Australians on their territory.

But god damn - you can't match the satisfaction of a 39-10 victory. Naturally I was very sporting... ok I did start chanting - "Are you England? Are you England? Are You England in disguise?" But other than that... well ok there was the attempted flag raising.. but other than that I was a good sport.

Anyway it was a great fight back from the All Blacks tonight - one of the best performances I can remember - right up there with Wellington in 1996, Sydney in 2000, Paris in 2004, Wellington in 2005 and Lyon in 2006. Hopefully this will ease some of the pathetic-media's attention on Henry and put some heat on their golden boy. The only thing more satisfying than an amazing victory against all odds is being able to savour it with the enemy!

Post mortem

This is probably one for the weekend. Late last year the Liberal Party was of course smashed by a revitalised (if a little vacuous) Labor and in February this year the ABC's Four Corners show did a fantastic behind the scenes look at the final days of the Howard Government, aptly named Howard's End.

It featured in-depth interviews with all the key players - Costello, Downer, Hockey, Abbott, McLaughlan, Minchin and others. For political junkies this sort of honest assessment (albeit in hindsight) of the fall of one of the more powerful governments is nirvana. It covers everything from Howard's leadership, Costello's desires for the leadership, policy disasters (work choices, not signing Kyoto) and how everyone knows better.... now.

It's definitely worth a look, below is part one and below that are links to the other four parts. The official site is here and it feature the full length interviews



Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five

I'll finish on a lighter note - that famous apology to the Aboriginal people by 'John Howard' in the lead up to the Sydney Olympics on The Games.
After watching the video -
Gina Riley: What do you think?
John Clarke: It's not the prime minister.
Gina Riley: He didn't say he was. He said he was John Howard speaking to you from Sydney, Australia.
John Clarke: That's John Howard, the actor.
Gina Riley: That's John Howard.
John Clarke: Everyone knows that's not the prime minister, don't they?
Gina Riley: Everyone in Australia knows that, but this is going overseas.
Enjoy

Summer Heights High

I recently got put on to Summer Heights High, its the new series by Chris Lilley, the dude that brought us the very excellent We Can Be Heroes. This time the show follows the lives of two students - Ja'mie from We Can be Heroes and a new character Jonah Takalua as well as a Drama Teacher, Mr Gregson.

Unfortunately I havent seen it on our screens yet - but the DVD is around or you could be naughty and download it.

In the meantime, below is one of my favourite scenes - Mr Gregson using his drama skills to liven up the evacuation drills. Enjoy.

The Big Costello

Turning across the Tasman for a second I thought I would make some bold predictions of what i think is going to happen in the post-Howard era for the Liberal Party. Now while many of us have delighted in the fall of Howard and his cronies the manner in which the Party was crushed and gone from being a political powerhouse to something that resembles post-Tsunami Myanmar has had loads of people talking about how the Liberals will rebuild themselves.

Following the election, former Treasurer and Howard heir apparent, Peter Costello, seemed destined to take over the Libs and try to rebuild them - but of course he didn't, and instead 'honourably' stepped aside to let a new breed through. The ever irritating former leader and Howard Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, similarly went to the backbench and appeared to be positioning himself for a future tilt at the South Australian Premiership (which he probably wouldn't win anyway against Kiwi expat and incumbent - Mike Rann).

Former Defence Minister, Brendan Nelson, beat out the more popular and electable former Environment Minister, Malcolm Turnbull for the leadership and has only really succeeded in making matters worse by taking the Party to new polling lows.

Till now I, like many people, have thought that its just a matter of time before Turnbull comes in like the cavalry and rebuilds the Party like David Cameron in the UK and John Key in New Zealand. But of late I've been pondering what really might be happening - and its all about Costello and Downer and how it will be them and not Turnbull that take over.

The party is hugely divided along factional lines and for every step forward, it has been pushed back two steps by internal fighting, mainly driven by the Costello-Kroeger faction from Victoria. Costello knew the party was going to be in a mess post election, and knew he would be pissing in the wind if he tried taking on Rudd while he was riding his post election honeymoon wave - which is why he didnt take the leadership. He also knew Turnbull wouldnt get the numbers. So the previously inoffensive but not particularly capable Nelson would become leader with Turnbull as shadow Treasurer and Downer and Costello would appear to be heading towards honourable exits from the political landscape on the backbenches.

But I think that Costello and Downer planned this whole situation. They have actively worked against Nelson behind the scenes and have blocked any attempt to kickstart the Party and I think they have used him as collateral damage and set him up to take the worst of the post-election carnage. Costello didnt want to inherit a mess and he knew it was only going to get worse in the interim. Not only are Costello and Downer waiting for Nelson to crash and burn, but they're also setting him up to take the fall.

In time they will then unleash a campaign to further kill off Nelson and do enough damage Turnbull to ruin his chances of taking the leadership in the near future, which will then see the Party becoming 'desperate' and pleading for Costello and Downer to return and lead them to promise land. Turnbull will be so wounded that while he will probably mount a leadership bid, Costello and Downer will crush him and Costello will become leader and Rasputin himself, Downer, will become shadow Treasurer.

So I guess we'll watch this space, but I don't think the situation is as simple as I first thought and I predict that Costello and Downer will lead the Liberals into the next election.