Good Weekend

Mel Gibson at the Cannes Film Festival this year.

Mel Gibson faces up

The rants and the outbursts have exacted a price, but the Hollywood bad boy says he's ready to get on with life.

Features

East to west

Mourners at the funeral of a man killed in the Istanbul airport attack in June.

Terrorism, an influx of refugees and a leader more sympathetic to Islam are combining to create new tensions in Turkey – and an ancient neighbourhood in Istanbul.

The scientist at sea

Church on the CSIRO research voyage in May. The instruments behind him collect water samples and other information.

Described as the "Don Bradman of sea-level science", John Church's sacking from the CSIRO left many observers gobsmacked. Can we really afford to let him go?

Burden of care

Vanessa Browne with her 22-year-old son Alex, who has Sotos syndrome and requires constant care.

People with intellectual disabilities are a silent minority, often forgotten by a society that finds it too easy to look the other way. Yet their parents face a lifetime commitment.

Now it's my turn

Photos of the Camerons nearly always show them in close physical contact. “We love each other more than ever,” says David.

Until just a few years ago, Samantha Cameron was a high-flying businesswoman earning three times her husband David's salary as Britain's PM. Now that she's left Downing Street, what's next?

A man of one's own

<i>Illustration by Sam Bennett</i>

As sex enters the lives of a teenager and her mother, close bonds are tested and new intimacies formed in unexpected ways.

Within these walls

Hazara refugees from Afghanistan in one of Adele Dumont’s English classes in Auburn, western Sydney.

As an English teacher working at an immigration detention centre, being a 20-something single woman with all-male classes wasn’t the most difficult thing about the job, recalls Adele Dumont.

The freedom fighter who didn't

Williams in the distinctive cap of the French Foreign Legion in Nimes, 2011. He passed the notoriously tough training ...

Jamie Williams decided to take off overseas to fight with Kurdish guerillas in Syria against Islamic State. The Australian government had a different idea.

Race to the edge

Dutee Chand, a sprinter who didn't qualify to compete as a woman due to the presence of high testosterone levels.

Dutee Chand was born a woman, raised as a woman and identifies as a woman. But winning a gold medal led to a legal challenge – and humiliating "gender verification" tests.

The man who made Disney sing again

Alan Menken’s Disney credits include <i>Pocahontas</i>, <i>Aladdin</i>, <i>The Little Mermaid</i>, <i>Beauty and the ...

Alan Menken was instrumental in ushering in a golden age for Disney when he co-composed the songs for 1989's The Little Mermaid. And it all began with a singing, man-eating plant …

Hell Rider

Cody Heffernan clings on to Long Prong, a bull bred by his brother, Brad.

Cody Heffernan has been stomped on, headbutted and thrown like a rag doll by one-tonne bulls. Yet, Heffernan insists, he finds serious beauty in riding these beasts.

Beyond the Hedge

Illustration by Tavis Coburn/The New York Times (supplied image, NO ARCHIVING) GW - July 9 : The Fall of China's Hedge ...

Xu Xiang's secretive trading style helped him achieve staggering returns on the Chinese sharemarket, even as the country's boom turned to bust. Then his extraordinary luck ran out.

Under Pressure

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An international ranking puts Australia's schools in the middle of the pack, way behind many Asian regions – and Finland. But could striving to reach the top signal "the end of joy" for our kids?

The Noongar Warriors

Noongar thumbnail

These Indigenous people from the south-west could field their own AFL team. How did they get to be so good?

Happy pampers

Friends celebrate Jarrah O'Connor's eighth birthday party: the "crazy-popular" trend for pampering at girls' parties ...

Pedicures have replaced pass-the-parcel, high teas trump hide-and-seek: these days, children's birthday parties pump to a very different beat.

The safe room

Dr Alex Wodak, right, and Matt Noffs, pictured here with The Schielestrasse centre's Gabi Becker, have embarked on a ...

In some European cities, drug dealers and addicts are watched over by the police at legal consumption rooms. Could Australia's ice epidemic be contained if we did the same?

The Undoing of Slater and Gordon

Under Andrew Grech's leadership, Slater & Gordon went from taking on the big end of town to being the big end of town. ...

Too big to fail? Andrew Grech transformed an Australian law firm into a sharemarket-listed behemoth - only to see it crash and burn.

Woman on Top

"There is good and bad in ageing. Each age you become reveals a new person you've become."

A trailblazer for feminist heroines on TV and film, Helen Mirren loves shameless women - and Kim Kardashian's butt.

Baby, please don't go

An exceptionally clingy partner or loved one may be suffering from adult separation anxiety disorder.

By constantly hounding a loved one, tracking their every move, sufferers of adult separation anxiety disorder push away the very person they so desperately need.

Secrets of the Brethren

Children with disability are at higher risk of being sexually abused.

Known for its obsession with privacy and its silencing tactics, the Exclusive Brethren has managed to avoid any scrutiny over alleged child sex abuse. Until now.

Milk money

One of the last of Australia’s Greek-Australian-run milk bars; the Olympia’s dilapidated shopfront speaks of a bygone era.

A dusty and decrepit cafe serves as a bizarre living museum that tells the story of Australia’s decades-long love affair with the milk bar.

Just one of the boys

Paul Buhre, now 17, in his bedroom in his Berlin home. “Never enter the room of a teenage boy,” he says. “Even after ...

German teenager Paul Bühre has written a bestseller about the secret life of adolescent boys. According to him, the worst thing on the net is not what you might think it is.

Natural selection

Robinson's <I>Self-portrait with Stunned Mullet</i>, which won the artist his second Archibald Prize in 1995.

Initially, many in the art world didn't quite get the wit and wonder of Queenslander William Robinson's work. Today, the 80-year-old's paintings routinely fetch six-figure sums.

Farewell, Julian

<I>llustration: Bren Luke the illustrationroom.com.au</i>

A bone marrow transplant fails and Lucy Palmer, an Australian journalist, finds herself having to juggle the demands of her young family, the new farm and an adored husband, who is terminally ill.

Recovery effort

Chef Matt Golinski at his Noosa Hinterland home with his dog Duke.

A quiet determination to give back to those who showered him with love helped chef Matt Colinski emerge from the dark shadow of tragedy.

'Good night, husband'

"I now pronounce you husband and husband," said officiant Paulette Roberts as Jim Obergefell, left, and John Arthur are ...

Two young men meet and fall in love. Twenty years later - in tragic circumstances, they marry. It is the start of a battle that will change the face of human rights across the world.

Metal petals

The iron maidens of Babymetal (left to right)  Yuimetal, Su-metal and Moametal.

Move over Metallica ... some youthful Japanese iron maidens are giving the rockin' world of heavy metal a J-pop shake-up.

Apology to Tim Ellis, SC

Apology

Parts of the story "Waters of Doubt" (Good Weekend, May 7) incorrectly described the conduct of the trial and the role played by the prosecutor Tim Ellis, SC, the former Director of Public Prosecutions.

Two Of Us

Modern Guru

Danny Katz

Initial concerns

A recent houseguest carved his name into a favourite tree. I can't ignore it. Any advice?

Amanda Hooton

Amanda Hooton

Save the date

We'd decided to go to Europe for Christmas, and joined a homeswap site.

Adult Education

LIVING

Domestic objects frame the entrance to the dining room which breaks up the linear formality of the marble doorway. The ...

Home: hunter gatherers

A precious collection, honed over years of fossicking, does double duty as an interior-design feature.