MUSIC

Fine life

[Photo provided to China Daily]

For such a prolific songwriter, it's a bit ironic that Paul Kelly names his new album after the one song he didn't write. Life Is Fine has lyrics by the poet Langston Hughes. That oddity aside, the album maintains the Australian's typically high standards. It showcases Kelly's ability to display depth and range in seemingly effortless fashion. At one end of the musical spectrum, Finally Something Good and Josephina have a light, infectious pop touch, and at the other, My Man's Got a Cold is raw, percussive blues. Numbers such as the rocking Rising Moon and Firewood and Candles reveal Kelly's gift for narrative storytelling, while I Smell Trouble is mesmerizingly evocative. And on Leah: The Sequel, Kelly again looks to another writer, but instead of borrowing words, he uses Roy Orbison's Leah as inspiration for a tale of his own, which turns out to be nearly as beguiling as the original.

MOVIE

By the sea

[Photo provided to China Daily]

US film director Kenneth Lonergan's Oscar-winning, Manchester by the Sea hit Chinese theaters on Aug 25. In the movie, Lonergan creates an improbable protagonist: Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck), a maintenance worker for an apartment complex in suburban Boston, who seems lost somewhere far from his everyday life. Chandler returns home to the seaside upon the sudden death of his brother and the unexpected reality that he has been made the legal guardian of his teenage nephew, Patrick (Lucas Hedgus). For Lee, there are demons here, immense and unrelenting, and the movie comes down to the internal war between the strife devouring him and his burgeoning desire to put it aside for his own happiness and the young man who desperately needs him.