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#JESUIS,
ARRIVE
More than ever, we live in a world where we see what an algorithm wants us to see — with points of view and individual stories lost to what clickbaity headers and well-positioned cameras show us. But rather than just talking about it, British dancer Aakash Odedra has developed #JeSuis — a choreographic piece about instability and displacement in the wake of attacks, like Paris in 2015. The performance is led by a group of Turkish dancers Aakash met in Istanbul, with each dancer telling about the struggles of trying to be who you are in places where you are told to be someone else. On Feb 15 and 16 at The Patrick Centre, tickets are £15, with talks including a pre-show-er featuring photographers who travelled with Syrian asylum seekers when the migration crisis was at its most severe.
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LOKI EDGBASTON: 50% BETTER
Loki opens in Edgbaston Village this month, and we've been for a full tour on your behalf. Like in the original Great Western Arcade beauty, there'll be Enomatic wine dispensers, so you can try all the vin rather than bet hard on a particular bottle. Unlike Loki numero uno, there'll be four beers on draft, including a Brum exclusive: Kräusend — an unfiltered Czech lager from Budvar. There'll also be a rotating gin menu, and British focussed deli counter from which we hear the cured duck breast is the pick. In good news for your wallet, from today, top-up a Loki tasting card online or at the Great Western Arcade, and get 50% more to spend when you bring your tasting card and receipt to Loki Edgbaston. So if you buy £100 of credit, you get £150 of spend on anything your tasticles desire at Loki Edgbaston. Full T&C
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DUCK AND WAFFLE AND BIRMINGHAM
The Chef Director of Londinium's Duck & Waffle is bringing his supper club to Harvey Nichols for one evetide. If you're not free on March 23, this is terrible news. For everyone else, Dan Doherty is whipping up slow-cooked lamb shoulder with hot hummus and chickpeas, and we're also hearing a lot about a pistachio and orange blossom cake with rose chantilly. It's £50 to get a spot at Sprout, which includes a cocktail, snacks, mains, a pud and some biccies for the journey home, which'll be a lot quicker than if you were getting back from his London gaff.
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MOVIE PICK: PHANTOM THREAD
The new movie from Paul Thomas Anderson — Daniel Day-Lewis’s last, apparently — is elegant, high-end stuff. Appropriately so, given it’s about an haute couture fashion designer in the Fifties — but it’s no frocks ‘n’ frills frippery. Another one of Anderson’s power games as films (see There Will Be Blood or The Master), with Day-Lewis’s brilliantly named Reynolds Woodcock falling for gawky waitress Vicky Krieps. We’re all set for a familiar narrative of the narcissistic genius burning a relationship as fuel for his art, but that’s not quite how things play out, and the wrestling match for authority between the pair is, in its way, just as intense as There Will Be Blood. It’s a quiet intensity, to be sure — but it does creep up on you; this is one you’ll think about for weeks. Oh, and Day-Lewis is great, of course — but mad props to the relative unknown Krieps for matching him every step of the way.
Times & trailer
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Venue: Ellora; 1661 High Street, Knowle, Solihull, B93 0LL; Website
Choice: Chicken Rezella, but massively menu hacked (£6.50) Chooser: Waiter
Quick recap: The "You Choose" section is all about asking the staff what we should order and then blimming well ordering it, no matter the response. Often the stock reply is a little, erm, vapid. "Everything is good," is the drab dagger to our daredevil hearts. Not at Ellora, though, where our waiter went above and beyond. "Here's what to do," he whispered looking over his shoulder as if, were he caught by the chef bastardising his menu, he'd be ostracised. "Order the Chicken Rezalla, but swap the chicken out for lamb." We were already going in for the high-five when he hit us with what magicians refer to as The Prestige. "And add saag." The result was a vibrant, thick-sauced balti bowl of beautifulness. Peppery greens and reds popping out of the dish, and packing a punch that danced the tango with our smitten tastebuds. It was the antithesis of the "they all come from the same sauce" criticism that so many of us level at curry houses. If we said it tasted authentic we'd be out of our depth, we have no idea, but it was vivacious and snappy and utterly alive with tang and twang. Pre-drinks are recommended at the Ale Rooms and Oktogon (try this gin at the former), but the star of Knowle High Street is this menu hack. Oh and if you don't finish the dish, doggy bag it. It's one of those meals that tastes better the next day. And at £6.50 you're robbing them blind. Worth travelling for. Menu
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