DARK DAYS ON SCREEN
By Peter Wilhelm
The Golden Nude Oscar - annually awarded to the Best Performance By An Arse - goes to Viggo Mortensen in A History of Violence. What particularly distinguishes Mortensen's rump is its ability to climb stairs in pursuit of Maria Bello's a...

KNOCKOUT DROPS
By Neil Pendock
The Santé Classic Wine Trophy Competition, now in its eighth year, is an oddball in the extensive calendar of SA wine shows. As the name implies, it seeks to reward "classic" - that is, French - wine styles where balance and elegance are hon...

DID YOU HEAR ?

"Birth flu claims 9th Indonesian," declared the online poster for one of News24.com's top international stories last week. So, a new disease scare joins the looming bird flu crisis. A radio ad for SABC TV soap opera Isidingo urges y...

BERTH CONTROL
By David Furlonger
Thank goodness I don't suffer from agoraphobia. During the few days I drove the latest Renault Espace, its cavernous interior left me feeling almost as if I were alone in the world. It's hard to imagine that some people find it cramped. But they d...

COWBOYS IN CAMEL LAND
By David Furlonger
Too late, the driver of the open-top Jeep Wrangler realised he had misjudged the steepness of the huge sand-dune. With a sense of inevitability, he and his passenger held on tight as the vehicle rolled over and over down the soft sand before co...

HAUNTED BY HODGE
By David Williams
Hodge: it is a flat and uninspiring name, easy to underestimate, not as common as Smith, Brown, Botha or Williams, but as boring. Thomas Hardy wrote a poem about "Drummer Hodge", killed in the Anglo-Boer war, destined to rest forever und...

PLAY IT AGAIN, SAM
By Justice Malala
Tis, indeed, the season to be merry. You can see it by the huge wads of supermarket specials that come with the newspapers. So thick...

A LITTLE LET DOWN
By Michael Coulson
Phokela so raised our expectations by making such a great impression in his previous show - with his beautifully painted African takes on the Old Masters - that his latest offerings are doubly disappointing. Significantly, the only really ...

DIG THIS SCOOP
By Don Albert
Santa Claus must be a jazz enthusiast. He has made sure that one of the most important discoveries in jazz history has taken place just in time for Christmas. In 1957, Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane played in a concert at Carnegie Hall. I...