Entertainment

Sean Thomas has won the most dreaded of British literary prizes — the Bad Sex in Fiction Award, with the award winning passage: It is time, time… Now. Yes. She is so small and compact and yet she has all the necessary features… Shall I compare thee to a Sony Walkman. She is his own Toshiba, his dinky little JVC, his sweet Aiwa… Aiwa, aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwa aiwaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh

A Salmon of Doubt — the sixth episode of Douglas Adams’ Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series — will hit book shops next May on the anniversary of the writer’s death

A lazy weekend with nothing much on gave me the chance to finally see Looking For Alibrandi.

Josephine Josie Alibrandi [Pia Miranda] has a lot on her plate. Coming from a large close-knit Italian family is difficult enough, where she not only has to battle with the stigma of coming from a single parent household, but one where her father is a secret known only to herself and her mother.

In her final year at a posh Sydney private school that is overflowing with more than its fair share of cashed-up Daddy’s little princesses, Josie, in contrast, attends on a scholarship. As Vice Captain, her temper and individuality cost her the role of School Captain — a position that went to one of the princesses, a noxious junior model named Carly Bishop [Leanna Walsman].

Christina Alibrandi [Greta Scacchi] is a strong and determined woman. When she announced her pregnancy at seventeen, her father threw her out of the house and forbade her mother to see her or her daughter Josie — an edict that remained in place until his death. She defied everyone and raised her daughter alone.

Katia Alibrandi [Elena Cotta] is the family matriarch. A fierce and single-minded woman [anybody spotting the pattern here?] she believes that the Alibrandi women are cursed and never misses a chance to remind them. She carries a deep sadness and also a dark secret.

Michael Andretti [Anthony LaPaglia] is a successful and respected barrister who has moved back to Sydney for the first time since he left high school. He is more than surprised to discover he has a daughter, never dreaming that Christina would defy her father and have the child. And yet he is proud that his daughter is planning to follow in his footsteps and study law at university.

John Barton [Matthew Newton] is the Captain of a neighbouring private boy’s school. He is a young man who appears to have it all with his future life mapped out in politics by his father, but that pressure on top of his HSC is a lot for anyone to handle. Jacob Coote [Kick Gurry] is the irreverent Captain of the local public school, he’s as far from what he perceives Josie’s world to be — and yet closer than he imagines.

Josie world at first appears to be dominated by her traditional grandmother, Katia, her every move watched and monitored by her grandmother’s personal Mafia of cronies. But instead of being the downtrodden child she follows in the Alibrandi tradition of strong-minded women and makes her own way in the world, even though everything she knows and understands is constantly changing.

Possessed of a quick wit — like her mother — that serves Josie well as a debater, her wicked temper [like her father] gets her in trouble when she breaks Carly Bishop’s nose. The fight serving to bring Josie and her father, Michael Andretti, together in something other than a slanging match. Unfortunately the reunion of Josie and Michael is a little too easy, but that appears to be the only slip in the story.

The casting is wonderfully fitting for the characters and the direction by Kate Woods serves to bring out their best. All of the actors are perfectly cast. Notable performances come from Matthew Newton — son of Australia television icon Bert Newton — as the epitome of all Josie aspires to be and Elena Cotta as the traditionally valued Italian, both characters carry secrets which more often than not shown without the need for dialogue. Pia Miranda deservedly won an AFI Award for her lead role as the determined Josie Alibrandi, as did Greta Scacchi for her role as Josie’s mother.

The locations around inner city and suburban Sydney are well chosen and create a perfect backdrop for the story, fortunately without the addition of twee tourist icons which would have made the film distracting to a foreign audience. The music is well chosen and brings a vital sense of mood to the film.

Looking for Alibrandi is a great coming of age drama which may well be overlooked as a film aimed solely at teen girls due to the subject matter, which would be a shame as it’s a gem of a film that will be remember fondly.

Sylvester Stallone may bring, Rambo, his one-man army out of retirement and send him back into Afghanistan 13 years after his last mission

Warner Bros, the makers of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, were accused by one of the film’s stars, Zoe Wanamaker, of penny-pinching with the mostly British cast

The theft of props from the set of the Harry Potter film is being investigated by police after items were put up for sale on the internet

It may come as no surprise that Keanu Reeves isn’t exactly motivated by money. He has even signed away a sizeable back-end deal for two Matrix sequels, handing over his valuable profit-sharing points to the franchise’s special-effects and costume-design team

Graeme Shirley Strachan, the rock singer and television personality, was killed yesterday when the helicopter he was flying solo crashed into a cliff face in the hinterland of the Sunshine Coast

Mick Jagger was said to be fuming after a picture of the ageing Rolling Stone was used for the front cover of a British seniors’ magazine, Saga