With a dialogue-heavy screenplay, and controversial subject matter, Doubt is not a film for everyone. However, John Patrick Shanley’s adaptation of his award-winning play is nothing short of compelling.

Leonard Cohen is a funny man. Small, 74 years-old and with a voice that could make even The Wiggles’ songs sound prophetic, he shouldn’t be skipping on and off stages and blaming cheerfulness for a lack of religiosity. And he most certainly shouldn’t have 20 year-old girls heckling that he’s cute. But bowing his head onstage to a crowd of 7000, gathered atop the hills of the Hunter Valley for A Day on the Green, this was the L. Cohen we got (and loved).

Ben Lee is going back to uni this February. However, when he returns to Australia for the Big O tour, he’ll be on unfamiliar turf. “I did two weeks, [of uni and] I had my fill,” says the unapologetic singer-songwriter. “I was doing communications, but then I got an idea for an album.”
Lee never looked [...]

David Williamson’s The Removalists is a bleak but darkly funny play. The Sydney Theatre Company production manages to extract a lot of black humour from amongst the violence, hypocrisy and verbal abuse.

After years of being missing in action a man climbs his way back into the spotlight. This is the tale of both Mickey Rourke and the character he portrays with such passion in The Wrestler, the latest film from director Darren Aronofsky.

Three years in the wilderness and Scotland’s Franz Ferdinand is back with Tonight, the Archduke namesake’s third record that involved a failed dalliance with Girls Aloud’s production team and apparent dabbling with African influences.

If you’re reading this right now, it means that you actually like Vertigo enough to bother reading our blog so a big thumbs up to you. And in the spirit of appreciation, we’re going to be offering you interesting titbits about upcoming bands, shows, free stuff, pretty things and a whole heap of crazy right here on our blog.

You might not know Yves Klein Blue but chances are you’ve heard their song Polka. Fresh off the Big O Tour, Michael Tomlinson (vocals/guitar) chats to Donna Yan about LA, drugs and the colour blue.

You can’t have The Big O without The Music. The 2009 Big O tour, which kicks off later in the month, will herald the return to Australia of UK indie-rock foursome, The Music. Sophie Jeliba spoke with bassist Stuart Coleman on the eve of the bands own orientation to Australia’s unis.
Q: What did you guys [...]

Quick-witted and disarmingly honest, the Hon. Michael Kirby recently sat down with Bonita Silva and Jade Tyrrell to reflect on his legal career and talk student politics, love, and feminism in his last interview as a justice of the High Court of Australia.