Welcome to GR Online, a series of short-form articles that take aim at the moving target of contemporary culture as it’s whisked along the guide rails of innovations in digital media, globalisation and late-stage capitalism.
Certified flesh
Body horror is a filmic genre, inseparable from cinema and related in particular to the revolution in special effects that began in earnest in the 1960s. The emergence of the Canadian director David Cronenberg was catalytic, heralding as it did a squishy synthesis of big ideas and sweaty latex, a cinematic imaginary unlike anything hitherto labelled ‘horror’. In body horror, corporeality itself constitutes the main source of the uncanny.
Working from home
Not surprisingly, the tradwife movement has been broadly criticised for its conservative sentiments. I agree with these assessments... But much of the discussion in response to the trend also, I think, tends to miss the point. Because if we look closely, we can see that the central concerns of the tradwife movement are indeed feminist concerns.
Fire and finitude
Nobody any more seriously doubts that cigarettes are injurious… What is not well understood by those opposed to smoking is that the danger of cigarettes is not antithetical or even peripheral to their appeal – it is central to it.
Bill’s secrets
Janet was about to discover that Bill was born into a Welsh coal-mining family, most of whom were still alive when she married him – including his mother, living in the Probert family house in Ynyshir. Ynyshir, we learn, is in the Rhondda Fach, South Wales. Apparently Roy simply disappeared from their life at the end of the Second World War.
Notes from a Sunshine City
I feel like our collective relationships with The House™ as a motif changed so much during that time; the housing crisis, lockdown and climate apocalypse were looming large all at once. Personally, I developed this kind of bizarre voyeuristic relationship with the suburbs and houses I passed on my mandated mental-health walks.
Post-apocalyptic parenting
How does one balance raising children with a sense of wonder and innocence in a world that’s just waiting for them to get hot/legal/sign up to the heterodoxy? As their mother I reserve the right to irrevocably damage them. It’s my job to give them some good therapy fodder in case future them have any money to spare after buying future air and water.
Beyond Bluey
What I want to explore instead is a recurring question for Australian producers who are trying to ensure that Australian stories – like Bluey, like Fisk, like Colin – continue to be made. And that question is… What are we good at?
A fair game for all
When a disabled writing student tells me they won’t submit their work for publication because they fear being rejected for not being enough, I always find myself wishing that the publishing industry had the time and empathy to reply more thoroughly to these marginalised voices.
Nothing about us without us
This emphasis on economics erases the very reason the NDIS exists: disabled people. We are more than budget estimates or figures on a spreadsheet. The value of our lives should not and cannot be reduced a monetary figure.
John Williams makes me get something in my eye
With just a few notes I can feel excited, thrilled, scared, sad, melancholy, soaringly happy and optimistic – I could go on. Frankly, I didn’t even know I came with those as factory settings, let alone being able to activate them with a few bars of music.
Motherhood and Madness
Some of us mask our Madness to avoid detection, but hiding takes its toll. Becoming a parent adds layers of complexity to managing one’s mental stasis: it can be terrifying to realise that you are responsible for the health and wellbeing of a tiny, precious human.
Witchy women
The ’90s saw a trend of witchy, occult or otherwise supernatural women on TV. Sabrina was joined by Charmed and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, gracing our screens with characters who took control using abilities unknown to man – and men. These shows formed part of the girl (magic) power movement.
