iBook
Like last year’s iMac, the new iBook represents Apple’s latest attempt to charm its way back to the consumer and education markets. Behind the apparently frivolous exterior _ available in blueberry or tangerine — is an extremely fast G3 3OOMhz processor, 3.2 Gb Hard Disk and wireless networking technology, called AirPort, that allows the user to wander around the office, home or school while connected to the internet. With a top of the range display and six-hours battery life, expect to see this machine draped casually around desks to give an office a ’we’re with it’ sheen.
The iBook will be available at the end of September, priced around £ 7,249 plus vat. For details call the Apple Centre 0870 600 6070
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Your Friends And Neighbours
Neil LaBute's debut film In The Company Of Men showed the nastier traits of the male of the species. Here, he relishes portraying friends who loathe each other and neighbours who love thyselves. Jason Patric, F “SMWM Catherine Keener, Ben Stiller and “"‘V‘HAL "4mm comic
Nastassia Kinski bitch, bonk and J abomfg-«aiii-‘IEW'YyIMW @ betray their way through life in a
game which can only be described as survival of the shittiest. There
seems to be a strain of this sadistically funny kind of thing speWing forth from north America these days. One of the last places you would want to be is in any kind of a room with LaBute and Todd Happiness Solondz.
Your Friends And Neighbours is available to rent on Universal now.
123 THE “ST 19—26 Aug 1999
. .5. YourFriéfia
Neighbors
GII.
Pulling into the Wild West on the flu express from Edinburgh, I surveyed my fellow passengers. A stray Martian on an away-day break from the outer spheres could surmise that we‘re all currently labouring under the oppressive bulk of August. Hollow-eyed arts administrators croak gossamer excuses into mobiles, while Barbour-clad Canadians scrabble frantically for the door and a return trip to the capital they have mistakenly left. Neatly sidestepping stray tumbleweed and packs of neon knapsacked mid-Europeans, I dive into an all-too-available taxi and watch the frontierland speed by.
For one month of every year, Glasgow dons its artistic diVing suit and plumbs the depths of the capital’s hotspots. West coast reSidents are left only With an overwhelming feeling of making do With entertainment methadone
finds a Festival alternative
ILLS
books Quoasis for a third sell-out run.
5. Hundreds of vultures pick at the bones of Kaddish and are wowed by men in wellies. Hundreds of Glaswegians queue round the block for the two-for- one offered on Tartan Bhangra and make whoopee to the strains of Lily Savage in Annie.
6.Whi|e the Gilded Balloon shakes With mirth at the collected Witticisms of the comedy Circuit, a lone man stands in Glasgow Central shouting abstract punchlines to a bran tub of characters assembled from the surplus cast of the Day Of The Dead.
7. Queues form round the Cowgate to hear two office girls Sing rugby tunes. Queues form up Sauchiehall Street to Witness Fat Elsie’s Karaoke comeback in the Dog and Strumpet.
8. Literary behemoths assemble to read from their collected oeuvres and inVite discussion about the central themes inherent in Scottish writing. The Evening Times serialises Alex Ferguson's autobiography and Borders inVites us all to meet
During August, the normal lines of cultural combat perform a dramatic 180 degree turn
while Edinburgh trances out on intellectual herom.
Unless I'm prepared to endure the nightly tradition of drinking until the last train home, I have to find some reasons not to follow the herds of the culturally disenfranchised and leave the Dead Zone for a month. Given that this is August, a period steeped in mid-year we/tsmertz and an over-riding sense of laissez faire, l have deCided to compile a list.
1. Edinburgh offers us trained street performers and a Visually stunning collection of novelty headgear. Glasgow weighs in With SO-year-old naWies in their dead dad's sUits.
2. While Edinburgh pubs conduct sterling trade in half pints of Old Dock's Cock for curious, khaki-clad t0urists, Glaswegians snort tequila, shoot up Tennents and dance on the grave of the single malt.
3. As hundreds of A-Listers beat a path to the Bresson retrospective, Glasgow inVites Grant Stott to the opening of Wild Wild West.
4. The orchestras of the world descend on Lothian Road for a multi-stringed Jam. Glasgow
Marc Almond.
9. Edinburgh unveils its multi- million pound Festival Hub packed to the gunnels With creative endeavour and feverish initiative. Glasgow levels a landmark and builds an altar to Saint Buchanan of the Consumer Galleries.
10. Edinburgh consumes culture. Glasgow consumes burgers.
So there we have it. For eleven months of the year, Glaswegians can sup from the cup of enlightenment and party like it's the Year of Architecture. But during August, the normal lines of cultural combat perform a dramatic 180 degree turn and the delicate creative balance weighs heaVily in favour of the capital. And there’s nothing we can do about it. Two tickets for Stars Of Neighbours On Ice please.
Gill Mills co-presents Radio 1’s Evening Session opt- out, Session In Scotland, every Thu, 8—10pm; co- hosts The Loafers on BBC Choice, Tue-Fri, 10pm; and presents Hot Pursuits on BBC Knowledge, Radio Scotland.