Melbourne on a White Night (Part 2)

Last post, I described the first part of our evening exploring Melbourne's first White Night festival. The adventure continues...

After we left the NGV we headed back across the Yarra River via Princes Bridge. This sturdy old thoroughfare was decorated with solid letters spelling out "WHITE NIGHT", being progressively decorated by artists as the night wore on:

The intersection of Swanston and Flinders Streets, though a vast expanse, was almost completely full of people listening to music played on a temporary stage. The musicians were performing "under the clocks" of Flinders Street Station, the time-honoured Melburnian meeting place, while the building's facade flickered with impressive illuminations:

Across the intersection we were surprised to find a relatively unpopulated space, the car park in front of the Chapter House next to St Paul's Cathedral. It was a brilliant place to pause, as the building was the screen for a dynamic series of animations which were tightly mapped to its facade. I shot a short sequence - check it out below:

The station and the Chapter House were the prelude to what the White Night organisers called Wonderland, "evoking memories of grand illuminations and re-imagined carnivals". The name was a fair call, as every single building on the north side of Flinders Street toward Russell Street had its own set of changing projections:

Best of all was the ornate 1920s Forum Theatre on the Russell Street corner. While waiting in a queue for a burger truck which closed for restocking when we were second from the front (sigh), I took these shots:

We ate pizzas at a cafe in Federation Square, and were impressed with how prompt the service was at 2am. That was something we noticed all night - officials running things and staff serving food and drink were friendly and efficient. It was impressive, given the stress that must have been caused by the unexpectedly large crowds.

Crossing the Flinders/Swanston intersection at 2.30am was much more difficult than it had been an hour or two earlier, because popular local band The Cat Empire was on stage by then. This was the only time I thought the crowds were a potential hazard, as the area was now packed tight with bodies and it wasn't hard to imagine someone getting trampled in a panic.

But we made it across, stood for a few minutes to take in the music (the acoustics were terrible), then decided to move on up Swanston Street. At City Square, there was an entertaining show involving both "interactive shadows" and the general public:

We finished watching the shadows, then realised we were very very tired and weren't going to make it to dawn. So we walked back to our apartment, the happy crowds thinning as we reached Elizabeth Street, and went to bed.

Melbourne's first White Night had been a great experience; I often found my thoughts wandering back to it over the next few days. There were obviously issues involving space and crowds which would have to be worked out for its next occurrence, but most people agreed it had been a huge success.

What made it special wasn't just the conjunction of unconventional art with an unconventional all-night timeslot. It was above all the vibe, the friendly, enthusiastic, joyous mood that coursed through the crowds all night. I've always found Melbourne an unusually positive city for whatever reason (there's a PhD waiting for someone on that topic), and here was that positivity again on display.

It was a great night. Can't wait for White Night 2014.

An official date for Melbourne's next White Night has yet to be set, but will likely be the final Saturday in February 2014. Check the White Night website closer to the date.

Melbourne on a White Night (Part 1)

On 23 February 2013, Melbourne held its first White Night. Based on the model established by Paris' Nuit Blanche back in 2002, the one-night festival ran from 7pm to 7am in the heart of the city. Along the main streets and laneways were bands, illuminations, exhibitions, and over 300,000 people enjoying it all.

The numbers surprised everyone, frankly. Melbourne has always been a city in which people turn out for events, but this first White Night had been put together on short notice and faced challenges in getting the word out over the holiday period after Xmas.

I'd heard they were hopeful that 100,000 might turn up; that attendance was over three times that was a great tribute to the city's love of the arts.

As it had been a hot humid day, Narrelle and I decided not to venture out onto the streets until 9pm, after the sun had set. The first hint we had that the attendance was going to be impressive was when we crossed Flinders Street on the western edge of the White Night zone:

We walked under the train station past a series of screens playing video of artists discussing the crumbling interior of Flinders Street Station, then joined a multitude on the pedestrian bridge across the Yarra River, some looking west toward large white balls onto which were projected short messages of love submitted by the public.

I did find myself idly wondering how many people the bridge had been designed to carry, but it held up all right. Looking east, we could see the big White Night sign on Princes Bridge:

Given the crowds, we decided to bypass the core of the event and start at the Arts Centre on the river's south bank. Miraculously managing to score two wicker chairs at the cafe in the forecourt, we awaited the coming of Joey at 10.30pm. The huge puppet horse from the War Horse production at the Arts Centre was scheduled to make a one-off appearance in the forecourt, and it was an impressive one.

People crowded close to the "horse", smiling and taking photos. What was remarkable was how convincing it was as an animal even up close; whenever it reared or neighed, we flinched as if it might panic and trample us. Our brains knew it wasn't real, but our emotions had their own ideas.

Here's some video I shot as Joey returned from his circuit through the forecourt:

Next stop was the National Gallery of Victoria's international branch, right on the southern edge of the White Night zone. There were big crowds here, but movement was relatively easy and there were some great things to see.

On the outside of the building were rolling projections depicting famous works from the NGV's collections...

... inside the entrance was a relaxed zone where people could draw comic books...

... and within the Great Hall beneath Leonard French's famous kaleidoscopic ceiling, this huge temporary structure of foam by Michel Blazy was immensely popular. So popular, in fact, that the rowdier element within the crowd were pressing against the barriers and grabbing handfuls of the sticky stuff. Oh well, the night was supposed to be about interaction with art.

A wave at the odd guy seen below, and we were out into the night...

It was well past midnight now - surely that'd mean that many people would head home on the last trains of the night and the crowds would thin a little? We would soon find out...

NEXT POST: A visit to Wonderland, Fed Square in the wee hours, the Cat Empire crush and shadow play like you've never seen it before.

An official date for Melbourne's White Night in 2014 has yet to be set, but will likely be the final Saturday night in February. Check the White Night website closer to the date.

Bruny Express

It may not have escaped your notice that I'm an urban kinda travel writer. Culture, history, food... that's my beat. I generally leave adventure and nature travel to those of my colleagues who are better qualified than I to tackle that kind of thing.

However, I certainly don't mind getting out into nature should it call (so to speak), so on Sunday Narrelle and I joined the award-wining eco-cruise on Bruny Island, south of Hobart, Tasmania, which is operated by Rob Pennicott's Bruny Island Cruises.

There are some impressive vistas along the way, and we were lucky to have a calm sunny day on which to see them.

The cruise leaves Adventure Bay (named after the ship of Furneaux, the British captain who visited in 1773), and follows the rugged eastern coastline of South Bruny, an unpopulated area that'd be difficult to access any other way.

Once out of the harbour and sailing down the coast with the Tasman Sea to port, things quickly become spectacular. These cliffs with their geometric projections reminded us both of the Lord of the Rings movies, looking as if they'd been carved by an ancient civilisation:

Nearby, this rock formation gives the same impression. It's known as the Monument, and as a crew member pointed out it looks very much like a king riding a llama:

The cruise company's boats are powerful and manoeuvrable, so we were able to roar safely between the Monument and the rocky shore. Twice, in fact; I filmed it the second time:

There were lots more quirky geological features on the way. This "blow cave", for example, from which water would periodically erupt as it moved back and forth within a cave whose roof lay just above the surface:

And larger caves through the rock, which looked as if they should lead to a James Bond villain's lair:

I liked these colours too, another example of nature producing something so regular that it looked like a manmade pattern:

The highlight of the cruise, though, was our encounter with a more mobile aspect of nature: seals. As we left the Tasman Sea and officially entered the Southern Ocean, we met this big seal colony spread over various rocks and islets. As always to my mind, they resembled Labradors of the sea:

As we left them to their rollicking day in the sunshine and water, this group seemed to be waving goodbye. According to a crew member, the animals project their fins this way in order to regulate body temperature. Au revoir, mes finny amis:

I was very impressed with the cruise, as there was plenty to see with no dull patches. The boats were a decent size and clearly powerful, allowing adventurous speed while being completely under control. The crew seemed capable and knowledgeable, expert but also mindful of safety; reassuring for such a broad group of passengers, including one lady in her 80s which the crew were at pains to assist on and off the boat safely.

As the cruise can be undertaken as a day trip from Hobart, with buses picking up passengers from the city's dockside and lunch included, it's a great activity to tack onto a trip to the Tasmanian capital. High culture at MONA one day, perhaps; then seals and the rugged coast of Bruny Island the next.

If you're staying in Hobart, the contemporary apartment-style rooms of the new Salamanca Wharf Hotel are walking distance from the cruise's pick-up point.

You can also join the cruise if visiting Bruny under your own steam. If you're thinking of staying on the island, Adventure Bay Retreat is comfortable accommodation set back from the coast a short distance from the cruise office. Here's a pic:

Aside from the upmarket interior, we saw wallabies grazing in our front yard every morning and evening we stayed there; including one of the island's unusual white wallabies. Bonus.

Disclosure time... On this trip I travelled courtesy of the Salamanca Wharf Hotel, Adventure Bay Retreat, Bruny Island Cruises and Tourism Tasmania.

The Unpublished 13: MONA - Wild Art in Hobart (Part 2)

Continuing from the first part of my profile of the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA) in Hobart, Tasmania, which I visited in 2011...

Truck Corridor, by
James Angus

We notice as we walk that MONA’s visitors often engage in conversation with each other as they puzzle out each piece, and we get chatting with several fellow attendees.

It may be via the general sense of irreverence or just the fact that we don’t each need to stare at a patch of notes on the wall, but there’s definitely a greater sense of interaction here than in a standard white-walls gallery.

We also notice a lot of family groups taking in the exhibits. Though MONA does provide a recommended child-friendly path through the gallery, it seems that most adults are happy to have their kids see everything and talk about it as they go; which seems a sensible approach to me.

There are plenty of pieces that work perfectly with children’s lively imaginations in any case. The brilliant Truck Corridor appears to be a full-size Mack truck, wedged tight into a corridor and only visible from front and rear.  

Babylonia looks like an enormous rock, but is entered to reveal a miniature hotel corridor with locked doors emitting mysterious sounds. White Library is a fascinating room filled with dozens of completely blank white books and magazines, stacked in shelves and on tables.

White Library, by Wilfredo Prieto

Another remarkable exhibit – one which visitors have to queue for – is held within a dimly lit room centred on an artificial island surrounded by a shallow ornamental lake. On the island are two cabinets. The one on the left houses an ancient mummy, while the one on the right projects a digital image of the mummy, which gradually dissolves to reveal an X-ray of the skeletal form within.

It’s absorbing stuff – but visitors do not live on art alone, and we decide to have a break for lunch. Before the gallery was established, the site’s Moorilla Estate was a noted winery and brewery, and you can still enjoy its products in The Source restaurant in the main above-ground building.

However, we opt for the more informal setting of The Wine Bar, which has a pleasant view across lawns where concerts are sometimes staged.

The menu is a short list of classy dishes which could easily work as sharing plates. Some of the choices today are duck and orange salad; house-cured tuna; and sweet potato, cashew and apricot salad. It’s tasty food, imaginatively served.

Lunch at The Wine Bar, MONA

The beer list is as long as the food menu is short, covering 70 brews with a dozen on tap. I order one of Moorilla’s own beers, the Moo Brew Pale Ale; it’s hoppy and refreshing on a warm day.

There’s much more to see back at MONA, but for the moment we’re enjoying the contrast between the low-light world of challenging art and the sunlit, scenic world up above. Art matched with good food and drink seems the perfect combination, and we have plenty to talk about as we mull over the works we’ve seen.

Somehow, sitting here at lunch amplifies the impression of being the absent Walsh’s guests. From his eccentric art notes to this fine place to eat and relax, his presence seems to be unavoidable.

Back in MONA, I spot a brightly painted wheel which hangs above the floor, slowly spinning. It turns out to be a work by the famed British artist Damien Hirst. In the O, Walsh’s note about this work reads “I really like it now. Maybe I’m just trying to avoid facing up to the fact that I’ve blown half a million bucks”.

If so, that was half a million bucks well blown. Not to mention the rest.

Disclosure time... on this trip I was hosted by Tourism Tasmania.

The Unpublished 13: MONA - Wild Art in Hobart (Part 1)

In 2011 I visited the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA) in Hobart, Tasmania for the first time. It was only a few months old, but would soon rocket up the charts to become the island state's most popular tourist attraction. 

After the visit, I wrote this profile of the amazing gallery and its exhibits. However, the magazine which had requested it had accidentally requested the same coverage from another writer. I managed to incorporate the heart of my work in another article, but the original has never been published. Until now...

MONA, as seen from an approaching ferry

What do you do  if you’re an eccentric mathematical genius who’s made millions by designing successful gambling systems? Live the high life on the French Riviera? Or return to your roots and open a vast new modern art museum in the northern suburbs of Hobart?

It’s this thought that passes through my mind as my wife Narrelle and I sit on the deck of the ferry that’s taking us from Hobart’s CBD to the Museum of Old and New Art. 

MONA is the brainchild of David Walsh, a self-made gambling millionaire who’s beholden to no government grants. As a result, his contemporary art museum beneath a promontory in the Derwent River is packed with an eclectic collection of works that would startle any conservative state-run gallery director.

The lowest level of the gallery

I’m really looking forward to getting inside and seeing what the fuss is about. Since it opened in 2011, MONA has had locals and visitors to the slow-paced Tasmanian capital in a buzz, with reports of outlandish objects and fascinating concepts. Now we’re about to see it for ourselves.

This ferry trip seems a great way to get into the right mood. The passengers are a happy group of art lovers on a day out, enjoying the views along the broad river on a warm and sunny day. Even when we pass an enormous refinery halfway along, it feels as if we’re taking in a complex piece of industrial-themed art.

Then we’re at MONA’s dock beneath a rugged headland, climbing the steps to the entrance. There’s not much to see at this point, oddly, just a door framed by reflective metal sheets, approached by walking across a fake tennis court. Reportedly Walsh specifically ordered this low-key approach, rather than an intimidating lofty facade.

The view over the river is beautiful from this point – but we’re heading down, to the bulk of the gallery within the hillside.

A spiral staircase takes us down a circular liftwell, through millennia of exposed sandstone. At the bottom, a corridor flanked by high stone walls feels like the entrance to a tomb. We’re already impressed, and we haven’t even seen any art yet.

Bit.fall, by Julius Popp

It’s not far away. Nearby are a number of works of varying sizes and concepts, including Bit.fall, a fountain from which timed bursts of water spell words which then stretch and fall to the ground below; III Crossing, a video installation in which a giant hand moves pedestrians and cars about a busy intersection; and the amazing Loop System Quintet, five enormous machines with arms mechanically rotating in patterns, each arm topped with a single light bulb.

There’s also the memorable Locus Focus, installed within one of MONA’s toilet cubicles. It’s a functional facility equipped with mirrors which enable startlingly intimate views while sitting on the loo.

Loop System Quintet, by Conrad Shawcross

Given the diversity in size and shape of these works, and the relatively low-lit environment, the usual system of descriptive notes on gallery walls might not cut it. In place of this is “The O”, a customized iPod Touch with which each visitor is issued upon entry.

On the press of a single button, this clever device senses the holder’s location in the museum and displays details of the closest works. It’s a clever idea, freeing the viewer from the necessity of hunting down wall notation and peering at it in low light.

The O offers multiple choices of information about each work – there may be an audio interview with the artist, the usual academic notes, and some short sharp remarks designed to provoke thought. Under the “Gonzo” category, there’s input by Walsh himself, amusing meanderings which occasionally contradict the other notes or even complain about the art.

It may sound absurd, but in practice the device invokes a sense of playful humour, making the art fun...

NEXT: The wild exhibits continue, including Truck Corridor, Babylonia, White Library and a pair of mummies in a dark wet room (!).

Disclosure time... on this trip I was hosted by Tourism Tasmania.

The Long & Winding Dollar: Saving Money While Travelling

The foldable bowl... budget saving magic.

“I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move.”

When Robert Louis Stevenson wrote this, he was reflecting on his two-week trek by donkey through the Cévennes mountains of France.

But who knows what his expenses were? Travelling for the sake of travel is great, but you can do so much more of it if you can make your money go further – and most 21st century travellers have many more expenses than donkey feed.

Drawing on my own travel experiences, here’s a baker’s dozen of tips on stretching your travel budget:

1. Pack light. The obvious benefit of taking minimal baggage is mobility, but it also saves cash. For a start, budget airlines normally charge more for luggage stored in the hold. Secondly, if you only have a small pack you can save money on taxis by walking or catching public transport. For more details, check out my post last year on how I pack ever so lightly.

2. Plan ahead with transport bookings. Inevitably, flights become more expensive the closer you are to the date you want to fly. I remember one time I had to book a flight from Kraków to London just a week before, and it was cheaper to fly British Airways than the usual budget carriers. And that wasn’t cheap at all, either. The same applies to train fares, especially in the UK.

3. Check out transport passes. There are a number of good-value rail passes which can only be bought outside that country before arrival, which can then save stacks of money if travelling frequently. The BritRail Pass, for example, is only available to non-Brits before arrival. The venerable Eurail Pass, by comparison, can be bought in Europe but at a 20% mark-up. Much better to buy before you go.

4. Catch local trains rather than international. In Europe, international trains tend to be pricey. A way of saving money is to catch a cheaper local train to the border or just beyond, then switch to a local train in the new country. Fiddly, but saves €€€.

5. Buy a local SIM card with plenty of data. Everyone should know this by now, but you should never be tempted to use your smartphone’s data roaming capabilities while overseas. Telstra, Australia’s biggest telco, charges about $15 per MB while you’re roaming; to put that in scarier context, that’s $15,000 per GB – about the size of the average movie download.

Instead, drop into a local telco when you arrive in a new country and ask for a SIM card with plenty of data allowance, or pick one up before you go from a local company which imports them. It's well worth doing this when visiting Australia in particular, as free wi-fi is not so common here.

6. Get a stored-value cash card loaded with foreign currency. You can obtain one of these from a bank before you go, rather than withdrawing cash via your credit card once there. Although withdrawals from these cards still attract fees, they’re generally much lower and easier to understand than the fees charged on credit card withdrawals.

7. Take advantage of tax-back schemes. Some countries allow travellers to recoup the tax they’ve paid in the country while visiting or working, subject to various rules and limits.

8. Take out travel insurance. I know, it’s counter-intuitive – insurance costs money. But it can save you a truckload of expenses if you should be robbed or injured. Insure yourself with a company with a good track record, and check the fine print first to make sure the cover is what it seems to be.

9. Haggle (if it’s part of the local culture). In plenty of countries, the locals are happy to negotiate the prices of goods. But you should only haggle if you’re serious about reaching agreement and buying the thing, and you should always remain good-humoured during the process.

10. Aim for the free days. Sometimes local museums will have a day of the week when entry is free (this is common in Poland, for example). It does mean you’ll be there in the company of a crowd, but it’ll save you money.

11. Eat standing up. In some places, restaurant dining is vastly more expensive than eating at a street stall. When we first visited Berlin in the 1990s on a tight budget, I remember living off stand-up kebabs.

12. Shop at supermarkets. An obvious one – you can save plenty of money by self-catering. And while you’re there, pick up some muesli for use with my final tip…

13. Buy a fold-up plastic bowl. Camping stores sell these origami-like sheets of plastic, which magically fold and tuck to form a usable bowl [pictured above]. I carry one of these flat in my backpack (with a lightweight spoon), for those days when I’m exhausted by nightfall and just want to eat something quick and easy in my hotel room. It’s brilliant.

This post was sponsored by Taxback.com. Visit its site for information about how to apply for tax refunds after you've been working in Australia.

Warrnambool Attacks! Part 2: Cyborgs & Aliens

In last week's post, I was walking through the Invasion exhibition in Warrnambool, Australia, when I turned around to be confronted by a shiny metal head with glowing red eyes...

... which was, of course, from the Terminator series of films and TV programs. No matter how fictional, still scary up close:

Around the corner in a darker room, I'd entered alien territory. Here's the Predator:

... and in the room beyond that, an Ood from Doctor Who. They look vaguely as if they could be related, don't they?

Next to the Ood, my favourite TV science fiction villain of all time: a Dalek. My earliest distinct memory of watching Doctor Who is the 1960s Patrick Troughton story The Evil of the Daleks, which featured a Dalek civil war in glorious monochrome. What's particularly interesting about the Daleks is that though they look robotic, they contain an evil blobby organic creature and thus are cyborgs.

Nearby was a future inhabitant of our own planet, from the 2001 remake of Planet of the Apes:

Within a case was one of the prosthetic skulls used to turn actors into aliens in the excellent TV series Alien Nation (again, for some reason, I'm thinking of the Ood):

Also on the cyborg list was Jean-Luc Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation, at a difficult time in his career when he'd been re-engineered by the Borg. Looks like he'd be accepted into the gritty 1970s British TV series Blake's 7, no questions asked:

Finally, we peered through glass at this model of the robot from Fritz Lang's 1927 movie masterpiece Metropolis. It seemed somehow fitting that we should finish our journey back through time with one of the first cinematic robots:

Disclosure time... on this trip I was hosted by Warrnambool Tourism and V/Line. The Invasion exhibition continues at the Warrnambool Art Gallery, 26 Liebig St, Warrnambool, until 28 January 2013. Entry: adult $15, child $7.50. Warrnambool can be reached by V/Line trains from Melbourne and Geelong.

Warrnambool Attacks! Part 1: Robots & Spacesuits

You may have heard that the US government recently declined a petition to construct a fully operational Death Star (spoilsports).

However, at an entirely different official level, the city of Warrnambool in southwestern Victoria, Australia, is proudly displaying an image of the partly-built orbital death machine from the Star Wars movies on its art gallery wall:

Rather unexpectedly, this coastal city three hours from Melbourne has found itself the exclusive Australian showcase for Invasion, an exhibition of science fiction costumes and props gathered from a wide range of TV shows and movies.

This temporary recasting of the Warrnambool Art Gallery as a science fiction hotspot was the brainchild of gallery director John Cunningham. Adopting the philosophy of "Why not?", Cunningham made contact with the Ideas Museum of Movie Magic in Falkirk, Scotland and asked if he could ship one of their travelling exhibitions a bit (well, a lot) further than usual.

The result is a strange and stimulating array of costumes, with the odd prop among them, encountered past this charming gent from Mars Attacks:

As I inspected the exhibits, I realised there were more replicas than original items among them, though often the replicas had been used by the original filmmakers to promote the finished product. That was the case with this model of Iron Man, used to publicise the first movie featuring the superhero:

Further on I spotted the B9 Robot from the original Lost in Space TV series, generally just known as "Robot" when addressed by young Will, or as "You ninny!" by the simperingly evil Dr Smith. The relationship between the three of them made the show, which otherwise was noted for its forgettable storylines and bland characters.

To keep with the Lost in Space theme, this suit was worn by Matt Le Blanc (of Friends fame) in the 1998 movie. Judging by the suit, he's shorter than he looks on the telly.

These next exhibits demonstrated the eclectic range of the Invasion collection. In the foreground was the shimmery uniform worn by the Arnold Rimmer character in the Red Dwarf episode Holoship (one of my favourites). At the rear was an odd-looking "nude" version of the android Kryten which apparently appeared in the very forgettable Season VIII of Red Dwarf.

My notes fail me here, but I believe this was a replica of the Forbidden Planet movie robot, Robby:

At the far end of the room, in an area by itself, was the gem of the collection - this authentic early version of the Darth Vader costume, in which the villain's helmet was crafted from black perspex. Behind him is a matching stormtrooper:

At this point I was only halfway through the exhibition, pleasantly surprised by both the diversity of costumes and how close one could get in order to examine the detail.

Then I swung around to find a shiny metal head glaring at me with glowing red eyes...

[Cue cliffhanger music from Doctor Who, run credits]

NEXT POST: In the second half of my Invasion review, I face off against aliens and an imaginative array of cyborgs. And Daleks take to the Warrnambool streets!

Disclosure time... on this trip I was hosted by Warrnambool Tourism and V/Line. The Invasion exhibition continues at the Warrnambool Art Gallery, 26 Liebig St, Warrnambool, until 28 January 2013. Entry: adult $15, child $7.50. Warrnambool can be reached by V/Line trains from Melbourne and Geelong.

War Horse Review, Melbourne: Spectacle & Imagination

You've no doubt heard of the theory of persistence of vision, by which the brain threads together images in order to see a smoothly unified world.

Something similar is at work in theatre, I think, where the audience mentally melds non-realistic sets and bold acting into a vibrant, living universe (which might be why stage productions projected later on a screen seem flat).

This wonderful imaginative collaboration between audience and performers is cranked up to 11 by War Horse: a story of the bond between the boy and his horse, which is broken and reforged amid the horror of World War I.

The main drawcard of the show is its complex puppetry, involving full-sized horses which are operated by people within and beside their frames. These are simple marvellous; although the operators are clearly visible, the horses are entirely credible.

This is partly down to design - the horses are supremely flexible, being able to twitch their ears and tails, and move their heads in complex and subtle ways.

Credit must also be ladled on the operators, who imbue their mounts with both small and large details (including sound effects) which make it easy to believe in them. Though counter-intuitive, dressing the puppeteers in period costume rather than all-black works beautifully, and demonstrates a trust in the audience's imagination.

The puppetry and stagecraft are worth the hefty price of a ticket alone, a reminder of how theatre as spectacle can involve more than Hollywood-style special effects on stage.

The story itself is more problematic. Being derived from a 1980s children's book, it's populated with characters formed from broad cultural stereotypes, including larger than life village folk, bluff officers, naive but likeable young Tommies, they're-just-like-us enemy soldiers, etc.

Albert, the boy who pursues his horse to the battlefields of France, is so broadly portrayed that he comes across as a bit simple (but as the character can't read, perhaps that's the idea).

It seems a story pitched at children. But the theatre this night is packed with adults, and the war scenes are so impressively terrifying that I'd hesitate to take a young child along. With tickets ranging from $80 to $130, it'd be a pricey family night out in any case.

Having said that, if you had a kid over, say, ten years old who you wanted to introduce to the imaginative power of theatre, I couldn't think of a better example than War Horse to take them to.

All up, War Horse is a tour de force of puppetry and spectacle, if lacking in plot and character complexity. As with the earlier Lion King stage production, it's a fine example of the ability of theatre to transcend the literal and take a popular story to new creative heights. 

War Horse continues at the Arts Centre Melbourne to 10 March 2013. Bookings online.