Category Archives: Regimes

Andrew L. Urban Neighbours from all over gathered after a violent house invasion and wrung their hands. There were 90 of them. They tut-tutted. Shook their heads in disapproval. The invaders were refusing to leave, so the neighbours spoke of … Continue reading →

Andrew L. Urban Q: What do Succession star Brian Cox and Australia’s filmmaker Nadia Tass, of Malcolm* and Amy* fame, have in common? A: Oleg Vidov. Cox narrates Tass’ 97 minute documentary about the late Oleg Borisovich Vidov (1943-2017), once … Continue reading →

Bernardo Bertolucci’s 1970 masterpiece, adapted from the 1951 Alberto Moravia novel is a case study in conformism under a Fascist regime. The film stars Jean-Louis Trintignant as Marcello Clerici, a conformist mid-level Fascist functionary in Mussolini’s Italy who is ordered … Continue reading →

Andrew L. Urban Vladimir Putin is playing his cards in the Ukraine Invasion Stakes as if he held the trump card. A resolute player at the table might well trump that card. On the 2nd anniversary of his invasion of … Continue reading →

The second book by Andrew L. Urban and Chris McLeod to examine Ukraine’s President in the context of the Russian invasion of February 2022, contrasts Zelensky, often at the front line leading his military with Russia’s Vladimir Putin anywhere but … Continue reading →

Andrew L. Urban Brought up in the grunt town of  Kryvyi Rih, a Soviet-looking industrial city in the southeast of Ukraine, a centre of iron mining and metallurgy, Volodymyr Zelensky knew about bullies before he left school. To survive among … Continue reading →

Ukraine’s most popular comedic actor was an unlikely President of his country. And now even more improbably, Volodymyr Zelensky has become the world’s most celebrated statesman. Yet more improbably, the first book about him comes from Australia. Australian authors Andrew L. … Continue reading →

Wearing his now iconic battle green T-shirt, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky was beamed into the Australian Parliament chamber on March 31, 2022, above the heads of the business-wear dressed members and senators filling the seats in respectful anticipation. After the … Continue reading →

Andrew L. Urban All three signatories to the 1994 Budapest Memorandum promising protection for Ukraine against attack in return for Ukraine abandoning all of its nuclear weapons, have failed to abide by that agreement. The Russian Federation most egregiously by … Continue reading →