Datasets:

BEE-spoke-data

/

fineweb-cinema-100k

like 0

Follow

BEEspoke Data 33

At first blush, Joy Cinema and Pub bears a striking resemblance to classic movie theaters with its intimate lobby, marquee surrounded by neon lights, and 1950s-style cartoon mural behind its concessions stand. However, this cinema differentiates itself from its forebears with a schedule of newly released Hollywood hits, generous pours of frothy microbrews, and occasional 3D features. Evening shows are "minor with parent" unless otherwise specified. As they enter the training circle at Curves, female guests come face-to-face with the smiles of other women. And just as points on a circle share a common distance from the circle's center, workout participants share the experiences of those nearby by trading stations throughout the 30-minute training session. One minute is spent on a piece of strength-training equipment built for feminine frames and designed to work two opposing muscle groups with a single movement. Exercisers then move on to a recovery station, where they run, jog, or dance to maintain heart rates and keep platforms in place during momentary losses of gravity. Cellar Door Wine Tours is located in the heart of the Willamette Valley American Viticultural Area, which encompasses numerous subregions—delineated by climate, soil, and other features—that are known worldwide for their pinot noir. Owners and tour guides Helen Avery and Mark Treick couldn't be more excited about their location, since their relationship is somewhat built on a mutual love of wine: their first date was to a beer and wine festival near Portland, and they moved to Oregon's wine country after their family established their own vineyard. Now, they lead couples and small groups on full-day, half-day, and à la carte tours of boutique wineries, wherein they share their enthusiasm and knowledge of Oregon's wine country and its accompanying food and culture. At The Four Graces Winery, we wanted to make consistently outstanding Pinot Noirs representative of this unique terroir. We are committed to making rich, complex wines where the fruit may be elegantly expressed. The wines are hand-crafted in small lots using traditional techniques coupled with the most modern technology. Oregon Dream Ponies sits surrounded by hillside vineyards and orchards that pose as a serene backdrop for pony rides, horse rides, and special events. The roster includes ponies of varied sizes and ages that ensure kids of all ages can ride comfortably and confidently. While visiting the ranch, children as young as two years old learn how to interact with ponies, how they're groomed, and what they eat. Pony rides hand-led by staff members either at the ranch or during on-location pony parties give children a supervised opportunity to learn to ride. Other sessions allow children to guide ponies through a series of obstacles, from crossing a bridge to trotting over logs to solving complex algebraic equations. After the birth of her first child in 2001, Baby Boot Camp’s founder and certified trainer and spin and Pilates instructor Kristen Horler wanted a postnatal fitness program that didn't require her to leave her baby at the door. Her solution was to start a suit of programs just for new and expecting parents where mothers could bond with their infants while soaking up the support and camaraderie of their peers. During Strollfit sessions, certified trainers and Radio Flyers equipped with outboard motors lead ladies through innovative routines that incorporate baby-filled strollers into yoga, cardio, and strength training. For long-term fitness, coaches encourage aspiring runners to break through the tape during the 5K training program, and Kristen's own Nutrition Solutions teaches the benefits of healthy-eating habits during a four-week program designed by registered dieticians.

Theater company to expand into other states HUNTINGTON -- Derek Hyman smiles and laughs to himself. It doesn't matter how many years they've known him, but there are some community members who have approached him lately and asked him what he's doing now that he's not in the movie theater business. They assume that since the Keith-Albee and Camelot theaters closed, he's just kicked back or moved into a new field. But the Greater Huntington Theatre Corp. thrives. A simple visit to www.ourshowtimes.com shows that the theater corporation is still running Park Place Stadium Cinemas in Charleston and Fountain Place in Logan, as well as the Cinema discount theater on 4th Avenue in Huntington. And the corporation looking to open a new theater, Pierce Point Cinema, just east of Cincinnati in June. It's true that without the Keith-Albee and the Camelot, "what we have is not enough to keep me busy until we retire," said Hyman, president of the corporation. "Our organization is bigger than what we need to run Charleston, Logan and the discount house here." So the new theater in Pierce Township, Ohio, will help address that, and it probably won't be the last new addition either. While the business started in Huntington, this is not its first multi-state venture. The Greater Huntington Theatre Corp. was opened by Derek's grandfather, Abe Hyman, and great uncle Saul Hyman. They came to Huntington in 1906 from the West Virginia coalfields and were in the tavern business, but when the city went dry shortly afterward, they turned to nickelodeons for their bread and butter. That's how they came to be in the entertainment business. They opened the ornate Thomas Lamb-designed Keith-Albee Theatre on May 7, 1928, as a movie house and vaudeville stage. After 1939, it was home to the Marshall Artists Series -- and Tri-Staters enjoyed the talents of a rich diversity of entertainers from Les Brown and his Band of Renown, singers Rudy Vallee and Harry Bellafonte and hillbilly radio team Lum and Abner to comedians Tim Conway and Don Knotts. The theater corporation was handed down from Abe and Saul Hyman to Jack Hyman, who ran it until the 1990s. Derek started in the family business at age 15, taking tickets and working concessions. He went away to West Virginia University without plans to come back, but when his father fell ill for a while, he came back to run the show. And he's glad he did. Along with the theaters downtown and the current theaters, the business has had others, including drive-ins. There was the East Drive-In along U.S. 60 near the current site of HIMG. There also was Starlight in South Point. Drive-ins were the height of popularity in the 1950s "when everyone was in love with their cars," Hyman said. They lost their luster as years passed, and as suburban sprawl took over, the vast expanses of land they required became too lucrative to keep. Greater Huntington Theatre Corp. also temporarily owned a theater in Oak Ridge, Tenn., in the 1980s. But shortly after they expanded that theater, an even larger theater opened up nearby and forced them out of business. In the movie theater business, you just hope you can stay in business for at least 20 years because that's about how many years it takes to pay for them, Hyman said. Choosing where you're going to build one is a game of strategy. And from now on, they're going to look at smaller, under-served markets that aren't likely to have a 16-screen competitor move in shortly after they open. As he and Vice President Greg Pauley were looking for such a place, Pauley came upon the Pierce Township area in southern Ohio, which is about eight or nine miles from big theaters on either side. "I'm very excited (about the new theater)," said Pauley, who has been with the company 32 years, starting as an usher and then becoming manager of Park Place for 18 years. "The population of that area is growing about 2 percent a year -- people are moving from Cincinnati to the suburbs. ... I think we've gotten to this area at the right time, right at the beginning of its development." It will anchor the 11-acre pad, to be developed by Pat and Joe Perin. Restaurants and other businesses hopefully will follow, Hyman and Pauley said. Now, the theater corporation is looking for other small, under-served areas in the state and region that need the same boost. They spend a lot of time looking at maps to see where theaters are, and looking at the demographics of an area to see if there's a decent-sized movie-going crowd there. Most of all, they want to make sure the competition is slim. "I'm tired of looking over my shoulder for the next guy to build on top of me," Hyman said.

Already a member? Sign in over here » Enter the email address you have registered with us..» It looks like your preferred language is English. Our sister site HostelBookers can create a tailor-made booking plan for your large travel group. We are located in the centre of Nikolaev between Dekabristov Street and Lyagina Street. The best way to get to the apartment is by taxi, it is near the Pioneer Cinema. Thank you for signing up to our newsletter! © 1999–2013 Hostelworld.com Limited Security & Privacy Terms & Legal

Carter is as proficient at the piano as he is on the defensive line FOXBOROUGH - Patriots defensive end Andre Carter, dressed in black, quietly enters the movie theater lobby and sits behind a baby grand piano. The day after he set the franchise record for sacks in a game (4 1/2) in a 37-16 rout of the Jets, Carter stretches his long, bony fingers, four of which have been dislocated during his 11-year NFL career. After a false start, he bangs out a soulful version of Miles Davis’s classic composition, “So What?,’’ without the benefit of sheet music. Nobody in the Showcase Cinema de Lux at Patriot Place recognizes the talk of the town. Carter is not nearly as well-known as nose tackle Vince Wilfork and his wife, Bianca, who are at the theater taking in a matinee of “Jack and Jill’’ on an off day. “I’m into jazz,’’ says Carter, 32. “I love Miles Davis.’’ The Patriots’ signing of Carter didn’t receive the same fanfare as the arrivals of Chad Ochocinco or Carter’s former Redskins teammate, Albert Haynesworth, but it has proven significant. Carter is tied for fourth in the NFL with nine sacks and has a total of 38 tackles. He never takes a play off. As for his career day at MetLife Stadium, he says, “I’m still on Cloud 9,’’ before quickly giving credit to his teammates for pressuring Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez. “It was special because we put together four quarters. We just played hard, we played fast.’’ The 6-foot-4-inch, 255-pound Colorado native has been playing piano a decade longer than he has played football. His mother encouraged him to take piano lessons when he was 5 years old. “My mom made sure I practiced so that I wouldn’t make a fool out of myself when the piano teacher came on Saturday,’’ he says. “I loved it and I got good at it.’’ Asked the difference between a pianist and a defensive lineman, Carter, whose second selection for the cinema crowd is Bruce Hornsby’s “[That’s Just] The Way It Is,’’ says both require good hands. “Piano is more at peace, D-lineman is more violent,’’ he says. “If you don’t have good hands, you won’t get to the quarterback.’’ His father, Ruben Carter, was a defensive lineman for the fabled Orange Crush Bronco teams from the mid-1970s through the mid-1980s. He wanted a kinder, gentler life for Andre. “My dad didn’t want me to play football because it was a violent sport,’’ he says. “He wanted me to play tennis or basketball. “I remember him coming home hurt. My mom wanted me to be a model. She’d say, ‘Look at your figure, you’ve got a nice figure.’ But that ain’t going to happen, mom.’’ Carter was in the locker room and on the field as a kid, but he was quiet, almost too shy to shake John Elway’s hand. But in 10th grade, he finally signed up for his high school football team. “My dad said, ‘Are you sure? Are you sure? OK then, I’m going to get you right,’ ’’ says Carter. “Got some weights into the backyard and started pumping iron.’’ He also got his love for music from his father. “My dad played guitar,’’ says Carter. “He could also jam. We listened to Quincy Jones, Anita Baker, Stevie Wonder, and Ray Charles. John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Harry Belafonte. “It was good music. I love Frank Sinatra, Elton John, especially on the piano.’’ Years ago, he bought a baby grand at a liquidation sale for his Southern California home. “Music soothes the soul, it really does,’’ he insists. “It defines emotion. You’ve got your songs when you’re angry. You’ve got your songs when you’re happy. You’ve got your songs when you’re sad.’’ A call from Belichick A first-round draft pick out of California in 2001 (No. 7 overall), Carter played for the San Francisco 49ers before signing a six-year, $30 million contract with the Redskins in 2006. His 2009 season was a sad song. His production tumbled because the Redskins changed to a 3-4 defense, which required Carter to play outside linebacker. He hated being out of the three-point stance. “It definitely humbled me,’’ he says. “It definitely taught me more about myself, not just as a football player, but also as a man and as a father and husband. “It was a tough pill to swallow and it was a pretty big pill, but I did it with class. I kept to myself, took the high road, did due diligence even though the position wasn’t for me.’’ He says he got his release by “mutual agreement.’’ With an NFL lockout looming, he thought his career might be over. “We were praying hard,’’ he says. “We were prepared to walk away if I didn’t get picked up. I just didn’t want to finish like that.’’ But then he received a call from Bill Belichick. “I was blunt, he was blunt,’’ Carter says. Belichick said he was looking for veteran leadership, a man who could play the run and the pass, a two-dimensional player. “I said, ‘Give me a plane ticket and let’s talk about it,’ ’’ said Carter. “And from then on I’ve enjoyed every minute of it. ’’ This season, he has not missed a single practice, which earned him a special parking spot at Gillette Stadium. And in breaks from drills, he engages teammates in hand agility exercises, which helps him shed offensive linemen. Carter says he enjoys New England but rarely goes out, preferring to stay home with his family. He enjoys a good game of chess or just playing with his 4-year-old son, Quincy, or stepdaughter Aysha, 17. Despite his love of music, you won’t see him on the field wearing headphones during warmups, like many of his teammates. “I used to listen to rap,’’ he says. “Pumped-up stuff, but you know what? For me, as you get older, you don’t need it.’’ Now, he meditates pregame. He says he’d consider pursuing a musical career after his playing days, or maybe even become an analyst. Asked about Haynesworth, who recently was cut by the Patriots, then picked up by Tampa Bay, Carter shrugged. “In football, as in life, it’s a gamble,’’ he says. “You win some, you lose some. “Did he try? I couldn’t really evaluate him. Only he knows. There were times when he was effective and there were times when he didn’t play - he was hurt and the next guy steps up. “Whatever he does from this point on is on him. Great talent, big size, very explosive. Is he misunderstood? Yeah, absolutely. I couldn’t even understand him.’’ Carter ignores criticism of the Patriots defense, which is ranked last in the NFL, especially the inexperienced secondary. And for the first time in his career, he’s more vocal with teammates. “I have all the trust in them,’’ he says. “We’ve had a lot of changes in the back end because a lot of guys have been banged up. I told everybody: ‘Come to work.’ “They’re accountable. They study, study, study. Then if you play 100 miles per hour, when we look at the film, I won’t be mad at you. We have the mentality that if one guy messes up, we all messed up.’’ Asked if Belichick yells, Carter smiles. “I think all coaches yell,’’ he says. “He’s a coach. “From the outside looking in, he’s a mystery man, but at the end of the day, he’s a coach who loves the game of football. He takes pride in his players, pride in his game, and constantly tries to push us to a higher level. Nobody knows the X’s and O’s better than him.’’ As for his future, Carter knows a musical career is a long shot. “If I practice long enough and hard enough, I might come out with an album like [former Saints tackle] Kyle Turley or [former Yankees center fielder] Bernie Williams,’’ he says. “You wish you could play this game forever, it’s such a great game. I’ll play till God says, ‘OK, son, get that Clydesdale and ride off into the sunset.’ ’’ Stan Grossfeld can be reached at [email protected].

In a world of destruction, a young boy is captured and subjected to military experiments. He gains psychic powers that he uses against the oppressive forces, but shit, he's out of control. Who can save, or rather, destroy, Tokyo? You guessed it: Akira. I just have some questions: Isn't Billy Crystal famous for having a razor-sharp wit? Why then, does his script for this latest Hollywood schlock-fest resort to the lowest levels of comedy, including a man getting hit in the head with a golf ball, and another man getting his balls licked by a doberman? And why is uber-celebrity Julia Roberts cast in the role of the Ugly Duckling? Why has Catherine Zeta-Jones played a despicable bitch in every movie she's been in? Type-cast, perhaps...? Why are bad movies that make fun of movies still getting made when the genre is as stale as old bread? And why, for God's sake, is John Cusak in this bad, bad movie? Why are tender doves aflight invariably brought back to Earth, burned down by the fires of capitalist whorishness? Why, why, why? (Justin Sanders) Every generation needs a Young Guns, but this one, featuring twentysomething hunk slabs Scott Caan (who looks about as old West as a Volkswagen Bug), Will McCormack, Gabriel Macht, and Colin Farrell as the James-Younger gang, looks particularly shabby. Also featuring Ali Larter, Timothy Dalton, and Ronny Cox. American Pie 2 The original American Pie was a surprise not because it was good, exactly, but because it wasn't as screamingly awful as you assumed it had to be. The story--knowingly based on the Porky's school of blatant vulgarity blended with dewy comings of age (recall the climactic moment, in which the greaser bully tells his abusive dad, "If being a man means being what you are, I'd rather be queer!" Nice... of a bunch of modern teens trying to pop their cherries before graduating high school managed to sneak a few poignant observations about friendship in among the poo jokes, and offered a number of actually funny lines. This sequel seems destined to try and have it both ways again, milking the gratuitous nudity for adolescent boners and repeating variations on the famous jokes of part one, while waxing nostalgic about growing up, and so forth. An American Rhapsody We've all done it: You're sneaking across the heavily-guarded border of Communist Hungary on your way to refuge in America, and in the heat of flight you suddenly notice something's missing--whoops!--I thought you brought the baby. Young Suzanne grows up Hungarian, while her family basks in the full glow of '60s capitalism before retrieving her a few years later. But Budapest beckons her back, despite the lure of TV, hula hoops, and Coca-Cola. Stars Nastassja Kinski, Tony Goldwyn, and Scarlett (Ghost World) Johannson. * Apocalypse Now Redux Francis Ford Coppola returns to the film that almost killed him, re-adding a bunch of boring parts. Yet somehow, it's still worth it! Bridget Jones's Diary Bridget Jones is a cow. She desires a boyfriend, so she sets her sights on the office cad (Hugh Grant), and then moans when he dumps her. Why do we keep coming back to these romantic comedies? Is it that we secretly hope the Jerk will change into a Good Guy so we can justify our bad choices in life? Is the office cad actually a misunderstood prince? Does this ever happen in real life? Fuck no. And I've got a long line of sisters who can back me up on that: the very same sisters who'll be standing next to me in the ticket line when the next romantic comedy comes along. (Kathleen Wilson) It's a comedy rule: There's nothing funnier than a kid with a rare terminal disease engaging in broad slapstick farce. Jake Gyllenhaal plays the comedic cousin of John Travolta's career-sparking cipher, a kid whose lack of an immune system can't keep his libido at bay. Rumor has it there's a sequel in the works: Sickle Cell Sammy and the Magic Hammer. * A Clockwork Orange Malcolm McDowell stars in this brilliant adaptaion of Anthony Burgess' novel about a gang of psychotic punks and their nightly forays in ultra-violence. This film is rumored to have been a big influence for 'N Sync. An accountant at a condom factory realizes he's about to be fired. Divorced, alienated from his 17-year-old son, he contemplates suicide, but is instead given some rather odd advice from his neighbor, a retired psychiatrist: Announce that you are gay at work, and the powers that be will be too frightened to fire you, lest they get slapped with a nasty lawsuit. The accountant takes his neighbor's advice, and, well, hilarity ensues. Or, if not hilarity, at least a few laughs here and there. Actually, how well you like The Closet may in fact depend on just how high Three's Company ranked on your laugh-o-meter. If the answer is 10, then by all means, rush out and see it. If, on the other hand, the number is five (or four, or three), you might want to stay home. (Bradley Steinbacher) Curse of Jade Scorpion Helen Hunt plays a part similar to her acadamy-award-winning role in What Women Want. She's the hard-ass insurance agent who's going to take the old-fashioned guy down. Woody Allen, much like Mel Gibson, wants to get back at her, and get in her panties. Ewwwwwwww. See review this issue. * The Deep End Though it comes dressed in the icy blue clothes of a suspense thriller, The Deep End is a far more interesting creature. Using its intricate plot as shrewd camouflage, the film serves as an examination of the evolving relationship between a lonely mother and her gifted teenage son, whose sexuality (homo) is such an impenetrable subject that Mom (the ineffable Tilda Swinton) would rather navigate a murder cover-up, blackmail, and death threats than talk to the lad directly. See review this issue. (Sean Nelson) * The Dish Sam Neill and Puddy from Seinfeld come this close to screwing up the first televised moon landing in The Dish, a quirky Bill Forsyth-ish comedy about quirky small town folks given a great responsibility. Though almost too cute at times, director Rob Sitch captures the wonder and excitement of that awe-inspiring first trip to the moon. (Wm. Steven Humphrey) Erotic Tales 7 Can I be your Bratwurst, Please? includes classic porn star Jeff Stryker and his amazing package. He checks into a motel, and everyone wants a piece of his sausage, but will they get it? The Gas Station is all... "you dented my car dickhole," followed by "well you're a dirty bitch, wanna get busy." The third short, Angela, is yet another film about old horney guys who want to get sex. How is that erotic??? Erotic Tales 8 The Summer of My Deflowering will make guys wonder, why can't I meet a horney young thing on the internet? Powers shows what happens when supernatural powers spiral out of control. And I'll let you guess what Why Don't We Do it in The Road is all about, okay? * Ghost World Fans of Daniel Clowes' epochal comic novel about the listless inner teen life have been awaiting this adaptation by Crumb director Terry Zwigoff for years now, and the film delivers, though not in the direct way you might have anticipated. Clowes' super-detached geek queens Enid (Thora Birch) and Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson) have graduated from high school, and, bored, they answer a personals ad placed by über-dork vinyl-junkie Seymour (an R. Crumb surrogate played brilliantly by Steve Buscemi) responds. As an experiment, Enid decides to educate Seymour in the ways of love, and her world begins to crumble. (Sean Nelson) * Ghosts of Mars Ice Cube and Natasha Henstridge open up a can of whup-ass on the Martians in this latest B-movie from John Carpenter. See review this issue. The Golden Bowl The Golden Bowl is, in part, a drama of manners, and Merchant Ivory's production moves neatly upon the joints and hinges of a repressed society. But the filmmakers seem to think that a well-appointed costume drama with the weight of Henry James behind it doesn't need any creative help to succeed, so the neatness is plodding. People enter rooms, whisper to one another, make out passionately behind closed doors while holding lit candles, and glare portentously at photographs--but the movie remains too damp to make a spark. Guerilla Filmmaking 101 Ground Floor Cinema returns with new indie shorts including White Face, Recipe, The Regular Menu, Hilda Humphrey, and some live-action Spiderman shorts entitled The Making of Green Goblin's Last Stand. * Hedwig and the Angry Inch John Cameron Mitchell wrote, directed, and starred in this Rocky Horror-cum-Velvet Goldmine-esque opus about a big-haired megalomaniac singing his/her way across the US. With 40-plus costume changes and songs that you will be singing for days, this is pure rock and roll candy, which should be see on a big screen with big audio. (Michael Svoboda) Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back Kevin Smith is the cinematic equivalent to the Comic Book Store Guy on The Simpsons (or vice versa). He's managed to take his own particular brand of juvenile, dick-and-fart humor (mixed with a dose of ironic self-awareness and a dollop of grandiose delusions) and become an actual auteur of sorts. His movies never look like much, and they're not consistently funny, but when they hit the spot they're goddamn hilarious. This latest (and reportedly last) entry in the Jersey-based Jay and Bob mythos finds our pot-dealing, Quick-Stop-loitering, Laurel-and-Hardy-esque duo on a trip across the continent to stop a movie based on the comic book based on their (fictional) selves. If you haven't seen every other item in the Smith oeuvre, a lot of the humor will seem stupid. If you have, it'll still seem stupid, but it'll also seem humorous. If nothing else, this film probably establishes a new record for mentions of the word "clit" in a feature motion picture. It's the "Scarface" of "clit." Wow. Plus you get a look at Ben Affleck back when he was still drinkin'. (Marc Mohan) Karma Got Friendly Joe gets busted for a bad, bad crime, and his buddie Friendly is called in to help reconstruct the events leading up to it. Filmed in Portland and made by local dude, Josh Bovinette. Film adaptation of David Mamet's play about life through the eyes of a kid working on Great Lakes freight boat. Directed by Joe Mantegna. Memento has a lot of starch in it; the film sticks with you for days as you rehearse it over and over in your mind. It's also a movie so good, you fear a critical backlash against it. You come out of it feeling almost resentful at how good it is, and given that almost everyone is an aspiring filmmaker these days, this resentment is unvarnished jealousy. But this reviewer is pure of spirit, or at least spite: I may have seen a better film so far this year than Memento, but if I have, I've forgotten it. (D.K. Holm) Monty Python and the Holy Grail Although you've seen the movie enough times to memorize the lines, now they've added new footage as the Arthurian troupe heads up the Mekong Delta in Vietnam and, in a hilarious encounter with the French, heap on the "fart in your general direction" jokes. The horror! The hilarity! A well-executed gothic horror film in a Jamesian vein, starring Nicole Kidman as a post-war mom on a tiny British isle, desperate not to let the new servants (including the great Fionnula Flanagan) expose her "photosensitive" children to daylight. The claustrophobic tension of the incredible house (the film's only set, and its true star) mounts through the eerie film as the truth, like the characters' lives, unfurls methodically in this truly frightening endeavor from Spanish director Alejandro Amenabar. As an added bonus, the always-gripping Christopher Eccleston (Jude, Elizabeth) has a supporting role. (Sean Nelson) Jim McKay would like you to believe he is our version of Ken Loach--a compassionate, class-conscious intellectual telling overtly political tales. In this film, his second feature after Girls Town, he again focuses on the cliché-ridden trials of inner-city postadolescent girls through a vaguely proletarian lens. The trouble is, where Loach has a deep history of class conscious art to draw on, McKay is howling at the moon--and it shows. This film is simplistic and dull, as was the last. (Jamie Hook) Planet of the Apes As promised, Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes is upon us and it stinks like feet. If you like spaceships (first 10 minutes) and screeching apes, this film has 'em, but that's about it. Throw in a bland and predictable ending, and you have the most anticipated letdown of the summer. Sounds like a three-pronged blockbuster to me. * The Princess and the Warrior The second collaboration between director Tom Twyker and the stunningly beautiful German actress Franka Potente. This time around, though, the pair has replaced the frenetic Nintendo plot of Run Lola Run with a carefully paced romance. No, we're not talking about a fawning Julia Roberts running around with her estrogen hanging out, but an eerie and tragic fairytale where castles are replaced by an insane asylum, and Prince Charming by a stoic street punk. A Vegas hotshot starts a race for money, so he can make some his damn self. * Rocky and Bullwinkle Marathon The Clinton Street presents the complete, original 1963 14-part Rocky and Bullwinkle adventure, The Search for the Buried Treasure in this week-long event! Along for the ride are all your old favorites, Dudley Do-Right, Peabody's Improbable History, and Fractured Fairytales. Rocky Horror Picture Show Jesus Christ, can you just shut up? I'm trying to watch a fucking movie here! This is not the Life of Brian, people. * Sexy Beast Gal Dove (Ray Winstone) is a retired gangster, living high on a hill in the Costa del Sol, enjoying a lethargic existence. But he is as out of place here as the heart-shaped ceramic tiles on the floor of his pool. Bad news arrives in the shape of Don Logan (Ben Kingsley, so great), there to coax Gal back to England for a job. Gal resists, but Don won't take no for an answer, setting in motion a verbal boxing match so artful and intense, it turns the sprawling Spanish vista into a pressure cooker in which Gal is forced to reckon for his ill-had comforts. A voice buried deep within Gal tells him--and us--that this can't last. Don is that voice, given brutal, relentless human form. In the fallout of their confrontation lies one of the finest films in recent memory. Anit-government radicals defrost Woody Allen after a cyber revolution. A super funny classic film. Janet McTeer stars as Dr. Lily Penleric, an early 20th-century musicologist trapped as an associate professor in a man's university. Passed over for professorship, she retreats to the foothills of Appalachia, where her sister (Jane Adams, always great) runs a progressive remedial school with her Gertrude Steinesque mentor. Within minutes, Dr. Lily discovers that the hillbillies can not only sing, but have a vast catalog of pure English folk songs in their repetoire. As she goes about collecting them, her initial academic condescension is overcome by the humble beauty of the melodies and the rubes (Aidan Quinn and the great Pat Carroll, in particular) themselves. The film verges a bit towards the Hallmark Hall of Fame, but a few narrative wrinkles rescue it from the land of cloy. Plus, the music is so great (Iris DeMent and Taj Mahal both appear as musicians), you can't help but sit back and revel. (Sean Nelson) No, not a story of hot, generation Y fishmongers... this is a baseball movie starring the acharismatic Freddie Prinze Jr. as a minor league pitcher who dreams of the majors while trying to get laid with trashy townies (or richies). Redemption, love, and teenage feel-ups ensue. * Thomas in Love This film has the potential to become the greatest computer geek date movie of our time. Thomas In Love concerns an agoraphobic of the future who communicates exclusively via his computer screen. That is, until he decides he wants a girlfriend-a real one. Will love conquer machine? Through the Olive Trees A film within a film. A film crew begins shooting in post-earthquake Iran. Houssein, a homeless illiterate is cast in a small roll, and a woman he has the hots for is cast as his wife. Will he win her over? * Under the Sand While on holiday at their summer home in western France, Jean vanishes during a swim, leaving his wife Marie, played by the indefatigably beautiful Charlotte Rampling, to be ravished by loneliness. Upon her return to Paris, she is encouraged to begin dating again, but can't shake the feeling that Jean is still alive, refusing to come to terms with the "closure" her friends demand of her.

Watching TV on Saturday afternoon, just before the rugby and the Great Gordon Discomfort, I stumbled on a screening of Doctor At Large, the second in the "Doctor" movie series with sexpot Dirk Bogarde in the lead role. In one scene, a woman comes into Bogarde's surgery with her puppy-fatty teenage daughter and explains that the daughter has a cough. Doc Dirk applies his stethoscope to the girl's back and asks her for "Nice big breaths." The daughter, speaking for the first time, lispingly replies, "Yeth, and I'm only thixteen." I first heard that joke when I was a small boy, and until yesterday didn't know - or had forgotten - that this half century-old piece of British cinema comedy had made it famous. Quite rude for 1957, don't you think? And yet I'm also wondering if in these generally much ruder times a joke involving a male medical professional and an underage girl's bosom would be acceptable.

Back in March, multimedia artist Doug Aitken began his highly-auspicious public art project “Song 1″. Running through May 13th, the installation sees the cylindrical exterior of Washington, DC’s Hirshhorn Museum transformed into an 360-degree outdoor cinema, with 11 projectors covering the 82-foot high building each night from sunset to midnight. Accompanying the various visual components is a soundtrack of spliced-together covers of “I Only Have Eyes for You” by Beck, James Murphy, No Age featuring Tim McAee, Devendra Banhart, Lucky Dragons, Koen Holtkamp, High Places, and more. These new versions range from the hazy crooning of Beck’s to the ’60s pop lean of Banhart’s and even the romantic (albeit) noisy No Age contribution. To hear several tracks in full, head over to Pitchfork. For an insider look at the project, watch the trailer below. The Hirshhorn is holding an evening of special performances on May 11th. For ticket information and a forthcoming list of guest acts, stay tuned to their official website.

Kirsten Dunst will be showing her short film “Bastard” during Cannes Film Festival. Before the presentation she enjoyed a night out at the 2010 amfAR’s Cinema Against AIDS Gala this evening. On this occasion she opted for a black Chanel Fall 2009 Couture. Thanks to Kirsten we can finally see the front of the gown as it drapes at the front revealing a sheer split which is embellished with black crystals. Normally we see Kirsten in edgy looks by Rodarte or Opening Ceremony, but I guess she wanted a more grown up look at Cannes considering she’s at the Festival to present her work. Credit: Style.com & Getty MORE FROM RED CARPET FASHION AWARDS: Posted by Catherine Kallon on May 20th, 2010 In:

Last week, the annual Sundance Film Festival took place in Park City, Utah. As far as American film festivals go, Sundance is the big daddy of them all. Every independent filmmaker, and I do mean every single one, hopes (and prays) to secure one of the few coveted screening slots at Sundance. But with the exponential growth of independent filmmakers over the past decade, the odds of getting the call from Sundance are, well, not good. Once upon a time, film festivals were a great way for filmmakers to get their films seen. Today, film festivals are mostly a great way for filmmakers to go broke. Festivals now are innundated with submissions — along with the handy submission fees, thank you very much — far beyond what is even humanly possible to review. Little-known festivals, in the middle of nowhere, are getting five to six hundred submissions, and for the big name festivals, well, forget about it. I read one article where the author claimed that if you submit a film and pay the submission fee during the open call for a big festival, you already aren’t getting in. It’s completely turned into an insider’s game. But it wasn’t always that way. I know. Because twelve years ago, I submitted a film during the open cattle call from Sundance. Months later, on a cold December evening, the phone rang in my kitchen. I looked down at the caller ID, and there it was: “Sundance.” (Take note kids: they don’t call you to tell you you’ve been rejected). I was in. Me, a nobody from nowhere. Every year at this time, I fondly remember my one and only Sundance experience. Here’s how it was. For a nobody, from nowhere. My Sundance Diary By Jay Rosenstein Thursday, 1/18/01 – morning After another sleepless night (don’t ask), I settle into the American Eagle shuttle with my usual routine: a lower lumbar support pillow on my seat, a too heavy carry-on bag at my feet, and my all important Chicago Sun-Times in my lap. It’s the usual Sun-Times fare — the Bulls stink, another friend of Gov. Ryan going to jail — until I hit Roger Ebert’s column. It’s a preview of the Sundance Film Festival. My heart beats faster; this year, for the first time, I’m going to be there too. Ebert describes the Sundance experience as an, “inconvenient location, lousy weather, overcrowded screening facilities, municipal hostility, and a ten-day lineup of films that in some cases will never be heard of again.” My anticipation grows. Thursday, 1/18/01 – afternoon I run into Roger Ebert himself at baggage claim in the Salt Lake City airport. He’s dressed in sweats, and wears the expression of someone on his way to the dentist for a root canal. Naturally, I approach him. I tell him it’s my first time at Sundance, and ask for his advice. “Don’t go to any of the parties,” he answers. “There’s always too many people, too much smoke, and not nearly enough food. And don’t trust the shuttle buses. They’re always late.” My anticipation grows. Thursday, 1/18/01 – evening After waiting over an hour for the shuttle to Park City (Roger was right!), I finally arrive at Sundance headquarters lugging my bags and wheezing like any Midwestern asthmatic would at 7,000 feet above sea level. I get in line to talk to the coordinator for short films. Right in front of me is director Penelope Spheeris, best known for having directed Wayne’s World. How cool is that? I check in and ask how I can get to my hotel. A driver named Helmut (from Chicago) is dispatched to drive me. He picks me up in a brand new Mercedes. Over the past few years many independent filmmakers have been complaining that Sundance has sold out to Hollywood and corporate America. That may be true, but today I am perfectly happy getting chauffeured to my hotel in a brand new Mercedes. Friday, 1/19/01 – morning I rush out early to catch two shuttle buses to get to my film’s first screening. It’s 8:30 a.m., opening day. If it isn’t bad enough that my film is being shown in a venue called “the Library,” I have visions of five people showing up at this ridiculous hour. But as the bus pulls up, I see a line of people already waiting outside to get in. Now I’m nervous. I walk in to meet Trevor Groth, the man who selects all the short films for the festival. My film is a short, and there are several collections of shorts grouped together as programs and shown during the festival. Trevor introduces me to two of the other filmmakers in my program. One of them, Scott Coffey, looks familiar to me. It turns out he’s an actor from L.A. and has been in lots of what he calls “teen films.” He rattles off the list, and I’ve seen a few. “So,” he asks me, “are you from New York or L.A.?” Later in the festival, Scott will introduce me to the star of his short film, a tiny, drop-dead gorgeous woman named Naomi Watts. I’m sure she remembers meeting me too. Friday, 1/19/01 – morning – The Screening So this is it. My first screening at the Sundance Film Festival. My film is second on the program, and I am incredibly nervous. The theater is almost packed, probably more than 200 people in the audience. After the first film, I stare at the black screen and fidget in my seat. I am frightened to death. It seems to take forever for my film to begin. My film starts, and some people laugh immediately at my father’s first on-screen comment. A good sign. As the film goes on, more and more people start laughing. They’re into it. When my mother says in the film “…this is your mother, Marion Rosenstein,” the entire room practically explodes with laughter. But gradually, as the real subject of the film is revealed — my mother’s dementia — the laughs slow down and the audience becomes silent. They get it. Finally, when the film finishes, I get an enthusiastic and sustained applause that lasts through the entire credits. I’m elated. It went great. After the program is over, I wonder if anyone will want to talk with me, especially since one of the later films, Ari Gold’s Helicopter is absolutely brilliant. As I slowly walk out, I’m approached by a woman who says she loved my film and it made her cry. Then a second woman says the same thing. Moments later, I’m approached by a dark-haired woman who hands me her card. She says she’s interested. I look at the card: Kelly Devine, Acquisitions Director, Independent Film Channel. Life is good. Friday, 1/19/01 – evening I’m at a crowded screening of the documentary Go Tigers (I hate it). A woman walks in with her two friends. She spots the open seat next to me and takes it. We chat. She’s in acquisitions for TNT. She hands me her card. “Send me a tape,” she says. Saturday, 1/20/01 – morning At breakfast at my hotel, I see the old actor who played the father in Breaking Away and Sixteen Candles eating alone. At the next table, also eating alone, is the short, bald actor with the weird voice who played the teacher in Clueless. I guess they put up all the quirky-looking old actors at my hotel. Not sure what that says about me. Or perhaps, I am sure. Saturday, 1/20/01 – morning I leave breakfast and head for the festival headquarters. Today is the big day for all the Sundance directors: We’re going to be driven by bus two hours away to the Sundance Institute, where we will have brunch with Robert Redford. I check my hair again in the mirror and realize it’s hopeless. We board the two buses reserved for the trip. We talk to one another, identifying ourselves by our film titles, then chat about the usual director’s talk: distribution deals, film and tape transfers, etc. I end up sitting next to an African American filmmaker from New York who made a short called This is for You Spike (good title). He’s a former Temple University football player and spends the whole trip telling me football stories. Even here, in the remote wilderness of Utah, I can’t seem to get away from sports. We arrive and are marched into a large building near a ski area. At the door we are asked to show our tickets for the brunch. I wonder why they didn’t ask us for our tickets before we made the two hour bus trip. I also begin to panic and wonder what will happen if I can’t find my ticket; will I have to go back and sit in the bus? Fortunately, I find it, and they let me in. The room is huge. There are food buffets at either end, and television lights and video cameras all around. I sit next to Doug Pray, director of Hype, a documentary about the Seattle music scene. I tell him my wife is in love with Eddie Vedder of the band Pearl Jam, who is interviewed in Doug’s film. I ask him if he’d send me an outtake from Eddie Vedder’s interview. He says no. We don’t speak again. Finally, a silver-haired man steps onto the small stage and up to the podium set up for this event. He is one of the heads of the Sundance Institute. I start to get butterflies in my stomach; this must be Robert Redford’s introduction. I begin to wonder what he looks like in real life. The man continues his speech, talking about Redford’s commitment to independent film and how every year he especially loves this event, the chance to meet all the directors at the festival. But, the man continues, for the first time in the festival’s history, Robert Redford is not here. Instead he is away on location making a film. He sends his regards. I slowly realize I will have ridden on a bus for four hours through the wilderness of rural Utah for Robert Redford’s regards. Saturday, 1/20/01 – evening I’m riding the festival shuttle bus, trying to time things so I can both eat and make it to a screening on time. Having lost my watch already, and unsure of the time, I turn around to ask the man behind me if he has a watch. I freeze. The man is D.A. Pennebaker, one of the most legendary documentary filmmakers of all time. Two of Pennebaker’s classic documentaries from the 1960s, Monterey Pop and Don’t Look Back, probably have more to do with my becoming a documentary filmmaker than anything. I introduce myself. He tells me he’s heard of my name. I don’t hear anything else for the rest of the conversation. Saturday, 1/20/01 – evening, later This, from the newest Entertainment Weekly magazine: “Sundance: It’s the cell phone capital of the world because indie filmmakers must stay in touch. With their parents.” I am the only person at Sundance without a cell phone. I ask the guy behind the counter at the Holiday Village Cinema (one of the screening venues) if they have a pay phone. The reaction on his face looks as if I just asked where to find replacement parts for a Model T. I might as well have. Eventually, he directs me outside. I stand out in the cold using the pay phone, watching dozens of people walk by using their cell phones. They all look at me strangely. I am certain that I am the first person ever to use a pay phone at Sundance. Sunday, 1/21/01 – afternoon I sit down for a screening of the film Chain Camera. A woman sits down in the empty seat next to me. “What have you seen that’s good?” she asks. It is the most common conversation starter at Sundance. We talk. It turns out she made a short film that won the Grand Jury prize last year at Slamdance, another festival that runs in Park City during the same days as Sundance. She says she has also directed other short films, all of which she sold to various companies. One of those films even screened at Cannes, the most famous film festival in the world. Because of that, she continues, she now has a script-writing job at a major Hollywood studio. “I’m totally living the American dream right now," she says. “Don’t tell anyone,” I reply. Sunday, 1/21/01 – evening I go to a screening of We Sold Our Souls to Rock and Roll, a documentary about Ozzy Osbourne’s Ozz Fest (a quick side note: Sharon Osbourne is also at the screening, sitting a few rows behind me. I barely notice, and I barely care. But ten years later, I share this story with my eight-year-old daughter, and she thinks it’s the coolest thing in the world). While we wait for the film to begin, I start talking with a guy behind me. He tells me he is a reporter for Entertainment Weekly. After I introduce myself, I tell him that the best film I’ve seen so far at the festival is Helicopter, by Ari Gold. He says that’s the first time ever at Sundance that a filmmaker has pitched him someone else’s film. I tell him that’s because I am from the Midwest. I’m not really sure what that means, but after I say it, he writes down my name and contact information, then calls the next day to invite me to the private Entertainment Weekly party. I don’t go. Sunday, 1/21/01 – very very late After leaving the Ozz Fest film, I get on the late-night Park City shuttle bus. My hotel is only about a quarter mile away, but I’m tired and don’t want to walk. The driver pulls away and puts in a tape. I quickly realize I got on the right bus, but unfortunately, it is going in the wrong direction. I end up hearing the entire Doobie Brothers’ Greatest Hits album, beginning to end, before the bus finally makes it to my hotel. I could have walked to my hotel in about ten minutes. But then again, I love the Doobie Brothers. Wednesday, 1/24/01 – afternoon This afternoon I attend a panel about international distribution for documentaries. It is one of the many documentary-related panels I attend this week (a side note: I notice a beautful dark-haired woman who seems to be attending all the documentary panels too. I introduce myself and find out her name is Emily Morse. Today she hosts a radio show called “Sex With Emily” and starred in a VH1 reality show last year. I’m sure she remembers me too). One of the panelists is Catherine Olsen from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. I recognize her name because a few years ago I sent her a tape of my documentary In Whose Honor?, but she turned it down for acquisition. After the panel, I approach her, introduce myself, and remind her about my film. She says she vaguely remembers it, probably because she feels so strongly about eliminating Native American sports mascots. Given that, I ask her, would she like me to send her the tape for consideration again? She doesn’t reply, and there is an awkward silence between us. “It’s ok if you say no,” I say, finally, trying to break the tension. “No,” she replies. Wednesday, 1/24/01 – early evening I’m at the private press and director’s reception. It will be the one and only Sundance party I attend all week. I’m approached by a Taiwanese filmmaker who I’d met earlier on one of the shuttle buses. He also has a short film in the festival. He keeps raving about my film, telling me over and over how much he liked it. When I mention that I am leaving the festival tomorrow (Thursday), he seems shocked. He’s convinced I must stay for Saturday’s awards ceremony because my film is going to win the festival’s best short film award. I make a mental note to consider moving to Taiwan (it doesn’t win). Wednesday, 1/24/01 – minutes later (Another note: after leaving the reception, in the hall, I meet two women who are a filmmaking team. One woman is short with dark hair, very Jewish, and talks non-stop, pitching their film to me. The other woman is taller and thin, wearing glasses. She doesn’t say a word and totally ignores me. Today she is my girlfriend, and we’ve been together for five years.) Wednesday, 1/24/01 – later in the evening While killiing time waiting for a screening of the documentary StartUp.com (executive produced by D.A. Pennebaker, by the way), I see a clipping from yesterday’s Salt Lake Tribune posted on the wall. It’s an article highlighting some of the short films at Sundance this year. It includes a mention of my film. The reviewer calls my film a “pithy short” and a “touching four-minute film.” Not bad. But he also says my film was made by Jay Rosenblatt, a San Francisco filmmaker who is much more famous than me. Oh well, I think, at least they spelled the name of film right. And Jay Rosenblatt’s name too. Thursday, 1/25/01 – time unknown I’m sitting on my American Eagle shuttle flight back to Champaign, still buzzing from the overwhelming Sundance experience. A passenger walks down the aisle, turns to his friend and says, “It don’t matter where you sit.” My euphoria snaps, and I realize I’m back in central Illinois. The dream is over.

Description: Nina's mother takes the viewer along on a journey of her remarkable daughter, from her thirteenth birthday through her fortieth birthday, amid a lively, though fatherless, extended family. Confused yet extraordinarily mature, lonely but much loved, Nina determines her own goals. Movie summaries and listings powered by Cinema-Source Sign up for our free email newsletters and receive the latest advice and information on all things parenting. Enter your email address to sign up or manage your account.

In the depths of winter, I finally realized that deep within me there lay an invincible summer… -Albert Camus As has become tradition, as my summer vacation comes to an end, I like to recap my adventures, so here it is! Summer 2011! If last year was the summer of new experiences, then 2011 is easily my Invincible Summer. As a dedicated teacher, during the school year I rarely have free time, so I take full advantage of my summer break. I make up for everything I don’t get to do when I’m working. I see my friends as much as possible, I concert, I stay out late, I watch movies, I have date nights more than once a week, I experience new things…I just LIVE. So you might be wondering why I’m calling this my “Invincible Summer” and if you read the sadface blog post I put up last week, it might make more sense. You see, the news that has left me devastated robbed me of my happiness four months ago. During the last few weeks of school in May I looked forward to summer because I thought I could just lay in bed all day and cry, and do all the crying I couldn’t do before, because I didn’t want my eyes to be all swollen the next morning at work. I have to look at 140+ kids every day! They notice everything! Even if I cut an inch off my hair! I’m serious. So I did the crying thing for a few days, and then I thought…oh hell no! Not allowed. Grief and tragedy has robbed me of so much happiness and bliss, its not taking my summer too! I am not going to waste away and cry my summer away. NO. Well, I must have not yelled NO loud enough, because I had some sadface days in bed, but since I had put off dealing with the grief while I was teaching, I allowed myself days to wallow, and be sad, and let it all out. Last summer I dedicated a page to my experiences during those two months, and I often read it during the school year and smiled as I thought “wow, I really did all that?” in between grading essays. I want to do the same this year. I packed so much into these last two months, I hope I remember it all. Concerts: I love concerts. I love the energy, the live music, the feeling that they are singing that song to me, and only me. I don’t go to many concerts during the school year. Mainly because they tend to go late, and unless they take place on a Friday night or Saturday night, I can’t stay out late. 140+ kids demand your attention, and they drain you of your energy, in a good way, of course. I’m a responsible adult, and I take my job very seriously. I’m shaping lives here, I need to bring my A game to class daily. New Kids on the Block/Backstreet Boys – Best concert of my life. My life! My Chemical Romance – Bucket List status! Trivia: My beloved Friendly Valley Social Club! I have been on this trivia team for a while now, and I’m on it with some of my best friends. I don’t go to trivia during the school year because I need to be in bed early, and its an inside joke now. Soap, roast, shaving my legs…but I promised the team I would be there all summer, and I was! And when the team made it all the way to the final tournament, I was there too! I look forward to checking my inbox every Wednesday afternoon! Awesometown Summer Nights: during the week, there was nothing more wonderful than random nights out with the crew. Even sitting on the sidewalk eating Kogi and drinking OG Dr. Pepper and having random conversations. It makes you realize what friendships are about. As Erin said, ”It doesn’t matter what you’re doing, it just matters that you’re out with friends enjoying those wonderful summer nights and it feels like the one you’re in is the most perfect one ever until the next one with similar ingredients comes along.” Girls Night Out: Erin, S, and I totally bonded over girls nights. Whether it be a Dodger Game or Will’s birthday, we know how to have fun. And of course, getting lost and ending up in Torrance will always be a great memory! And photo booths too! Gold Class Cinema – Our New Obsession: S and I were looking for something to do and decided to check out Gold Class. Not knowing quite what to expect, we were blown away by the experience, and will head down to Pasadena often to spoil ourselves! Baller Girls Night! Girls Night Out +N8: We took N8 out on a little adventure to Pasadena a few weeks back. He didn’t know where we would end up but was totally game to it. Even when we serenaded him with NKOTB songs. S and I keep saying, the look on his face made it all worth it. Like a kid on Christmas morning…he showed us so much appreciation. Melt. And of course his friend Waze when stuck in Hollywood traffic will forever be a good time. Hello Kitty Cruiser: Last year I bought my dream bike, and finally took delivery of it this summer. It is so beautiful, and so pink. I love it. Red Bull Soap Box Race, DTLA: I went to this two years ago and had a blast. So, when Scott and Bree mentioned they were going, N8 and I were quick to tag along. What an adventure! Friday Night Lights: Easily my favorite documentary, this summer I finished watching the whole series, and it is easily one of the best television shows ever made. Coach is the epitome of everything a man should be. Seriously. I miss this show, and I look forward to the movie. Movie Nights: Thanks to all my free time this summer, I got to watch a BUNCH of movies. This is something I rarely do during the school year. I totally got my money’s worth on Netflix instant play! Weeee! Six Flags Magic Mountain: even though I live so close to MM, I rarely go, and there were many roller coasters I had never been on. Last month I finally did Six Flags the right away and went on so many rides! My favorite roller coaster is Green Lantern. Can’t wait to go back! Comic Con: I enjoyed SDCC last year, but kind of rushed through it. This year, I took my time and saw so many people and did so many things. It is seriously an experience. I’m a fangirl. OC BBQ Fest: One of the last outings before Aleks left for Mammoth. A day of friends, fun, BBQ, knights, and more…and Gaston! Dodger Game: I had never really been to an actual Dodger Game and had the full experience so when Erin suggested it for girls night, I was totally interested! Then a week later I won tickets on the field level! Sitting close enough to almost get hit by the baseball…priceless. Date Nights: During the school year, I’m usually at work until late, and I’m too tired to go out…this summer however, I was free to enjoy multiple late nights and had many pretty sweet dates out and about. I’ll miss date nights during the week though… Fourth of July: This year, I was adamant that I wanted to see fireworks for the holiday, to the point where I was pretty stubborn about it. What followed was one of the greatest nights out in Awesomtown. He took me to a “secret” spot within the city limits where I could see fireworks from all different directions. One of the best memories from summer 2011. So romantic. DTLA Crawl: It really is no secret that I love Los Angeles, and I spend a lot of time exploring downtown LA. So last week we went on a little mini crawl hitting up some of my favorite spots, including two from 500 Days of Summer! The Bradbury Building and the bench at Angels Knoll. We took photographs on the bench that will forever be my favorite. So tragically lovely. X Games – EnduroX: I randomly ended up at X Games last summer because I had never been, I had free time, and hey? Why not! So, this summer, I had nothing to do, and thought…why not? So, Susan, N8 and I went to see EnduroX which is a tricked out obstacle course + motocross. Our tickets ended up being in the front row and it was a wonderful experience! I know there is so much more that I’m forgetting to mention. I’ll update it as I remember… Yes, I’m knee deep in a terrible winter storm, but I didn’t want that storm to rob me of my summer. And as I read over this list, and think back to everything I saw and experienced this summer, I realize that it was an Invincible Summer. Grief tried to take my summer, tragic circumstances beyond my control tried to take my summer, someone I cared about chose to abandon me this summer, but look at that list! Summer clearly won. My summer, although not without tears, was invincible. I lived. I experienced. I loved. I saw. I did. In my own way, in my own weak way…I won.

An option to appreciate artistic presentations in Managua is the theater Justo Rufino Garay. This alternative theater is air conditioned and has space for 150 spectators. It has a small stage equipped with special effect instruments and lighting. In this theater, both national and international artists have performed, including not only professionals but also amateurs. The theater is part of a cultural project, which includes a theater school and the professional group of theater Justo Rufino Garay, which has 25 years of artistic history. This project took the name of Justo Rufino Garay in honor to a Sandinista combatant. During the revolutionary war, he used the national theater as a fighting instrument. He died two months before the war was won in July of 1979. Every week there is a presentation of alternative cinema called 'Wednesday of Alternative Cinema' with classical, alternative, and international films. You can find information about weekly presentations in our Weekly Calendar. An important event presented annually is the 'International Theater Festival', which will take place from September 2nd to September 10th. In this festival there will be artists from different countries. The Theater Justo Rufino Garay is locates next to the park Las Palmas in Managua. The theater is located in a neighborhood called "El Carmen", and in front of the park of the same name. You can get there by bus, taxi or with your own car. The address is: From the Montoya Statue, 3 blocks West, 15 meters North.

A first look at Cartoon Network's 'Firebreather' animated movie. Plus: Cartoon Network unveils 'Young Justice' and 'Mad' as well. Heading into a 'Losers' weekend. Morrison talks about the killer pets of 'We3' and more! Go Petunias! It's your Comics2Film 10.4.22! If you need help getting up to speed on 'The Losers', check out Chad Derdowski's primer, right here on Mania.com. Comics2Film checked out a screening of 'The Losers' last night. As always, we'll defer to Mania's critic of record for an in-depth discussion of the film. Overall we have to say we didn't love the movie. In spite of replicating numerous action beats from Andy Diggle and Jock's comic series, and coming up with a close approximation of the military-grade heist structure of the book, the movie lacks the stronger story elements of the source material. Admittedly, seeing all the best action segments and funniest lines of dialogue in the numerous trailers and clip reels that have been released probably didn't help. The highlight was seeing Jock's stunning graphics blown up wide screen during various segments. It'll have its fans and may even win the weekend, but the movie will drop like a stone after that. Bottom line: we'd grade it a C. OK. 'Tamara Drewe' isn't the kind of comic book movie that most people are reading this column to learn about, but we do aim to be complete in our coverage. The new movie by director Stephen Frears is based on Posy Simmond's comic strip from the UK's The Guardian paper. New photos and info about them movie, which stars actress Gemma Arterton ('Clash of the Titans') are online at Blogomatic3000.com. Here's the official description of the movie: "Once a shy and unattractive teenager from a small rural idyll, Tamara’s past catches up with her when she returns the village and has to face an old flame. With a rock star boyfriend back in London she gets caught in a love triangle and becomes the focus of gossiping locals." We've lined up one of the images with the comic strip art so you can see what they're going for. Click through to Blogomatic for more images. Are you really going to say no some nice pics of Ms. Arterton? Comics creator Grant Morrison expressed to MTV Splash Page his disappointment over the lack of progress in getting the adaptation of his mini-series 'We3' to the big screen. Morrison had written a screenplay for the film, which was to be directed by John Stevenson of 'Kung Fu Panda' fame. "People don’t seem to realize how great of a project it is," Morrison told MTV News. "To me, if they make a movie of 'We3,' it’s basically a new 'E.T..' Everybody’s going to be weeping as they walk out of the cinema at the end. It’s the kind of movie you can watch in China or India or America or Scotland, because it’s about animals," he added. "Everyone can identify with the literal underdog." Of course, 'E.T.' didn't come with a Gatling gun that could blow people into hamburger chunks. That stuff is in the comic, which focuses on three animals, a dog, a cat and a rabbit, that have been fitted with cyborg parts and turned into intelligent weapons. They go on the run when their handler learns they're slated to be destroyed. "In the script, we took all of that violence out. Frank Quitely only drew the violence because his kids were goading him on," Morrison said with a laugh. "Unfortunately, it kind of scares people off, because they don’t think it could be a family film." Morrison says his script improves on the comic. He also says that producer Don Murphy is actively working on the project and communicating on a regular basis. Cartoon Network unveiled a substantial new line-up of content yesterday at its annual Advertising Upfront presentation at New York’s Time Warner Center. Among them were two new animated series with comic book roots. The one that surprised us is 'MAD'. Produced by Warner Bros. Animation and using the iconic MAD magazine, published by DC Comics, as inspiration, MAD is an animated sketch-comedy series utilizing a chaotic mix of animation styles and twisted humor to pull back the curtain and expose the truth behind movies, TV shows, games, pop culture and, of course, curtains! Classic MAD magazine characters and features such as Alfred E. Neuman and Spy vs. Spy pop up, and no subject matter or individual will be safe from MAD’s barrage of parodies and sketches. In the end, viewers won’t get even, they’ll just get MAD! Sam Register (Teen Titans, Ben 10, Batman: The Brave and the Bold) is the executive producer. Kevin Shinick (Robot Chicken) and Mark Marek (KaBlam! The Andy Milonakis Show) are the producers. Of course, Mad Magazine was also the basis for the long-running 'MADtv', the live-action sketch comedy show which served as Fox's answer to Saturday Night Live. More anticipated by readers of C2F is the new 'Young Justice' animated series, which focuses on a DC Universe teen super group, but plays it straight (rather than the kid-oriented 'Teen Titans'). Young Justice: In Young Justice, being a teenager means proving yourself over and over—to peers, parents, teachers, mentors and, ultimately, to yourself. But what if you’re not just a normal teenager? What if you’re a teenage super hero? Are you ready to join the ranks of the great heroes and prove you’re worthy of the Justice League? That’s exactly what the members of Young Justice—Robin, Aqualad, Kid Flash, Superboy, Miss Martian and Artemis—will found out, whether they have what it takes to be a proven hero. This all-new series is produced by Warner Bros. Animation and based upon characters from DC Comics. Sam Register (Teen Titans, Ben 10, Batman: The Brave and the Bold) is the executive producer. Brandon Vietti (Batman: Under the Red Hood, Superman Doomsday, The Batman) and Greg Weisman (Gargoyles, The Spectacular Spider-Man, W.I.T.C.H.) are the producers. Click on the thumbnail to see the cool new designs for 'Young Justice'. A few years back, Cartoon Network announced plans to develop a handful of comics into animated movies. Among them was a C2F favorite: 'Firebreather' by Phil Hester and Andy Kuhn. At yesterday's upfront presentation, Cartoon Network revealed that the 'Firebreather' movie is set to air this year. The CGI movie is directed by 'Aeon Flux' creator Peter Chung. Here's the net's official description: Cartoon Network’s first original all-CG animation adventure presents Duncan Rosenblatt, a rather typical, awkward high school kid, except that his dad is a fire-breathing monster who tells Duncan that he is destined to protect the earth. Firebreather is created and co-executive-produced by Phil Hester (The Wretch), co-executive-produced by Andy Kuhn (Freedom Ring) and executive-produced by Julia Pistor (Lemony Snicket). Jim Krieg (Ben 10: Alien Force) joins as writer with Peter Chung (Aeon Flux) directing. They also provided two images from the film. In all honesty, we're a little disappointed with the selected stills. We need some shots of Duncan in full on battle mode, with wings and fire and everything. Come on, Cartoon Network! We've been waiting two years! Throw us a bone! Here's another one of Reubenpac's Iron Man movie remixes for your Thursday funnies...

WASHINGTON — Iranian state news agency Press TV published a conspiracy theory by a 9/11 truther on Wednesday positing that Ben Affleck is a covert government operative and could be hanged for war crimes because of his movie Argo, which recently won Best Picture at the Academy Awards. It’s the latest in a mounting, if not very threatening, campaign against the filmmakers of Argo for producing a movie that the Iranian government sees as a biased, stereotypical portrayal of Iranians. Writing in Press TV, 9/11 truther and former professor Kevin Barrett quotes a “U.S. Intelligence Expert” who “believes that Argo is the propaganda project of an intelligence agency or agencies, and that its purpose is to convince the American people to go along with Israel’s plan to drag America into a war on Iran.” The intelligence expert in question is Barbara Honneger, a former Reagan administration official who published a book about the “October surprise” conspiracy theory about an alleged plot by the government to delay the release of the Americans trapped in the Iranian hostage crisis. “Will Ben Affleck, and other covert operators working to launch a criminal war of aggression against Iran, ever be brought to justice?” Barrett writes. “Iran’s lawsuit against the makers of Argo is a good place to start.” Earlier, Iran announced via Press TV that it was planning on suing the people behind Argo. It has hired controversial French lawyer Isabelle Coutant-Peyre, who is married to Venezualan terrorist “Carlos the Jackal,” currently serving a life sentence in French prison. For a time, Coutant-Peyre represented Zacarias Moussaoui. Per PressTV: Iran cultural officials talked to an internationally-renowned French lawyer Isabelle Coutant-Peyre over filing a lawsuit against Hollywood during a meeting held in Tehran’s Palestine cinema on March 11. The meeting was held alongside a conference titled “The Hoax of Hollywood” organized by the Iranian Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance. “The conference was held to unify all cultural communities in Iran against the attacks of the west, particularly Hollywood,” said the conference secretary general Mohammad Lesani. The Argo side of the spat doesn’t appear to be taking the suit very seriously. Affleck’s lawyer declined to comment on it, as did Warner Brothers, the studio that distributed Argo. Iran would have to prove that the movie was defamatory, a difficult task in a country where the onus is on the accuser to give proof of libel and in a situation where the movie was not marketed as a documentary but as a fictionalized account of real events.

Hyatt Regency, Kolkata (5 Star Deluxe Hotel) Hotel Hyatt Regency is Kolkata's premium business hotel, contemporary in design with innovative hospitality concepts and classic standards of service and excellence. Set on 6.5 acres of landscaped grounds, this modern hotel has 235 technologically equipped guest rooms and suites. Oberoi Grand, Kolkata (5 Star Deluxe Hotel) The Oberoi Grand is the premier business class hotel in Kolkata (the capital city of West Bengal), characterized by its old world charm and gracious hospitality. The hotel is centrally located in the main business and shopping areas of Kolkata. It is also conveniently located to all major convention centers, legislative offices, banks, consulates and deputy high commissions, chambers of commerce and clubs. The Oberoi Grand is affectionately known as the Grande Dame of Calcutta. Its neo classical facade and grand pillared entrance mark a successful fusion of classical and traditional Indian style and reflect the citys colonial heritage. Cool green marble floors, corinthian columns, balustrades, classical pediments and palms all add to an air of turn of the century colonial grandeur. Taj Bengal, Kolkata (5 Star Deluxe Hotel) Magnificent Atrium Lobby with dramatic lighting and a unique vertical garden is the most unique feature of Hotel Taj Bengal, adding its charm. Nature blooms in every nook and cranny of the hotel, creating an ambience of peace and tranquility. Hotel offers world class services and amenities to its guests. Its elegant hospitality and friendly staff makes travellers feel like their home. Sonar Bangla Sheraton, Kolkata (5 Star Deluxe Hotel) ITC Sonar Bangla Sheraton truly echoes the architectural and cultural values. It is surrounded by curvaceous bodies of water and 16 acres of greenery. This hotel provides an aura of a relaxed, yet luxurious ambience. Executive Club Rooms are the largest in the city in their category, while the Towers block and its Darjeeling Lounge reinforces the notion that service and hospitality is their number one priority. Park, Kolkata (5 Star Deluxe Hotel) The Park, Calcutta stands elegantly on Park Street, Kolkata's commercial hub and hot spot for shopping and entertainment. It is characterised by supreme comfort, eloquent design and delicious cuisine. Luxurious rooms and suites and outstanding banquet and conference facilities made it the preferred choice for travellers. Hindusthan International, Kolkata (5 Star Hotel) Hindusthan International Hotel provides an ideal rendezvous, both for the business traveller and pleasure visitor. The language and beauty of its solemn interiors are only part of the discreet personal service that Hotel Hindusthan International has to offer to its guests. Located in the heart of City, this is the place where joy knows no limit. It is located near the Business & Commercial centre of Kolkata and close to Places of Tourist Interest. MBD Airport, Kolkata (5 Star Hotel) MBD Airport Hotel Kolkata is a fine airport hotel, which is located just one kilometre from Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airport. For business travellers, and those in transit through the great commercial metropolis of Kolkata, Hotel Airport Ashok provides an ideal stopover, offering all the facilities and comforts of an international hotel and business centre. It serves Indian and international cuisine. The coffee shop at the hotel is the right venue for light meals and The Kenilworth, Kolkata (4 Star Hotel) Hotel Kenilworth is situated in the heart of the city, within minutes of business centers as well as major shopping arcades. Kenilworth lives up to its colonial benchmarks of service and takes pride in its warm and friendly employees and impeccable customer care. Pearless Inn, Kolkata (4 Star Hotel) The Peerless Inn on Chowringhee is in Kolkata's choicest city centre location close to both shopping and business areas. Just 100 metres from the Esplanade Metro Station, the hotel is a 10 minute walk to Eden Gardens & New Market, and a 15 minute stroll to the Victoria Memorial. The Peerless Inn is friendly, warm and modern with an aesthetically ambience of efficient hospitality. Ffort Radisson, Kolkata (3 Star Hotel) Resort Ffort Radisson is constructed on an old fort theme, complete in all intricacies, where the contemporary blends harmoniously with the medieval, as a piece of architectural excellence. It offers all facilities for conferences & leisure, Sit-outs offer breathtaking view of the river Hooghly and the undulating greens beyond. Rutt Deen, Kolkata (3 Star Hotel) The warm hospitality, efficient services, and modern facilities make Rutt Deen Hotel a preferred accommodation option among visitors. Lytton, Kolkata (3 Star Hotel) Set up in the heart of Kolkata, its closeness to the major shopping markets, Cinema Halls, unique Indian Museum, Birla Planetarium, Victoria Memorial and the monumental Howrah Station makes it the most obvious choice for most Business travellers, domestic and international alike. Rooms of this hotel are designed tastefully with the latest state-of-art facilities, centrally air-conditioned with pleasing ambience and personalized service at par with the international standard. Camac Plaza, Kolkata (3 Star Hotel) Hotel Camac Plaza offers several facilities that make the stay at the hotel comfortable in every sense. The hotel also offers conferencing and

Further to my correspondence of some time ago regarding the lady in the next house who flaunts her body nightly - well, you have inadvertently disclosed something about yourself in making a “Freudian slip”. By claiming Freud was a friend of yours you most certainly must be a very ancient crone, as the man cashed in his mortal coil in 1939, that is 74 years ago to save you consulting your abacus. Or was this claim of friendship untrue, and you were merely seeking fame by association? Nothing is documented in his memoirs that he knew of your existence, but you are certainly of great age to even allege you were of his acquaintance! It is a great pity wisdom did not accompany your ageing process. Now, what would Freud have made of you? The mind boggles. As Freud once profoundly said in his book titled “Agony Aunts Are Always Abysmal” (it was awarded 5A ratings in the best sellers list), “There’s many a slip between hand and hip.” And you have leapt to some unwarranted conclusions. By inferring some time ago as to whether I still have my rocking horse is akin to asking a total stranger “When did you stop beating your wife?” Of course I still have that memory of a very happy childhood, and his name is “Giddyup”. But back to my original subject - the flaunting lady. Circumstance has forced her to cease her shameless behavior of showering in full view of neighbors. The other night, while performing her normal erotic ablutions, she unfortunately tripped over her Zimmer frame and sustained such injuries that she was whisked off to hospital on a stretcher. I haven’t seen her since, so perhaps the medics are having difficulty in putting her back together. However, knowing your penchant for such things, I do have photographs which I’ve saved especially for you to view. Puritanical Pattaya Parishioner You are indeed a very sick puppy. Whatever gave you the idea that I would be in the slightest interested in photographs of someone being whisked off on a stretcher? Or were you offering photographs of your rocking horse? Once more you have made conclusions not based on sound facts. There’s more than one Freud in this world, my peeping Petal. At last count there were 84 in the Austrian phone books. My friend Ziggy Freud (amateur psychologist) should not be confused with Sigmund Freud (professional psychologist and erstwhile author). I am glad your next door neighbor has now left you in peace, so you don’t have to crane your neck attempting to look into her boudoir, and this closes the correspondence on this subject. Have a big problem with the GF (Thai of course). Playing around behind my back when I’m at work. Not doing it for money because I give her enough each month (30K) and she generally has money left over. I just can’t get my head around why she does it. She says she’s happy with me and denies playing around, but my mates have seen her working out of a bar on Beach Road. What’s my next step Hillary? Too few details for me to be specific. How long have you been together? Did she come from a bar in the first place? If your friends can find her so easily, why don’t you go to the bar on Beach Road and see for yourself? Make sure, however, that she’s not just visiting friends if she came from that bar in the first place. And it is all very well saying you give her 30K “salary”, but does she have enough to do while you are at work? Start collecting facts, my Petal, and not rumors from your friends. A friend of mine got picked up by the police the other night in one of their roadside check points. She had her helmet on, all the paper warfare for the bike and carrying no drugs thank you very much. Fined 200 baht! For what? I am told this is a common occurrence. Any ideas? Jack and Jill Dear Jack and Jill, I wasn’t there, so I can’t really comment, can I? It is a common occurrence I am told, but since I don’t ride motorcycles I have never had this problem. I do ride a motorcycle taxi to get across Thepprasit Road as it is far too dangerous for me to cross over to the noodle shop from the office. I liked the old office better as there was a noodle shop next door. How much do I need to spend each month to live nicely in Pattaya. I know that since it is an international resort for tourists it might be a bit more expensive than up-country. It would be just for me as I don’t intend having any live-ins or anything like that. I am 58 years old and have retired early. There’s quite a few books on this subject, Petal, including one from our own Dr. Iain (Farang The Sequel). To live at a decent standard, eating at restaurants and the odd bottle of wine (make it Veuve Clicquot and I’ll join you), movies and a reasonable condo, look at 100,000 baht a month. Of course, if you own your own condo you can make that monthly figure a lot less. It is school holidays and the cinemas don’t show children’s movies? Is there some Thai reason for this, or just not thinking ahead? It beats me. I have three children 8, 10 and 12 and there’s no movies for them? Thank you for bringing this to my attention. Not having a tribe of rug rats to entertain during school holidays, this is something that never occurred to me. Hopefully the cinema management people might see this and will realize how much money they are losing by not catering for children. If the Thai women are as grasping as it would seem, reading the letters on your page, how come they are still in the business? Surely if they were all that bad, word would have gotten out by now. I get the impression that they’ve been given a bad name and it has stuck. Sure there has to be a few rotten apples, but am I correct that the bad ones are a small percentage only? It is not correct of me to comment on the bar girls as a group, but there is certainly a good percentage of them out for what they can get. Certainly these are the ones whose men ‘friends’ end up writing to me. Provided the male holidaymaker understands the ground rules, everyone is a winner. But it is the men who mistake financial arrangements for romance who fall for the “I lub you too mut, tee rak.” There are enough books out there, there are enough internet sites out there about this side of a Thai holiday, and the heart-rending advice from yours truly as well. Nobody should be puzzled, Petal. Not even you. I have become friends with a couple of Thai girls through Facebook and we are contacting each other every day, and they seem to have excellent English. I have never been to Thailand but I am now looking at a holiday there. Both the girls say they want to “look after” me when I come over. I don’t want to disappoint one of them, and honestly I don’t know which to choose as they look drop dead gorgeous in the photos. Any suggestions? You have been snared in the net - and that’s not the internet. Local girls do not have excellent English, and they want to look after your wallet, not you. Run! Could you put in your column to the poor, Aus cobber about his pension. Don’t spit out your dummie. If you want it you have to fight for it. I got in touch with the international ombudsman. Start with one that will help you. Good luck, don’t give up. And that’s a bottle of Veuve Clicquot for Hillary when you get it. Advice free! On behalf of the un-named Australian, thank you for the free advice, and I certainly hope he gets a positive outcome. I can taste the Veuve Clicquot already. To Charlie who holds up Thai bar girls as the way to go. Yes Charlie old bean, “Mug” is the word! When, oh when, will you “mugs” learn? About once a year, my friends and I take a trip down to Walking Street, we find a bar, turn the seats around to face the street and watch the entertainment, which we call it “the Jonny 2 weeks show”. We like to watch all the “greenhorns” (mugs) doing what they do best - meet a girl and after 3 weeks ask her to marry them and why not buy her a motorbike, a house perhaps and then cry about how she stole from you, how these girl are not to be trusted, my advice is - if you do not have a mirror at home fill up a bucket of water, look in to the bucket and that idiot looking back at you is responsible for everything that happens to you. Stop crying, learn to speak Thai, get a life and enjoy Thailand - if not, I say, “Som nam na!” Dear Thai Mark, Everything you mentioned is true, without a doubt, but if these “mugs” didn’t do all the silly things, there would be no need for this column! Regarding “salaries” for GFs. Why must you upset the mango cart? The financial arrangements have been here a long time and seem to work out for all concerned. You cannot change the system old girl. Dear Singha Jerry, You seem to be confused, Singha Jerry (too much Singha perhaps)? Wives and husbands are a team, not one the master and the other the servant, as you would like it to be. Sorry SJ, I cannot agree with you in any way at all.

Jared Peoples, a recent University of Alabama at Birmingham graduate, has been awarded a prestigious Fulbright Teaching Assistantship. And when the 24-year-old Odenville native gets the letter confirming his award he knows exactly what he will do with it — tape it to his forehead. Peoples plans that as a homage to Josh Lyman, the current Chief of Staff for the White House — no, not the Obama administration, but the Santos one. Lyman, a character on the TV show The West Wing, taped his fictional Fulbright acceptance letter to his head so all the world could see. Peoples is a big fan of the show and a TV and film aficionado. During his Fulbright tenure in the East European state of Moldova, he plans to share that love in a place that has the second lowest movie attendance rate in the world. “I am so excited about this opportunity,” says Peoples, the son and grandson of insurance salesmen and the first to attend to college. The Fulbright Program, sponsored by the U.S. government, gives students the opportunity to study, teach and conduct research overseas as part of the organization’s goal to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and other countries. Participants are selected based on academic merit and leadership potential and help contribute to finding solutions to shared international concerns. Peoples is the third UAB student to receive the Fulbright this year and the 16th since 1993. “Jared’s Fulbright appointment, along with the four other Fulbright awards UAB students have earned just in the past two years, reflects academic excellence and a dedication to local and global service to community,” says UAB President Carol Garrison. “These students aren’t merely studying abroad; they are ambassadors who will have an affect on our global society.” Peoples enrolled at UAB in 2007 with a double major in history and political science and had planned to attend law school. But after taking a labor history course that incorporated the 1954 dramatic film On the Waterfront into the lesson, he discovered his true passion — using film to teach. Peoples changed his career course with sights on becoming a college professor. He even began reviewing films for UAB’s student paper, Kaleidoscope. He graduated magna cum laude with a bachelor of arts degree and then entered UAB’s School of Education graduate program. In May, he graduated with a perfect grade-point average. Peoples had an early fascination with Romanian cinema and fell in love with 12:08, East of Bucharest, a movie that comically recounts the fall of the communist regime. Moldova sits between Romania and Ukraine and, “you see Moldova over there and start to wonder about it,” Peoples says. He read about Moldova’s abysmal movie attendance rates and “immediately felt the need to rectify this situation,” he says. Peoples plans to go there and start a film club; on Sept. 4 he leaves for his nine-month assistantship with a treasure trove of films: On the Waterfront, Star Wars, a Woody Allen movie, The New World and The Godfather. He might even take the first seasons of The West Wing, he says. Peoples hopes his Moldovan students will come to a better understanding of American culture and the beauty of its films, he says. After the assistantship, he is considering studying film in Europe and even doing some screenwriting. Peoples is the son of Chris and Janet Peoples of Odenville, Ala. He also credits his grandparents Ottis and Marie Peoples, who helped his parents fund his education.

2.20. Concretization and intepretation A reader does not read an action: s/he reads a narrative text, and constructs or concretizes the action on the basis of the linguistic and schematic structures coded in the text. The action is not wholly coded: any text consists largely of gaps which are left to be filled by the reader's co-operation. The reader's contribution includes such common coherence-building maneuvers as inferencing and spreading activation of related concepts, working out implicatures and presuppositions. These maneuvers are required of any reader of any text, but they assume specific features in different kinds of text. We have already remarked that coherence-building in narrative is heavily influenced by plot construction. A comic action and a tragic action, once identified as such, trigger out different expectations of development and coherence. Different narrative genres also make different collaborative demands on readers ‹the difference between film, theatre and written narrative being and obvious one. Space and figure are obviously constructed in a different way in each of these genres. That is why some people dislike illustrated novels: they feel somehow cheated of their right to flesh out the characters and situations on the sole basis of the text. Of course, this right is forfeited in advance in genres like theatre or cinema. But even within one and the same narrative sub-genre, any difference in narrative technique implies a difference in the constructive maneuvers required of the reader. Moreover, concretization is never fully controlled by the author or by the text structure. Being the reader's share, it may vary from reader to reader. This is clearly the case in "open" works which deliberately make such demands, asking the reader to provide a conclusion to the plot or leaving open to inference significant events in the action. But any narrative is "open" to some extent: there are always details left to the reader's imaginative collaboration. Unimportant events of the action, such as transitions, are often left unmentioned and can often be explained in a variety of different ways. Minor incoherences in the course of events (e. g. Sancho Panza riding his donkey some chapters after it had been stolen) may be used as a challenge to the reader's ingenuity. Generally speaking, the action is read out in two different ways: on one hand, those elements which are explicitly mentioned in the text are given a fuller, more concrete appearance by the reader; on the other hand, those aspects of the action which are left fully to inference are created ex nihilo on the sole basis of inferential cues. The issue of fictionality is also relevant to the process of concretization. We might establish a polarity: from the ideally self-contained, purely fictional text, to the non-fictional narrative (which does not necessarily mean non-literary narrative). Fantasy and science-fiction often approach the first pole, while the non-fiction novel (Mailer, Capote) or the historical novel occupy a middle ground, and such genres as autobiography, history or travel books approach the pole of minimum fictionality within literature (of course, instrumental narrative is quite another matter). The difference to the reader may not be so clear-cut, since it has to do mainly with the intersections between the narrative he is reading and the demands of previous narratives or world-knowledge in order to construct the action. An action taking place on an imaginary planet or an alternative universe may pick and choose among the demands of coherence and frames of reference of our world; an historical narrative often tries to be consistent with available knowledge about the past. We have already commented on the reader's construction of a possible world on the basis of the textual cues. Here we meet a phenomenon common to all structures of signs. Such structures do not exist apart from their reception, which is always an implicitly interpretive act. Insofar as they are not being produced or received, activated in a communicative act, signs cease to be signs, they are only potential signifiers existing in a purely material state. We can therefore establish a conceptual difference between the narrated world as it is schematically signified in the text and the narrated world as it is actualized in a specific reading. In studying the construction of the action, we are studying an idealized process, one which we assumed to be sharable by a variety of informed readers. Of course, determining the specific features of such an idealization is always an interpretive act, with specific aims and assumptions. Each individual reader will probably concretize the schematic signifieds of the world in a way of his/her own. If the differences between two readings lead to relevant conflicts in the understanding and interpretation of the text, we will say that the readers belong to different interpretive communities. Classical narrative does not usually cause many conflicting readings at the relatively shallow level of interpretation we are dealing with here, and different interpretations of the artistic or ideological significance of a narrative can very well agree on every point as to the structure of its narrated world and action. Nevertheless, it is not uncommon to find interpretive disagreements at the relatively superficial level of the construction of the action. We shall concentrate on a specific case: the reading of the action in Stephen Crane's story "The Monster" by a number of critics, as reflected in their interpretations. These critical commentaries often take for granted the level of reading we are concerned with now, and focus mainly on wider aesthetic or ideological questions. The proportion of critical agreement can be measured to some extent by taking a standard summary of "The Monster" and comparing it to the interpretive assumptions of other critics: Henry Johnson, the black servant in "The Monster," is physically deformed and made imbecillic as a result of his heroic rescue of Jimmie Trescott from fire. But it is the townspeople who become the real monsters through their unreasoning fear of the disfigured but harmless Johnson and their ostracism of the town doctor, Jimmie's father, who has helped him. (Weatherford 1973, 21) Some facts are present in all concretizations of the work, and are assumed to be indisputable. At least, they have not been disputed by the critics, and indeed any discussion of a fictional work must accept some portion of the story as given, as a portion of world which it would be nonsense to contest. For instance, nobody to my knowledge has disputed the fact that Dr. Trescott is a white man, or that Henry becomes disfigured. The undisputed core of the story would read like this: Henry Johnson, the black servant in "The Monster," is physically deformed as a result of his heroic rescue of a white boy, Jimmie Trescott, from fire. The townspeople (blacks and whites alike) ostracise Johnson and the town doctor, Jimmie's father, who insists on taking care of him. Such an outline leaves all the moral issues of the story unresoved: it does not specify the authorial attitude to the story. As we shall discuss in another section, all interpretations of the level of the textual author seem to involve a moral or ideological choice on the part of the reader. Indeed, this seems to be also true of some "bare facts" at story level. We need to draw a working distinction between unacceptable readings and misreadings. One critic's reading may be unacceptable to another critic because of their different assumptions about the nature of interpretation, criticism, or literature. But a misreading is not perceived as the result of such a divergence, but rather as the result of carelessness. We assume that if we pointed his mistake to the critic he would recognize it. The reviewer of The Monster and Other Stories in The Spectator, for instance, misread the action of this tale. He provides a summary of the story according to which Henry Johnson "saved the life of his master's little boy from a fire caused by his own carelessness" (1901, 244). The reviewer has been misled by one of the townspeople's unreliable comments ("The Monster" 38), and has failed to match it to the text's description of Henry Johnson running to the house on fire after his visit to the Farraguts. When I interpret this reading, that is, I do not assume that the reader's concretization accomodates these textual data and supplements them with other facts which are deducted from them or assumed to be hidden in the text in some way. I do not believe that this reader thought that Henry Johnson caused the fire in Trescott's house after his evening walk, then went out for a second walk and ran back. The simpler explanation is that one reader's attention has skipped some facts whose level of sharability is otherwise undisputed. However, if several readers make the same deviant reading, the explanation through an accidental misreading ceases to be the simplest one. This is the case with a few significant issues in the story of "The Monster," such as Henry Johnson's madness or Trescott's attitude at the end of the narrative. Most critics agree that Henry Johnson has become an idiot or a madman. We can assume, moreover, that most of the readers who do not comment on this fact take for granted that we do not have to read between the lines. The average or "uncontroversial" reading of the story does not cast doubt into this issue. However, some critics hold that Henry's idiocy is a figment of the townspeople's imagination. He is sane and harmless, and they believe him to be crazy and dangerous. Indeed, the reliable narrative voice of the story never passes judgement on Henry's sanity; only witnesses whose reliability is dubious do so. Judge Hagenthorpe does so for the first time before Henry is recovered: "As near as I can understand, he will hereafter be a monster, a perfect monster, and probably with an affected brain" (TM 45). The next minute, as the judge grows incensed, this has become: "he will be a monster, and with no mind" (TM 45). Alek Williams, who is trying to emphasize the burden Henry represents to his family, says that "he's crazier 'n er loon" (TM 56). The idea that Henry is sane has interesting implications, especially as it would imply that critics themselves are the victims of the text's strategies. Such is Hafley's account (1959, 160); we have already met Walcutt's opinion that Henry is sane and that Trescott knows it (1956, 83). Modlin and Byers (1973) need to ignore the fact that Henry has become an idiot in order to turn him into a Christ-figure. Henry's own appearances have not been found to be conclusive proof of his lunacy by some critics. Cooley , too, ignores Henry's idiocy: he wants to see in him a hero unjustly neglected by his author. He nevertheless recognizes that in his last appearance, Henry seems to be submitting and relapsing into primitivism (1975, 13). Foster notes that Henry's speech and actions after his accident seem surprisingly rational, and that he just seems to be suffering from amnesia. He becomes mad only afterwards, by subsequent degradation and isolation (1976, 88). Petry (1983) makes a similar point, too. She considers that there is no evidence that Henry Johnson is mad, and arques that Trescott does not reveal his estimate of Henry's mind. Morace (1981, 72) considers that Henry's brain has been affected, but that he has become something like a child, and not a maniac, as Judge Hagenthorpe implies. An anonymous reader of the Tales of Whilomville copy I have used marks with a question mark the margin of Levenson's introduction at the point where he affirms that Henry's mind has been destroyed. For most critics, as I have said, this is not an issue at all. Some of them do stoop to consider the possibility that Henry Johnson is sane in the light of the scenes where he appears. But Kahn finds him idiotically insistent in the "Miss Fa'gut" scene of chapter XVII (1963, 40), and for E. Solomon Henry's amnesia and his madness go together: "Henry cannot master the situation, for his mind's clock is permanently stopped at the hour before the fire, and he considers himself only as he was, a handsome figure and an experienced hostler" (1966, 193). Trescott never denies that Henry's mind is affected; many readers would presumably claim that if we were supposed to think that Henry is sane, we ought to have been given clearer signs. Interestingly enough, no critic wishes to challenge the idea that Henry Johnson is harmless; most critics ignore or play down the fact that people do not seem able to control their reactions when they see him and that a girl, Sadie Winter, is almost scared to death (TM 70). According to Foster, she may have seen nothing at all; it is just that people want to believe she has seen Henry (1976, 90). The interpretations of the story progress only in one direction: new interpretations suppose a more radical criticism on Crane's part and a greater ironical complexity, a greater complexity of the relationships between the action and the narrative discourse. This circumstance seems to indicate that the value or the present-day relevance of a work are increased as its complexity increases. We shall see further instances of this move at other levels of the textual structure. For the moment, I will only note that the tendency to move towards the more complex interpretation is often a critical prejudice which leads to a neglect of the historical perspective on the work. The average reading of the story is challenged only in the sense of an increased complicity with the assumed authorial intention. The ironical view on the beliefs of the Whilomville denizens favoured by the textual author provides some interpretations with an inertia which makes them defy the unmarked reading of the story at those points where this reading converges with and is supported by equivalent maneuvers which are requisite in constructing other moments of the story. Irony seems to call for more irony, and the text as read by Cooley or Foster is certainly more complex than the average reading would grant. Clearly enough, it is also more attractive to them. However, I can imagine most readers recognizing the superior irony of this possible story and still not being able to enjoy it because in their opinion it would not the story Crane wrote. Cooley's reading forsakes the pathetic advantage of having the hero of the story destroyed, as well as the powerful effect of Henry's idiocy as an intertextual deautomatization of the hero-figure. Part of the force of "The Monster" derives, no doubt, from the fact that we are unable to identify with Henry after his accident. Agreement on the intepretation of the evaluative stance of the textual author and reader presupposes a more fundamental agreement at the story level. Cooley points out the "irony" that it is Trescott's laboratory which destroys Henry, as "Trescott is the only character in 'The Monster' who might have wisdom, humanity and strength of character sufficient to maintain integrity and achieve understanding from the tragic experience" (1975, 12). Cooley takes this irony as the proof that Crane wants to test Trescott's moral strength. But there remains a problem. Must we suppose that Trescott knows about his responsibility in the laboratory accident? Even if he does know, is it (acknowledged to be) a responsibility at all? Monteiro (1972, 103) suggests that Trescott's attitude to Henry is partly due to his own responsibility in the latter's accident. Morace (1981, 77), on the contrary, assumes that Trescott does not know about his own share of responsibility, and that his disinterestedness makes him appear the more admirable. It is not difficult to piece out an explanation if we feel the need for one: Trescott, being a medical man, surely knows the difference between the burns of acid and fire. It all depends on the kind of reading we want to deal with. The question of Trescott feeling guilty because of his own doings does not seem to arise for most readers. Conclusions on such issues should be regarded as more peripheral than the consideration of the basic core of the interpretive discourse around the story, which in turn may include both agreements and disagreements. The core issues are those which are taken into consideration, albeit in an implicit way, by a significant number of readers. Henry's madness is such an issue. The ending of the story is another. Usually, the construction of the story and that of the authorial attitude reinforce each other (that is the sense of the vertical arrows in our diagram in page 99). Vasil'evskaia and Foster's deviant interpretations of the authorial attitude sustain and are sustained by deviant interpretations of the story. Also, it is not surprising that the deviant interpretations all concern those elements of the story which do not belong to the narrative‹which are not pictured, or dramatized. In Ruthrof's phrasing, when two interpretations differ "it is not the schematically signified, but the concretized worlds which are in conflict" (1981, 38). We may assume that Henry's mind is in such or such a state, and we can adduce different kinds of textual evidence, but we cannot show a portion of the text which describes Henry's mind in an explicit and reliable way. Vasil'evskaia and Foster speculate about that portion of the action which falls beyond the end of the narrative; this discussion cannot be expected to yield clear-cut results either. Is there any sense, then, in trying to interpret what actually happens in the action of "The Monster"? This question cannot be answered here without additional specifications. An interpreter who is trying to interpret the authorial attitude in the story will have to posit an interpretation of the action, because the authorial attitude must be an attitude towards something. However, different interpretations of the action may be compatible with a general description of the authorial attitude, provide that they agree on some basic points. It is to be expected that the critics who want to reach agreement on the implied authorial attitude will agree on an action-scheme which is the basis for their intepretations. If a critic's aim is to reinforce an existing interpretation with additional data, he may further specify the assumed contents of the action in a way which illuminates both other events and the authorial attitude. This is the case, for instance, with the speculations on Trescott's responsibility in the articles by Monteiro and Morace. The concretizations run against each other, but this does not prevent their agreement on the more basic issues of the story. The critic who examines previous interpretations with the aim of validating one of them must also make a choice‹in this respect his position is not essentially different from that of the critic who is concerned solely with the story. If a critic wishes to challenge an existing intepretation, the scope of his challenge will depend on the centrality of the issue about which he differs with other critics. Therefore, the question is really one about which issues are important. But this problem is not specific to the analysis of the action. Indeed, the deviant interpretations of the action can be most usefully discussed in their relation to the question of the implied authorial attitude. It is not surprising that the main divergences in the interpretation of the action are directly related to such controversial issues as the racial message of the story or Crane's judgement on the ultimate sense of personal ethics. For a more detailed discussion of these terms, cf. de Beaugrande and Dressler; Petöfi and Franck. See Ruthrof 37. See Fish, "Interpreting the Variorum." Cf. Hawthorne 1900, 260; rev. in Critic 1900, 182; rev. in Spectator 1901, 244; rev. in Daily News 1901, 6; Beer 1923, 163; Van Doren 1924 (qtd. in M. Solomon 1956b, 38); Åhnebrink 1950, 378; Berryman 1951, 191; Geismar 1953, 116; M. Solomon 1956b, 41; Hoffman 1957, 173; Ellison 1960 (in Ellison 1964, 75); Gullason 1960, 663; Kahn 1963, 37; E Solomon 1966, 181; D. Gibson 1960; 230; 1968, 137; Stallman 1968, 332; Ives 1969, 25; Levenson 1969, xx; Cazemajou 1969b, 423; Westbrook 1972, 89; Monteiro 1972, 103; Mayer 1973, 34; M. Holton 1972, 207; Linder, 1974, 156; Gross 1975, 102, Colvert 1984, 124. Petry seems to be driven by the main point of her paper, the analogy between Henry Johnson and his alleged model John Merrick, the "Elephant man," who was perfectly sane in spite of his deformity. Most critics would not deny that Henry does frighten the little girl. E.g. Gullason 1960, 666. In Linder (1974, 145) there is a suggestion that Trescott's laboratory alludes to his being guilty of hybris; he is then symbolically banished from Eden. According to Westbrook, there is no hint in the story that Trescott is responsible in any way for Henry's accident (1972, 94).

Everything gets darker as the year goes by! By the time Fall comes around, possibly earlier, you’ll start noticing the trend of darker makeup. As the title shows, the Laura Mercier Cinema Noir Collection is set to be black. So what comes in this edgy collection? Well for eyes, the Eye Colour Duets are priced at $22 per piece, which you can get in either Mystere or Suspense. Then there’s the Tightline Cake Eyeliner, at the same price, and finally they’ve got the Long Lash Mascara, at $24, in the color of Burgundy. For lips there are the Raspberry Sorbet and Tea Rose Lip Colours for $24, the Shimmer Bloc at $38 in the shade of Starlet Mosaic, and Nail Lacquers in the colors Nude Silk and Cocoa Suede for $18. Get ready to find these in stores in July!

As you’ll have no doubt have gathered from this series of articles, unlike Roger Ebert and Mark Kermode, I am fascinated by the new wave of 3D releases, both in terms of aesthetics and industry trends, and so last weekend I indulged this fascination by going to see StreetDance 3D at the Peckham Multiplex and Toy Story 3D at the Empire Leicester Square, two very different films, both of which throw up very different issues. Judging by the parade of trailers before the screenings, it seems that Kermode is mistaken on the count that “3D has never been the future of cinema. It is, was, and always will be the past.” All of the animations previewed for release later this year are to be released in both 2D and 3D versions, so clearly there’s been enough invested in promoting this new format for exhibitors to pull out at this late stage in the game. In fact, Toy Story 3D’s Summer rival, Shrek Forever After, was premiering in the cinema next door at exactly the same time. Unlike the earlier boom in the 1950s or the 1980s revival, which in reality only ever amounted to a handful of titles like Jaws 3-D (1983) and Amityville 3-D (1983), there’s already a sizeable canon of films to analyse and, from the evidence of the two under discussion here, one can already detect signs of stylistic innovation. I’m a little more sympathetic to Ebert’s claim that it is just a way for the industry to charge more for admissions. The Peckham Multiplex not only put a £1.50 surcharge on the ticket, they also forced me to buy the glasses, which cost another quid, although this at least means I can keep them for future presentations at this venue (Space Chimps 3D? Well, maybe one has to draw the line somewhere…) As an aside, the glasses provided to view the system used to project StreetDance 3D, RealD, appear to be incompatible with Toy Story’s Disney Digital 3-D system, so already we seem to be in a war of formats, although I assume that the projectors being rolled out across the world can handle both systems, and any differences between these formats are at the production level. There’s some info about this on Wikipedia, with RealD described as “the world’s most widely used technology for watching 3D movies in theatres and the cheapest to install and maintain,” while Disney Digital 3-D is actually a brand, “not a presentation nor a production format or technology. Films advertised as Disney Digital 3-D come from a number of sources, film, digital camera as well as animation software, and can be presented using any digital 3D technology.” I wonder what the projection technology actually was for Toy Story was then, seeing as my RealD glasses didn’t work for it? The trouble most critics are likely to have with explaining the appeal of 3D is that it is often difficult to describe the aesthetic aspects of cinema in basic words. It is something one feels at a deeper level than words can often do justice to. It is also difficult to illustrate the formal aspects of 3D on a 2-dimensional screen, such as the one you’re looking at this article on now, and besides, publicity stills don’t always accurately represent the scenes as they appear in the actual film, nor can they convey movement. My ideas are therefore based largely on my impressions while watching the film. There’s a further trade-off to these new productions that the widescreen formats never had to deal with – while CinemaScope titles eventually found themselves on television within the first decade of this new anamorphic projection system, reframed and re-cut to fit 4:3 screens, they were made to be shown in cinemas. As soon as widescreen became a standard but it was acknowledged that a great deal of viewers would watch the film on television, directors came up with strategies to limit this damage, by centrally positioning the characters in the frame, for example, so that it didn’t matter if the edges fell outside of the TV screen – many even oversaw the TV edits of their films. Now that widescreen TVs are the norm, reframing for domestic viewing is no longer an issue. Comparing the switchover from standard to widescreen ratios with the adoption of full colour is also interesting. Colour was, perhaps to a lesser extent than 3D, also associated with added spectacle, arguably a needless luxury as far as most viewers were concerned, judging by the several decades it took to become a production standard, and not something that necessarily contributed to any sense of “realism”. Look back to the early Technicolor productions and you’ll see it was originally associated with non-realistic, fantasy genres such as animation, or musicals, while serious dramas such as On the Waterfront (1954) remained in monochrome. I think the contrast between the colour and monochrome sequences in The Wizard of Oz (1939) perfectly illustrates this point (made, not by me, but by Ed Buscombe in the essay “Sound and Colour.” in Movies and Methods vol. 2, ed. Bill Nichols, 1985). It was several decades before colour became the norm for filmmakers, due to the cost of the film stock. If you remember that the BBC only began colour broadcasting in 1967, any films shown on UK TV would have been viewed in black and white anyway. It was after this point that the number of films actually produced in monochrome started to decline, with black and white films coming to be seen as old fashioned. Interestingly, the UK’s first colour TV broadcasts were matches in the Wimbledon tennis tournament (see more here), while the UK’s first 3D broadcast, on February 6 of this year, was also sport, the England Vs Wales rugby match, although it was mainly seen this way by viewers attending participating cinemas (see here). Still, with 3D ready flat-screen TVs now a reality, who knows how long it will be before such broadcasts become the norm? And what will this mean for cinema? Still, at the moment, it is assumed that the majority of viewers for the latest wave of 3D titles such as those by Disney/Pixar will be watching the film at home, not projected in 3D. Here’s the compromise: films must be made that use the format in a way that persuades viewers it is worth paying that bit extra, and yet take care that their impact is not diminished on the flat screen. This compromise is much in evidence in StreetDance 3D. Thinking about it a little more, this film is the first actual live-action film produced in 3D that I’ve caught in the cinema, distinguishing it from the other titles I’ve written about, which are either animations such as Coraline or Up, films which make heavy use of CG such as Avatar, or films which were rendered as 3D in post-production such as Clash of the Titans or Alice in Wonderland. For those who’ve not heard anything about it yet, it’s a pretty fascinating title, a British film realised on a relatively modest budget of £4.5m that took more at the UK box office than Ridley Scott’s new Robin Hood film (budget $200m+) and Prince of Persia ($150m) in the first week of its release on 21 May. It’ll no doubt do pretty good business internationally too, for a film of this scale. It’s already been sold to almost 30 countries. You can read more about this surprise box office success on the websites of The Guardian, The Telegraph and The Times, or indeed the film’s own website. You won’t hear serious film critics talking much about the film though. It’s thoroughly lowbrow entertainment aimed at a teenage demographic, one of its hooks being the performances of Diversity, the East London street dance group that famously beat Susan Boyle to win last year’s season of the ITV competition Britain’s Got Talent. The plot isn’t much to write home about either: a young South London girl working at a sandwich bar leads her dance posse to success after drafting the failing students of a snooty ballet school, under the encouragement of their teacher, Charlotte Rampling (the only real name actor in the film). It’s an exuberant wish-fulfillment fantasy in the vein of the TV series Glee or Adrian Lyne’s Flashdance, a title from 1983 that wasn’t made in 3D. Lets face it, it’s really not aimed at people like me, but you may be surprised to hear it, I enjoyed its naive razzle-dazzle far more than I did Avatar. Here is a film that uses 3D in a totally different way from what we have been led to expect by previous releases. There are precious few moments of objects coming out of the screen at you, although a hat is flung out into our faces at the end of one early dance number, and there’s a riotous food fight in the ballet school’s cafeteria which I thought looked pretty good. What really impresses is the use of depth, the sense of a lived in space beyond the plane of the screen; the framing of shots along the ballet school corridor that stretches into the distance, the vistas of London bathed in a cosy sunset glow that evoke a city far different from the one of my daily experience. And then there are the dance scenes themselves, whether they take place in shopping malls, nightclubs or the ballet academy’s class room. These look best in static wide angle shots, which create a depth of field in which all of the dancers remain in focus. There’s no need to break down these scenes of action into bewildering flurries of MTV-style edits, although this has been the norm for these types of sequences since the 1980s, an aesthetic cultivated by the rise of the pop promo, and an aesthetic which the film struggles to resist. Can we imagine this sort of style applied to old-school martial arts films such as the finest work of Hong Kong’s Shaw Brothers, where the real-life gymnastic depicted on the screen are what causes viewers to sit up and gasp, rather than the fake CG-enhanced Matrix-styled sequences we’ve all become so inured to? This is where the compromise come in, though, because as successful as it has been upon its theatrical release, a larger part of the film’s revenues are sure to come from DVD sales for people viewing it flat. The sensation of dancing bodies arranged and moving through a palpable volumetric space is not only sure to be lost on TV, it will also look decidedly unspectacular in comparison to films such as Flashdance, that ‘cheat’ by cutting up and reassembling the breathtaking real-life action of the performance in an attempt to create something more spectacular. Projected on 3D in the cinema, these straight filmed performances are impressive enough, they don’t need editing to make them look any more dynamic (and again, one is reminded of Jean-Luc Godard’s statement about cinema, that “Every edit is a lie”). We also have the luxury of allowing our eyes to roam around the various moving figures on the screen, be they in the background or the foreground. We don’t get this on the small screen. Filmmakers working in 3D need to be mindful about such intrinsic aesthetic considerations though. For one thing, dazzling montages of short cuts can really give you a headache. Stereoscopic images might trick the brain into believing we’re looking through a window into the distance, but our eyes are still focussed on a flat screen a fixed distance away from our noses. Static shots allow us to take in the details across the whole scene. Moving shots give our eyes time to adjust to the illusion that we’re part of the scene. Rapid edits between shots of different focal lengths jar and confuse, which is why so many people claimed that Avatar hurt their eyes. They’re probably not lying. This seems to present another interesting aspect of 3D. If you look closely at some of these screen shots, you’ll notice that they are composed in accordance with 2D film aesthetics. If the camera is focused closely on a foreground object or character, then the background is thrown out of focus. The use of narrow angle lenses strive for this very effect. Take a look at this shot of Carly in the foreground. It is clearly composed to draw the eye to the details of Carly’s face, and yet if this were reality, the viewer would also be able to change their focus onto the dancers behind her, which here remain a blur. Our sense of reality is shattered, as we are made aware of the constraints of the camera lens. Here, the use of focus serves the same effect as an edit. We are forced to concentrate on one specific detail, rather than look around the scene looking for other salient features that may, or may not, be a part of the narrative. Compare this with the shot below. The ballet dancers are arranged in a straight line perpendicular to the camera, with each figure afforded equal prominence by the focal length of the lens. They are clearly the subject of our gaze. However, rather than depict an out-of-focus background space behind them, the painted backdrop prevents our eyes from looking past them. Some viewers might wonder what lies beyond the screen obstructing their view. Most, in reality, probably won’t, but at least they have the freedom to do so, rather than being made aware of the role of the camera in framing what they can or can’t see. They won’t feel like their missing something taking place in a background blur. In my previous posting, I talked a little about staging in depth (profondeur du champ), which David Bordwell goes into inconsiderable detail in his book On the History of Film Style (1998). 3D is clearly ideally suited to this type of scenic composition. It encourages our brains to compose our own narratives from the details we can see on the screen, in the foreground and the background, and across the multitudes of depth planes in between. A long static shot of characters moving along the Z-axis, into or out of the screen, for example, down a corridor (inventively lit so that certain details are hidden by real-life phenomena such as shadows, we might imagine), along a road, or as in this case within the space of a stage, also seems a good use of 3D, as relative size is also a depth cue that works in tandem with stereoscopic vision, to heighten the sense of realism. As well as causing huge headaches for 3D film viewers, rapid editing shifts the balance of power to the director and editor. Controlled focuses within narrow depths of field might not cause headaches, but they similarly highlight the viewer’s passive role in the film. From this I draw my conclusions that using long depths of field is the best use of the 3D screen. (There was another thing I noticed though: when the film cuts from mid shots or close-ups to the extremely wide shots of the dance group onscreen, it gave the odd effect of the figures appearing to shrink in size to Lilliputian dimensions.) Camera lenses have certain physical constraints, particularly in different lighting conditions, so that if focusing on something particularly close in the foreground, the background will be out of focus. I don’t know as much as I’d like to on the issue of to what extent modern 3D camera equipment is limited by these real-world practicalities, but the field of CG animation most certainly isn’t. It should permit every depth plane of the image to be in as sharp a focus as the next. Toy Story 3D uses the 3D format in a way that is effective and yet doesn’t draw attention to itself. And yet if we look at this scene here, we can see Andy in sharp focus, holding Woody and Buzz Lightyear (slightly out of focus) and the background of his bedroom (out of focus). The virtual camera is emulating the focal depth of a real-life camera. One of the things I’ve often mentioned as strange about CG animation is that in its attempts to be realistic, it emulates camera-lens realism, introducing such details as lens flares and camera judders in action sequences. But the thing is, it doesn’t have to replicate the same sense of depth of field. This is an stylistic choice. This scene (perhaps not the best example, but the best I could find on the web, and again, I make the point that publicity stills might not accurately reflect how the scene looks in the film) could have been rendered so that everything would be in perfect focus. I don’t intend this as a criticism of the film (which, like all of Pixar’s releases, raises the bar for CG animation even further). For all I know, it might look really strange if everything was in totally sharp focus, perhaps because viewers are habituated to a lens-based reality in cinema. This is just a point to ponder, and it applies to live-action too. If the backgrounds of StreetDance 3D were in completely sharp focus in the close-up scenes of the characters, would this look really bizarre too? I’ve no answer to this, but aside from my observations that I found the wide-angle shots the most impressive, the point I am making is that 3D makes possible a radically different onscreen reality than that which we have become accustomed to in cinema. That animators are already beginning to explore its potentials is evidenced by the short animation Day & Night that accompanies Toy Story 3D, which I found fascinating. I can’t sum up its experimental approach of juxtaposing 2D and 3D any more succinctly than its Wikipedia entry, which describes its approach thus: “The insides of the characters are computer animated, the use of a masking technique allows the 2D characters to be windows into a 3D CGI day or night world inside them.” Links to the rest of these articles:

T2 / Arts / Architecture Our grandparents could swim at any of the hundreds of open-air lidos in 1930s Britain. Few remain, but some are at last being restored. BRITAIN MAY BE roasting in a heatwave this week, but the day I visit Tinside Lido theres just me and a few hardy souls in kagouls braving the Plymouth seafront. Still, this is quite a place. The lido, a semicircular saucer of fresh blue and white stripes, perches with astonishing grandeur beneath the cliff at the southernmost tip of the Hoe, resting on crags which thrust out into Plymouth Sound. Ships pass on nearly every side. Standing on its terraces, lashed with rain, you feel jolly elemental, as if dangling on a string halfway between sea and land. Next week, Tinside opens to the public for the first time in more than a decade. This is something of a miracle. The lido which embraced the exotic by adopting the Italian word for an open-air swimming place is now practically extinct. In its pre-Sixties heyday we had hundreds. By 1991, just 120 remained; now there are fewer than 50. They were made obsolete when cheap package hols started in the Costas. The 1980s finished them off. Left over from an era when governments and councils thought that supplying citizens with health and happiness was not a luxury, lidos found themselves bracketed with libraries and playing fields as one more cost to cut. The British summer being what it is, they rarely turn a profit alone, and the land can be so much more profitable if sold off. Once a lido closes, it becomes harder to reopen: the fabric deteriorates, the water stagnates, people forget how ravishing it once was. It becomes that much easier to demolish. But the Tinside Action Group never forgot its lidos 1930s glamour. This bunch of local enthusiasts kept Tinside a hot political topic for years, as the city council, swinging from Labour to Tory to Labour, ummed and ahhed. Its consumed five years of my life, says Kevin Kelway, of the action group, who drummed up support from anyone from the Prince of Wales to Margaret Thatcher. Finally, he says, the council said, If we save the pool will you shut up? And so they did. Theres no tougher heritage nut than a lido nut. These people get up at 7am in January to go swimming in unheated pools. Theyre hard as nails. Lidos inspire devotion, says Janet Smith, historian of Tooting Bec Lido, South London. Ive seen people transformed in here. The exhilaration you get when you leave the water and your circulation pumps round your body trying to catch up! People get quite hooked. Its an addiction. Ive got it. Id never leave Tooting. Theres no question of moving away from the pool. Every lido is bolstered by a network of these enthusiasts, who eschew fancy wave machines and fluffy towels for the simpler appeal of the open air. Naturally, they have an excellent website www.lidos.org.uk, set up by Oliver Merrington, a three-times-a-week man from Cambridge and figureheads such as Julie Burchill, one-woman apologist for Saltdean Lido, near Brighton, the most perfect place on earth, she says. And their defenders. The Twentieth Century Society has campaigned to protect lidos since the destruction of a glorious arched listed diving platform in Weston-super-Mare. The Jubilee Pool in Penzance was the first lido to be listed in 1993, five more have followed, including Tinside in 1998 and, last month, Brockwell Lido in South London. The lido appeals to a very British sensibility, thinks Ken Worpole, author of Here Comes the Sun, a history of modernism and the great outdoors. Theres something very British about our clinging to the open-air life even when its wet and cold. Nothing symbolises our cheerful Ealing-comedy optimism better than that unflinching faith that the sun will always come out, if only for a second. Outdoor swimming is most revered in north European countries like Sweden and Finland. Its something to do with subjecting the body to pleasure and pain. The pain is obvious. The pleasure comes from a freedom uncontaminated by consumerism and bureaucracy, Worpole says, those precious moments when its just you, the sunlight, the water (or rain) and a few ducks. In lidos, the hedonist and the puritan meet in one big happy splash. For the paternalist councils who built them, mostly in the Thirties, they were a cunning way to soak up unemployment, and give citizens something healthy and self-improving to do in their spare time. The first proper research into the benefits of exercise, sunlight and the open air led to the 1937 Physical Training and Recreation Act, following model programmes in Germany and Italy, where Mussolinis Opera Nazionale Dopolavoro had organised leisure activities to improve national health and efficiency. For the public, though, it was funtime. The Thirties was the decade of the holiday camp, the chalet, the rambler, Blue Guide jaunts and sunbathing. With shorter working hours and paid holidays, wed never had so much free time. Photos from Tinsides heyday show swarms of people clinging to every terrace, sailors with their girlfriends in their Sunday best, kids, grannies, mums and dads. One night during the Second World War, 3,000 tickets were sold to locals exhausted from clearing the rubble after the bombs. Its easy to forget now how thrilling they once were. Like the cinema, the lido was a place to fantasise: it turned Scarborough into St Tropez. Parliament Hill Lido was opened by the movie star Tyrone Power. Lidos were sexy, glamorous and distinctly unBritish. You went there to catch a saucy glimpse of the bodies beautiful in shapely swimsuits. Architecture was all part of the package. Most council architects sought the modish glamour of Art Deco-ish modern, the exotic style of cruise liners or Hollywood, and the glorious 1929 Piscine Molitor in Paris. It reached its peak with the embracing arms of Saltdean Lido, and Jubilee Pool in Penzance, curved, it was said, like a seagull on the water. But the scrubbed-up Tinside can show them a thing or two: a staircase of smart blue, red, black and cream ceramic tiles and brass and copper handrails guides you from the clifftop, past a rooftop sun terrace and the Tinside Diver, a graceful arc of a diver etched into glass, to a ground-floor unisex changing room and then out onto the pool, 180ft wide, painted with blue and white stripes, and churned by three fountains which funnel the water in jets and mushrooms. At night the lido was built to glow with three-colour floodlights. The restored lido has 14 million colour variations and fibreoptic cables in the fountains. A restored lido is a rare thing. A council financing it is rarer still. This was a big job a new concrete pool floor has been sunk into the bedrock worsened by the logistics of getting materials to the cliff-bottom site. Plymouth managed to raise the £4 million by including the lido in a programme to revive Plymouths whole foreshore, levering regeneration funds that wouldnt be available to a lido alone. A canny move. A built-in restaurant will bring in income during the winter. Tinside may even mark a lido comeback. Lambeth Council secured a 25-year lease for Brockwell last month; Parliament Hill Lido is embarking on a restoration; while in East London, locals and the council are working on the revival of London Fields Lido. Many, though, are still being demolished; last month the South Bay Pool in Scarborough became the latest. When Lambeth Council pulled the plug on it in 1994, the Brockwell Lido in South London was rescued and run by Paddy Castledine and his partner, Casey McGlue. When the sun shines all is well. Last weekend, 5,000 visited. But Brockwell rarely breaks even, unless theres a spectacularly hot summer. The pair had to be entrepreneurial, even sealing a £100,000-a-year sponsorship deal with Evian, whose logo is painted on the bottom of the pool. After a final bail-out to get it through the last summer, Lambeth has just signed a 25-year contract with Fusion, a not-for-profit sports group, which has promised local enthusiasts like the Brockwell Lido Users Group that it will invest £2.25 million to upgrade the newly grade II-listed pool. Councils cant just blame poverty for letting lidos close. Thats lazy. On the Continent, where spa culture is more firmly entrenched, outdoor pools such as the Olympic in Helsinki or the Strandbad Wannsee in Berlin throng all year round. Lidos may be expensive, but surely in our new global-warming, leisure economy theres room for them to make a comeback. GREAT OUTDOORS TOP 10 Parliament Hill Lido, London NW5. Classic 1930s municipal glamour, with a 60m pool and fountain. Serpentine Lido, London W2. Built in 1929, with elegant colonnades and grass verges. Expect lots of geese and ducks for company. Tooting Bec Lido, London SW16. The capitals oldest in London, built in 1906, and still in good nick with bright primary-coloured changing huts. Brockwell Lido, London SE24. Brixtons beach, and South Londons Miami! Whatever. perhaps Londons the most popular London lido, with a great events programme (floodlit swimming, barbecues, etc). Hampton Open Air Pool, southwest London. Built in 1922, this one was saved by locals back in the 1980s, when the council was on the brink of demolishing it again. Heated! Guildford Lido, Surrey. A heated 1933 pool, surrounded by elegant landscaped gardens. and pergolas. Jesus Green Lido, Cambridge. At 90m long one of the longest in Europe. Surrounded by trees and 1960s timber changing rooms. Jubilee Pool, Penzance. Grade II listed lido, built in 1935 by Captain F Latham; its triangular design at the waters edge rivals Tinside for location. Saltdean Lido, Brighton. A grade II-listed Deco masterpiece, designed by Richard Jones. Restored in the late 1990s after years of dereliction. Stonehaven Open Air Swimming Pool, Aberdeenshire. Heated sea water! Good job, too, in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Built in 1934, and Olympic sized. Copyright 2003, Times Newspapers Ltd.

- It's covered so extensively elsewhere you'd think it was the most important thing about movies. It's not. - $$$ has zero correlation to quality. And sometimes even not that much correlation to perceived quality (Witness how many people flock to sequels of films they didn't love, expecting not much at all. I'm guilty here, too... I've dubbed it The Blockbuster Loop) - Covering it only adds to the problem of 'the tipping factor', wherein something that is successful becomes even more successful (even if total crap) merely because people see the success and intuit that they're supposed to be into it (Twilight, anyone?). - I find it nearly impossible to manipulate the masses to my way of thinking. Curses! They wear deflector shields to ward off my psychic will. If I ever find a chink in those shields, suddenly everyone will be buying tickets to films about women (yay), films with auteurial points of view (respect!) and films that get more thrills from acting, costumes, art direction and cinematography than from lazy CGI (yes) and, ummm, musicals (doo-wah). 01 Where the Wild Things Are new $32.6 It wasn't just the cinematography that was golden. This opening take made JA feel groovy, got people talking crazy, and as the Big Picture notes, the latest from Spike Jonze didn't even have to lie about what sort of movie it was. Truth in advertising. What a concept! It cost $100ish million to make though so it's going to be a long road to actual profit. Still, wasn't it great to see actual puppets again as opposed to weightless CGI? That in and of itself was pretty thrilling. I loved those shots of Max burying his face in the brown ratty-looking puppet hair, so tactile and inviting -- like a stuffed animal you've dragged with you everywhere. You can't let go of it even after it's germ laden and smelly from your play time adventures. 02 Law Abiding Citizen new $21 Gerard Butler, King of Bad Movies 03 Paranormal Activity $19.6 for a total of $33 Previously covered by JA here. Even though I'm not into horror I'm curious because I loved The Blair Witch Project to which this is often compared. 04 Couples Retreat $17.2 for a total of $62.6 Or nearly double what (500) Days of Summer has made in its entire run. Honestly, American peoples... WHY?!? 05 The Stepfather new $11.5 Is any audience more faithful than the slasher audience on opening weekend? I'd guess no. 06 Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs $8 for a total of $108.2 It's holding very well which leads me to believe it has a real shot at the animated Oscar nomination. It's currently the #20 film of the year but still behind four other animated titles as 2009 money grabbing goes... including G Force. Weird, right? 07 Zombieland $7.6 for a total of $60 Did you know that this is the highest grossing zombie film of all time? That totally surprised me. Given the amount of zombie films we've seen this decade you would think there was some gargantuan blockbuster take in recent years that every studio was hoping to recreate. 08 Toy Story (double feature in 3D) $3 for a total of $28.5 It's all gravy. The first two Toy Story films had already earned $847 worldwide + the a few pennies from merchandise I suspect. I love the movies so why aren't I more exciting about #3? Oh, yes. Third Films = Quality Drop. It's a movie rule. 09 Surrogates $1.9 for a total of $36.3 10 The Invention of Lying $1.9 for a total of $15 "We're number two! We're number two!!!" 11 Whip It $1.5 for a total of $11.3 Actually Hurl Scouts, you're #11 in your third week because people hate fun movies that are not based on comic books, other movies or tv shows. The masses also (supposedly) don't like films about women unless they're romcoms with bankable A listers or films starring the Queen of the Universe Meryl Streep. Nothing wrong with romcoms (unless they're bad) and definitely nothing wrong with the Streep... but women make up more than 50% of the population so there has to be more to female driven cinema than that. I still can't quite figure the standoffishness that greeted this film. You can do -- and people do do -- much worse for an evening's entertainment when you hit the multiplex. Maybe Joe Reid is right. Maybe it should have been a television series instead? 12 Capitalism A Love Story $1.4 for a total of $11.6 Michael Moore continues to be the only documentarian who can guarantee a sizeable gross. His films make up 50% of the top grossing political docs ever. His box office pulls seems to be waning these days but still... Documentaries rarely gross in the 7 figures let alone the 8s. 13 The Informant $.9 for a total of $31.7 For some reason I was under the impression that this Soderbergh / Matt Damon comedy had flopped. $31 is respectable for smart laughs, I think. It surely helps that Soderbergh doesn't often overspend on his movies. 14 Fame $.9 for a total of $21.7 I assume this is not the kind of gross they were hoping for a franchise reboot. I enjoy musical performance films that aren't musicals as much as your average citizen (probably) but maybe reality competition shows have oversupplied for this very particular demand. Plus, there's GLEE which is JOY for free on your telly. 15 A Serious Man $.8 for a total of $1.8 Great per screen averages for this Coen Bros film (still in less than a 100 theaters) and Focus is obviously being careful with it. But aren't the Coens, who have been championed for many years by movie fanatics, at least kind of well known in the mainstream now after the consecutive relatively big grosses of Burn After Reading and No Country For Old Men and the ongoing obsessive fandom from their earlier work? It would have been interesting to see how well this could have done --even without movie stars -- if it had opened wider (if not wide). 16 Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All By Myself $.5 for a total of $51.3 Perry is such a consistent force. You have to give him that. It's probably easy to raise your production budget when you can safely expect a $40-$60 style gross for each outing. 17 Love Happens $.5 for a total of $22.4 Or... twice as much as Whip It has made. I bet you anything that Jennifer Aniston fans don't remember this movie in two years while Whip It will be in thrice as many DVD collections. 18 GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra $.4 for a total of $149.6 19 Good Hair $.3 for a total of $1.7 20 Bright Star $.3 for a total of $3.5 There will be those who claim that the new distributor Apparition should have waited to release this fine romantic drama closer to Oscar season but those people can never seem to grasp that not every movie can or should arrive in December with every other movie. There aren't enough theaters and there also aren't enough pages and blogs and television programs to give 75 Oscar contending films their due all in the same month. At least this way it got some attention. And a $3.5 take (so far) for a quiet period piece without any "names" is not a bad tally at all in this day and age. Well done Apparition. The question now is: can they keep it open for awhile longer to gird up for that Oscar campaign?

How bad is bad? Good enough to make a sequel. In Vienna, just after the war, there was a shortage of penicillin that led to a racket. In The Third Man, this fellow, Harry Lime, cornered the market in penicillin. He was selling it for 70 quid a tube. Then logic occurred to him: he could dilute the stuff but put the price up. It was a kind of murder. "Men with gangrened legs, women in childbirth. And there were children, too. They used some of this diluted penicillin against meningitis. The lucky children died, the unlucky ones went off their heads." - The Third Man - Production year: 1949 - Country: UK - Cert (UK): PG - Runtime: 104 mins - Directors: Carol Reed - Cast: Alida Valli, Joseph Cotten, Orson Welles, Trevor Howard They could be your children. Calloway, the policeman, shows the results to Holly Martins to break that fool's friendship with Lime. In 1949, such scenes were too grim to put in the film itself. But no one stinted on the charm of Lime. He's talked about for three-quarters of the picture, and there he is, like a little boy in a grown-up's coat, hiding in a doorway, with a cat on his polished shoes, and giving that sweet, seductive Orson Welles smile into the camera. Would he smile to see the children in the hospital, or just pop another indigestion tablet to kill the acid? Those kids, he tells Holly, they're like dots on the ground. He offers Holly £20,000, "free of income tax, old man", for every dot that stops moving. It is a Satanic proposition, and The Third Man is a film where Satan has most of the best lines - like the one about Italy under the Borgias and good old Switzerland with centuries of brotherly love and only the cuckoo clock as its prize. Everyone loved Harry Lime in 1949, even if he had to die, so it was hardly a surprise that after the movie, Lime was back, on radio first - as a hero, a kind of modern-day Robin Hood, a bit of a rogue but a fellow who righted wrongs, someone the poor benighted mugs of the world could rely on. Nearly 30 years later, John Carpenter made a very simple horror film, Halloween, in which a demented and implacable killer revisited the scene of his first crime and raised havoc until the lovely, decent, brave, resourceful babysitter, Jamie Lee Curtis, put him away once and for all. Except that when the film went to look at the corpse on the street outside the house, it was gone. Witchcraft? Magic? Or just those cheery picture-business people being too smart to rule out a sequel? Once upon a time, the movie business was handled with immense moralistic caution. And so it was written into the rules for making pictures that crime could not be seen to pay, that villains could not be left to prosper and escape, that evil and wickedness knew what they had coming. Sweet dreams. Now that the picture business has coincided with 100 years or so in which evil and wickedness have had field days, it is far less easy to recognise screen villains and feel the confidence to boo them. Next month sees the fourth episode in the Terminator franchise. We may be stupid to expect too much of part four, but we still exult in the great lessons of the first two films made by James Cameron. For just as the brilliant time-scheme of the original story allowed for a cyborg sent to Earth to destroy a young woman so that her child could not lead the coming struggle against cyborgs, so the screen phenomenon known as Arnold Schwarzenegger not only embodied the unstoppable machine to perfection, but then saw how all the technical assets of the villain could be passed to the new hero - so long as the cyborg hero in Terminator 2: Judgment Day had a new villain. And so the first two parts of Terminator - truly pioneering films - became uncanny living metaphors of the conflict between human nature and special effects that is dominating both life and the movies The cyborg in T2, Robert Patrick, is terrifying (or is it thrilling?), beyond science or reason, and more lasting than perpetual motion or an eternal flame - he is a Satan, so long as you don't insist on anything really "fallen" in this angel's status. And in the mounting battle of T2, it was evident from the outset that audiences were rooting for both Arnold and Patrick - just keep the battle flowing. For here is the key truth: in the dark of the movies, where morality may be hard to discern, villains are such fun and we, the audience, do not like to be disloyal to those who have given us pleasure. Of course, the old code just about hangs on: as we wait for this summer's Public Enemies, directed by Michael Mann, with Johnny Depp as John Dillinger, we may rely on Depp having a death scene at the end of the picture, not just because the real Dillinger was shot down by G-men in 1934, but because the enterprise known as the cinema hardly credits that it can let evil, the bad or criminals flourish. Still, in a world in which banks, their presidents and managers are getting a daily drubbing, it's unlikely that the banks Dillinger cracks will get much sympathy. In 1967, Bonnie and Clyde mined a new audacity by making its real-life hoodlums as beautiful as Beatty and Dunaway - but only because the film had that immense, slow-motion execution finale as a purgative, or as an escape clause. It's my guess that Public Enemies will be great public entertainment, in that Depp's Dillinger cheek will ride a current wave of anti-establishment feelings such as Bonnie and Clyde discovered in 1967. But something has been lost in all this, and I don't mean simply our moral bearings. It is very hard nowadays for the movies to keep a straight face while telling us to be afraid and disapproving of villains. Look at the first two parts of The Godfather, still in many ways the essential works of modern American cinema. I would guess that Francis Coppola would have said (and believed) he was making a study in the corruption of power and evil. Michael Corleone goes from being a decent Ivy League kid, the saved soul of the family, to being the prince of darkness. Except that's not how audiences read the films, or why they keep going back to them. Yes, Michael is a creep, a control freak, a very cold guy and the killer of his own brother. But he is also the man keeping the family together and maintaining its business. He is the bleak model of a ruthless leadership to which we all aspire - we all want to be Corleones. I think Coppola made The Godfather: Part II to help allay the glorification of organised crime offered in the first film. But that plan fell through. In the same way, I'm fairly confident that the author Thomas Harris created Hannibal Lecter to be the most loathsome and terrifying creature he could think of. But then if you think of the film of The Silence of the Lambs, you see the subtle distortion of that attitude. Yes, Lecter is a cannibal and a killer. But the real nasties in the film are the man in the cell next door, and the killer Jame "Buffalo Bill" Gumb. Lecter is a strange kind of helper to Clarice, because he likes her. And so a weird affection forms between them, and by the end of the sequel, Hannibal, the villain, has become one of our odder screen lovers. Anthony Hopkins won the best actor Oscar in the original film for a good supporting role - there has never been such a tribute to the beguiling force and gallows humour of villainy or evil on film. So are there real villains left? Well, there are the monsters, above all the creatures opposed by Sigourney Weaver's Ripley in Alien and Aliens. These are killing machines, but some of them have maternal instincts and the flexibility that will play along with our dark sense of humour. For a few surreal moments, Ripley had seen a daft kinship with the creatures. I encourage readers to supply their own "truly frightening villains". I have my own candidate. Robert Shaw never made a film in which he didn't frighten me. I have always found The Sting a broken-backed caper because I believe Shaw's Doyle Lonnegan could grind Newman and Redford down to make his own bread. Again, in Jaws, I find Quint scarier than the shark. And I know that high in my pantheon of "perfect" villains is Robert Patrick, reforming for more mayhem, as if he was the cat in a Tom and Jerry cartoon. But do movies "do" evil, without being tongue-in-cheek? I had nearly given up on that hope - until I saw Red Riding. The greatness of that work lay not just in delivering a world of wickedness, but in allowing us no way of slipping off its hook. • Who's your favourite movie villain? Let us know at guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog

Weekend box office: 'Kick-Ass' does not quite... After last week's too-close-to-call box office report -- a competition so neck-and-neck that it eventually turned out "Clash of the Titans" captured the top-movie title, not "Date Night," as originally reported -- we've got another tight race on our hands. Based on Sunday studio estimates, it appears "How to Train Your Dragon" claimed the top position at the weekend box office, out-grossing second-place finisher "Kick-Ass" by $200K, give or take. To the box office bullet points: First, the obvious question: What the @*#! happened to "Kick-Ass"? After all the fanboy buzz and Hit-Girl hype, the ultra-adrenalized comic-book flick made just $19.8 million and, as stated above, didn't even open in first place. (Assuming, of course, that studio projections hold up.) Part of the problem? Audience limitation. According to Box Office Mojo, 60 percent of the "Kick-Ass" audience was male and, more importantly, half was under the age of 25. Add in all the controversy about Hit-Girl and the hard-R rating -- which may have prevented a good number of teens from seeing it -- and you've got a recipe for a niche. A desirable niche, mind you, but enough of one to keep a broad swath of moviegoers from buying tickets. Reviews and word-of-mouth on "Kick-Ass" trended toward the positive, though. So perhaps its destiny is to take No. 1 next week, assuming they can take out that spunky Jennifer Lopez. But more on that later. The race between dragons and vigilante justice leagues wasn't the only close one at the box office this weekend. Two comedies -- "Date Night" and Chris Rock's "Death at a Funeral" -- also fell prey to the photo-finish effect; "Date" made $17.3 million, putting it in third place, while "Funeral" landed in fourth with $17 million. It seems moviegoers -- who bought enough tickets to raise overall cinema business by 12 percent -- are taking the classic mom approach: they like all their children the same. (You know, almost.) In a random but notable aside for those who constantly wonder why Jennifer Aniston is a movie star, "The Bounty Hunter" managed to stay in the top 10 for the fifth consecutive week. The comedy has now amassed $60.3 million in North America and a total of $98.9 million worldwide, after being made for roughly $40 million. That's called a nice profit and -- the "quality" of "Bounty Hunter" not withstanding -- that's why Aniston continues to be perceived as profitable. (Yes, Gerard Butler *may* have helped. If you're into that sort of thing ... and I know a lot of you are.) Now we look to this weekend, when Jennifer Lopez continues her (cough) comeback with "The Back-Up Plan" and another comic book-inspired action flick, "The Losers," attempts to attract attention. Will one of those movies win? Or will "Kick-Ass" finally triumph? | April 19, 2010; 10:45 AM ET Categories: Movies, Pop Culture | Tags: box office, movies Save & Share: Previous: Kim Kardashian poses unretouched in the buff; Man claims to be Oprah's dad Next: Profiles in 'Lost' Fandom: Meet Morgan McPhearson Posted by: chibbs2000 | April 19, 2010 12:18 PM | Report abuse Posted by: frieda406 | April 19, 2010 4:19 PM | Report abuse The comments to this entry are closed.

Rock musician Dave Navarro has teamed with Teravision to direct his first adult movie, Broken. Set for September release, the movie stars Sasha Grey as "a woman torn apart by the duality of control and powerlessness in her life." Broken is the first in a planned series of celebrity-directed porn movies from Teravision. Navarro conceptualized the movie with producer Sancho, who recently made his own directing debut for the company with Ferocious. "Dave's innovative sound with Jane's Addiction was always creatively inspiring to me," said Sancho. "I loved the combination of depth, eroticism and dark, moody art. So it was not surprising that Dave and I both had the exact same vision for this movie. We wanted to break the cookie-cutter mold and do the exact opposite of what is happening in adult. This is the foundation of what I stand for in this business. So working with Dave was perfect." "I have always had an interest in film making and the visual arts, so when Teravision approached me about directing a film, it felt like a natural partnership," said Navarro. "I have known Evan and Tera for years and have many friends in the adult entertainment industry, so I figured... What a great opportunity to work on a feature length project with people I already know. I have missed the sense of danger and edge in the music business for many years and working on this project reminded me a lot of the old days when we were just a bunch of kids in Hollywood playing the clubs, getting our hands dirty and raising some eyebrows along the way." Navarro's camera crew included Teravision directors James DiGiorgio, Ethan Kane and Axel Braun. The core of the movie was produced as a six-camera shoot in which the crew taped four separate scenes at once, in a single take. Although Navarro has no intention of performing sex on screen, he does appear in the movie as himself, directing the action. "What happens is, the film breaks fantasy and goes back into reality and you’re actually on the set, so my interaction is mainly me giving Sasha direction," Navarro told AVN. "You might see me walk up to her and direct her where to go – when you see me interact in the film, it’s as a director. The movie opens with kind of a theme and as it progresses into the six-camera day, the theme continues but the fourth wall is broken – you can see cameras, cables and lights, almost as if you’re watching Sasha go to work." "We had all six cameras rolling at once," Sancho explained. "We had Axel, Chris Hall, and Jimmy D shooting, and then we had Dr. Philgood running a jib arm and a Steadicam, so we shot all the sex scenes simultaneously in one take, together, and they all intertwine because Sasha and Dave go in and interact in each scene. It was a brand-new experience for me, for sure; I've never shot anything that grand." Navarro told AVN that there are no scripted lines in Broken. The movie's seven erotic scenes are lniked thematically by Grey's character. "We’re not reinventing the wheel- we’re just making a film," Navarro said. "What’s most exciting about the opportunity was to literally get behind the camera and work in the direction field. If anything, there’s definitely an artistic flair and sensibility throughout the picture that might at times appear self-indulgent – I hope so!" Broken also stars Jenna Haze, Victoria Sin, Audrey Bitoni, Lisa Daniels and Kayla Paige. Male talent includes Mark Davis, Marco Banderas, Tommy Gunn and Spyder Jonez. "It was great that Sancho and Dave both understood each other's visions, making the process all the more enjoyable," said Sasha Grey. "Working with a new director can be a positive or negative experience and this was definitely a positive. There was collaboration between the three of us, a vision, and now something that everyone can get off on!" In addition to performing in a boy/girl scene, Banderas contributed to the production by picking up the camera for Tommy Gunn's scene and shooting an orgy from a POV perspective. "Marco didn't realize who Dave Navarro was until after the shoot, when he saw Navarro in a magazine," said Lisa DeMarco, Banderas' wife. On the subject of his first-time adult directing experience, Navarro said, "As a creative force, I was more interested in what was going on on the monitors, with the lighting and the angles. I was thinking more as a director rather than a voyeur. It was a lot more technical than I had thought it would be. I do a lot of different short films for my internet show [Spread Entertainment] with my partner Todd Newman, and those are all reality-based clips. I’m less concerned in those cases when it comes to shooting; in editing , we make it work. Here, since I was dealing with a fantasy world, it was important that it be shot in the way I had envisioned it." Navarro is not contributing any of his own music to the project, but he is personally supervising the soundtrack. "We're getting a great hard rock band with a female vocalist to score the movie," Navarro said. "They do everything from super-heavy, hard metal to really ambient, hypnotic trance-electronic music. They cover a wide spectrum of emotion, much as the film does from scene to scene. Within the theme of female empowerment, to have a female vocalist fronting such a heavy band is appropriate." "Dave is an extremely talented artist with tremendous vision which he has always communicated through his music," said Tera Patrick. "I truly believe that with the Teravision team, Dave is breaking down barriers and exploring a new medium, erotic cinema. With our society so hung up about sex, yet so comfortable with violence, I think Dave's involvement in this project is a breath of fresh air and real stand for freedom of speech. Make love, not war! The music to the movie is incredible and I truly feel the bar has been set very high for those who will attempt to follow our lead. Dave and Sancho have created a movie that stands alone, and in many ways literally defines originality. Sasha's performance will take you up and down through many emotions, but always so hot! I think a scene with Sasha is definitely in the cards. . .and as for Dave working with Teravision. . .why not? He is hot as hell, and what woman wouldn't want him working under her?" "We have been biding our time, waiting for the perfect way to fuse porn, rock and celebrity into a dark new artistic vision that will put both the porn and mainstream worlds on notice," said Teravision owner Evan Seinfeld. "I give Dave a lot of credit for having the guts and the true rock star attitude to do what safe, corporate rockers and rappers can't. Porn is not taboo. The real taboo is people's innate fears that they will be judged for embracing sexuality. His movie sets the bar high in terms of intensity and creative expression with a focus that goes beyond the hot sex. Teravision is already closing a deal for the next movie in the celebrity series. This is what it's all about." Broken is scheduled to arrive in stores on Sept. 27. For sales, contact David Peskin, (866) 466-6969 ext. 108 or e-mail [email protected].

Down by Law was the hippest film I’d ever seen when I was around sixteen years old, until I explored the rest. I’m yet to see Jim Jarmusch’s debut effort, Permanent Vacation, which is supposed to be just as good, but a little less known. Down by Law gave me a kind of official introduction to Jim, and I’m glad that it was this one. Telling the tale of three convicts who find a way out of their cell and onto the open road, in his trademark black-and-white and starring Roberto Benigni, John Lurie and Tom Waits, it gave me a good indication of the director’s style. Down by Law was actually his third project following his thesis-turned-film Stranger than Paradise. By this point, Jarmusch has established himself well as a big name in independent cinema. His work had developed a reputation for being broody, contemplative and highly focused on a deliberate mood. Each piece of work was unusually dark, humorous and poetic. He announced, once, that he felt like he created American films through a foreigner’s eyes, a unique sort of world cinema. This idea was added to by friend, musician and actor, Tom Waits, when he said ‘the key to Jim is that he went grey at fifteen, he always felt like an immigrant in the teenage world and he’s been a benign fascinated foreigner ever since’. Waits might be right in a way, but Jim’s films and the foreign, noir feel that each one effectively carries must be the result of something more than premature greying. For example, his final year at Columbia University was spent in Paris – where he lived for ten months. Here, he spent almost all of his time at the ‘Cinémathèque Française’ devouring hundreds of European and Japanese films. He once stated ‘that’s where I saw things I had only ever read about and heard about’. He is also known for his close affiliation with the renowned film noir director, Nicholas Ray, who is sure to have been responsible for a great amount of influence. Jarmusch is such a fascinating filmmaker because you almost know for a fact that he’d much sooner write a film about an evening spent in a café, or a walk in the park than a secret agent, a hurricane or a giant ape. His films always have a near non-existent plot while delving into character development, interactions and subtle observations. His work possesses a unique poetry while an absurd sort of philosophy resonates throughout. It’s easy to tell that his former ambitions lay in poetry, studying literature at university initially, and not film. Within independent and arthouse circles, he has consistently increased his reputation as one of the most adventurous and rebellious filmmakers in America and elsewhere. This adventurous and experimental nature has been present since the very beginning, and shone through even during Jim’s university years. On eagerly bringing his script to be reviewed, his friend and mentor, Nicholas Ray, put it down as having a lack of action. Jim responded to this criticism by reworking the script and returning it with even fewer events than the original.

Jeethu Joseph has been a roll of late with back successful Malayalam films, My Boss (2012) and the recent Memories. After working with popular actors like Suresh Gopi, Dileep and Prithviraj, Jeethu has now worked with Mohanlal in his forthcoming film-Drishyam. About these ads Priyadarshan hasn’t been having a great time of late in Hindi Cinema with his last successful film being De Dana Dan, way back in 2009. In between he made a comeback to Malayalam Cinema with Arabeem Ottakom P.Madhavan Nairum in Oru Marubhoomikadha. Well in my previous article on this year’s Eid releases I had tried to draw attention to 3 different films across 3 languages, each one of them being different from each other but appealing to the intended target audience in their own ways. I did not realize that I will write another post carrying off … All those who are familiar with Malayalam Cinema will acknowledge the fact that writer-director (also producer and actor at times) Ranjith is one of the better writer-filmmakers around in the industry right now. Salam Bappu aka Salam Palapetty, a long time associate of Malayalam filmmaker Lal Jose turns independent filmmaker with Red Wine. For a debutant director Salam has managed to achieve something big by getting Mohanlal to play the lead role of Ratheesh Vasudev, a cop. Lokpal is a forthcoming Malayalam movie which sees veterans Joshiy and S.N.Swamy come back together after a long time. The director-writer combination of Joshiy and S.N.Swamy have worked together on films like Naduvazhikal, Dhruvam, Sainyam, Janmam etc. If you were to ask for the most widely discussed Malayalam movie online, Padmarajan’s Thoovanathumbikal would unarguably be the movie that would take the numero uno position. 25 years have gone by but a whole lot of Malayalam cinegoers and young directors will swear by their fascination of this cult movie. It won’t be wrong to say that Dulquer Salman has been the find of the year for Malayalam Cinema. With a smashing debut in Second Show and an even better follow up with Ustad Hotel, Dulquer has shown that he’s serious about making a name for himself and not resting on his father’s ( Mammootty … Major Ravi and Mohanlal have already worked together on a few films earlier like the reasonably successful Keertichakra and Kurukshetra and the colossal failure, Kandahar ( which even had a cameo by Amitabh Bachchan ).

COMMISSION REPORT TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS on the implementation of the European Agenda for Culture /* COM/2010/0390 final */ |Bilingual display: BG CS DA DE EL EN ES ET FI FR HU IT LT LV MT NL PL PT RO SK SL SV| [pic] | EUROPEAN COMMISSION | COMMISSION REPORT TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS on the implementation of the European Agenda for Culture COMMISSION REPORT TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS on the implementation of the European Agenda for Culture Culture lies at the heart of the European project and is the anchor on which the European Union's "unity in diversity" is founded. The combination of respect for cultural diversity and the ability to unite around shared values has guaranteed the peace, prosperity and solidarity the EU enjoys. In today's globalising world, culture can make a unique contribution to a European Strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, promoting stability, mutual understanding and cooperation worldwide. The adoption of the European Agenda for Culture in 2007 opened a new chapter of cooperation on culture policy at European level. For the first time, all partners – European institutions, Member States and culture civil society – were invited to pool their efforts on explicitly defined shared goals, which were endorsed by the Council: - promotion of cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue - promotion of culture as a catalyst for creativity - promotion of culture as a vital element in the EU's international relations In order to support cooperation, the Agenda also introduced working methods new to the field of culture: - an Open Method of Coordination (OMC) for closer Member State cooperation on the priorities identified in the Council Workplan for Culture 2008-2010, - a more structured dialogue with civil society in the field of culture through various platforms for discussion and exchange. Purpose of this report This report examines progress at European and national levels towards the three objectives of the Agenda and assesses first experiences of the new working methods, drawing upon the national reports submitted by Member States and the work of the OMC groups and platforms. In the light of this analysis, the Commission has drawn the conclusions presented in sections 3.1.2 and 3.2.2. Progress in making sure that culture aspects are properly taken into account in relevant EU policies ("mainstreaming") is highlighted above all in the Staff Working Paper which accompanies this report. PROGRESS TOWARDS THE AGENDA OBJECTIVES Agenda objective 1: Promotion of cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue Progress can be highlighted in many areas. The 2008 European Year of Intercultural Dialogue focused on both awareness-raising and on developing the policy debate on intercultural dialogue. New policies and structures are a legacy of the Year in a number of Member States, while at EU level political agreement was reached on the need to promote intercultural competences and on the role of intercultural dialogue in external relations. The Platform for Intercultural Europe published, and continues to promote, the "Rainbow Paper" of civil society recommendations. Improving the conditions for the mobility of artists and other culture professionals has been tackled both by an OMC group focusing on obstacles to mobility and how to tackle them, for example through improved information systems, and on the role of intermediary organisations, and through an ongoing 3 million euro dedicated pilot project, which develops and tests new ideas on mobility support.. The Commission is also conducting a broader exercise aimed at tackling all obstacles European citizens encounter when they exercise their rights as Union citizens in all aspects of their daily lives, and will issue a Report on Citizenship later this year. Denmark's new DIVA artist-in-residence programme supports incoming artists in the visual arts, music, literature and performing arts. A programme for Danish artists wishing to work abroad is in the pipeline. The new Czech programme for creative or study efforts supports mobility for the purpose of new creations. The OMC group on mobility of collections has made a thorough comparison of practices in several fields, including incentives and obstacles to lending. A Commission study on the prevention and fight against illicit trafficking of cultural goods is underway. A pilot project to explore the development of a cultural heritage alert network has been launched in 2010 by the European Parliament. The Netherlands runs an awareness raising campaign against illicit trafficking of cultural goods, tailored for four target groups: the art trade, the general public, heritage institutions and law enforcement agencies. A government programme in Cyprus supports transfer and exhibition costs for both incoming and outgoing works of art. Synergies between education and culture have been the focus of one OMC group and a topic for the Platform on Access to Culture. At European level, policy conclusions on promoting a creative generation recognise that cultural expression and access to culture have a vital role in developing the creativity of children and young people. Slovenia adopted National Guidelines for Culture and Arts Education. Sweden's Creative Schools initiative to promote collaboration between schools and the cultural sector has been taken up by 97% of municipalities. The education directorate of each Greek municipality includes the post of Head of Cultural Affairs with the remit of reinforcing education-culture links. Belgium's (Flemish Community) "Dynamo3" programme encourages schools to develop a long-term vision on arts and culture education. The Commission's 2008 Communication on " Multilingualism : an asset for Europe and a shared commitment", set out what needs to be done to turn linguistic diversity into an asset for solidarity and prosperity. Two structured dialogue platforms involving business and civil society have since been created. In the broad field of access to culture, digitisation has also been an area of progress. Europeana was launched in 2008. The Commission has announced new measures for promoting digitisation and on line accessibility of cultural heritage in the framework of the Digital Agenda for Europe. Estonia's Digital Cultural Heritage Strategy 2007-2010 includes a range of e-services to make heritage more accessible, including cooperation between the national archives, the national library, public broadcasting and museums. Regarding media literacy , understood as the ability to access and critically evaluate media contents, a 2009 Commission Recommendation calls for Member States and the media industry to increase people's awareness of the many forms of media messages they encounter. Follow-up work is underway through the MEDIA 2007 programme and MEDIA International preparatory action. Portugal has introduced a copyright literacy programme for schools, aiming to reinforce young people's understanding of the value of creation and cultural diversity. Slovakia has adopted a media education concept prepared in cooperation with civil society, education and media institutions. Also with a view to promoting access to culture, the Commission has proposed a European Heritage Label to build on the current intergovernmental initiative. The Label would highlight sites that celebrate and symbolise European integration, ideals and history. Award would be based on criteria including the educational dimension of sites, especially for young people. Agenda objective 2: Promoting culture as a catalyst for creativity Cooperation has focused on cultural and creative industries (CCIs) and the contribution of strategic investment in culture to regional and local development. At both European and national levels, the potential of culture to foster creativity and innovation, and so to contribute to an environment favourable to growth and jobs, is increasingly in the spotlight, as confirmed by Council Conclusions on Culture as a Catalyst for Creativity and Innovation. Poland's "Culture Counts!" campaign highlights the role of culture both in the economy and in broader society. Italy's 2009 White Paper on Creativity explores a model of creativity and cultural production and proposes actions to boost creativity. The 2009 European Year of Creativity and Innovation also explored the ways in which culture generates both economic and social innovation. The Manifesto of the Ambassadors of the Year emphasises the creativity which can be generated by building bridges between art, philosophy, science and business. Several studies conducted on behalf of the Commission fed into the debate, notably the 2009 study on the impact of culture on creativity, the 2010 study on entrepreneurship in CCIs and the thematic report by Eurydice on Arts and Cultural Education at School in Europe. CCIs have been a particular focus of attention, culminating at EU level with the publication in April 2010 of a Green Paper on how to create an environment in which this sector can fulfil its potential to contribute to smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. The Green Paper draws strongly on the work of both the OMC group and platform on CCIs to frame a consultation on issues such as access to finance, the skills needs of creative entrepreneurship, and innovative partnerships with other economic sectors. In October 2009, a reflection paper on the challenge of creating a European Digital Single Market for creative content like books, music, films or video games was published, analysing the obstacles to the free circulation of creative content on the Internet and launching a public consultation on some possible measures to create a genuine Single Market. The 2008 Creative Britain Strategy addresses the key issues for government intervention in the creative industries: skills and talent, innovation, intellectual property and supporting creative businesses. Lithuania's new Strategy for the Development of Creative Industries includes support for the national network of Creative Industries Incubators. Finland's Development Strategy for the Creative Economy addresses employment, entrepreneurship and product development in the creative industries sector. The contribution of culture to local and regional development is also increasingly recognised. 6 billion euros of cohesion funding have been allocated to culture for 2007-2013 covering protection and preservation of cultural heritage, development of cultural infrastructure, and support for cultural services. Further funding is allocated under headings such as tourism, urban regeneration, SME promotion and information society. A study explores the contribution of culture to local and regional development and will include a practical tool for policy makers at regional and local levels and cultural operators. Preparation of the future cohesion policy, to run from 2014, should draw lessons from projects and studies to design instruments which release the full potential of the cultural sphere, and particularly that of the creative industries. Cultural and creative sectors should be mainstreamed in integrated regional or city development strategies, in partnership between public authorities representing different policy areas and relevant civil society representatives. Ireland's Cultural Tourism Initiative was launched in 2009 to improve collaboration between arts, culture and tourism spheres. The Romanian Ministry of Culture's new specialist unit on cultural tourism is promoting interservice cooperation to exploit the full potential of tangible and intangible heritage. Developing methodologies for producing harmonised cultural statistics has proven to be a challenge to address through the OMC process. Since September 2009, Eurostat supports a network of national statistical services cooperating together. Over two years this network, coordinated by the Ministry of Culture of Luxembourg, will tackle the methodological framework of cultural statistics; CCIs; public and private expenditure on culture; and cultural participation and the social impact of culture. Agenda objective 3: Promoting culture as a vital element in the EU's international relations As Party to the UNESCO Convention on the Protection and the Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, the EU is committed to integrating the cultural dimension as an element in its relations with partner countries and regions. Since the adoption of the Agenda, a new strategic framework for culture in the EU's external relations has emerged. Culture is increasingly perceived as a strategic factor of political, social and economic development. New initiatives have mobilised increased financial resources; since 2007 more than 100 million euro have been earmarked for culture in third countries and regional cooperation. EU support for culture cooperation in the region covered by the European Neighbourhood Policy has been significantly reinforced. The Special Action of the EU Culture Programme is dedicated to this region in 2009 and 2010, with a new initiative for regional and inter-regional cooperation due to be launched in 2011. In the context of the Union for the Mediterranean , preparation of a new Euromed strategy on culture is underway. The Commission has carried out a needs assessment and consultation process; an ad hoc working group nominated by the partners will elaborate the strategy to propose to Ministers. In the enlargement countries , the major effort made on the rehabilitation of cultural heritage has been complemented by a focus on independent organisations through a dedicated call of the IPA civil society facility. Culture is also an axis of policy dialogue and cooperation in the new Eastern Partnership , launched in 2009. The Eastern Partnership Culture Programme, to be launched in 2010, aims to strengthen the capacity of cultural operators, foster regional links and contribute to the development of inclusive cultural polices in partner countries. Slovenia hosted in 2008 the conference during which the Ljubljana process-funding heritage rehabilitation in south-east Europe has been launched. The role culture plays in development policies is also increasingly recognised. In 2009, the Commission launched a process to enhance the role of culture in development, founded on joint efforts by all stakeholders. A committee of ACP and EU professionals has been established to monitor progress and input to the formulation of the 10th EDF intra-ACP Culture Programme. Spain's 2007 Culture and Development Strategy is founded on the principles of the Unesco Convention. In the field of trade relations , the EU has continued to take into account the specific dual (economic/cultural) nature of the audiovisual sector as vector for communicating identity and values in relevant bilateral and multilateral negotiations. At the same time, in line with the UNESCO Convention, the need to ensure preferential treatment for developing countries in the field of cultural expressions as a way to foster more balanced exchanges has been recognised by the signature of a Protocol on Cultural Cooperation in the framework of the Economic Partnership agreement with the Cariforum countries. New cinema coproduction agreements between France and partner countries include a reference to the Unesco Convention as a matter of course. Another step forward has been through bilateral partnerships with developed or emerging partner countries. A high-level seminar "Russia-EU: signs on the road map of cultural cooperation" took place in Moscow in 2009, co-organised by the EU and the Russian Ministry of Culture. In 2010, a Northern Dimension Partnership on Culture was established. The EU strategic partnership with Brazil has a cultural dimension, reflected in the signing of a Joint Declaration in 2009 between the European Commission and the Brazilian Ministry of Culture. A strategic relationship between the EU and Mexico was officially established in October 2008. Policy dialogue between the European Commission and the Chinese Ministry of Culture was launched in May 2009. Culture Programme Special Actions have supported cooperation projects inter alia with China, India and Brazil. In the audiovisual field, the preparatory action MEDIA International aims to explore ways of reinforcing cooperation between European and third-country professionals from the audiovisual industry and encourage a two-way flow of cinematographic / audiovisual works. Support will continue under the successor MEDIA Mundus programme, with 15 million euros in funding for 2011-2013. WORKING METHODS AND PARTNERSHIPS The Commission proposed several new working methods in the Agenda, notably the Open Method of Coordination (OMC) and a more structured dialogue with the culture sector . The 2008-2010 Council Workplan on Culture established four expert groups to work together through the OMC to exchange experience and make recommendations on the priority themes identified in the Workplan: - Culture-education synergies - Mobility of artists and other culture professionals - Mobility of collections While the Workplan set objectives for each group, the process of agreeing more specific fields proved challenging for the groups and, in some cases, delayed the effective start of their activities. On most topics, groups concentrated on sharing experience to develop policy recommendations. In some cases, the emphasis has been on collecting and analysing more systematically national practices. While it is difficult to draw firm conclusions after just two years of experience, both the Commission and Member States consider the OMC to be overall an effective way of cooperating in the field of culture. The OMC process has proven to be a good framework for networking and mutual learning among national administrations. While all groups aimed at generating policy recommendations, the main challenge remains to channel them into policy making at EU and national level, and articulate the work of the groups with that of Council Presidencies and the Commission. Challenges for the future OMC cooperation shall focus on issues and outputs which can be taken up by Member States and the Commission in their respective fields of competence, leading to progress on the goals of the Agenda. A closer articulation of the work of OMC groups, the Commission and the Council, notably Presidencies, will support this. Presidencies should have clear ownership of priorities, making sure that Presidency programmes, and Council work build on OMC outputs. Meetings of Directors General of Ministries for Culture have proven to be an effective forum for strategic reflection and have the potential to be an important channel for the dissemination and uptake of OMC results. A more systematic hosting of a Directors General meeting under each Presidency, examining the outputs of one or more OMC groups, in accordance with Presidency priorities, should be envisaged. In the light of suggestions by Member States in national reports and by OMC participants, the Commission proposes the following ways to reinforce effective cooperation: - Member States through relevant Council bodies should define both the broad themes and the more specific topics to be addressed through OMC groups. A maximum of 4 or 5 thematic groups is a realistic limit, ensuring that the Commission can effectively support the process and that the Council, notably Presidencies, has sufficient capacity to take up the outcomes of the groups' work. Within each group, topics should be tackled successively and articulated in a timeline. A four-year perspective would allow sustainable cooperation, a mid-term review and meaningful thematic progress. - The Council should also define target outputs for each topic, such as analytical reports, good practice compendia, or policy recommendations, and should identify opportunities for dissemination, including Presidency conferences, Directors General meetings, events organised by / with culture sector Platforms, and Commission-organised seminars. - Against this background, each group would determine its working methods, ranging from plenary meetings in Brussels to peer learning activities organised by a host country. Groups would, as now, be chaired by one or two presidents, following nomination and agreement by the CAC. - Well-defined topics should make it easier for Member States to identify group members with the right profile. The registration exercise can be repeated annually to ensure that members have the most suitable profile for the topics to be dealt with that year. Some topics may require in-depth content knowledge, others a broader policy vision. Whether nominating content experts from academia or civil society or Ministry officials (or both), a close link with policy making and effective support from the Ministry is in any event essential. - The size of OMC groups, with 22 to 27 participating Member States, has proven to be a mixed blessing, and smaller sub-groups have in practice been the preferred forum for discussion. Active exchange and discussion remains the goal. This may mean sharing practices, hosting a peer learning visit, or drafting a case study for example. Successively tackling specific topics over a four-year period should make it easier for Member States to identify the discussions in which they wish to actively participate. - The Culture Programme should provide support for the groups, in particular for peer learning and dissemination activities. Adapted working methods will help promote take-up of OMC results. With clearly identified topics, target outputs and dissemination opportunities, Member State cooperation through the OMC will take place in a framework with clearer milestones. Closer articulation of the work of OMC groups, the Commission and the Council, notably Presidencies, is the overarching goal. Structured dialogue with the culture sector The Commission remains committed to dialogue with the culture sector, aiming to ensure that its voice is clearly heard in policy debate at European level. Since 2007, the structured dialogue between the Commission and the sector is taking place through two main structures; thematic platforms of European associations and the European Culture Forum. In the run-up to the 2008 European Year of Intercultural Dialogue, the sector formed the "Rainbow Platform", an interface between civil society and the Commission for planning and supporting the Year. This has since developed into the Platform for Intercultural Europe. Drawing upon this example, the Commission published an open call for expressions of interest in mid-2008 to encourage cultural organisations with a strong European dimension to create two further Platforms, on Access to Culture and CCIs. Each platform has developed first policy recommendations and presented these to the broader sector during the European Culture Forum in 2009. One main benefit reported by the Platforms is deeper and broader dialogue within the culture sector. The structured dialogue has been an invitation to players in the very heterogeneous culture sector to search for common ground. The sector is better informed of policy processes and is more open to engaging with policy. But depending on the roll out of priorities, the sector may struggle to identify the most relevant interlocutors and policy initiatives on specific topics. A closer articulation of civil society dialogue with the work of the Commission, OMC groups and Member States in Council would give a clearer picture of when and where to input recommendations. Challenges for the future In the light of suggestions by the Platforms and by Member States in national reports, the Commission proposes the following ways to reinforce effective cooperation: - Thematic Platforms should each "mirror" and be connected to an OMC policy field with the goal of concerted reflection and debate on priority themes. The Commission will continue its bilateral contacts with Platforms and propose an annual meeting with Platform Boards. - The biennial European Culture Forum remains a major opportunity for dialogue between civil society and policy makers. The 2009 Forum highlighted progress on mainstreaming culture in related European policies and attracted over 1,000 participants. But smaller-scale events are also needed to provide space for discussing specific issues. Future Platform-led discussion and dissemination events should unite participants from the sector, the "mirror" OMC group, Member State and European policy makers. Alternatives to operating grant funding will be explored; experience of the pilot phase indicates that project grants may be better suited to supporting Platform activities. - In some Member States, a positive development of structured dialogue with culture civil society has emerged. In Hungary, the Cultural Sectoral Policy Council brings together representatives of government, culture professionals, funding bodies and trade unions. In Romania, a pilot dialogue platform has grown into a department for Stakeholder Engagement in the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. A more focused dialogue with culture civil society will contribute to better articulated common efforts towards policy priorities. Thematic platforms which "mirror" the topics addressed through the OMC will make it easier for civil society practice and knowledge to transfer into policy making. THE WAY FORWARD Experience since the Agenda was adopted has clearly shown the potential of cooperation on culture policy at European level, be it through exchange of experience between Member States with a view to best practice-based policy adaptations, greater input by culture civil society into the policy making process, or a more coherent approach to culture in related policies. The current broader context makes it all the more important to reinforce cooperation. The "Europe 2020" strategy proposed by the Commission aims to put Europe back on a long-term growth path, with measures to promote smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. Within this framework, culture can play a fundamental role, including in flagship initiatives such as Innovation Union (creative ecologies, non-technological innovation), the Digital Agenda (media literacy, new environment for creation and access to culture) and New Skills for New Jobs (intercultural competences and transversal skills). The role of culture in regional and local development should also be emphasised in the framework of cohesion policy (creative and intercultural cities and regions). Beyond EU borders, the role of culture in the enlargement policy and external relations should be further developed (branding Europe as the place to create, promoting balanced cultural exchanges and cooperation with the rest of the world). By reinforcing effective cooperation, the proposals presented in this report are intended to help ensure that culture makes its full contribution to a smart, sustainable and inclusive Europe. The European Parliament, the Council, the Committee of the Regions and the Economic and Social Committee are invited to react to this report. The Council is invited to take the appropriate steps to decide on a set of broad thematic issues and specific priority topics to be addressed through the OMC. The Commission proposes to report thematically on progress towards the agreed topics, drawing upon OMC outputs, the work of structured dialogue platforms and voluntary contributions by Member States. http://eurlex.europa.eu/smartapi/cgi/sga_doc?smartapi!celexapi!prod!DocNumber&lg=en& type_doc=COMfina&an_doc=2007&nu_doc=0242&model=guicheti Final reports of OMC groups: http://ec.europa.eu/culture/our-policy-development/doc1565_en.htm Platform recommendations : http://ec.europa.eu/culture/our-policy-development/doc1199_en.htm See http://ec.europa.eu/culture/key-documents/doc539_en.htm See also Amsterdam Declaration at http://126.96.36.199/~workshop/ More than 110 ratifications by April 2010 See http://www.culture-dev.eu/pages/en/en_accueil.html Differentiated agreements and protocols implementing and promoting the Unesco Convention have also been initialled with South Korea and are being finalised with Andean and Central American countries.

Prinsengracht 518 - 520 Tel: +31 (0)20 6209546 Fax: +31 (0)20 6242909 Hotel Mozart is a warm, charming three-star city centre hotel Amsterdam, located on one of the famous Amsterdam canals: the famous Prinsengracht Canal. The location of the hotel on the canal is relatively quiet and peaceful but around the corner you will find the bustling Amsterdam nightlife around Leidseplein with its restaurants, shops, cinema's and Europe's largest casino - Holland casino. If you are looking for culture, Hotel Mozart is the ideal starting point in Amsterdam for visits to the nearby Rijks Museum and Van Gogh Museum. Hotel Mozart on the Prinsengracht Canal has been completely renovated and re-opened its doors in April 2006. Some of the rooms offer a very nice, romantic view on the canals, others are located on the more vibrant street side with its monumental buildings. All rooms can be reached by elevator.. Amsterdam is a great city with a lot of things to do. Our friendly and professional reception staff will be happy to provide you with information about the major attractions, public transport or restaurants in the area. If you would like to make excursions in and outside of Amsterdam or take a trip with a boat, do not hesitate to ask at our reception desk - they will provide you with all necessary information and book your trip.

79. The Road Goes Ever On The Lady Galadriel and Lord Celeborn proved to be welcoming hosts and eager to show off the beauty of their Golden Woods. Much to everyone’s surprise and joy Galadriel’s mirror had shown that Celebrian was a mother again and that there were little ones waiting in Valinor for their daer naneth and ada. Now released from her anxiety over Celebrian she was able to open her heart to her daughter’s successor and the hin. Galadriel was indeed lonely for “little ones” and willing to share her affection for them as their daer naneth. Still everyone was very relieved when Elrond’s family was safe once more back in the last homely house. While Elrond was grateful for the comforting presence of Amarie and the twins during the increasing dissonance outside Imladris, he more then once debated the wisdom of sending her and the hin to safety in the Undying Lands. He found Amarie was adamant that neither she nor the hin would go until he was prepared to do so as well. In one matter she did agreed and no further trips were made to Lothlorien. Orders for the original creations of Bar-Meneg-Mir-Lain continued to grow in spite of the outside problems and Amarie found herself challenged to develop new cartoons to meet the demand as well as for her artisans to complete them. A small number of skilled weavers appeared among the refugees both men and elves that arrived in small battered groups from time to time and she was glad to add them to her still growing group of artisans. Two proved to be exceptional. The first was a man of Gondor called Haram, who also had experience as a dyer and produced the richest and finest colored threads that allowed the weaving of the finest tapestries they had yet produced. The second was a young elleth Nibenell who was a fine artist able to quickly pick up on Amarie’s ideas and translate them into finished cartoons. Both proved to be excellent additions to the artisans. Over the decades Gandalf was a frequent visitor and spent many hours sequestered in closed meetings with Elrond and his councillors. He was a welcome addition to family gatherings and the two elflings loved his stories and colorful fireworks. Amarie often found herself the subject of his teasing over her earlier fears that Elrond’s possible refusal to welcome Bar-Meneg-Mir-Lain. “Did not your dreams give you any indication of his desire to welcome you penneth?” he chuckled. She glared at him. “It would have if I had known who he was at that point. But then who was I to expect the great Lore Master and Lord of Imladris would be anywhere in my future? I would have really been terrified if I had known the Valar themselves intended to take a hand in our meeting.” Gandalf simply smiled and shook his head. In spite of the looming darkness there were the occasional bright periods when there would be various get togethers for high holidays, begetting days, and fairs. Harvests remained good and Imladris was able to share its bounty with those not so lucky. One thing that did not change was the everlasting shadow that ranged just beyond her borders and the workload of keeping tabs on Sauron’s activities. Elrond sighed and turned from the pile of finished work on his desk. *Meleth, are you coming to bed soon? * Amarie touched his mind. *Ai, ind nin, I am on my way. I just finished the last report. * He smiled at her sleepy tone and snuffed out the candles on his desk and in the nearby wall sconces. *It has been a long week, meleth nin, I am glad the delegates have finally departed. * *As am I, lirimaer, but I fear we solved nothing. Our list of allies grows thin. * He entered the hall and wearily climbed the stairs to the family apartments. *I meant to ask earlier, is Arwen still coming next month as she planned? Galadriel said nothing about it last time we talked. * *I have not heard anything to indicate she will not. * He opened the door to their rooms and crossed to their sleeping chamber pausing at the door to look at Amarie’s slender form lying comfortably in the centre of their bed. *I must remind Sadi to make sure her rooms are ready… * She stopped as her hervenn joined her on the bed and swept her into his arms. “I have wanted to do this all evening, ind nin.” And he proceeded to show her exactly what he meant. While Imladris continued to be a refuge for many, the growing problems outside its borders as Sauron sent his underlings out to ravage the surrounding lands placed additional pressure on Elrond to take some kind of action. Elrohir and Elladan were often gone as they travelled with the Dunedine Rangers gathering intelligence and fighting the increasing threat of the yrch. Arwen spent less time in Imladris, as both her ada and daer odhil refused to let her make the trip between the two kingdom during certain dangerous periods fearing a repeat of the Red Horn Pass incident when Celebrian was brutally attacked. It was one hot summer day that was to herald the change that everyone was hoping for and fearing. *Ada. * The sad and troubled voice of Elladan reached Elrond as he sat in his office listening to Glorfindel as he discussed the latest requirements for new recruits. *Ion nin, what has happened? Are you and Elrohir all right? * Elrond sat up straight and immediately raised his hand silencing the golden haired warrior. *Yes ada, but Arathorn has been struck down. We are taking his body home to Gilran. * Elrond closed his eyes in sadness and sighed deeply. *Another of the line of Isildur gone. * *Ion nin, Neither his wife or child will be safe now. Bring them both here to Imladris. They must disappear before the agents of Sauron can find them. * *Yes, ada, we should be there by the end of next week. * *Be careful, ion nin. * *We will, ada, until then, namarie. * “What is it Elrond? What has happened?” Glorfindel asked quietly. Elrond looked at his Balrog Slayer. “Arathorn is gone. Ionath nin are bringing his widow and their son to Imladris.” Occasional meetings of the representatives from the various elven and dwarven kingdoms continued over the following decades but those from the human realms soon drifted away. Finally only Lothlorien, Imladris and a few of the dwarven representatives continued to meet and worry about the growing power of Sauron. It was clear that he was spreading his influence and corruption among the various human kingdoms and there were fewer to restrain his actions. Saruman as head of the White Council played a waiting game and urged a cautious approach to whatever action they pursued. He said that the one ring had been lost, washed to the sea and would never be found. Neither Elrond nor Galadriel were comfortable with his presumption about the ring and continued to carefully keep watch. Gandalf travelled extensively through the lands of middle earth seeking to keep an eye on Sauron’s activities. It would not be until much later that Saruman’s desire to hold the power of the ring himself that the depths of his perfidy were discovered. The future of middle earth was growing dark and the final battle was nearing…….but that is another story…… Ind nin-my heart Meleth nin-my love Ion nin-my son Ionath nin-my sons This is a work of fan fiction, written because the author has an abiding love for the works of J R R Tolkien. The characters, settings, places, and languages used in this work are the property of the Tolkien Estate, Tolkien Enterprises, and possibly New Line Cinema, except for certain original characters who belong to the author of the said work. The author will not receive any money or other remuneration for presenting the work on this archive site. The work is the intellectual property of the author, is available solely for the enjoyment of Henneth Annûn Story Archive readers, and may not be copied or redistributed by any means without the explicit written consent of the author.

More than just little bro to heavyweight director Ridley Scott, " /> Director Tony Scott answers your questions More than just little bro to heavyweight director Ridley Scott, Tony Scott is famous for a string of retro movies made in the eighties and early nineties. Scott paved the way for Eddie Murphy in the popular, albeit slightly cheesy follow-up film Beverly Hills Cop 2 and introduced a fresh faced Tom Cruise in Top Gun and Days Of Thunder. Willing to show off his diversity as a director, Scott later gave true love a twist in his 1993 hit, True Romance and worked with Will Smith and Gene Hackman in the conspiracy driven Enemy Of The State. In anticipation of his latest release, The Taking Of Pelham 123 – starring Denzel Washington, John Travolta and James Gandolfini – LOVEFiLM is sitting down with the main man himself to talk about whatever YOU want. That’s right, we’re giving you the chance to quiz one of cinema's greats. From films to favourite pets we’ve got it covered – so send in your questions today! All you have to do is email [email protected] with Tony Scott in the subject line. Director Tony Scott presents The Taking of Pelham 123. The ordinary day of New York City subway dispatcher Walter Garber is thrown into chaos by an audacious crime: the hijacking of a subway train. Ryder, the criminal mastermind who leads the highly-armed gang of four hijackers, threatens to execute the train's passengers, unless a large ransom is paid within one hour. Watch the trailer here Titles related to this article

There is a deal of the week again at Creative. This week you can purchase two Aurvana Live! Headphones with superb audio performance. If you buy the Twin Pack of those great headphones you will save 44% (£ 70). The headphones are reduced from £ 159,98 to £ 89,98 and the shipping is free! Have you not bought all gifts for your family and friends, yet? Teufel has the solution for you: Teufel set great new systems to their sale page. Take a look and see which soundtastic system you want. You can save up to GBP 150.- and more! There also is an Advent Calendar Raffle now for the year. You have the chance to win a new product every day! Just visit the Calendar and click on the next door for your chance to win the great systems. If you're considering a new sound system for your home this fall season you are very lucky: Teufel recently released a few new systems with PC, Home Cinema, Stereo or even iPod or iPhone compatibility. If you buy one of those new products in the next days, the shipping will be free! Of course it's limited until the new Teufel loudspeaker systems run out of stock. Some stereo loudspeaker systems are reduced or you can get an advantage buying them. So e.g. the Teufel "Ultima 60", stereo loudspeaker system, which has a capacity of 160 watt and costs £ 348 includes some useful cables now and the shipping is free. You save £ 50,80! There is a christmas event at Teufel, so that many products are reduced. For example you can buy the headphones "Aureol Groove", which are in-ear headphones with super bass for £ 59 or the "iTeufel Dock v2", which is a device holding hub for awesome iPod playback, for £ 39. The Teufel "Concept E 100 Control", which is a 5.1 PC loudspeakers surround set for Teufel beginners and includes a free cable set, is reduced from £ 258 to £ 219!

Inside Llewyn Davis "Inside Llewyn Davis" is the most satisfyingly diabolical cinematic structure that the Coens have ever contrived, and that's just one reason that I suspect it… H ONOLULU - If there is a nation that seems to have one foot already planted in the 21st century, that nation is Japan, where every new high-tech gadget and virtual reality world seems to get its first consumer tryout. At the 16th Hawaii International Film Festival, which specializes in new films from the Pacific Rim, three movies danced along the cutting edge of new technology and emerging art forms: "Haru," from Japan, is the first feature about an online romance, conducted by e-mail. Messages scroll down the screen as they're typed back and forth by a frustrated executive in Tokyo and a young woman in a small town, who is trying to get over the death of her sweetheart. "Memories," also from Japan, is an extraordinary new animated film developed by Katsuhiro Otomo, acknowledged master of what the Japanese call "anime." It tells three stories of human lives overwhelmed by technology. "Synthetic Pleasures," a documentary by the Korean-American Iara Lee, is a free-form look at many forms of virtual reality, from vast indoor Japanese "beaches" and "ski hills" to computer-generated 3-D games, artificial intelligence, "body sculpture" and cybersex. ("Synthetic Pleasures" opened last week at the Music Box, 3733 N. Southport, where it is playing through today.) All three of these films foresee a new century in which men will live in closer symbiosis than ever before with their machines, especially machines that can think (or seem to think) and machines that create artificial worlds that seem real to their human inhabitants. This brave new cyberworld is not a cheerful one, in the view of the two Japanese films, although Lee is more optimistic, and her documentary features testimony from pioneers of the electronic frontier. "Haru," the film about an online romance, is paradoxically the most old-fashioned and humanistic of the three. It begins in an online "Cinema Forum," where two participants named "Haru" and "Hoshi" meet and begin to chat about the movies. Soon they are chatting with each other, through private e-mail, and gradually they reveal their true identities (and sexes - for there has been some deception). One is a Tokyo executive, mired in frustration, whose job is to promote soup to supermarkets. The other is a young woman who hops from job to job, trying to stay one step ahead of an annoying suitor. The online chats scroll down the screen, and alternate with real-life footage that is actually colder and more impersonal: Both characters are often seen in fluorescent-lit, air-conditioned environments, photographed through glass walls; their real lives don't offer the same opportunities to confide and unwind that they find online. "Memories" tells three futuristic stories, coordinated by Otomo, who made the landmark anime fantasy "Akira." In one, explorers in an outer-space Sargasso Sea find themselves seduced by a virtual reality world generated on an abandoned space station. In the second, a laboratory worker takes what he thinks is cold medication and becomes a deadly source of poisons meant for chemical warfare. The third, directed by Otomo himself, has the power and the imagination of a futuristic "Animal Farm." It is seen through the eyes of a young boy who lives in a fortress city, every building and turret bristling with giant cannons. His father works on a team that operates the largest of the cannons, and we follow through a workday dedicated to the care and feeding of the vast weapon. It gradually becomes clear that the entire society is based on paranoia, on rounds fired at an enemy that has long since ceased to exist. "Synthetic Pleasures," a once-over-lightly kind of film, has been made by traveling around real and cyberworlds, looking at the lifestyles of people caught up on new electronic realities. One of its subjects is a man who travels America on a recumbent bicycle, the solar panels behind him powering the Macintosh computer mounted between his handlebars. "I live on the Net," he explains. We also visit VR amusement parks, meet body piercers and tattooists who are trying to turn their bodies into works of art, talk to artificial intelligence gurus, and learn about online sex. Director Lee's definition of virtual reality is broad enough to encompass drive-through wedding chapels in Las Vegas, as well as the amazing buildings in Japan that contain artificial golf courses or ocean beaches. Most of the visions in these three films will not cheer ordinary people who cling to everyday values. Although the enthusiasts in "Synthetic Pleasures" hail the dawn of a new age of man and computer, their activities still seem more synthetic than pleasurable. But "Haru" takes a different approach altogether. Its two characters find intimacy, a little at a time, through the revelations they make online. Midway through the film there is a striking scene. The man must take a bullet train past the district where the woman lives. They plan to "see" each other. She will stand by her car in a field, and he will stand in a doorway of the train. They pass quickly, but they do see each other, and both of them videotape the "meeting." The irony is that neither can see the other's face, because it has a video camera in front of it! Later, when they finally do meet, there is an extraordinary shot in which they stand face to face, and look, simply look, at each other. Gerardo Valero sees the potential for a good remake in "Escape from New York." The first in a monthly series of video essays about unloved films, Scout Tafoya's video essay is an appreciation of "... Erik Childress looks at the first awards of the season and their possible impact on the Oscar race. Omer Mozaffar reflects on "12 Years a Slave."

The Children's Film Foundation lives on in this bizarrely old-fashioned kiddie romp, a sort of Emil And The Detectives transplanted to Venice with a cast of plummy-voiced stage-schoolers and not one Italian accent in earshot. Based on the novel by Cornelia Funke, it's the story of two orphans who run away to the city of gondolas and fall in with a teenage Robin Hood. Hounded at all turns by Jim Carter's bumbling private eye, our young heroes seek the final piece of a magic roundabout with the power to reverse time. Though Richard Claus' effort comes with the usual array of slumming Brit-thesps (Vanessa Redgrave, Alexei Sayle), it's too reliant on its charmless leads to appeal beyond the kid crowd. For anyone older, the prospect of turning back the clock and avoiding the cinema will look mighty appealing long before the flick's CGI-heavy climax.

Greetings from the apocalypse! Jimmy Cliff sang that song on the soundtrack for "Cool Runnings," and now that spring is in full effect I've got a spark in my step and an abiding hope that this weekend will mark the beginning of a fruitful harvest from the movie gods ... or another season so dreadful it'll make me wish I'd died with John Candy. A geek classic and a remake of a geek classic are stomping their way into theaters, let's see how they stack up … Friday, April 5 POW! IN THEATERS The big budget Hollywood remake of "Evil Dead" won't so much swallow your soul as burp it out. Directed by Uruguayan newcomer Fede Alvarez, this offering is bigger and slicker but lacks the energy and homemade invention of Sam Raimi's original, falling prey to the recent trend of making franchise reboots as deadly serious as possible. There's plenty of possessions, creepy cellars and tree rape to be had, and can you say "a tsunami of blood?" You bet. The gore flows like wine, but where's the playfulness? Alvarez is clearly more infatuated with creatively disfiguring his gorgeous leads as they battle demons in a remote cabin in New Zealand … er, Tennessee, but who am I to begrudge a guy this insistent on doing everything in-camera? Oh, and definitely stay through the end credits for a little extra sugar, baby. If you're in Austin, Texas, head down to the Alamo Drafthouse Ritz where for a minimum donation of $5 to Scare For a Cure a scary make-up wizard will transform you into a demon straight out of the Necronomicon today or tomorrow. JOIN US for the jolts. JOIN US for the scares. JOIN US for the Fake Shemps. JOIN US for 1981's original ultimate experience in grueling terror, "The Evil Dead," streaming on HULU fo free yo, and also without commercials on Netflix Streaming. Raimi and his bestest pal Bruce Campbell went through hell in a handbasket during the tortured twelve-week shoot of this cabin-in-the-woods scarer, but all the cuts and bruises were worth it as it spawned many careers as well as a franchise that keeps on keepin' on. Stephen King hailed it as "the most ferociously original film of the year," and given the lack of originality of the new one, that statement holds even truer in 2013. Watch it in its entirety below. I chuckled to myself during "Evil Dead" when Lou Taylor Pucci mentioned that a character was "not having a panic attack," because that was a subtle in-joke to the title of the film that got Alvarez the gig directing that movie in the first place. "Panic Attack!" ("Ataque de Pánico!") is a scrappy little short from 2009 about a bunch of giant mechas blowing the s**t out of South America. Although it's more reminiscent of "Sky Captain" than Deadites, you can see what made Sam Raimi pluck this young man out of obscurity to helm what's likely to be this weekend's #1 movie. YOU DOWN WITH VOD? This must be our week for revisiting classic terror! I finally got to check out the doc "Room 237" and man oh man does it deliver, which is why it's my highly-touted "Survivor of Thunderdome." Available on VOD, iTunes and in limited theatrical play, this is a minute examination of Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining" by several obsessives who reveal their theories on the film's (often tenuous) connections to Native American genocide, the holocaust, the Apollo moon landing and the MANY creepy impossibilities/mysterious errors built into the film, seemingly on purpose. Whatever you think of these bug-nutty theories, it will only deepen your appreciation of Stanley Kubrick's success in crafting the scariest Rorschach test masquerading as a movie ever made. Ever. For a more immersive experience the doc will screen at 7 p.m. tonight at Chicago's Music Box Theater, followed by a Skype Q&A with director Rodney Ascher. Meanwhile, at the stroke of midnight tonight and tomorrow IFC Center in New York City will be playing "The Shining" in addition to running all-day shows of "Room 237" and a special Kubrick-centric exhibit in their lobby. Saturday, April 6 BASIC CABLE BLUES Simon Pegg and Nick Frost have pretty much solidified their standing as the modern British equivalent of Laurel and Hardy, and one of the vehicles that achieved those lofty heights is "Hot Fuzz," which you can catch on Comedy Central at 10 a.m. this morning. This 2007 follow-up to "Shaun of the Dead" finds Pegg as a goodie-two-shoes supercop stuck in a one-horse town in the countryside who finds some unexpected action. Pegg, Frost, and director Edgar Wright will complete their "Blood & Ice Cream Trilogy" this summer with "The World's End," and all three will come into play later today. How's that for a slice of fried gold? POW! IN THEATERS Despite references to CD-ROMS and UNIX Systems, the original "Jurassic Park" hasn't aged a day. In fact, if this was a new movie people would be calling it a "return to form" for Steven Spielberg, who hasn't really made a popcorn movie with this much command since. A virtual treatise on the ethics of dino-cloning colliding with the untamable nature of chaos … or the untamable chaos of nature, depending on if you're Jeff Goldblum or not. Aside from a few awkward floating lens flares, the 3-D conversion works marvels with Dean Cundey's stellar cinematography, with the T-Rex-baiting goat so delicious-looking you can almost taste him. "What's the matter, kid, you never had lambchops?" NETFLIX RECOMMENDS WITH A VENGEANCE Okay, so I said Spielberg hasn't made popcorn with that much command in a while, but "The Adventures of Tintin" on Netflix Streaming was made with the gleeful abandon of someone who's earned the right to just have fun and play with the medium. As an animated adaptation of a couple of classic comics by Herge, it's completely true to the spirit of the intrepid boy reporter, his fluffy dog Snowy and his drunkard sidekick Captain Haddock. Frost and Pegg of "Hot Fuzz" appear as bumbling detectives Thomson and Thompson (in a script co-written by Edgar Wright) and Spielberg stages some of the most outlandish set pieces of his career, including the greatest pirate battle ever filmed. It's the true fourth "Indiana Jones" movie. Stand-up comic/inventor/magician/genius Joel Hodgson is a Gen-X hero for taking snark and turning it into a cottage industry with the cult show sweetheart "Mystery Science Theater 3000." Now he's a little older, a little wiser and able to turn his snappy comment ray upon himself in a one-man show "Joel Hodgson Live: Riffing Myself" at The Loft Cinema in Tuscon, Arizona tonight at 7 p.m. Twenty bucks gets you in, but for $45 you get to scope out a seat right in front for you and your robots shaped like gumball machines so you can heckle the crap out of him and then unironically ask for his autograph afterwards. That's called karma, Joel. Sunday, April 7 PAY CHANNEL PAYBACK Remember when all the Marvel movies like "The Punisher" and "Fantastic Four" sucked ass and barely saw the light of day outside of convention bootlegs? Those days are long gone with comics now at the top of the cinematic heap, and the 1960s-set "X-Men: First Class" at 10:45 a.m. on Cinemax is one of the best of the best. Director Matthew Vaughn of "Kick-Ass" proves that a dude can live, breathe and eat comic book culture and still sleep next to Claudia Schiffer at night, and he brings that bravado to the screen by showing the origins of Professor Xavier (James McAvoy) and his mutant professorship. Meanwhile, Magneto (Michael Fassbender) gets to live out both a James Bond style and a Jewish revenge fantasy. Hells yeah. NEW ON BLU Speaking of the Marvel Universe, some of you geeks with a little more disposable income should take a long hard look at that charity you were gonna donate to and say "F THAT!" Why? Because you need to spend that cash on the "Avengers Assembled" Phase One six-movie collector's set, which features "Marvel's The Avengers" (duh), both "Iron Man" movies, "The Incredible Hulk," "Thor" and "Captain America: The First Avenger" all in one cool-ass suitcase, some in 3-D, and with a real active (?) Cosmic Cube!!! I'm a sucker for fancypants repackagings so as soon as I rob a liquor store (or two) I will (probably) be able to afford this. STAR WARS CORNER If you're in a literary mood why not check out the latest piece of exhaustive research into that galaxy far, far away with "Star Wars: The Blue Prints." Written by J.W. Rinzler, who has penned the definitive Making Of tomes for both "Star Wars" and "The Empire Strikes Back" (his "Return of the Jedi" book drops in October), this one goes into detail on the various craftsmen/designers who engineered everything from Han Solo's Millennium Falcon to Obi-Wan Kenobi's bedpan. It features tons of spiffy art showcasing the nuts and bolts involved in bringing George Lucas' vision of hamburger-shaped spaceships and donut-shaped hair to life. As I ride off into the distant horizon, here's wishing you fellow weekend road warriors the best outing possible from this burnt-out, blighted wasteland. Enjoy your fast Internet, clean-ish movie theaters, plentiful gasoline and all the comforts of home, for this world lives now only in my memories …

This book is a quirky study of 40 British blokes and the personalities and passions hidden within their sheds, whether home to a milk bottle collection, a pub, cinema or chapel. Each story is accompanied by photographs of the shed-man, the inner sanctum and the customised exterior. This book is in stock |Size:||177 x 148||ISBN:||1843303299| |Images:||90 black & white photographs||Format:||hardback|

The Big Ones: THE FALLS Does size matter? A new column takes a look at how plus-sized features fit into a small-screen-sized world. Welcome to the first installment of “The Big Ones,” my new column on cinematic works that are at least three hours long, possibly quite a bit longer, and all available on home video/streaming. It’s called “The Big Ones” for a few reasons. First, I think it’s funny. (Remember Kirstie Alley, accepting an Emmy award and thanking her then-husband Parker Stevenson for “giving [her] the big one” over the years? What better way to pay tribute to towering masterpieces such as Satantango or Shoah than by comparing them to the phallus of a washed-up TV star?) But second, and more honestly and importantly, “The Big Ones” was a film series of very long films, programmed by Paolo Cherchi-Usai at the George Eastman House in Rochester, New York, back when I was living there in the mid-’90s. The very concept was extremely intriguing to me then—films categorized not by director or actor or nationality or even theme, but by length—and it’s obviously stuck with me. It’s not just that long films, or very long films in some cases, are less likely to be screened than films with more traditional running times. We know this is true; just ask our good friend Harvey Scissorhands. Certainly in commercial terms it’s hard for unusually long films to find a place in theaters, for the simple reason that they generate less money for exhibitors. Even if, in an ideal universe populated only by Jonathan Rosenbaums, North American audiences only wanted to see films like Yi Yi and Eureka and the director’s cut of Margaret, exhibitors would still cry foul. Long films can’t play as many times during the business day as shorter films, so the very opportunity for tickets sales are drastically reduced when running times swell. In light of this, very long films (contemporary ones, not historical ones—more on those in a minute) have tended to languish in distribution limbo. An acknowledged masterwork of world cinema like Béla Tarr’s aforementioned Satantango (seven-plus-hours long) didn’t have a U.S. distributor until over a decade after it was made. (Facets Films and Cinema Parallel circulated it to major cities as a repertory booking.) Sion Sono’s four-hour epic Love Exposure, which is quite a bit faster-paced and more accessible than Tarr’s film, didn’t receive a commercial release in the U.S. for four years after its production date, and a scant release at that. Some stalwart distributors, dedicated to promoting Film as Art no matter the cost, will take the risks and put long films in theaters. Romanian filmmaker Cristi Puiu’s disturbing, attenuated Aurora, from a few years back, is a recent example. The good folks at Cinema Guild bought it, and really got it out there. But mostly, if it’s not a Hindi musical or it doesn’t feature Orcs and Hobbits, the three-hour mark really is box office poison. So this is part of why I conceived of “The Big Ones.” In some sense, there is an answer to the dilemma of “long film” and its lack of accommodation to commercial dictates. Home video: the great equalizer. Yes? After all, between DVD and Blu-ray and Netflix and VOD and online streaming, not to mention services like Fandor, the average consumer has a wider array of access to all sorts of difficult films (including long ones) than ever before. Before we rattle our noisemakers and give ourselves a parade down Main Street Cinephilia, however, one question remains. Do these options actually serve the films? Think of it this way. Back when, say, Antonioni was shooting L’Avventura, he understood certain basic parameters of his medium, not only on the production but also on the receiving end. He knew that his viewers would see his images and hear his sounds in a theater, unfolding gradually in time within a darkened room on a giant wall. He could compose his long, slow shots as time assemblies that would be organized within the sensory controls of the theatrical space. There would most likely be no interruption. The sequence would generate a virtual space vis-à-vis its spectators. It was just assumed that a filmmaker could reorganize time, like one plastic element among many. Peter Greenaway was already way ahead of himself. ‘The Falls’ is a modular hypertext, a film that yields multiple varieties of pleasure depending on whether you choose to let it engulf you (the ‘modernist’ text), front to back and wall to wall; or if you take charge of it, treat it as a series of passages or even—I can’t believe I’m about to use this word—’webisodes.’ But is that the case now? What does it mean to watch a film on video, or on a laptop? Well, it certainly presents a shift in the size orientation of the viewer to the object. We kind of lord it over films now. And one way we do this is by exercising the power of Pause. We can start and stop a film over and over again, breaking up our experience of the work as a total, coherent whole. This basic element of the apparatus, wholly assumed by filmic modernism, is now compromised. How can a film’s formal aspects come together over the course of five or six partial viewings? And how does this alter the very idea of thinking about film as a composition in time? To put it another way, we now have more access to once-obscure long films than ever before. But are these the works to which we gravitate, among our myriad choices? Are these works suited to the unique demands of home viewing? (Phone ringing, kids yelling, the lure of unanswered emails….) The answer to this question, it seems, depends entirely on how, in this era of digital delivery, we’re prepared to understand cinematic time. Does it still demand to be treated as an integral whole, a single composed experience? Or can it be segmented, lopped off, stopped, started, rewound, sent back to the beginning months later when you never got back to that movie you started, etc.? We talk a lot about the problematics of watching celluloid artworks as digital artifacts, but we seem to speak much less about the temporal plasticity of video. Back in the early ’80s, when VCRs first came out, there was talk of watching your favorite shows at a time other than when they were broadcast. “Time-shifting,” remember that? Here, we’re talking about an entirely different kind of shifting of time, one that is more Gilles Deleuze territory than that earlier shuffling of solid things around a still-sturdy grid. How has “long film” changed in light of this problem? We understand that canonical “Big Ones” are likely to make unwieldy, but not insurmountable, demands in the home video era. You can turn off your ringer (I actually just typed “unplug your phone” just now—this should be an indication of the tragically mid-century subject position I’m mired in, and that I struggle to overcome!) —anyway, you can turn off your ringer and watch Abel Gance’s Napoleon, if you have the wherewithal to shut out the larger world. (This part of this issue, who has the privilege to attain uninterrupted contemplative time, has been on philosophy’s back burner, of course, at least since the Greeks, and hits a crisis point with Descartes’ Meditations. But I digress.) But in any case, the “Big (Old) Ones” are still there, with their high-modernist temporal frameworks, making no concessions to contemporary viewing conditions. Barring the lucky strike of a repertory screening, we either bend ourselves to the iron will of the text, or vice versa. But more recent films, it seems, can take this conundrum—distraction, interruption, fragmentation, play/pause/rewind—and conceptualize it, imprint it on their very DNA. This isn’t true only of “Big (New) Ones,” naturally. A lot of these multi-character roundelays seem to court distracted viewing, and imply a kind of modularity. (“This couple didn’t test well in Orange County. Drop ‘em.”) But in a broader, more expansive sense, the digitization of time-based communication has had a number of structural consequences. The move to non-linear editing suites like the Avid system, the greater application of web-based narrative tools, hypertext, and even the increasing tendency to perceive a “film” (you know, the finite, time-based piece of story-strip) as one component in an expanded field of relay that includes the website, the tie-in books, and other platforms. (Back when I taught at Syracuse University, the Film department proudly rechristened itself the Department of Transmedia, as a kind of harbinger of all this stuff. Sounds vaguely Death Starry to me, but you know. “Unplug the phone.”) But wait up. You’ll notice I used the word “structural” up there. I did so advisedly, because in a manner of speaking, that particular strain of avant-garde filmmakers, the so-called structuralists, already foresaw a lot of this movement toward “digital” data organization. As anyone in reach of the Criterion Collection’s recent Hollis Frampton set can attest, there was a guy who thought that Godard’s injunction—beginning, middle, end, not necessarily in that order—was kids’ stuff. Frampton films like Zorns Lemma and (Frampton’s really Big One) Magellan are structured like abstract information, catalogued like, well, data. Same thing with such structural “Big Ones” as Michael Snow’s Rameau’s Nephew or Ken Jacobs’ Star Spangled to Death. You can excise significant chunks from them; they imply many other elements that could be introduced into them. They are open texts. (In fact, according to Scott MacDonald, Frampton even stipulated that, in its finished form, Magellan should incorporate one of Yvonne Rainer’s own feature films. Among other things, this open taxonomic invitation would provide Magellan with the female perspective that Frampton, regardless of his every intention, could never provide.) And of course, this leads us to Peter Greenaway and The Falls. In many respects, this three-hour semi-narrative, quasi-mockumentary, Borgesian-structuralist whatsit is the ultimate Big One for the age of digital viewing. Greenaway has long cited Frampton as one of his masters (along with Alain Resnais), although The Falls bears only passing resemblance to the work of either man. Part of what is so remarkable about The Falls is that this, of all places, represents the man’s first foray into feature filmmaking. Up to this point, Greenaway was making largely abstract films, editing experiments whose patterns mimicked the mathematical schemes of minimalist music (particularly that of his then-collaborator, composer Michael Nyman). Although two years earlier, in 1978, Greenaway had made the faux-documentary featurette Vertical Features Remake (in which he first introduced his lifelong alter ego, Tulse Luper), even that film was primarily about the organization of space in a much more classically structuralist mode (cf. Snow’s Wavelength, Ernie Gehr’s Serene Velocity), and building a narrative edifice around such experimentation. No, The Falls is a catalogue narrative, one in which 92 individuals are profiled. They have all undergone what the film mysteriously refers to as a Violent Unknown Event, or VUE. This event, never directly explained, has affected the individual so dramatically that in some ways they could be said to be mutants, or other than purely human. (Some are immortal. One can process saltwater. All develop new languages. Most develop some strange relationship with birds.) And, oh yes, they all have names beginning with the letters F-A-L-L. In many respects, this three-hour semi-narrative, quasi-mockumentary, Borgesian-structuralist whatsit is the ultimate Big One for the age of digital viewing. What does Greenaway want from us? There are several ways to think about this film—hundreds, really—but seen from the standpoint of Bigness, I’d like to propose just a few. First, the 92 subjects’ stories do eventually interrelate. However, this is only because the VUEs themselves paint a particular picture of a global scenario, one for which any given subject’s testimony is extraneous. This, after all, is how science functions. The “FALLs” are an implied random selection from a British Registry of several thousands of similar events. This means that The Falls, hypothetically, moves out almost infinitely, in both directions. Second, each of the 92 sections is alphabetically arranged. There is no “build” to The Falls, apart from that which accrues just by amassing multiple testimonies and profiles. That is to say, one could theoretically watch The Falls in many different orders and derive epiphenomenally different but essentially similar results. The Falls is a modular narrative. So, the question of “The Big Ones” in the digital era: As I’ve mentioned, a great deal has been made of the radical changes that new technologies have produced in how we assimilate data, and how we balance and adjudicate between narrative and non-narrative information sets. Even Greenaway himself has gotten on this “transmedia” bandwagon, to mixed results. His Tulse Luper Suitcases project from a few years back encompassed three feature films, some video works, an interactive web presence, and was supposed to have included some graphic novels before the funding streams dried up. But in many respects, Greenaway was already way ahead of himself. The Falls is a modular hypertext, a film that yields multiple varieties of pleasure depending on whether you choose to let it engulf you (the “modernist” text), front to back and wall to wall; or if you take charge of it, treat it as a series of passages or even—I can’t believe I’m about to use this word—“webisodes.” As this column progresses, we will see that not all “long film” has considered its post-film afterlife as thoroughly as The Falls has. Some are destined to suffer under the sovereignty of the remote control. But Greenaway’s foresight put his early cinema way ahead of where the medium would eventually exhaust itself. The end, then strikes me as a perfect place for us to start.

Camano Island...Golf Retreat with a Private Lakefront Setting You sent a message to this owner. - Minimum stay:Contact owner - Pets considered:Yes - Wheel chair accessible:No Camano Island house description Our Camaloch Cottage is perfect for all kinds of gatherings for up to six people. With its wonderful interior and stunning views of Smith Lake plus the private hot tub, you'll find it to be a most relaxing place! If you golf a little, or a lot, we'll spare you the cost of renting the golf cart! That's right - drive the private Golf Cart from your delightful lakeside vacation house to the community owned three-star Golf Course (open year round), play 9-18 holes of golf, and when you are through explore charming Camano Island and it's quaint communities and multiple public beaches. Access to the Island is via bridge -no ferry delays for your Seattle adventures! Rain or Shine, you can't help enjoying the playful antics of the local waterfowl out on the non-motor lake just outside your door. And if you feel like taking a soak, the jetted spa on the south facing deck above the lake will soothe your senses, especially if the moon is reflected on the water. Aaaaa... Our Non-Smoking, Lakeside House is located in a gated community and features panoramic lake views from the living and sleeping rooms, exposed beam and natural wood cathedral ceilings throughout, finished wood accent walls, wall to wall carpeting, a charming gas fireplace in the living room, window blinds, skylights, air conditioning and ceiling fans. It is comfortably furnished with a large spread-out-and-relax leather sectional sofa, marble dining table, large Sitting Area sofa grouping with a curtain for privacy, Loft King bedroom and Mission-Style Queen bedroom. One stunning bathroom has a huge walk-in tile shower and another stunning bathroom with a tub/shower. The garage houses the golf cart and provides storage for your recreation equipment. With half the rainfall of Seattle you'll have lots of chances to golf or discover the secrets of Camano Island and visit the shops of old downtown Stanwood, nearby historic LaConner, or the $7.8 mil. Tulalip Casino with its dazzling art glass displays, all within 5-30 minutes of the Cottage. Adjacent to Camaloch Golf Course & Canopy Tours NW for zip line adventures, and 5 minutes from my favorite island beach, there's lots of entertainment! Come here for that romantic getaway for two, come alone, bring the children, or bring the grandparents and the children to share your island adventure, but come soon. Discounted rates as shown are available October 1 thru May 15, excluding Thanksgiving, Christmas & New Year's Holidays. Keywords: Vacation House, Camano Island, Cabin - Vacation Rental - Minimum Age Limit For Renters Bedrooms: 2 Bedrooms, Sleeps 6, Beds for 6 Bathrooms: 2 Bathrooms Kitchen & Dining - Ice Maker - Linens Provided - Clothes Dryer - Air Conditioning - Washing Machine - Gas Fireplace - Parking Off Street - Satellite / Cable: - Video Library - DVD Player - CD Player Pool & Spa - Hot Tub - Outdoor Grill Location & View - Fitness Center - Sight Seeing - Wildlife Viewing - 3-Star 18 Hole Golf Course, Private Golf Cart, 2 Adult Mountain Bikes, Canopy Tours NW Zip Lines, Island Beaches, Beach Combing, Sound Fishing, Crabbing, Birding, Massage, Adjacent Camano Plaza has salon, grocery, coffee shop (ice cream cones, too!) kitchen gift shop, fishing shop & video store, Camano Island & Stanwood Restaurants & fast food nearby, 5-Cinema Complex with restaurants, Island Boat Launches, Antiques, Skagit Tulip Festival April 1-30, May Mother's Day Camano Island Studio Tour, Home Town 4th of July in Stanwood, October Island Art Festival...moreless ReviewsWrite a review Nice and quiet Nice and quiet The home is nice and the area is quiet and relaxing. The beds are very comfortable and bedding/towels are high quality. We loved the hot tub and fireplace. Our dogs had a great time in the large yard. I have to agree with another reviewer that "lakefront" is a little exaggerated. There is a lake, but it is very small and it is not accessible from the yard. The water is a serene view from the house, just don't expect boating or swimming. - Guest Melody J. - Date of stay 09/15/13 - Review Submitted 09/24/13 Recommended for: Romantic getaway, families with young children, age 55+, pet owners. Not That Great. Not That Great. Place was clean & equipped w/ many extras you may have forgotten at home. The place & location were nice but that’s about where it ends. The ad is misleading-the property is on a lakefront but the lake is not directly accessible from the property as a pic depicts, while another pic shows lakeside beach but you are unable to swim in the lake. 'Large pond’ would be more accurate. The ad also states there are 2 bdr; however, there is only 1 bdr & a loft which is open to the downstairs. There was also an issue w/ a missing remote for an A/C unit in the loft, which we were accused of losing but did not use during our stay. We were harassed with 5 phone calls & an email in the course of 1 evening. The owner was very distraught & made clear the apparent urgency, despite the fact the guests were not using the loft & the A/C was still functional–manually, just not by remote. Since we have a young daughter we took responsibility, regardless of the fact the owner had new cleaners prior to our arrival who may have mistakenly misplaced it. This was not something the owner was willing to entertain. In any case, we felt horrible & wanted to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. As the cabin had guests, we offered to return immediately upon their departure & before the next guests arrival. We were told that didn't work for the owner. We went as far as offering any day/time. We were never provided this or any opportunity. We also offered to buy a remote online & have it shipped to the owner at our expense. 4 days after this offer, the owner bought a new remote herself & had it shipped overnight, doubling the cost of the remote. We were confused to say the least as we had 1st of all, offered to do this very thing 4 days earlier thereby lowering the cost to us, and 2nd of all, we had been told the guests would not be leaving for another 3 days. The owner felt they should have also been compensated for their time in dealing with the issue, which would be fair if they provided us any opportunity to resolve it. Throughout all of this we also made inquiries about the security deposit, which went ignored. The remote was bought by the owner 1 full week before the security deposit was to be returned to us, yet it wasn’t until we sent an email the day it was due that we got a response. The security deposit was refunded late according to the owners Agreement & was not refunded in full, w/ the cost of the remote & the express shipping deducted with no further explanation. - Guest Courtenay R. - Date of stay 07/23/13 - Review Submitted 09/05/13 Owner response: They had a great time at the Cottage as documented by his comments written in my guestbook. He doesn't mention that his daughter hid the remote controls and 2 of them were recovered while the 3rd, to air conditioner located above the king bed, was not. He has twisted everything in an attempt to discredit me. I have been happily providing a wonderful setting for my guests for 10 years and my guests have been delighted as evidenced by 4 Volumes of wonderful guestbook comments left by my guests. I would be happy to answer any concerns. gloria, Owner Camaloch Cottage, on Smith Lake Very nice and clean home!! Very relaxing and nicely decorated home. We were able sight see during the day and then hot tub at night. Highly recommend this home to anyone wanting a nice play to stay and enjoy. - Guest MKNW (Trout creek, mt) - Date of stay 06/13/12 - Review Submitted 06/27/12 Recommended for: Families with teenagers, sightseeing, romantic getaway, families with young children, age 55+, girls getaway, pet owners. We wanted a place to relax for a weekend, and the camaloch cottage was perfect. The weather was not great, but it did not matter. We spent time in the hot tub, sat by the fire, walked to the store, and cooked some excellent meals. We have stayed at many vacation rentals over the years, and most of them feel like a vacation rental. The cottage, on the other hand, felt like we were staying at a friends house for the weekend. The cottage was very comfortable, cozy, and well appointed. Can't wait to come back with better weather and take the golf cart for a ride. - Guest Gebruiker (Kent, WA) - Date of stay 10/21/11 - Review Submitted 10/28/11 Recommended for: Adventure seekers, romantic getaway, age 55+. Had a wonderful time! Had a wonderful time! We had such a great time at this cabin. It truly has everything you need. We came for a family wedding on the island and stayed an extra day to just have some fun. We went hiking and sight seeing, had dinner in La Conner, used the hot tub multiple times and played checkers and Uno as a family. The cabin is clean, and well maintained. Gloria was so helpful and accommodating to our every need - we would love to stay here again and have some time to tour the neighborhood in the golf cart! - Guest The Hiker's (Eagle, Idaho) - Date of stay 08/04/11 - Review Submitted 08/11/11 Recommended for: Families with teenagers, sightseeing, romantic getaway. what a great place. very well maintained..spotlessly clean.very dog friendly.had some east coast friends over.so just the four of us plenty of room .short walking distance to the country club and just a little farther to the local IGA store.we'll be back. thanks again gloria. - Guest nature lover (grass valley ca.) - Date of stay 10/13/10 - Review Submitted 11/06/10 Recommended for: Sightseeing, romantic getaway, age 55+, girls getaway, pet owners. What a warm and comfortable home. Everything we needed for our comfort and entertainment was provided, cards, books, movies, sports equipment. The lake is beautiful, and both mornings we were there we watched a bald eagle fishing for his breakfast. All in all it was a beautiful, comfortable place to stay. - Guest The Spagnolas (Eugene, OR) - Date of stay 04/25/06 - Review Submitted 04/25/06 Guest comment entered by owner "It was lovely beyond our expectations. We enjoyed ourselves utterly. You'll be hearing from us again. Thank your for your time and effort. Regards" - Guest Annie - Date of stay 03/05/06 - Review Submitted 03/05/06 Guest comment entered by owner "Thanks Gloria, We had a wonderful time at your Beautiful cabin. It's everything we expected and more. Was perfect breath of fresh air! We will definitely be back. Thank you for putting so much thought into everything - made the stay just perfect. Thanks for everything" - Guest Carri & Kevin - Date of stay 02/20/06 - Review Submitted 02/20/06 Guest comment entered by owner "Thank you so much for making our New Year the best it could be. This was the best place possible to enjoy the stormy weather! Would love to come back sometime & enjoy a little sunshine! Thanks again" - Guest Rob & Kathy - Date of stay 01/01/06 - Review Submitted 01/01/06 Discount Rates .. Oct 1-May 15: High Season & Holiday Rates: 1-2 .. $150/night ... $1050/week 1-2 .. $175/night .. $1225/week 3-4 .. $185/night ... $1295/week 3-4 .. $225/night .. $1575/week Add'l Guest: $25/night..$175/week Add'l Guest: $35/night..$245/week Check-in 4:00 PM - Check-out 11:00 AM 2 Night Minimum, Except 3 Night Minimum Memorial Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving & Christmas Stays. $300.00 Security Deposit. $95 Cleaning Fee. $50.00 Pet Rent. Credit Cards via PayPal. 10.7% Sales & Lodging Tax Note: Until confirmed, rates are subject to change without notice. This owner accepts HomeAway payments. Always use this free service to protect your payments up to $10,000 against fraud while keeping your financial information private. With HomeAway Payments, your credit card information is not seen by the owner or manager. NEVER pay by cash or instant money transfer services such as Western Union or MoneyGram. Call the owner to confirm booking request. Don't forget your vacation protection! Get protected now Adding our Vacation Protection services can make sure your getaway goes smoothly, no matter what. We offer Cancellation Protection, Carefree Rental Guarantee, and Damage Protection so you can truly relax. About the owner: Dale & Gloria McBain, Owners I'm Gloria and I am determined to live long, talk much, laugh often and love deeply. I have always lived my life by the golden rule and God has been very good to me for which I am very thankful. Some people go into the vacation rental business, but I am in the people business in that I love sharing what we have created in our homes so others may find what we have found there. Both our vacation homes are within an hour of our home, but they are simply a world away. I want nothing more than for you to come, respect what we have provided, have a wonderful time and tell your friends and family about our Waters Edge Seattle Vacation properties. Your vacation is as important to me as it is to you! Thank you for your interest in our wonderful property. As always, I welcome any questions or concerns you may have. gloria McBain Waters Edge Seattle Vacations - Secondary: +1 360-568-1015 Pacific Time Dining Area with View Window Main Level Queen Bedroom Sitting Area with King Bed Conversion Camano Island State Park Part of the Living Room Loft King Bedroom Sitting Area (view window not shown) Sitting Area with Twin Bed Conversion Island Time is a Relaxing Time... There have been visitors to this page since the counter was last reset in . This listing was first published here in 2003. Date last modified - Thursday, November 07, 2013 2 Bedroom / 2 Bathroom Three services to protect your trip: Protect your payments in case you need to cancel. Guarantee the rental meets your expectations. Ensure you're prepared in case of accidental damage.

Hi my sweet readers… I have so much to tell and… I can’t make it now! Not yet… All I can write is that I have a lot of amazing and interesting work. So I’m still in progress. Can’t show you nothing and it’s not ok – I know, but believe me – soon I will publish my last weeks layouts. It’s December and I decided to make a December Daily album this year. Last year it was much easier. I used a lot of gold glitter, and… gold, and more gold and glitter This year I would love to prepare something clean& simple in traditional ‘christmas palette’: red & white. I find this mix attractive this year Yesterday I start to complete the first pages. From these origins only colours survive. I CAN’T make any clear&simple pages – sorry So let’s start, these are the first days of December – I know they’re not very stylish, but this is all I can create now. This year I prefer treming the tree, bake the cookies, walk on frosy walks – you know, I have a real christmas spirit inside. You can find here a lot of Chic Tags goodies, for example here you can see two of ChicTags christmas mini tags, and my favourite DearLizzy date roller stamp! I used one of ChicTags Frosty ATC In a pocket I hid a letter from Jaś to Santa: ‘Please wake me up Santa!”, it was so sweet! Do you see this huga red lable with ’5′ on it? This is one of the christmas LABELS from ChicTags. And I have a surprise for you! For just $1 you can grab your own set of those LABELS here today only! Great! And this is one of the 25 Days Icons! I sticked it to the vellum envelope where I hid an instax photo and cinema tickets. I use a baby blue TAB from ChicTags 25 Day Tabs set. This is a special ‘envelope’ page. I made it inspire by the song ‘Let’s have a kiki’ – if you don’t know it yet, you have to find it somewhere on You Tube (I prefer the ‘Glee’ version with Sarah Jessica Parker). Inside the envlope I put Jan’s letter to Santa and his drawing. I love these Lily Bee christmas stamps from Christmas Cheer collection These are ‘this year special’ christmas decorations which I bought in Paris, and I love them :))) I know it was a lot of pictures – but these are my nine days of December and I am proud that I found any mobilization inside to finally make it. Ok, I’m going to bake some gingerbreads now. Have a nice evening everybody

Saoirse Ronan has been cast as Susie Salmon in Peter Jackson’s The Lovely Bones, an adaptation of a best-selling novel by Alice Sebold. She joins Rachel Weisz and Ryan Gosling, who play her parents, in a film about a brutally murdered girl who watches events unfold from heaven. I’m hoping this is a return to PJ’s Heavenly Creatures, which if you haven’t seen it, run out and grab it. I believe it was that film, plus his FX work on The Frighteners and other films, that led him to working on The Lord of the Rings trilogy. I know, I know, we wish it were The Hobbit films (yes, there will be two, or at least some sort of other LOTR prequel), but to be honest, I want to see something a little more simple. I’m going to check out the book, which sounds dark, but intriguing! Dreamworks is producing with Paramount set to distribute from a script by PJ, Philippa Boyens and Fran Walsh. What’s interesting was how the deal was made; a short time ago, PJ put the script and deal out to the studios with his directing attachment (except New Line Cinema, where the studio chief and PJ are having a battle) and DreamWorks bit. Production starts this October for a 2008 release, and I’ll bet this is going to be an Oscar contender! Stay tuned for more details!

The Hollywood studio behind the Batman movies has decided not to publish weekend box office figures after the Colorado theatre massacre. Twelve people were killed and 58 injured when a gunman dressed in full body armour opened fire at a packed midnight premier of The Dark Knight Rises in Denver. James Holmes, 24, was taken into custody outside the cinema after the attack. He is in solitary confinement and is due in court on Monday morning. Within hours of the attack, Warner Brothers had cancelled the movie's Paris premiere, which was to have been accompanied by a press junket with the cast and crew including director Christopher Nolan and main star Christian Bale. The company also cancelled red carpet events for the film in France, Japan and Mexico, although screenings will go ahead as planned. Warner Bros has now confirmed it will not publish weekend takings - a form of crowing about box office success - until Monday. This was despite the fact that unofficial figures cited by industry daily Variety suggest that it made $US75 million on Friday alone, the third biggest opening day ever at the US box office. The move was swiftly followed by major Hollywood rivals including Disney, Fox, Sony, Lionsgate and Universal. After initial radio silence from most of the cast and crew, Nolan issued a statement lamenting the "senseless tragedy," and expressing "our profound sorrow at the senseless tragedy that has befallen the entire Aurora community". On Saturday Bale, who plays Bruce Wayne aka Batman, also expressed his sadness. "Words cannot express the horror that I feel. I cannot begin to truly understand the pain and grief of the victims and their loved ones, but my heart goes out to them," he said in a statement. In a separate move Warner Bros scrambled to pull a trailer for another film, Gangster Squad, including a scene in which mobsters shoot at theatre audiences.

Opening Remarks (video) Dain Borges, Director, Center for Latin American Studies Mark Hansen, Dean, Social Science Division Ambassador João Almino, Consul General of Brazil in Chicago Marina Silva, Senator, Green Party (from Brazil via video) "International Reactions to the Coup in Honduras" (video) Rodolfo Pastor is Minister of Culture, Arts and Sports of Honduras, and, since the coup of June 28 that overthrew the government of President Manuel Zelaya, he has also been Visiting Professor of History at Harvard University. Pastor discusses the current political situation of Honduras, the Honduran political system, as well as the upcoming electi "Teach-in on the Haiti Emergency" (video) Greg Beckett, Anthropology PhD and Collegiate Assistant Professor in the Social Sciences, and Ann Clark, Principal at Nicholas Clark Architects, Ltd, contextualize US-Haitian relations and Port-au-Prince itself, and discuss the nature of Haitian political and social life before the earthquake. “Freefall: America, Free Markets, and the Sinking of the World Economy” (video) A talk by Columbia University professor Joseph Stiglitz. The current global financial crisis carries a "made in America" label. In "Freefall", Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz explains how America exported bad economics, bad policies, and bad behavior to the rest of the world, only to cobble together a haphazard and ineffective response when "With Immediate Effect: The Events of 1989 Revisited" (video) 20th Anniversary Roundtable with the Consuls General of Austria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary and Poland. A discussion concerning the historic events of two decades ago in Central and Eastern Europe, and the paths taken since then - through personal reflections and recollections of how the process developed, the spirit of the movements, the le Entrepreneur Elon Musk: Why It's Important to Pinch Pennies on the Road to Riches Superpreneur seems like a better label for Elon Musk. At 38, he has already been a co-founder of PayPal, which sold for $1.5 billion, and SpaceX, which aims to commercialize the launching of payloads into orbit. He is also an initial investor in electric-car pioneer Tesla Motors and solar energy company SolarCity, which sells and services solar energy equipment. In the second half of a two-part interview, arranged by Wharton Entrepreneurial Programs, he tells Knowledge@Wharton the story of his e Behind the Scenes: On Line: A. Balasubramaniam On Line: Drawing Through the Twentieth Century The Museum of Modern Art, November 21, 2010-February 7, 2011 For more information please visit http://www.moma.org/online. Audio courtesy of Acoustiguide © 2010 The Museum of Modern Art, New York Behind the Scenes: On Line: Guiseppe Penone On Line: Drawing Through the Twentieth Century The Museum of Modern Art, November 21, 2010-February 7, 2011 For more information please visit http://www.moma.org/online © 2010 The Museum of Modern Art, New York 84: The MBA oath debate INSEAD professors Craig Smith and Theo Vermaelen face off on whether MBA students should take an oath in the first place. 85: Welcome, ‘Stateholder’ In light of the amount of government capital injected into the so-called "private economy" since mid-2008, INSEAD Professor Ludo Van der Heyden hails the emergence of the new 'stateholder'. Understanding global politics This is a module framework. It can be viewed online or downloaded as a zip file. As taught in Autumn Semester 2009. This module introduces global politics through the major theoretical, historical and empirical ways of seeing international relations. Different claims, about, for example, human nature, power, war, peace, the state, society, law and politics are offered by thinkers who exercise a major influence on our contemporary understanding. These claims contribute to different approaches t Reenactment : fans performing movie scenes from the stage to YouTube In this presentation from the Institute of Film and Television Studies' Ephemeral Media Workshops, Professor Barbara Klinger from Indiana University discusses her research on the phenomenon of fan recreations. Presentation produced/delivered: June/July 2009 Suitable for: Undergraduate Study and Community Education Professor Barbara Klinger, Indiana University Professor Barbara Klinger's research and teaching focus on U.S. cinema, film exhibition and reception, fan studies, cinema and new med Politics in 60 seconds. Passive revolution Dr Adam Morton defines a polical concept in 60 seconds for those with a spare minute to learn something new. This videocast focuses on passive revolution as a political concept. Warning: video does contain bloopers and out takes. May 2010 Suitable for Undergraduate study and Community education Dr Adam Morton, School of Politics and International Relations Dr Adam Morton is a Senior Lecturer and Fellow of the Centre for the Study of Social and Global Justice (CSSGJ) in the School of Politic Images of the Earth Structure: Three credits. Three lecture hours per week (45 total hours). This is an introduction to the new, rapidly evolving, and interdisciplinary field of Earth System Science. This course emphasizes the ideas of Earth as a planet within the solar system; the interactions among the components of the geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere; and global changes. Studying Earth as a system is accomplished by the analysis of remote sensing data. Images acquired by airborne and spaceborn President William McKinley A four minute summary of William McKinley's accomplishments and life history. A very good video to show human side of a president. The Empathic Civilization At this event Jeremy Rifkin will talk about his latest book The Empathic Civilization: The Race to Global Consciousness in a World in Crisis. His book is a sweeping new interpretation of the history of civilization, that looks at the evolution of empathy and the profound ways that it has shaped our development-and is likely to determine our fate as a species. It's time that politicians had performance-related bonuses During the financial crisis, politicians across the spectrum have assailed bankers’ bonuses. In a similar way, politicians should now use the sovereign-debt crisis as an opportunity to re-examine their own pay. The collapse of the largest Ponzi scheme in history, the European Social Model, is not caused by inappropriate bonuses, but by a lack of bonuses. M As: Not necessarily the best way to grow your company There are several good ways to grow a company, but only about a third of firms actively use all the methods available to them, and this narrow focus widens the corporate gap between success and failure significantly. That’s according to a 10-year global study of 162 telecom companies conducted by Laurence Capron, INSEAD strategy professor, and Will Mitchell, a professor at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina.

Tag Archives: bargains There was always a slot in the Bond 50 collection’s packaging for Skyfall, so this was pretty much inevitable. I’ve just gone crazy on Amazon, ordering any number of things from their Black Friday DVD and Blu-ray deals. Here are the titles I went for, and some of the good deals that I already had from before. These episodes never looked this good on broadcast, and I found some scenes to be absolutely jaw-dropping. Pretty hefty discount – so I’ve just stuck it in my cart. The first six Star Trek films are collected in a pretty polished Blu-ray collection, alongside a bonus disc featuring The Captain’s Summit, a slightly misnamed hour’s worth of roundtable discussion. Even if you don’t like all six films, and I imagine that accounts for more or less anybody who’s seen more than two of them, It’s still a good price for the ones you might like and the supplements included. I did have cause to say, just the other day and about another TV show I can’t name right now but I’m sure you can guess, “That’s the most fun I’ve had with a pilot since Firefly.” Plus a bonus tease about the upcoming Entourage movie. A great time to fill your shelves with over 500 episodes of great television. This low price must have something to do with Monsters University hitting US cinemas today. That or a typo. Lionsgate have some films to sell you. Importers be warned that this disc is locked to Zone A players as the film had different distributors in different countries. Can the label “crime drama” can even come close to containing what David Simon and team made here? There are commentaries, featurettes, some trivia tracks and even isolated scores – and no, that’s not a Silent Movie gag. While my Aaron Sorkin fever is being stoked by the imminent second series of The Newsroom, I might dip back into The West Wing. There’s some impressive animation in these episodes – and that’s not something I say lightly about Family Guy – and the adaptations have done a great job of compressing the storylines. 25 films that Universal are proud of, in one big box with plenty of extras. The sale titles include Brazil – which is the greatest film ever made in the history of cinema, as we all know. There’s also Rosemary’s Baby, Rashomon, In The Mood For Love, The Game and The Royal Tennenbaums…

Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen, Liv Tyler, Sean Astin, Cate Blanchett, Orlando Bloom, Christopher Lee, John Rhys-Davies J.R.R. Tolkien (novel), Frances Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson This Christmas, the journey ends. The winner of 11 Academy Awards including Best Picture is now 50 minutes longer! This extended version of the epic conclusion of The Lord of the Rings trilogy includes new score by Howard Shore and over 350 new digital effects shots. The final battle for Middle-earth begins. Frodo and Sam, led by Gollum, continue their dangerous mission toward the fires of Mount Doom in order to destroy the One Ring. Aragorn struggles to fulfill his legacy as he leads his outnumbered followers against the growing power of the Dark Lord Sauron, so that the Ring-bearer may complete his quest. $72.629 million on 3703 screens. English Dolby Digital EX 5.1 English DTS ES 6.1 English Dolby Surround 2.0 Runtime: 263 min. Release Date: 12/14/2004 Discs One & Two • Audio Commentary with co-writer/co-producer/director Peter Jackson, co-writer/co-producer Fran Walsh, and co-writer Philippa Boyens • Audio Commentary with production designer Grant Major, costume designer Ngila Dickson, Weta Workshop creative supervisor Richard Taylor, conceptual designer/set decorator Alan Lee, conceptual designer John Howe, supervising art director/set decorator Dan Hennah, art department manager Chris Hennah, and Weta Workshop manager Tania Rodger • Audio Commentary with producer Barrie Osborne, executive producer Mark Ordesky, co-producer & editor Jamie Selkirk, additional editor Annie Collins, co-producer Rick Porras, composer Howard Shore, visual effects supervisors Jim Rygiel and Joe Letteri, supervising sound editor Ethan Van der Ryn, supervising sound editor Mike Hopkins, Weta animation designer and supervisor Randy Cook, previsualization supervisor Christian Rivers, visual effects DP Brian Van’t Hul, and visual effects DP Alex Funke • Audio Commentary with actors Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Liv Tyler, Hugo Weaving, Sean Astin, John Rhys-Davies, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Christopher Lee, Bernard Hill, Miranda Otto, David Wenham, Karl Urban, John Noble, Lawrence Makoake, and Andy Serkis • Easter Eggs • Introduction from Peter Jackson • “JRR Tolkien: The Legacy of Middle-earth” Documentary • “From Book to Script: Forging the Final Chapter” Documentary • “Designing Middle-earth” Documentary • “Weta Workshop” Documentary • “Big-Atures” Documentary • “Costume Design” Documentary • “Home of the Horse Lords” Documentary • Middle-earth Atlas • New Zealand as Middle-earth • “The Peoples of Middle-earth” Galleries • “The Realms of Middle-earth” Galleries • Introduction from Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, and Elijah Wood • “Cameras In Middle-earth” Documentary • Production Photos • “Weta Digital” Documentary • Visual Effects Demonstration • “Editorial: Completing the Trilogy” Documentary • “Music for Middle-earth” Documentary • “The Soundscapes of Middle-earth” Documentary • “The End of All Things” Documentary • “The Passing of an Age” Documentary • “Cameron Duncan: The Inspiration for ‘Into the West’” Documentary PURCHASE @ AMAZON.COM Sony 36" WEGA KV-36FS12 Monitor; Sony DA333ES Processor/Receiver; Panasonic CV-50 DVD Player using component outputs; Michael Green Revolution Cinema 6i Speakers (all five); Sony SA-WM40 Subwoofer. The Lord of the Rings: The Return Of The King - Platinum Series Extended Edition (2003) Reviewed by Colin Jacobson (December 14, 2004) Here the journey ends. Almost three years to the day after the theatrical release of 2001’s The Fellowship of the Ring, we get a form of Lord of the Rings closure with this new package. A four-DVD edition of The Return of the King, this brings us the series’ sixth – and presumably final – DVD release. I’ll discuss the supplements in the appropriate area of this review, but here I’ll chat a little about the movie itself. For full coverage of my thoughts about King, please check out my review of the theatrical version. For this article, I’ll stick mostly with the differences evident in the SE’s extended cut of the film. Note that this discussion may include some “spoilers”. If you don’t want to know the content of the extra footage, head to the technical ratings now! Already a long movie, the “extended edition” adds 52 minutes to the flick. King now runs about 252 minutes versus the original’s 200 minutes. Actually, the entire program lasts 263 minutes, but the final 11 minutes display “Special thanks to the charter members of the LOTR official fan club”. While the original DVD packed the entire feature onto one disc, the extended version spreads the film across two platters. The first one runs two hours, 27 minutes and 30 seconds and cuts as the orcs bring up the “wolf’s head” battering ram. The second disc offers programming that lasts two hours, 15 minutes and 35 seconds if we include the lengthy fan club credits. In a nice touch, when you start DVD Two, it offers a menu that lets you either go right back into the movie or allows you to choose one of the four audio commentaries. Some may see this as a distraction since the film doesn’t simply continue without input from the viewer, but given the myriad of auditory choices, I like the fact the DVD’s producers don’t just assume what version you’ll prefer. As for the actual film footage, this material integrates quite well into the action. I recognized most of the added scenes but not all of them; after three prior screenings, I guess I didn’t know the flick well enough to immediately detect every change. Many of the extended sequences seemed pretty modest in nature. Rather than add a few long bits, this version of King mostly featured a lot of smaller extensions as well as a smattering of new sequences. I liked that approach, for it supplemented the original film but didn’t alter its flow. According to the DVD’s booklet, the movie included 13 new scenes and 24 extended sequences. The final new scene appears as Frodo and Sam get stuck in a mob of orcs on their way to Mount Doom. As for the last extended sequence, we see more of Gollum’s initial attack on our heroes as they almost make it to their goal. To my eyes, the most substantial change occurred early in the film. Saruman was cut out of the theatrical cut, but here we see his fate. Other significant components include an explanation for how Aragorn, et al., took over the corsairs, a drinking game to celebrate the defeat of Saruman, a confrontation between Gandalf and the Witch King, Aragorn and the palantir, Frodo and Sam among the orcs, and a meeting with the Mouth of Sauron. We also get a little greater exposition and more character moments that flesh out some elements, particularly related to Faramir and Eowyn; we see their introduction to each other, and that makes their budding romance at the end seem more sensible. Although I preferred the extended cuts of The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers, I think the theatrical version of King probably remains the strongest, though not by a lot. Too much of the added material detracts rather than contributes to the storytelling. The pacing slows slightly and pads moments that really didn’t need extra delineation. The Saruman and Mouth of Sauron scenes stand out as the most prominent additions. The former offers a less than satisfying conclusion to that wizard’s journey. Granted, it’s good to see his fate, since the theatrical cut leaves us without satisfaction in that regard. However, his ending comes across as anti-climatic and almost a throwaway moment, which doesn’t seem right given the character’s status. As for the Mouth, that scene succeeds in theory but not in execution. That’s largely due to the campy presentation. Bruce Spence offers such an over-the-top performance that essentially ruins the sequence. I like its idea but don’t think the final version is very good. In addition, I could definitely live without the extra moments connected to the army of the dead, though these have some merits. On one hand, it’s cool to see how Aragorn and the others commandeered the boats. However, these remove any tension from the scene in which they appear to save the day. The movie builds those to make us think our heroes are doomed, but since we already know Aragorn’s forces are on the ships, any anxiety deflates. And in the category of “odd choice”, there’s a pre-battle scene with Eowyn and Merry. Sure, it’s a nice moment of bonding, but it makes no sense because she reveals herself to all the soldiers! Minutes later we see her try to hide her identity from Theoden, so why would she let all these other combatants know who she is? It’s badly inconsistent and illogical. Some of the extra moments do add to the film. Anything new with Faramir is good, and I do like the fact we see the seeds of his relationship with Eowyn. Aragorn’s moments with the palantir are cool, and I really like the extra parts in which Sam and Frodo get stuck among the orcs on the way to Mount Doom. Ultimately, the extended King is something of a wash. The weaker sequences don’t badly hurt the movie, but they do create some problems, and the positive additions don’t compensate in full. It’s still an excellent film, but it simply doesn’t work as the best cut. One nice touch: if you check out the chapter menus on DVDs One and Two, you’ll find notations that indicate which ones include either new or extended scenes. This provides a helpful notation for those of us who feel less than secure in our knowledge of the material. This information also appears in the package’s booklet. The DVD Grades: Picture A/ Audio A/ Bonus A+ The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 2.35:1 on these single-sided, dual-layered DVDs; the image has been enhanced for 16X9 televisions. I anticipated a fine visual presentation, and this transfer of King more than lived up to my expectations. No issues related to sharpness occurred. Despite the many very wide shots that occurred, the image remained rock solid. I saw no softness at all, as the picture appeared crisp and detailed. I also detected no jagged edges or moiré effects, and edge enhancement seemed absent. Those in search of print defects will hunt in vain, as I witnessed no specks, marks, or flaws of any sort in this clean presentation. As with the first two flicks, King continued to display a rather stylized palette. Here, three types of hues dominated. The Rohan elements went with something of a golden tone, while Frodo’s scenes mainly used a dingy blue/gray. Minas Tirith featured blown-out whites. The DVD clearly replicated the movie’s intended palette. The colors were appropriately vivid when necessary and seemed accurately depicted. Black levels also came across well. Dark shots demonstrated good depth and clarity. Low-light shots were nicely displayed and seemed clear and adequately visible. Shadow detail was clean and tight. Again, this was a very strong presentation that reproduced the movie swimmingly. The extended edition of King integrated the extra 52 minutes of scenes neatly, and I never noticed any disruptive or awkward edits. The visuals appeared consistently positive for those segments, so I didn’t detect any decrease in quality. The elements flowed smoothly and concisely. As with the two prior extended editions, The Return of the King included both Dolby Digital EX 5.1 and DTS ES 6.1 soundtracks. Across the board, I found the two soundtracks to seem identical. I flipped back and forth between the pair and noticed no differences at all. Often I detect some improvement in transparency or bass response for the DTS mix, but that didn’t happen here. Instead, the two tracks came across as exceedingly similar. The soundfield appeared very active and involving. All five channels presented lots of material that kept the viewer at the center of a realistic and immersive world. Elements seemed appropriately placed and they blended together well. Flying creatures soared from location to location accurately, and other pieces popped up in their proper places too. The whole thing meshed together quite nicely, and the piece worked nicely. Not surprisingly, battle sequences were the most impressive, but the entire package seemed strong. Audio quality equaled the positive nature of the soundfield. Speech was natural and distinctive, and I detected no issues connected to intelligibility or edginess. Music sounded bright and vibrant, as the score presented rich and full tones. Effects came across as accurate and concise. No problems with distortion appeared, and these elements were clean and broad. Bass response was excellent, as low-end consistently sounded tight and powerful. The audio of King just narrowly fell short of “A+” territory, as it presented a terrific experience. So how did the picture and sound quality of the extended edition compare to those on the theatrical cut of King? I thought the visuals were very similar and didn’t observe any significant differences. However, the audio marked a notable improvement due to low-end elements. Both DVDs featured similar soundfields, but the theatrical release suffered from some overblown bass. The extended version’s mixes tamed that problem and became more satisfying. For this four-DVD release of The Return of the King, we find tons of extras. These closely follow the structure of the first two extended editions. On discs one and two, we locate a whopping four audio commentaries. Called The Director and Writers, the first logically comes from director/co-writer/producer Peter Jackson, co-writer/producer Fran Walsh, and co-writer Philippa Boyens, all of whom sat together for this running, screen-specific affair. Both of the prior tracks from this trio worked well, and their final chat follows suit. We get a great look at many elements of the production. Not surprisingly, we learn a lot about the story. We find information about the adaptation, changes made from Tolkien’s source material, and various related issues. They discuss additions to the extended edition as well as why those scenes didn’t make the theatrical cut. Many general production notes turn up, as Jackson presents good comments about the shoot and connected topics. Nonetheless, those story issues remain the most compelling, and we find a nice encapsulation about all the plot and character challenges. A smattering of happy talk appears, but we also hear some criticism, as the participants acknowledge a few complaints aimed at the movie. A good tone of humor keeps this all moving, and as usual, Jackson acts like a goof so the women can give him a hard time. Here he delights in discussions of the “25th anniversary edition” he claims to already have in the planning stages. This track offers yet another excellent discussion. Next we find a Design Team track that includes remarks from production designer Grant Major, costume designer Ngila Dickson, Weta Workshop creative supervisor Richard Taylor, conceptual designer/set decorator Alan Lee, conceptual designer John Howe, supervising art director/set decorator Dan Hennah, art department manager Chris Hennah, and Weta Workshop manager Tania Rodger. Though some of the participants seemed to sit solo for the track, most appeared to be clustered into logical groups. If you listen to this track, you’ll learn about all things visual in regard to King. The program covers props, sets, costumes, miniatures, makeup and pretty much everything else under that falls under that umbrella. We find out about design and execution of these elements. Though these topics might seem dry, the commentary actually comes across as lively and engaging. The pace moves quickly and provides lots of cool details about the material, with many fun anecdotes along the way. I liked the fact it offered so many notes about the visual design rather than simply “nuts and bolts” issues. For example, we learn about the stylistic concerns related to the computer created characters but we don’t hear about the technical areas; that’ll follow in the next commentary. Many tracks of this sort can drag due to excessive jargon and procedural matters, but this one goes by briskly since it avoids those traps. It offers a great look at the ways the crew brought Middle-earth to life, and it manages to provide a fun and entertaining glimpse at the design issues. For the third commentary, we find a discussion from the Production/Post-Production Team. This program includes remarks from Audio Commentary with producer Barrie Osborne, executive producer Mark Ordesky, co-producer & editor Jamie Selkirk, additional editor Annie Collins, co-producer Rick Porras, composer Howard Shore, visual effects supervisors Jim Rygiel and Joe Letteri, supervising sound editor Ethan Van der Ryn, supervising sound editor Mike Hopkins, Weta animation designer and supervisor Randy Cook, previsualization supervisor Christian Rivers, visual effects DP Brian Van’t Hul, and visual effects DP Alex Funke. Many of these folks obviously sat together, and it appeared they clustered in logical teams. The results then were edited together to make this track. This track had the most potential to get bogged down in technical mumbo-jumbo, but it usually avoids those pitfalls. It covers a mix of issues not discussed elsewhere. We hear a little about lighting and other photographic issues, sound effects and dialogue recording, computer and other visual material, the score, editorial decisions, and a few additional subjects. Lots of great anecdotes and notes from the set appear. Some of the funniest comments pop up here, as the participants occasionally delight in taking potshots at the movie. We get some cracks about what a “downer” Elrond is plus some other jabs. It’s an informative and enjoyable chat. Lastly, we find a Cast commentary that provides material from actors Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Liv Tyler, Hugo Weaving, Sean Astin, John Rhys-Davies, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Christopher Lee, Bernard Hill, Miranda Otto, David Wenham, Karl Urban, John Noble, Lawrence Makoake, and Andy Serkis. (The latter appears as himself and also does some in-character work as Smeagol and Gollum.) Two pairs of hobbits clearly sat together for their pieces; we get Astin/Wood and Monaghan/Boyd. It appeared that the others were taped separately. Yet another fine track, this one covers a mix of subjects. We get insight into the characters as well as scads of anecdotes connected to the shoot. At times it degenerates into too much praise; that’s more of a problem here than on the other three tracks. However, a good deal of substance shows up and fills us in on different aspects of the production. The commentary moves briskly and remains consistently engaging. With the end of the fourth commentary, we finish with the first two DVDs, but I want to make one remark before I progress. I don’t skim through portions of DVDs when I review them, which meant I needed to sit through all 16 hours of commentaries to write this article. I can’t say I looked forward to that task, simply because it would be so incredibly time consuming. However, these tracks all seemed so good that I didn’t mind the time at all. The chats went by quickly and I enjoyed the entire process. This DVD set of King didn’t just pack in four commentaries for bragging rights. Each one seems compelling and entertaining in its own right. Clearly a lot of care and thought went into the creation of the various tracks, which helped make this package all the more useful. One cool aspect of the commentaries: on-screen text identifies each speaker every time a new one appears. This means that the King tracks lack the constant voice-overs otherwise necessary to remind us of the different participants. This makes it easier to follow the commentary and seems like a thoughtful addition, especially during the tracks with many different members. Disc One includes an Easter egg. Go to the final page of the “Select a Scene” area and highlight the final chapter. Click down from there and you’ll see a ring. Hit “enter” and you’ll get an eight-minute, 58-second clip in which Dominic Monaghan plays a prank on Elijah Wood. It’s moderately amusing. Another egg pops up on DVD Two. Follow the same technique used on DVD One and you’ll see an MTV Movie Awards skit that involves Peter Jackson with Vince Vaughn and Ben Stiller. It runs five minutes, 45 seconds, and is entertaining, even though it owes a lot to The Player. Continue to Discs 3 & 4 Viewer Film Ratings: 4.4949 Stars|| Number of Votes: 99|

'I'll have what Reese is having' I’ve been avoiding the whole gift bag phenomenon this year, but it hasn’t been avoiding me. I got my fill of the subject last year, starting with watching a procession of celebrities hit the gift houses at that celebration of uncommercial cinema, the Sundance Film Festival. (As DJ Qualls of "Hustle & Flow" told me while loading up on swag at the Levi’s Ranch: "I've been doing nothing but this for three days. Seriously, it's sad. I'm a big ol' whore.") Then came the can-you-top-this gift bags at the Grammys and the Oscars, with the Oscar gifters winning last year’s battle by offering a supposed $75,000 worth of goodies to presenters and performers. The song remains the same this year, with a bounty of gifting opportunities for stars at this weekend’s Independent Spirit Awards, Oscars and various parties and swag suites. Now I’m being bombarded with publicists wanting me to write about their clients’ products being included in official or unofficial Oscar gift bags. And when I went to Moonstruck Chocolate Cafe on Michigan Avenue this morning to get a mocha ("The best in Chicago!" - Mark Caro, Pop Machine), flyers were on the counter announcing, "Moonstruck Chocolate Co. has been selected again to be included in the celebrity presenters and performers gift basket at the 78th Annual Academy Awards." Here’s a question: Do you care that Chicago products made it into these gift bags? The folks behind Effen Vodka (which will be in an unofficial gift bag) and the pricey-experience-selling Signaturedays.com think you do - hence persistent story pitches from both. Here’s another, more essential question: Does the fact that a product shows up in a celebrity gift bag make you desire it? That’s the theory here, of course. Stars stay at the hotels, wear the jewelry, drink the drinks and use the gadgets, and you think: Hey, I’ll have what Reese Witherspoon is having. Really, the stars don’t even have to use any of this stuff. These companies think it’s worth giving away thousands of dollars of merchandise just to say: You can own the same stuff that was given to Reese Witherspoon. Frankly, the logic always was lost on me: Gosh, you can spend lots of money on items that rich celebrities get for free! Lucky you! No wonder DJ Qualls thought to get it while the getting was good.

Agra jeweller shot at Prominent Agra jeweller Anand Agarwal was shot at and critically wounded by unidentified assailants on a motorcycle, prompting jewellers across the city to strike work on Monday, police said. Agarwal, president of the Sarafa Committee, the jewellers’ association, was attacked late Sunday near Anjna Cinema on MG Road. He was on his scooter, driving home to his Awagarh Colony house from his shop in Chaubeyji ka Phatak, the main centre of jewellers and bullion traders in the city, when the bullets were fired. Passers-by informed the police, and he was rushed first to a nearby nursing home and later to Medanta Hospital in Gurgaon where he is battling for life. Hari Parbat police said witnesses had informed them that three person on a black Pulsar mobike had fired at least two shots. As news spread, a large number of jewellers and trade associations’ office bearers reached the nursing home, shouting slogans against the police. “Agra businessmen are no longer safe. Even on the busy M G Road, people are shot,” said an angry trader. Agra has witnessed a large number of crimes in the recent past.

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson Fans of WW2 docus are always on the lookout for something new, and Koch Vision's The Royal Air Force At War: The Unseen Films 1940-1944 delivers exactly what they want to see. This collection of 24 training and public information short subjects was filmed during the war. They are all uncut just as the R.A.F. squadrons and local cinema audiences saw them. In other words, hint, hint, if you have a member of the family building an airplane model in the next room, your gift possibilities just went up by a notch. If you know someone who cares about this kind of film, you'll know what I'm talking about -- they aren't interested in the same 30 shots of the London Blitz, where the camera trucks into the glass doors of a shop to see the blaze within. The Unseen Filmscontains out-of-the-ordinary footage of every imaginable British airplane in action. In the training films we see even more of these aircraft. I now know where to access the first aid kit in a Spitfire, and three ways to get into a sealed cockpit without hurting an unconscious pilot! The films range from training tools showing turret gunners what to do, to pieces cautioning lazy pilots not to make bonehead mistakes, to civilian-friendly films to offer practical advice when stricken aircraft come tumbling out of the skies. The movies are very British in tone, with a highly developed sense of common cause. Although the narrations stress the concept of teamwork and equality, a definite class-consciousness is present. One film spends twenty minutes hammering home the proper way to salute superior officers. It's all so ritualized, you'd think that's what airmen do all day. Some of the films appear to have been produced to address specific problems or concerns. Many of the actors are authentic R.A.F. personnel but most of the "acting" is better than one sees in U.S. Signal Corps films. Few if any credits are included but it is likely that pro directors and artists from England's already-celebrated docu tradition worked on some of the pictures. Action is of course staged but personnel, uniforms, haircuts and the details of rooms evoke the era with an authenticity not found in fiction films. Here's a breakdown of the contents: Disc One: 1940 Bits of Our Aircraft Are Missing This half-hour drama intended for the general public tries to be a rounded entertainment. It has music, nightclub scenes and an entire secondary plotline about the romances of R.A.F. pilots. But the message is that civilians need to stop hunting souvenirs from downed aircraft. A special investigator must track a flawed elevator hinge back to some school kids, to find out what's killing good pilots. The movie makes its point -- the little brats cough up a hardware store of stolen "bits", while the handsome pilot marries knowing he'll be paralyzed for life. Discipline and Morale This training movie seems rather desperate. The way it keeps drilling the need for teamwork, cooperation, adherence to rules and following orders, you'd think that airfields were staffed with lazy layabouts and malingerers! Or perhaps it was shown to green recruits, country yokels who just have no idea of what military discipline is all about. Enemy Interrogation of Prisoners A fascinating POW story. It's a teaching tool explaining why fliers must tell the enemy nothing should they be shot down. German intelligence interrogators -- looking and speaking like Englishmen and wearing really unconvincing German uniforms -- easily trick enlisted dopes and "sophisticated" officers alike into volunteering everything they want to know. No waterboarding is necessary. Some of it is very funny now, for all the right reasons. Gun Turret Drill (Fraser-Nash) The Boulton Paul Turret Watch these two epics and you'll be ready for a career as a ball turret gunner. Every detail of loading ammo and prepping the two kinds of turrets is covered. I have to say that just seeing the gunners cram themselves into what amounts to a small goldfish bowl gives me claustrophobic shivers. The likelihood of getting out of one of those things in an emergency feels very remote. That fact must have been a strong motivator to shoot the **** out of any plane that came anywhere near! Local Boy Makes Good Crude animation with a sharp message, this was probably received with laughs and applause at the "aerodromes". A bomber pilot ignores instruments telling him to properly sequence fresh oxygen bottles to his crew's high-altitude masks, and everybody passes out! The little Oxy meter rebels, rips itself free of the instrument panel and fixes the damn problem on its own! Mission accomplished -- local boy makes good! Disc Two: 1941-1942 The First Thing A primer about how to salute, when to salute, who to salute to, how to salute sideways, saluting while walking -- every place but in the toilet. Exasperating but also fascinating. The "good saluters" have a snappy form that would bring tears of joy to the eyes of Colonel Blimp. Re-Arming a Bomber A film for the detail aficionados. It covers the entire period from when a plane lands until it's refueled and re-armed to fly again. The number of dangerous jobs involved is staggering. The guys tending the bombs and arming their fuses must have nerves of iron. Also, the variety of weapons payloads is explained to the nth degree. I know people who dote on this sort of thing. A tribute to the R.A.F., with historical footage of their action in WW1. A recruiting piece, perhaps? The flying corps certainly looks like the service of choice for the bold and daring. A primer begging flying cadets to please, please stop wrecking aircraft through stupid mistakes. It goes at the problem from all sides, as an officer berates fools who don't look where they're taxiing or radically misjudge landings and takeoffs. With some pretty feeble (and thus hilarious) attempts at comedy relief. The officer involved is played by Ralph Michael, easily remembered as the man haunted by the mirror in the horror omnibus Dead of Night. No matter what idiotic error a cadet makes, Michael gives them the same unblinking dressing-down. Civilian pilots will love this one. Fly Away Peter An interesting film about the ferrying of replacement planes to far-off battle theaters in Africa and the Far East. Fliers collect their tropical gear in the freezing English cold, and are told to pay their commissary bill before leaving. Immunization jokes -- what more can you ask? In the Drink This short explains the contents of the small life rafts tucked into bomber planes in case they have to ditch in the English channel. The rubber raft has more gadgets and accessories than you'd think, plus rations, etc. We wonder how many of the features actually worked in real use. A framing story shows a crew ditching at sea and picked up by a destroyer. Well done. An ode to a big bomber called the Avro Lancaster, the Brit equivalent (?) of our B-17 flying fortress. The film celebrates the factories and workers who make them as well -- we see female workers assembling many of the parts. Disc Three: 1943-1944 A Fighter has Crashed Quite a movie. David Farrar of the Powell-Pressburger films Black Narcissus and The Small Back Room advises some unhappy locals in a pub. They tried to rescue a downed pilot unconscious in his plane, but succeeded only in bashing him with an ax before the plane caught fire and he burned up. Bad show, that. Farrar explains how to trigger the cockpit latches and access doors on a number of planes and suggests the best way to remove injured pilots. The film is a testament to English trust in its citizens -- American military films would never suggest that a civilian approach a plane no matter how desperate the situation. At the end Farrar says that he doesn't mind trying to give some pointers and advice -- the pilot somebody saves may be him! A cute, sinister little film narrated in rhyme. Some airmen relaxing in a pub make a date with two cute locals -- realistic young women, not picked starlets -- and then foolishly brag about "big doings" back at the aerodrome. Come Saturday night, the boys have been killed in an air raid instigated by info from their own foolish mouths. Effective propaganda, especially because the airmen -- friendly, ordinary guys with bad teeth -- are obviously the real thing. A movie about navigation, spelling out the detailed map reading, landmark spotting and course correction skills needed to keep on course during low level raids on enemy territory. The route being investigated is in England, because "the enemy wouldn't cooperate". The movie makes navigating seem both exacting and nerve wracking, and some of the low flying looks very scary. Another training film, this time for R.A.F. ground personnel and soldiers who defend the aerodromes from a German invasion, a possibility apparently not ruled out until late in the war. The training footage emphasizes the idea that these rear guard troops are vital as well. Towards the Offensive Both of these titles are morale builders stressing the message that England is no longer holding on by its nails but visiting a deserved retribution on the Germans. We see French, New Zealanders and Americans with Alabama accents joining in the round-the-clock bombing melee. Plenty of flying footage and extended aerial scenes of Berlin in flames. The returning fliers checking in with debriefers seem barely out of their 'teens. Front Line Air Force An interesting look at a North African air unit relocating to Salerno, and all the effort and planning that's involved. The point is stressed that airstrips need to be reestablished immediately so that the fighters can support the ground offensive. Interesting scenery and hardware, and good filmmaking. Another morale booster showing how the R.A.F. bombers take the night shift to keep Germany under bombardment 24-7. Clearly assembled to give the civvies something to cheer about during wartime rationing. Each disc also features a bonus newsreel showing the kind of morale messages that were being produced for the general public. The films are all in fine shape, with only a couple taken from marginal source materials. The majority of them are in great shape and several are of excellent quality. Better yet, the soundtracks are all quite clear. As none of the actors are mumblers I had no trouble understanding all dialogue. Menus are easy to read and follow and the inner disc holder has a contents index to help keep things straight. The Royal Air Force At War: The Unseen Films 1940-1944 is fascinating history and interesting non-fiction moviemaking. It's fun figuring out what problem each film is addressing, and evaluating whether or not it does its job. On a scale of Excellent, Good, Fair, and Poor, The Royal Air Force At War: The Unseen Films 1940-1944 rates: Movie: Very Good Supplements: 3 news reels. Packaging: 3 discs in card and plastic folder in card sleeve Reviewed: December 9, 2008 DVD Savant Text © Copyright 2008 Glenn Erickson See more exclusive reviews on the Savant Main Page. Reviews on the Savant main site have additional credits information and are often updated and annotated with reader input and graphics. Also, don't forget the 2008 Savant Wish List. T'was Ever Thus.

I appreciate the challenges offered to pacifism in my post from last week. Larry, in particular, offers some good food for thought. I would think that most all Christians approach difficult interactions with others from the stance of peace. Or at least not beating the living tar out of them–physically or argumentatively. That said, there are dangers, and everyone would be wise to prepare for encounters that potentially seduce one away from one’s values, comfort zones, or core philosophy of life. I think pacifism is more than an ideal. And I think there is often more than one way out when a person is backed into a corner. Larry offers a thought experiment: In this example, a martially trained man and his young daughter are walking down the street at night. He has no cell phone, the shops are all closed, and there is no traffic on the street. Suddenly, the little girl is grabbed from the shadows – a disheveled man has grabbed her and runs with her down an alley. The man gives chase and catches the offender. Violence ensues and the disheveled man pulls out a knife. The martially trained man is cut but disarms the attacker, disabling him by breaking bones and joints, as he has been trained to do. The man retrieves his daughter while the offender makes a swift getaway by jumping into a nearby van driven by an accomplice. If you would, please describe briefly what the pacifist does in this situation, and why you believe that it is the morally correct thing to do. In this example, which is not at all far-fetched, it seems that the logical outcome is that the pacifist goes home without his daughter, perhaps in a body bag, while the pacifist’s little girl never comes home. If you would, please explain to me in logical terms why that is the preferred outcome. Just because a person is a pacifist doesn’t mean he or she would passively accept a kidnapping as an experience of fate. As a pacifist, I have no compulsion about pursuing a kidnapper. I commit no violence by giving chase. Those who argue a pacifist might not give chase are not fully informed about what pacifism is and is not. Indeed, since I have no training in the martial arts and self-defense, my action of giving chase might be more brave than the person Larry describes. A victim occasionally has ability or knowledge that would render equal or greater harm to an assailant. That can present a moral problem. This contrived thought experiment is easier for me because I have no ability for or knowledge of breaking bones or physically disabling the attacker. Like most any parent, I would lay down my life if I could arrange to get my daughter to safety. So if I could catch the assailant, remove my daughter from his grasp, and delay his pursuit of her, then the mission would be accomplished. Few enough crime victims are experts in the martial arts, so I’d think the likely result from this scenario isn’t much different for a pacifist from those who would be inclined (but unable) to punish the aggressor. The situation is more difficult if a pacifist has physical training and is able to disarm and disable the attacker. A pacifist understands that acts of violence, even justified, exact a price upon a person. One excellent illustration from the world of cinema is this bully getting his comeuppance. The anger in the face of injustice is righteous, certainly. Ralphie, in pummeling his opponent, illustrates the danger inherent in indulging violence: a loss of control. My own childhood experience of getting in a fight with a bully is nearly exact in congruence to this film clip. In fiction, we can root for the underdog, the oppressed. Larry continues: Please understand that my intent is not to insult your intelligence or your passion, but only to illustrate why it is my belief that strict pacifism is a well-intentioned but ultimately flawed, dangerous endeavor. Larry is wrong about pacifism. There is far more danger in being seduced and drawn into violence. Troops for hire (aka Blackwater) have brought shame on themselves and the US by enacting vengeance in Iraq. FDR and Churchill also for agreeing to indiscriminate bombing of civilians in WWII. In all of those cases, leaders in the West were confronted with what they thought was a just cause against an aggressive enemy. But in too many cases, American presidents have been responsible for the same grave immorality they sought to subdue: Roosevelt, Truman, Johnson, and both Bushes. Once the spirit of violence is let out of the bottle, it would seem that leaders are singularly incapable of restraint. I’ve mentioned before that many of my relatives have served in the military. My father and his two brothers served in WWII, one overseas and two stateside. A boyhood next-door neighbor served in Korea. A strange thing about asking these men about what they did during the war: none of them had stories from the front. None of them. My father once grunted something about “war is hell” and the subject was changed. Our neighbor once showed me his medals from his time in the service, but he couldn’t stop crying when I asked him what they were for. I never got an answer. I knew a Vietnam vet, a boyfriend of a woman who was in my prayer group. He went to see one of the Vietnam movies that came out in the 80′s. It was a disturbing experience for him. His assessment of the portrayal: “It was that bad and worse.” Christians who were engaged in war in patristic times returned home to do penance. Some Catholic sensibilities are shocked by this, but mine isn’t. The early Christians recognized the moral harm done to those exposed to violence and forced to engage in it. And even today, we have an armed police force and a military that has higher rates of divorce and physical abuse than the civilian population. I’m not satisfied that those who serve to protect me and other citizens are asked or expected to sacrifice in this way. And don’t even get me started on the medical and psychological mistreatment of soldiers in our society. In this regard, the stain on American leaders is dark and deep. And that avoidance in caring for the needs of those who serve and sacrifice is moral evidence, in my view, of the moral avoidance that takes place not only in this country, but in others. I can open up the hood of the family car, and beyond checking the oil or changing the washer fliud, I’m ignorant of the workings of the vehicle. I’m also ignorant of engineering, bookkeeping and accounting methods, quantum mechanics, ballroom dancing, and any number of other subjects. It is not my intention to insult anyone when I state from what I read in a person’s writings that they appear ignorant of authentic pacifism. Pacifism is not part of the usual education of children or adults. Pacifism is deeply misunderstood. And certain military and corporate interests see pacifism as a threat to the status quo. So many people are kept misinformed. I would caution my readers not to accept my blog posts as a manual for pacifism. But I know enough to suggest that if you’re looking for authentic information on the subject–go to a pacifist. Asking a person opposed to pacifism for information would be like asking a Yankee fan to school you on the Red Sox, or the SSPX to instruct you on Vatican II. Sure, you’re going get a very opinionated and passionate lecture. But ask yourself: will it help you? The what-ifs of contrived fiction are of less interest to me than living pacifism in a flawed world as a flawed human being. It’s enough for me to be at peace in day-to-day life, much less in a crisis event. But if I were called upon to live my Christian faith in a crisis, I would have no less an expectation of behaving like a saint, a martyr if necessary. I wouldn’t be looking for a loophole.

If you’re looking for a different angle on Black History, speak to NJIT Assistant Professor Allison Perlman. Perlman, a young professor in the NJIT Federated History Department, has much to say about the complicated relationship between media and the civil rights movement. Her forthcoming book, which explores a history of media activism in the U.S., includes chapters on the complex relationship between media policy and struggles for racial equality. The book examines these issues during the height of the Civil Rights Movement and during the culture wars of the 1980s and 1990s. Perlman is the first Fellow through this academic year of the inaugural Verklin Program in Media Ethics and Policy at the University of Virginia. Next month, she’ll expand on her current research in two talks. Catch her at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies Conference (March 10-13, 2011) in New Orleans or at the first Media and Civil Rights History Symposium March 18-19, 2011 at the University of South Carolina. (ATTENTION EDITORS: Perlman is available for telephone interviews. Call Sheryl Weinstein, 973-596-3436, for more information.) You can also learn more about Perlman’s theories on a video produced by NJIT which is now available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4B4D8wH1ZY. The Verklin Program supports academic research on the ethics of media policy, the reciprocal relationship between the media and the law and the political and social impact of media regulation. The Fellowship also supports the completion of Perlman’s manuscript: Reforming Television: Media Activism, Media Policy, Media History. “Very few people are aware that media regulation continues to be a critical battleground in the struggle for racial equality in this country,” said Perlman. “We often tend to understand the relationship between media and civil rights through the lens of representation, how newscasts reported on civil rights or how entertainment programs depict people of color.” In the 1960s and 1970s, policy-makers and activists increasingly recognized how media policy had operated to exclude African American perspectives from the public sphere, said Perlman. At the prompting of federal courts, the FCC enacted policies to expand the participation of people of color in broadcasting. These policies landed in the crosshairs of a number of concurrent trends in the 1980s and 1990s, including a paradigm shift in broadcast policy that embraced a marketplace approach to regulation. The repeal of these policies also resulted from the ascent of a color-blind discourse that equated all forms of race consciousness with racial discrimination. As the FCC and the federal courts stripped away such policies, their justifications frequently hinged on a reconstruction of U.S. civil rights history. “The new interpretation restricted the ambitions and scope of the movement,” said Perlman. “The dismantling of minority media rights policies during the 1980s and 1990s should be understood both as an affront to the speech rights of people of color and as a site where the whitewashing of civil rights history was codified into policy and practice.” Perlman received her doctorate in American Studies from the University of Texas in 2007.

Spanish cinema on ambassadorial mission The Spanish film producers body FAPAE wants to open special film officesin Spain's embassies and consulates around the world, starting next year, aspart of new proposed measures to promote their industry. Continue reading – simply subscribe below It takes just two minutes and you’ll immediately gain full access to ScreenDaily.com, PLUS Screen International monthly magazine delivered to your door. Screen International Subscribers: If you are a Screen International subscriber please sign in with your email address and click submit: Not a Screen International subscriber? Sign up today for immediate and complete access to screendaily.com and the monthly Screen International magazine for as little as £19 a month! Find out more about all the benefits of a subscription to Screen International.

showcase los angeles issue 358 Jul 2012Featuring creative talent and services from the most exciting production locations Welcome to the latest issue of Showcase Los Angeles, brought to you by Production Paradise. We present the very best of the LA visual media industry, with more information available in our dedicated Photo and Film directories. Be sure to check out these events coming up in the following months: - Emmy Awards, 23rd September at Nokia Theatre. - Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles, 8th to 12th September, showcase of the best in independent cinema. - Who Shot Rock and Roll, 23rd June to 27th October at Annenberg Space for Photography. - commercial production PRETTYBIRD Los Angeles commercials production PRETTYBIRD is a creative think tank that provides clients with distinct and visionary work across the ever-evolving entertainment and branding landscapes. In addition to award winning commercial and music videos for some of the biggest brands and stars, PRETTYBIRD has co-produced both documentary and feature films that have gone onto playing some of the world's biggest film festivals. - photo production Sheriff Production Los Angeles photo production Specialising in high-end fashion stills and motion shoots, and driven by its passion for beautiful images and films, Sheriff collaborates with clients to deliver an array of production solutions ranging from pre-visioning through full production to branding direction. Always emphasising quality and innovation, the company's expertise includes celebrity presence and cinematic media. Clients include Margaret Howell, Sony Music, Atlantic Records, Clarins Int., Yoox.com, Velvet, Robert Rodriguez, Danza, Marlboro Classics, Nike, Y3, Swatch, Esquire, Elle International, French Elle, Italian Elle, Harper's Bazaar and i-D. 3Star Productions Inc. Los Angeles photo production 3Star Productions is a worldwide full-service production company based in Los Angeles and New York City. The company provides a premier service for all aspects of still photography and moving pictures production. From budgets, casting, location scouting and permitting, to catering, travel arrangements and all other production needs, 3Star guarantees every detail is cared for. It is the team's goal to exceed clients' expectations and ensure that each project is executed with efficiency and care. With over 30 years of combined experience, 3Star is an industry leader. Deeply committed to the environment, the company is constantly looking at ways to lower the impact of each and every production while maintaining the highest quality service. Recent clients include UGGS, Numero Vogue, Harper's Bazaar UK, True Religion, MasterCard, KSwiss, Wrangler, Swarovski, Fox 20th Century, Subaru and photographers Mario Sorrenti, Camilla Akrans, Warwick Saint, Norman Jean Roy, Paola Kudacki, Nino Munoz, Steven Lippman, Sarah Silver, and Marc Baptiste, to name just a few. - post production Gloss Postproduction Los Angeles creative post production Gloss Postproduction NYC is currently undergoing minor construction and remodeling - feel free to drop by and check out the new look. Gloss Postproduction LA will have two full time retouchers from August 2012 on and will offer full CGI service from October 2012. Stay tuned for more updates and enjoy their latest work. “Thank you everyone helping us create such great work!” - styling, hair, makeup Jed Root LA Inc. Los Angeles styling, hair, makeup agents Jed Root, Inc. is the premier agency for leading fashion photographers, illustrators, stylists, hair and make-up artists, prop stylists and set designers within the fashion industry. The artists represented by Jed Root, Inc. contribute to projects including advertising campaigns, editorial photo shoots and fashion shows. Founded in 1989 in New York, the agency offers true global representation to its artists with offices in New York, Paris, London, Los Angeles and Tokyo. Today, Jed Root, Inc. sustains its commitment to supplying top talent and continues to set precedents within the constantly evolving fashion industry. - photo agents 46 Pictures Los Angeles photo agents 46 Pictures represents photographers who direct TV commercials and music videos including Chris Stanford, John Huba, Michael Miller, Mike McGill, Jen Rosenstein and Charles Imstepf as well as new addition Mischievous Studios, a viral video agency. 46 Pictures offers high caliber video media creators for any advertising project and to suit client's needs. 46 Pictures is headed by Jay Foster who brings more than 20 years' print production experience to the table. Jay has produced hundreds of projects for ad agencies, clients and magazines worldwide. Some Clients include Apple, AT&T, Atlantic Records, BMW, Callaway, Canon, Chevrolet, Deutsch, ESPN The Mag, Interview, Island Def Jam, J. Crew, Levis, Mattel, McCann Erickson, Mountain Dew, Neiman Marcus, Nike, Nissan, Outside, Pepsi, Quicksilver, Ralph Lauren, Rolling Stone, Sony, Stussy, Target, TBWA Chiat Day, Vanity Fair, Warner Bros. Records and Weight Watchers. Josue Pena Los Angeles fashion photographers “All our knowledge has its origins in our perceptions.” - Leonardo da Vinci. Josue Pena is an international photographer who creates characteristic images by combining clear aesthetics with a genuine commercial sense and the minutest attention to detail. His work has been published in numerous magazines including Harper's Bazaar Latin America, Cosmopolitan, OK Magazine, 944, CinePremier, Vice, InStyle and InFashion. Some of his most recent clients include Ximena Valero, Eva Franco, Just Aurelio and Requisite, among many others. Richard Thompson III Los Angeles car & transportation photographers Richard is a Los Angeles-based automotive photographer. His high energy, atmospheric photography makes use of vibrant colour and draws on experience in the racing world to shape dynamic images bearing the essence and character of each car. Work in automotive photography has taken him across North America and Europe creating images for auto industry companies, advertising agencies, and car organisations. James and James Productions Los Angeles food & drink photographers James and James Productions is a full service still and motion photography studio located in Los Angeles, California. Bruce James and Jennifer James, a husband and wife team, are both photographers specialising in shooting imagery for high-end food and beverage clientele. With Bruce's exclusive training in New York and San Francisco where he worked beside many well-known photographers, combined with Jennifer's in-depth training at Brooks Institute of Photography where she received a BA in Advertising/Illustration Photography, the couple has worked in the photographic industry for over 25 years. Backed by an amazing crew of talented individuals, James and James Productions welcomes client collaboration from pre- to post production. Shooting for many leaders in the food and beverage industry, Bruce and Jennifer continue to provide their clients with cutting-edge visuals for food packaging, promotion and advertising. David Hanover Photography Los Angeles people & lifestyle photographers Upon completing his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at Art Center College of Design, David Hanover relocated to New York City to continue with his apprenticeship. After weighing a number of associate offers, he returned home to Los Angeles to build the foundation of his career in photography. Once he was recruited by Tony Stone and helped build his stock agency to become the number one stock agency in the world, David's success as a photographer exceeded even his own expectations. David shot his way around the world for Stone, Getty and several fortune 500 companies in the advertising, fashion, and corporate arenas. Jason Kenworthy Photography Los Angeles people & lifestyle photographers While Jason Kenworthy may have made a name for himself shooting surf action, like any good photographer he always has an open eye and a camera at hand. His long career chasing surfers around the globe has led him to some amazing and eye opening places: places where the surfing often takes a back seat to what is going on around him. As Jason and his career have evolved he has begun to dedicate more and more time to capturing the world around him along his travels. Surfing may always be the driving factor, however it is the journey that often takes centre stage. Scott Witter Los Angeles portrait photographers Los Angeles portrait photographer Scott Witter specialises in celebrity, fashion, and music photography for editorial and advertising clients. His unique style has been labelled artistic and emotional with a concentration in dramatic lighting and cinematic scenarios. Whether on location or in the studio, fusing storytelling and off-the-cuff moments is what brands each one of Scott’s distinguishable images. Recent notable clients include DDB, Forbes, Condé Nast, Arena Swimwear, Pentax and St. Martin’s Press. Scott has also been busy with personal projects such as 'Dog People' and 'Cure People', which have gained him some well-deserved attention. Visit his website for more information. Allen Birnbach Photography Los Angeles people & lifestyle photographers Allen Birnbach’s career has spanned the worlds of advertising and fine art photography for over 30 years. Assignments for Fortune 500 companies have taken him to over 20 countries, driven by his enthusiasm for solving complex production and lighting scenarios and collaborating with unique individuals at every station of life. His work has been celebrated by Communication Arts, Photo District News, The International Color Awards, Photo Design, DoubleTake, and the Black and White Spider Awards. Clients include American Airlines, AT&T, Boeing, Bristol-Meyer Squibb, Charles Schwab & Co., Colorado Tourism, IBM, Standard and Poors, U.S. Postal Service and Vasque Outdoor Footwear. Debra Sugerman Los Angeles Portrait & Animal Photographers Debra Sugerman began taking photographs at age 12. Like most artists, she tested many disciplines before returning to her first love, realising her potential and establishing a career as a non-commercial fine art image-maker. Her work has found its way to small commercial niches as well as gallery exhibits and private collections. Honing her skills specifically in image-making, Debra's film-making has risen in a parallel effort. After a number of years working behind the scenes on large and small budget feature films, she found it a natural process to move into directing and creative producing. Debra currently has two documentary productions to her name. Flowing easily between jobs and unafraid of a challenge, she is capable of handling large or micro budgets. As a visual artist her singular vision translates well from concept to end result. Her early training as location manager taught her a lot about producing; coupled with her unique physical vision, this makes Debra an exceptional filmmaker. Location America Los Angeles Location Scouts Geoff Juckes is the founder of LocationAmerica, a company providing location scouting, consulting and aerial photography for feature films, commercial advertising and fashion. Geoff has extensive knowledge and location files covering the entire Western United States, particularly focusing on roads and remote areas. He has scouted locations in the USA, Brazil, the British Virgin Islands, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, the French Polynesian Islands, Jamaica and Mexico. Geoff brings a triad of disciplines to his work as a location scout, possessing a naturalist’s respect for remote, pure landscapes, an artist’s eye in collapsing the world into an illuminating visual frame, and a scientist’s intuitive skill in knowing the exact time to shoot for surface, mass, silhouette or meandering line. His clients include major production companies and advertising agencies in the United States and Europe as well as brands such as Citroën, Chevrolet, Mercedes, Independent Media. BMW, Buick, Nike, Nikon, Hertz, Honda, Gucci, Cavalli, Elle, Saab, 7Jeans and Loewe. - rental studios film Avenue Six Studios Los Angeles rental studios film Based in Van Nuys, California, Avenue Six Studios has emerged as a premier production facility in Los Angeles. Whether the project is a feature film, scripted television series, commercial, reality series, web series or infomercial, Avenue Six Studios is prepared to ensure every shoot runs like clockwork. With almost 20,000 square feet of shooting space, the diverse array of stages at Avenue Six Studios includes our New York City inspired backlot, East Stage featuring 6,000 sqft of light-laminate flooring and a fully functioning kitchen, North Sound Stage with green screen cyclorama, and South Stage with conference room and numerous ready-to-shoot office spaces and cubicles. Featuring well appointed green rooms, immaculate production offices with Wi-Fi, and an additional fully-functioning kitchen set with food prep area on the South Stage, Avenue Six Studios is versatile and always ready for action! - equipment rent Camera Car Systems Los Angeles camera car Filmotechnic USA Camera Car Systems offers the latest model camera cars outfitted with the academy award-winning Filmotechnic Russian Crane system and 3-Axis Stabilized Remote Heads, including its state-of-the-art Mercedes AMG ML 63, Porsche Cayenne Turbo and Ford Raptor SVT. Samy's Camera Los Angeles Equipment Rent Photo & Film Samy's Camera has been the leader in sales and rentals of high quality imaging products and the ultimate resource for the professional and amateur photographer. Samy's rents a huge assortment of equipment, from cameras and lenses to studio grip gear. Their clients include students, photographers, movie studios, and more. They offer lighting equipment, digital cameras and scanners, professional video gear, and film cameras from 35mm up to 4x5 and 8x10, plus panoramic format cameras. They are located throughout Southern California and they also ship directly to desired location.

Can you name the 100 most intriguing and iconic cinema characters? - Answers do not have to be guessed in order - This list strictly my work, but was influenced by work of critics, editors, and awards. The list was chosen not only on personal preference, but on the acting, significance, and legacy of each subjec - This quiz has not been verified by Sporcle 100 Greatest Film Characters Quiz - Created Aug 1, 2010 in Movies - Game Plays 364 Go to the Sporcle.com Mobile Site →

This month Cinema Asian America on Xfinity On Demand presents Yuriko Gamo Romer’s inspiring documentary, “Mrs. Judo: Be Strong, Be Gentle, Be Beautiful.” A profile of Keiko Fukuda, the highest ranking woman in judo history, “Mrs. Judo” chronicles the life of an individual who at age 98 was awarded the 10th degree black belt – judo’s highest honor, and a position held currently by three people and never before by a woman. Romer’s documentary, which has already screened-world wide to acclaim, follows Fukuda, from her early years in Japan, where she gave up a traditional life of marriage and family to pursue her passion of judo, to her life in the US, where she lived from 1966 until her death in 2013 and broke barriers for women in professional sports. Romer elaborated on her interest in documenting Fukuda, and the inspiration that she created through her life and commitment to both judo, and gender equality. Fukuda passed away earlier this year at the age of 99, a little over a year after you completed this film on her life. When did you first meet her and what drew you to her as a subject? YR: In 2006 I read an article in Oprah‘s “O” magazine about Fukuda Sensei. I realized that her dojo (studio) was in my neighborhood in San Francisco. So I walked the two blocks and went to introduce myself to her. From the moment I saw her I could sense a presence, one that commanded attention. After her class I introduced myself, she was very happy to chat with me in Japanese and invited me up to her house for tea. I live in between her dojo and her home. I think it was my destiny to make this film, especially when I recognized so much “destiny” in Fukuda’s life. Some of the most poignant moments of “Mrs. Judo”, are those when Fukuda allows herself to reflect on her life, and her commitment to judo, which came before everything else. We have the sense of a woman who has achieved all that she dreamed of, but also harbored some regrets about the path she took and those things which she didn’t experience. What effect do you think your filmmaking had on her own self reflection, as she faced the twilight of her life? YR: I know she had no regrets. I think as humans we all feel loneliness, and she was not exempt from this. I also think at the time she made “the choice” it was not a conscious decision to live a solo life, and in retrospect she saw how big that decision had been. She was a very emotional being, I appreciated that. It was very real and very human. She had no husband or children but she cherished her loyal students and her dear friend Shelley, who cared for her especially in the final years of her life. We all know people who have children and die alone. Fukuda was fortunate, she had so much love from all over the world. I had Fukuda Sensei’s support in making the film, from the very beginning. As the years progressed I became more a part of her life and I think I made her recall her past. I was always pulling out old photos and asking her about her life. I think she was especially nostalgic of her “best friend” the woman from Hawaii. I know that some of the archival footage in the film, she saw for the first time when it screened at the premiere. Soon after the film was released, I went to her summer judo camp and watched it with her and her students, many of whom were in the film. Afterward some of them started to share their stories with me, and I encouraged them to tell Fukuda Sensei directly. Soon there was not a dry eye in the house, I think everyone appreciated the opportunity to thank her and to share their stories. The filmmaker in me wishes I had those stories on tape, but I know that the moment was rare and precious. Later, Fukuda Sensei took my hands and thanked me. That was a special moment, a reward that we filmmakers cherish. I think she knew that through the film, her life mission would live on beyond her. Now I feel it is my job to introduce her inspiration and wisdom to as many people as possible. Fukuda was the highest ranking female judo practitioner in history and was promoted to the rank of 10th dan in 2011, at the age of 98. She is the only woman to have held this rank. What is her legacy to not only the sport of judo, but also to female athletes worldwide? YR: She will forever be the first. This opened many doors and there is no more glass ceiling for women in judo. Once the sky is open to the pinnacle it is open, period. 10th dan, or 10th degree black belt, is a rare honor. There are under twenty people to ever have been given this honor in the 131 year history and existence of judo. As far as I know, there are only three living 10th dan today. These are the three men mentioned in my film, as having been given the 10th dan just before Fukuda Sensei was given the 9th dan. These men are all at least 10 years her junior. The 10th dan was given to her by USA JUDO and the United States Judo Federation. But technically the Kodokan, Japan’s founding judo organization, has not given her the 10th dan. I think it might be because there was no 11th dan that they could give the three men. But this is not relevant because she has earned this honor by internationally recognized judo organizations, and there is no one in the world that will not recognize her rank. I believe Fukuda’s legacy to female athletes around the world, is that women are never second to men. And that you can achieve anything you truly commit to accomplishing. Granted the solo, singular life mission is not for all, but I think the road has gotten wider for women. Several of the other judo women I interviewed have been able to succeed in judo without personal life limitations. Many of them are happily married, with children. Of course we all know that with any choice there come consequences, but I think having that choice available today for women is huge. I hope that all female athletes, young and old get to know who she is, and what she has accomplished. I’m amazed at how few people outside of the judo world know about her. I hope to reach out to the women’s sports world in my next phase of community engagement. You have worked on many documentaries, as director, editor and producer and a through line is that many are biographical profiles of individuals, including the pianist Olga Samaroff Stokowski, and the civil rights leader Howard Thurman. What draws you to this way of investigating history and larger themes of gender, race and aspiration through the stories of individuals? YR: I’m drawn to stories about inspiring people, and I love seeing how our world grows through these pioneers. In 2010, I made a short film about Manjiro and Captain Whitfield. These two met in 1841, on a deserted island off the coast of Japan. Whitfield’s whaling ship rescued shipwrecked Manjiro, but could not return him to Japan because it was during the Shogun’s closed era of Japan. Instead young Manjiro went to Massachusetts and was educated there, later to return to Japan as a cross-cultural hero and interpreter for the Japanese government. He was an inadvertent ambassador, one of the first from Japan to the US. And, for 20+ years the descendants of Manjiro and Whitfield have been running a grass-roots, home-stay exchange between Japan and the US. Technically I am an immigrant, I was born in Japan (although I didn’t live there very long). My father came to the US to do research for IBM at a time when Japan was still poor and didn’t have much money for scientific research. I feel it was my destiny to share some of the stories that make our country great. I believe that we are a nation of immigrants and that bringing together many cultures is a gift. I love finding the people and the stories that opened roads for us of this generation. It’s very easy to complain about today’s conditions, but I think it’s important to reflect on where we came from, and see the inroads that were built for us. I am currently researching a film about the shared love of baseball between Japan and the US. This history goes back 130+ years, and has weathered some tough and ugly times. But most will agree that today baseball is a common thread and has been a positive vehicle for cross-cultural relations.

Wendy Dreaney's Profile |Display Name:||Wendy Dreaney| A great film for uber 30's style that would now be called "Hollywood Regency" is the 1938 film "The Mad Miss Manton" starring Barbra Stanwyck as a glamorous mystery solving heiress in an equally glamorous New York high rise apartment. The screwball comedy is charming on its own, but is made even better by the interiors. Cinema Style: 20 Unforgettable American Movie Interiors |8/5/11 02:41 PM| These apartments all have one thing in common, great style! Small Cool Hall of Fame: All the Winners… So Far |3/29/11 01:01 PM| I love the BHV, and go there every time I am in Paris. I love to go to the paint department and buy the small sized cans of paint in the wonderful colors you can only find there. I use the paint to customize vintage furniture finds that are even more special with their unique French tone. The Best Home Project Store in the World? BHV! |1/27/11 04:19 PM|

Posted on Friday, December 14th, 2012 by Germain Lussier When Ghostbusters was released, Jason Reitman was seven years old. Every kid in the neighborhood wanted to be a Ghostbuster for Halloween, but he was the only one with a real Proton Pack. This, of course, is because his father, Ivan Reitman, directed the legendary 1984 film. That kinship made Thursday’s Live Read, presented by Film Independent at LACMA, that much more special. Both Reitmans were in attendance as a cast including Seth Rogen, Jack Black and Rainn Wilson read through Harold Ramis and Dan Aykroyd’s shooting draft, dated October 7, 1983. The script is the movie we all know and love…with some pretty interesting changes. Unfortunately, Reitman and Film Independent don’t allow photos or recording inside these live events so we can’t present you with the entire thing. What we can present you with are five things we learned about the original script from Ghostbusters. Check them out below. Here are five things we learned about Ghostbusters. 1. Bill Murray improvised everything. This was a discovery Jason Reitman made when his father let him see the shooting draft. Almost all of the classic Venkman lines you know and love from the movie aren’t in the final script. “While almost all of the dialogue in original screenplay is echoed on screen, the Venkman character is completely improvised. It’s as if Bill Murray was given a mumblecore-style essay about each scene and then permitted to say whatever he wanted as long as he got the point across,” Reitman told Entertainment Weekly. For example “I feel so funky” after being slimed is his and “The flowers are still standing” scene was off the cuff. The live read inserted the classic improved lines along with the script. 2. Ecto-1 was originally written as a cheap gold ambulance painted black. Who can forget Ray coming back to headquarters with what would eventually become the Ecto-1? That white ambulance has since become a piece of cinema iconography. However, in the script, it wasn’t white, but a gold ambulance later painted flat black, the latter color revealed when they arrive at the hotel for their first bust. It was also cheaper. $1,400 in the script as opposed to $4,800. But don’t worry, the unforgettable ghostbuster symbol is described exactly as we know it, even on the black car as the black car. “Emblazoned on the door is the Ghostbusters’ new logo. It’s the international symbol of prohibition, a red circle with a diagonal red stroke across a ghost.” 3. Their outfits were blue with visors. The familiar Ghostbuster outfit, tan overalls with boots and knee pads, is radically different from what Aykroyd and Reitman first envisioned. In the script they’re described as wearing “matching blue futuristic jumpsuits” along with “brushed-metal, flip-down ecto-visors worn on the head like a welder’s mask.” You can imagine the change was made because they wanted to blend in more. Blue does not blend. And visors would obscure the actors’ faces. 4. Slimer was yellow. The most recognizable Ghostbuster ghost is, of course, Slimer. Green, gross and always hungry. In the original script, though, he wasn’t green at all. He was yellow. Still, the original description was spot on – minus the color change – “translucent, foul, yellow…It looks like a misshapen potato with a pushed-in face and spindly arms.” 5. Roberto Clemente could have terrorized New York. Well, kind of. In the finished film, when Peter’s explaining what Gozer means by “choose,” he gives an example before Ray chooses the Stay Puft Marshmellow man. In the film, it’s J. Edgar Hoover. In the script, it’s Roberto Clemente. As in “if we think of Roberto Clemente, Roberto Clemente will appear and destroy us, okay?” And here’s a bonus for making it this far. 6. New Jersey heard Gozer When Gozer speaks to the Ghostbusters and tells them to “choose” their destructor, we know she’s loud, but we only hear what they hear. However, in the script, it was much more menacing and far reaching: “And then Gozer speaks to them in a voice that can be heard throughout Metropolitan New York and parts of New Jersey,” it said. Overall, it was a fantastic evening with a great cast. Reitman does these readings every month or so and, if you want tickets, keep an eye on the LACMA website. They’ll announce the date and ticket sale date. Members get first crack too. Thanks to Film Independent.

A hard-drinking Australian seems an unlikely figure to be one of the most important and influential cinematographers in Asian cinema, but that is exactly what Christopher Doyle is. His richly atmospheric, improvisational style has worked its way into the lexicon of both music videos and mainstream Hollywood fare. Moreover, his photo-collage artwork and his bizarre, often drunken public antics have made him a sort of cult celebrity in much of Asia. Born in 1952 in Sydney, Doyle fled the banality of the suburbs to spend much of his early life on the road. At various points in his life he was a well digger in India, a Norwegian merchant marine, a cow herder on an Israeli kibbutz, and a doctor of Chinese medicine in Thailand. In the late ‘70s, Doyle was rechristened Du Kefeng by his professor at the University of Hong Kong, and his life has not been the same since. Soon afterward, he moved to Taiwan and fell in with the Taipei art crowd, including such future members of the cultural… read more

(with Mark Amerika and Adrian Miles) Mark Amerika: Let's talk about the vog; as the vog manifesto "9. a vog is dziga vertov with a mac and a modem" Could you elaborate? Adrian Miles: "I the machine show you the world as only I can see it." Of all the Russian montage directors Vertov is in many ways the most fascinating. This is partly because of his interest in documentary and reportage, though it's mainly because his work is oddly prescient. For instance in 1923 he wrote: "With the speed of international communications and the lightning dispatch of filmed material the *Cine-Gazette* ought to be a 'survey of the world every few hours.' It is not. We must face up to this. The *Cine-Pravda* is a car on a leash, an aeroplane beneath a ceiling: it cannot be a *Cine-Gazette*." This is a description, first of all, of CNN, and then it is a description of Internet based *production* and distribution--in 1923! As he says, the current system is a car on a leash, an aeroplane beneath a ceiling. This is how I see streaming media on the web right now, restrained by wanting to be just like TV. MA: Yes, the web suffers from TV envy, but then again, it's pre-TV. It's almost as though it were in its imaginary stage of telecommunicational development. Vertov saw that. The Kino-Eye as Writing Machine. The Dream of Mosaic [GUI-stickiness]. Interfacing with the Processual Mind as it "captures" screenal logic. In this regard, I think we should mention Tesla as well, since he anticipated the liberatory potential of transforming the body into an apparatus of network conduction. Not to mention Vannevar Bush and his "As We May Think" essay published in the Atlantic Monthly right after dropping the bombs in WW2. And then Ted Nelson watching Douglas Engelbart fidget with a mouse and windows- based computer screen having an epiphany, like watching Man land on the moon, and thinking--hypertext. Click-click, say no more, say no more...and then, with utopian-mystical vision [Xanadu?] conceptualizing what he soon called Literary Machines. AM: The epiphany for me was when I first saw Storyspace ) in '91 or '92, those spaces and link lines made *perfect* and *transparent* sense to me. It was on a mac and I knew that quicktime would work in there. I was a junior academic in cinema studies interested in computers and how and why I would write like this was obvious. Ever since then I've been thinking and writing with links. Links are what I write with and for me they're just like film edits. Made of the same stuff. When I write I get lost in these possibilities, the futures that present themselves while writing, in writing, through writing. It is this being-like-film that is the process I explore. Any edges you write are arbitrary, contingent, sometimes accidental. The key is to locate a vision, to find a vidcriture that is this writing. The web just ups the ante for the process as model. MA: Right, I use the web to capture the work-in-process, to remix my ongoing ungoing filmtext experience... which brings us back to Vertov and streaming in real-time theory and cultural production... AM: Vertov wrote lots of things that today, when transcribed to our use of streaming media, seem to be very relevant. His criticism of cinema as stories with illustrations seems largely what most people do when they think of "video on the web." He writes slogans and manifestos that let me think of him as posthuman. He makes no distinction between camera and person, machine and individual. It's a machinic vision and the role of the film maker in Vertov's kingdom is to learn how to listen to the machine--to write (see) with and for the machine, to not subject the machine to the individual. This is my experience of writing hypertext hypertextually, and it's what I want to learn how to do with time based media. To write MA: To write *in* quicktime as a writing or literary machine using kino- eye cinescripture to essentially code into being a randomized filmtext environment that others can access by way of a P2P network that sets into motion a utopian dreamworld of international culture. But I What about your vogs? AM: All my vogs are made using pretty generic tools. A domestic quality miniDV camera, a recent firewire equipped mac, and they're trying to find a way of writing that works for most web users, most of the time, where word, sound, moving image, etc., are not discrete entities outside of each others fields. MA: Hmmm. I guess I feel like that's how I work already. True, I have to emulate the seamless shape-shifting that must take place in order to discreetly pass from one application to another, but in the end, my nerve-scales are scintillating with raw (indigestible) desire and without even thinking about it I lose myself in the process. This is what it means to be a network artist. Finding yourself by losing yourself in the white-hot chemical decomposition of self in all its coded glory. Can you relate? AM: No. Though I probably could. :-) I've never thought of it as primarily networked but about getting rid of this distinction between words and pictures. For me writing hypertextually is always a postcinematic writing and while pictures work differently to words their different networks (to steal your terminology), or the differences in their networks, are erased. But it's one thing to talk about that kind of writing and quite another thing to actually do it. The vogs are an exploration in this direction. Instead of hypertext being the medium, it's video, though I guess they are pretty much hypertexts in quicktime-- same questions, same problems. A part of the code is the network, so you're right. It is about making things that more or less work now, with no really special requirements, with a small palette of space, bandwidth, and time. It should always be about fragments, parts, remixing. Scale is now relative to connection, + + + Mark Amerika is the Director of the Alt-X Network (http://www.altx.com Later this year, he will have two major retrospectives of his work exhibited in Europe and Japan. Adrian Miles (http://bowerbird.rmit.edu.au/adrian/ ) has taught hypermedia theory and practice since 1995. His creative and critical work explores the relations of cinema to hypermedia via the philosophy of Gilles Deleuze.

Listen to a collaboration between Bill Orcutt and Loren Connors, recorded August 30, 2012 at Georgia NYC. Following the session, Keith Connolly conducted a brief interview with Orcutt and Connors. Keith Connolly A part of the premise in arranging this session was to investigate the nature of the blues as it exists in the present moment. At the risk of attempting a definition by that which it is not, I’d like to ask the both of you about some of your extra-musical pursuits: Loren, you are also a painter and have a vested interest in history, especially that of nyc. Bill, I believe you were involved in operating an art-house cinema in San Francisco, and have exhibited a strong, almost pop-art design sensibility, which belies an interest in, dare I say, fashion, or at least a kind of sarcasm about the retro-contemporary. How would you say that these pursuits inform or are interwoven into your music? Loren Connors It’s all me. One thing affects another. Everything is an aesthetic exercise or a physical exercise. It keeps me going. Bill Orcutt I agree with Loren – it’s all interconnected. Also for me, I have a ton of interests and tend to do a lot of pseudo-research before a making a record – reading and listening which generally has nothing to do with the task at hand, but usually winds up expressing itself one way or another. Right now I’m reading everything I can find on minstrelsy, a subject I know practically nothing about. I have no idea how this “research” might work its way into the thing I’m making now, but I’m sure it’ll find a way…

Director: Ken Loach "The film works all at once as a lament, a celebration and a wake-up call to modern politicians and voters." – Time Out London Focusing on the pivotal post-WWII era in British history, Ken Loach's first feature-length documentary since 1998's The Flickering Flame is a timely, unapologetically polemical call to arms for the Labour spirit that engendered an unprecedented period of progressive politics in the UK, which endured until the rise of Margaret Thatcher. Exploring the great social and political transformations of the day – from the formation of the NHS to the nationalisation of transport, energy, housing and other areas of public life – through archival footage and impassioned present-day interviews, Loach (The Angels' Share, MIFF 2012) ultimately leaves us to consider how British society has developed since Thatcher and whether today's policymakers should take another look at the socialism of yesteryear. "An eloquent cry of rage and grief at what we once had and what we've allowed to be taken away from us … Loach challenges us to resist, to fight back against the forces of private greed and indifference." – Sight & Sound D/S Ken Loach P Rebecca O'Brien, Kate Ogborn, Lisa Marie Russo Dist Rialto Distribution TD DCP/2013 Ae Fond Kiss UK/Spain/Germany/ItalyMaster of contemporary social-realism cinema Ken Loach makes a return to MIFF with the final film in his acclaimed Glasgow trilogy, which includes My Name is Joe (M… More » Dead Creatures UK,/i>Imagine what Ken Loach would do with a zombie film and you have the flesh-munching treat that is Dead Creatures. This original entry into the grand tradition of films about the w… More » FRIDAY 11 AUGUST, 9PM - SOLD OUT ... The Wind that Shakes the Barley was winner of the Palme d'Or at this year's Cannes Film Festival. Both an ardent observer of reality and a deeply committed politi… More » “A meticulous and professional re-construction of true events that is imposing and moving precisely thanks to its modesty.” - Rotterdam International Film Festival Inspired by the likes of Ken Lo… More » “[A] cracking debut feature with enough clout to kick the door in.” - The GuardianLondon to Brighton is a British gangland thriller by way of Ken Loach. It's 3.07am and two girls burst into a … More »

Alongside "Slacker," "Roger & Me," "Poison," "Sex Lies and Videotape," and "Paris Is Burning," nearly twenty years ago Whit Stillman's "Metropolitan" marked a distinctive moment in American independent filmmmaking. Yet two decades later, the film is not as widely available as other classic U.S. indies. All that changed when the film debuted last night, for free, on Hulu. Asked how he feels about having the film re-surface online, Stillman deadpanned recently via email, "Great. Not having made a film in so long, I'm keen to have the existent ones available all ways possible." Set during the end of Manhattan's iconic Upper East Side debutante world, "Metropolitan" follows outcast Ivy League student from the wrong side of the park, Tom Townsend (Edward Clements), who gets drawn into the exclusive and upper-crust preppy circle of formal winter balls. The film introduced Chris Eigeman as the outspoken and critical Nick Smith, also featuring Carolyn Farina, Dylan Hundley, Taylor Nichols, and Allison Parisi. Its witty depiction of Manhattan life would certainly seem to have influenced later New York City-based films by Noah Baumbach and Wes Anderson. It was the first film in Stillman's thematic trilogy that later included "Barcelona" (1994) and "The Last Days of Disco" (1998). After studying at Harvard and working in publishing, Stillman was in his late 30s when he made his mark on the indie scene, launching the $300,000 film at IFP's Independent Feature Film Market in 1989 and then narrowly securing a slot at the Sundance Film Festival before screening at New Directors, New Films later that Spring. He went on to earn an Oscar nomination for best screenplay and, as John Pierson notes in his essential Spike, Mike, Slackers, and Dykes, Fine Line Features was formed the follwing year in the wake of the film's success at New Line Cinema. "I remember getting turned down by Sundance originally," Stillman recalled in an interview with indieWIRE 10 years ago, "I remember all the people kind of not liking the film or not thinking it was commercial in the first screenings. People see anything that's kind of strange in what it's doing and it's very natural to kind of doubt its ability to survive in the marketplace." So, apparently not much has changed in twenty years. It took the tirelessness of sales rep and the passion of a few well-placed film critics to get the film noticed. Asked this week what he thinks about the ways that the business of independent film has changed since he made "Metropolitan," Stillman said, "Well, things were bad then, too." "As a completed film, 'Metropolitan' was rejected everywhere, even by Sundance," Stillman recalled this week, "Thanks to [Sundance programmer] Tony Safford, the film finally got into the festival after which, despite a great reception, it still remained bereft of distribution. If it hadn't been for Ira Deutchman as our producer's rep, Lindsay Law (who bought the film for American Playhouse, allowing us to pay our lab bill), Sara Risher and Bob Shaye of New Line, and supporters in the press such as Roger Ebert and Vincent Canby -- all of them -- the film never would have come out." While re-licensing the film for television, watch for it on Sundance Channel, Stillman and his reps at Cinetic Rights Management decided to pursue an online release of the film. Readily available on VHS back in the day, "Metropolitan" is more rare on DVD here in the United States, save for a single "Criterion" edition. Despite the lack of distribution, younger folks have been able to catch it on television or via Netflix. "Thanks to the Criterion edition and some supporters at the cable channels, the film seems to have gotten a new audience," Still noted, "As it was old-fashioned and passe when made -- intentionally -- the film doesn't seem to have lost much with the passage of time." Since making his three features, Stillman has lived in Paris and other European cities, but is spending time in New York now. Asked how he reconciles his own inspirations for the film with the way the city is today, he commented -- sounding like one of the characters from his films -- "I am far more ambivalent about the role of wealth in the city -- no longer having any." At lunch in Manhattan yesterday, Stillman continued to press the flesh trying to get a few projects off the ground. Among them is "Dancing Mood," a film he calls "an early '60s Jamaican story...which has the advantage of characters and themes far more sympathetic sociologically than the poisonous preppies (I write as one) of the earlier triptych. Whoever backs it is going to be very rich!" "Now independent film is again at the low ebb of a cycle, which is probably a very good time to put new ventures in the works," Stillman told indieWIRE this week, "It's painful to hear the formulas enunciated -- casting, budget and marketing mantras -- by which judgment, intelligent effort and showmanship are to be replaced." "Metropolitan" is available for the next few weeks on Hulu.com

Season DVD Release Schedule (Jan. 13, 2009) BEST OF BENNY HILL - DVD Movie (Oct. 30, 2007) 58 Full-Length Episodes. 585 classic sketches. On 18 DVDs. The undisputed Funniest Man on Television Benny Hill pioneered a naughty new direction for the sketch-comedy variety show and pushed TV broadcasting to new levels of bawdiness as he electrified audiences all over the world with The Benny Hill Show. This show-stopping collection on 18 DVDs captures every classic comedic moment from the Merry Master of Mirth in his hey day! BENNY HILL: COMPLETE AND UNADULTERATED: THE COMPLEAT COLLECTION contains Benny s raucous 20-year reign over television s-sketch variety genre, from the naughty early years to the debut of the nubile Hill s Angels through the final episodes. Witness to the birth of crazy caricatures like Fred Scuttle, Chow Mein, and Pierre de Terre. Laugh out loud as Benny and his bevy of buxom babes flaunt their racy rowdiness and tongue-in-cheek satire in characteristically outrageous sketches like The Little Dimpton Street Party and The Crook Report. These 58 vintage episodes originally aired from 1969 to 1989, contain nearly 600 memorable sketches and deliver a comedy high kick that is quintessentially Benny. Never aired in the U.S. in full-length form, this complete collection of the Thames episodes of The Benny Hill Show presents a rare opportunity to view every saucy, unforgettable moment from one of the most uproarious and celebrated programs in television history. DVD Features: Bonus Documentary: The World s Favorite Clown; The Benny Hill Cheeky Challenge Trivia Quiz # 1-6; Benny Hill: Laughter and Controversy Episode of A&E s Award-Winning Series BIOGRAPHY; Eddie in August; I Was A Hill s Angel Featurette; Hill s Angels: Off the Record Featurette; Hill s Angels: In Conversation Featurette (Jan. 30, 2007) Never before seen in their entirety in the States, the eight original full-length episodes in SET 6 explode with the saucy wit and flamboyant humor that made The Benny Hill Show an international phenomenon. Armed with his naughty, nubile Hill’s Angels and the adorable The Hill’s Little Angels, Benny sails into new stratospheres of hilarity, whether it’s with Fred Scuttle and his daily newspaper or Lana and her gaggle of Performing Men. Classic sketches such as "The Crook Report" and "The Halitosis Kid" show off the slapstick silliness that made Benny the undisputed king of comedy. (Sep. 26, 2006) Benny Hill pioneered new territory in broadcast television as he delighted--and often shocked--audiences all over the world with his brilliant sketch comedy. In the early 1980s, The Benny Hill Show hit new heights of hilarity with even more daring double entendres, tongue in chee ballads, and dance routines with the naughty and nubile Hill's Angels. BENNY HILL: COMPLETE AND UNADULTERATED SET FIVE features new skits with Fred Scuttle and Chow Mein and includes the fan-favorite moments from "The Little Dimpton Street Party" and "The Hot Shoe Show." These nine episodes that originally aired between 1982 and 1985 deliver the same bold comedic kick-in-the-pants that first made the show a smash success. Never before broadcast in their entirety in the U.S., the only way to see these vintage Thames episodes uncut is in this exclusive DVD collection. DVD Features: "Hill’s Angels: Off the Record" Featurette; The Benny Hill Cheeky Challenge Trivia Quiz #5; Interactive Menus; Scene Selection (Jan. 31, 2006) Watch the Prime Minister of Comedy at the height of his career in BENNY HILL: COMPLETE AND UNADULTERATED--SET FOUR: THE HILL’S ANGEL YEARS! 1978-1981 witnessed new producer Dennis Kirkland's raucous and rowdy influence on The Benny Hill Show, Benny's receipt of the "Funniest Man on Television" award, and the introduction of the beautiful and buxom Hill's Angels. The Benny Hill Show's pioneering sketch comedy didn’t pull any punches, and this fourth set of complete episodes doesn't disappoint! Chow Mein and Fred Scuttle return in new madcap moments and the debut of Benny's Aussie Digger Blue, film legend Michael Caine, and the Scarlet Pimple bring new hilarity to the program. Never broadcast in full-length form in the U.S., the only way to see the ten original Thames episodes from 1978-1981 in their entirety is through this essential DVD collection. DVD Features: "I Was A Hill’s Angel" Featurette; The Benny Hill Cheeky Challenge Trivia Quiz #4; Interactive Menus; Scene Selection (Jul. 26, 2005) The most recognizable British comedian on the planet is back on DVD by riotous demand! Travel back to the freewheeling ‘70s and rejoice as Benny perfects his risqué humor and bawdy slapstick in this third set of complete episodes from The Benny Hill Show. The landmark THE NAUGHTY EARLY YEARS: SET THREE features all ten original episodes from 1975 through 1977, including the fan-favorite "Beach of Waikiki" ballad and "The Reluctant Bridegroom" skit that took the sketch-variety show to lofty new heights. Never broadcast in full-length form in the U.S., the only way to see these vintage Thames episodes in their entirety is through this DVD collection.DVD Features: Eddie in August, The Benny Hill Cheeky Challenge Trivia Quiz #3; Interactive Menus; Scene Selection (Jan. 25, 2005) Benny Hill--Britain's baron of bawdy buffoonery--bursts into full bloom in this boisterous collection from his golden fan-favorite era, The Thames Years! Wildly popular all over the globe thanks to his trademark smirk and affinity for comic naughtiness, Benny rejuvenated the sketch-variety genre with his multi-award-winning THE BENNY HILL SHOW. Satirizing everything under the sun, but sanitizing nothing, Benny and his crackerjack team of entertainers invented a squadron of crazy caricatures: lovable imbecile Fred Scuttle, avant-garde French filmmaker Pierre De Terre, and the verbally challenged Mr. Chow Mein. Backed by Benny's half-dressed flock of frisky foxes, THE BENNY HILL SHOW continues to stand the test of time by making the world laugh itself silly.THE NAUGHTY EARLY YEARS: SET TWO features all 10 riotous episodes from 1972-1974. DVD Features: "Benny Hill: Laughter and Controversy" Episode of A&E’s Award-Winning Series BIOGRAPHY; The Benny Hill Cheeky Challenge Trivia Quiz; "Liner Notes" DVD Insert Booklet; Interactive Menus; Scene Selection (Aug. 24, 2004) Studio: A&e Home Video Release Date: 08/24/2004 Run time: 550 minutes Rating: Nr (Jan. 28, 2003) Benny's back, hot on the heels of his bestselling first-ever DVD release BENNY HILL GOLDEN GREATS, with more from the master of manic mimicry and mayhem! This hilarious new DVD features Benny at his most hilarious - over six hours of uproarious laughs - with more songs, more sketches, and more Hill's Angels. Who could ask for anything more! (Aug. 28, 2001) Here are the funniest moments and naughtiest antics of British comic Benny Hill! Each volume features hilarious sketches, ridiculous slapstick, zany spoofs, and Benny's buxom and beautiful Hill's Angels. (Jul. 10, 2001) Benny Hill was always best at quasi-silent slapstick, so it's no surprise that some of the best stuff on The Best of Benny Hill seems to owe more to the work of Mack Sennett and Fatty Arbuckle than to mainstream TV comedy. It may also be no coincidence that, unusually, this release began life in the cinema. There's some classic material on offer here: the extended opening item, "Lower Tidmarsh Hospital," for example, almost transcends buffoonery to become social comment, but best of all is the sketch which features Hill as a chat-show host (people really used to wear matching shirts and ties) attempting to deal with a West End star and starlet, the former monosyllabic, the latter catastrophically plastered. Among the other items featured, the knowing send-up of the pretentiousness of avant-garde French cinema is also very funny, while the short linking items include a wicked parody of Alan Whicker and a sideswipe at barely literate actresses ("What's that in the road? A head?"). Fans will be pleased to know that Hill's regular supporting cast, including Patricia Hayes, Nicholas Parsons and Rita Webb, are all present. --Roger Thomas

Would you buy a movie on DVD or rent it? Why did you choose to see the film -- actors, genre, subject or director? How do you rank the movie on a scale of A+ to F? The answers gathered by Cinema Score are being made public and posted online for the first time. The 34-year-old company Batman is back and is once again standing face to face with the enemies of Gotham City. The third and last of the franchise directed by Christopher Nolan, The Dark Knight Rises promises a lot more action. Cinema Score, a film polling service that measures the reaction of moviegoers across North America for Hollywood studios, is now making available the grade that audiences give to films in theatrical release. On opening night, Cinema Score pollsters pose six questions to people in 25 cities across North America, collecting a range of information to determine the score to give the film. Audiences fill out a ballot and return it at the end of the film and result are processed immediately. A detailed breakdown of grades and demographics are available to studios for thousands of dollars a year. Here are the scores for ten recent films: The Dark Knight Rises: A The Amazing Spider-Man: A- Ice Age: Continental Drift: A Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted: A Katy Perry: Part of Me: A Marvel's The Avengers: A+ Men in Black 3: B Magic Mike: B Rock of Ages: B In the future, more data gathered may be shared with the public. To check out the weekly CinemaScore: http://cinemascore.com

Gosh, 2008 was so long ago. How can anyone even remember stuff from back then — like the plot of the original Iron Man movie? Luckily, popular YouTube channel CineFix has your answer for this very specific problem. Their 8-bit Cinema pilot, which dropped last night, retells Iron Man in the style of the classic video game Mega Man, so now you’ll always have a source to reference when you forget what Tony Stark was up to before the Mandarin showed up. (Never mind that Mega Man the game is older than Iron Man the movie. Nostalgia is forever. Just go with it.) - Are you excited for the Mega Man/Street Fighter crossover game? - How about checking out this Marvel/Mega Man mashup? - Or an 8-bit Super Mario Brothers game with Mega Man as a playable character?

If you don’t pay attention to any other information out there about PIPA and SOPA you must watch this – and then share it with others – and talk about it amongst your friends and family – and yell in the ear of your elected representatives. This isn’t just a US issue – it affects ALL of us. Our online video production, Ruffus The Dog’s Christmas Carol was being distributed for download via Megaupload. We, like may other legitimate businesses, have been using Megaupload (and other sites similarly targeted by the large media corporations) as a practical means of distributing our content. It allows us to bypass exorbitant bandwidth costs and negate the need for any usurious deals with established media distributors. In the coming weeks you will see more heavy-handed legal actions like this – and increasing vitriolic responses from those affected – as big media and corrupt government take off their gloves and masks and come out swinging for open and undisputed control of the internet. The net is more than a series of tubes, more than just another top-down distribution system and much more than just a thorn in the side of the dying music, film and television business models. The net has become an extension of our nervous system; it is how we hear and see and speak in this world – and it is being forcibly taken over by entrenched powers who don’t like it when we stop listening to them and choose instead to talk amongst ourselves. I’ve been busy over the holidays doing the usual things: wrestling with trees in the living room, eating too much, enduring overlapping fractured conversations in rooms full of simultaneously speaking family members and stuff like that. During that time I’ve also been reorganizing my office/edit suite and lining up my production agenda for the coming year. This will include all the upcoming efforts I’ll be applying to the Ruffus Project as a whole – including a slate of new episodes made exclusively for release on the web and a series of print-to-order books based on the original shows. That post will be put up here soon – I promise. I’m also in the process of setting up a whole new blog site at robbomills.net which will – eventually – take over from this site. Millsworks will fade away and get archived somewhere but I’m not going to worry about that right now. Both of those projects evolved from our creative incubation process with the Rhino Group – a semi-weekly gathering of our core colleagues at Parkdale’s Rhino Bar & Grill. More ambitious plans lay in wait for some longer form projects and I’m looking forward to being able to reveal them as they get closer to reality. On top of all that I’m also looking for some kind of job because none of these works are paying my salary – yet. There’s a lot of commentary I want to offer up since we are entering the year where the War On The Internet truly erupts. The Occupy Movement which sprang from the Arab Spring is just the tip of the iceberg of the disruptive nature of social media and the new ability of citizens to bypass traditional corporate and state controlled media to receive and disseminate information and culture. The interwebz hold the distinct possibility to make fundamental changes in how not just our individual lives are lived but how we as human beings think, operate and interact with each other and the planet we share. That’s big stuff. And believe it or not, kids puppet shows – and other offerings from indie producers like myself – have a place in all that. We are at the cusp of “use it or lose it” with respect to the Net – and also, believe me, of “defend it or die”. That material will have a better home on the new RobboMills site. There are many others playing in the same cultural media sandbox as yours truly. I’m privileged to know and work with quite a few remarkable people here in Toronto who are increasingly active in establishing what we do online as a serious industry. You’ll be hearing more about them too. They are awesome. But – between now and then I have to get all the shit in the boxes on my office floor up on the shelves, all the spaghetti of wires under/over/across my standing desk organized into a reasonable facsimile of a non-combustible electrical array, all my outstanding contracts and other legal documents vetted and signed, and I think there’s also this little thing called back taxes. Blah blah blah. There’s always going to be something to do. Soooooooo – bear with me as I get my proverbial shit together and we’ll have a fun and entertaining ride in Robbo’s culture bucket from now to the end of 2012. What happens after that is between you and your local faux-Mayan bullshit distributor. Predictions for the coming year? Everything is going to get very dark and scary and mean and bloody – and there will be puppets. Keep smiling, tell the ones you love that you love them, and speak out loud against lies, intolerance and hypocrisy. And eat more vegetables. And now – here’s a video of a crow tubing on a rooftop. Ruffus The Dog’s Christmas Carol is now online and available for the world to see and share. You can even watch it here: It would help a lot if you go to the YouTube site to Like and Comment on the show. That kind of audience engagement – *cough*buzzwords*couch* – really does make a difference. We’ll also be posting it to our Blip.tv channel and a bunch of other sites very soon – as in: as soon as I can get my shit together to do so. I promise to write a whole bunch more about how we made it, with photos and clips, and what our next steps will be for the Ruffus project – but for now you can check out what other people are saying by checking out their posts and leaving comments: Please share this show with as many others as you can. It’s our gift to everyone for the holidays. Download links will be posted soon – and if you want to watch the earlier Ruffus episodes you can find them on the official Ruffus web site. And if you really really like JP Houston’s song “Merry Merry” you can find it on our Bandcamp site as a free download. It’s an immensely catchy tune and deserves to be heard over and over again. Enjoy! P. S. Comments here are also appreciated. Tell me what you think of the show – I’d really like to know. The full production will premiere online on December 17th. We’re also having a screening at the Revue Cinema that day where Ruffus will appear in person to answer questions. I’ll probably be there too. If you are in the neighbourhood – that would be Parkdale, west end of Toronto – and if you’re up for a family friendly matinee screening of a Christmas classic then come on by. After the screening there will be a brief Q&A with Ruffus – live on stage! The pay-what-you-can box office proceeds will be donated to the Toronto Public Library Foundation. The holidays are fast approaching and I made a promise last year that our Ruffus The Dog’s Christmas Carol would be finished and released by then. Here’s how you can help make it so. When we started the project we attempted, through Indie Go-Go, to raise the full $8,500 we expected we could scrape by on to make the whole thing work and release it to the world. We only managed to achieve $2,090 but that generosity from our supporters convinced us to carry on and go ahead with the shoot. I’ve blogged about that before – here and here and here – and here’s our original Indie Go-Go pitch. Well now, after almost a year of gradually, inexorably (if not continually) working on the post production of the show we are coming down to the wire. The many favours and dedicated sweat equity contributed, in addition to the much needed cash, have carried us almost to completion but once again we find ourselves in need of real money to ensure the project gets finished at the level of quality it deserves and to enable us to release it to the world on time for the holiday season. The show will be released online for free streaming and downloading with the option to buy DVD copies, songs, posters, calendars, t-shirts and (hopefully) a graphic photo-novella. But it’s gotta all be done and ready for release before December 15th. Our clock is ticking. If you can contribute that would be freaking awesome. If you can’t you can still help us with word-of-mouth, just telling people about the project. Full Disclosure: When I refer to “we” on this project I am mostly referring to “me”, since I’m the guy who has always chosen to wear too many hats. Hey – I got a fat head – might as well use it, right? But I always say “we” because I am not a one-man-band; I rely upon and have benefited from the extraordinary generosity of my friends and family – all of them colleagues and collaborators in this work with me. I couldn’t do a thing without them. Thanks in advance for your generosity. If you have any comments or suggestions or if you have any questions please feel free to post them here or via email. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back in the basement and keep working on the show. I know – I know – it’s been months since I last posted anything about our online holiday special: Ruffus The Dog’s Christmas Carol. What can I say? I’ve been busy. I had to pay the rent. My car had a flat tire. My suit was still at the cleaners. My dog ate it. Insert applicable lame excuse here. Actually, I have been working on it and as it slowly nears completion I eke out small portions to share with other people to get their opinion and to just generally let folks know I’m not neglecting the task at hand. Here’s a few more. As you may recall from previous posts about the production and some behind the scenes footage – this production of Charles Dicken’s classic is just a tad out of the ordinary. We shot this thing in my living room. We used green screen in a very small area with no prepared background elements prior to shooting. It was all very much a seat-of-your-pants kind of shoot. Everyone who worked on it wore several hats and helped out with everything that needed to be done. It was a lot of fun. All the backgrounds – our virtual sets – are being constructed after the edit was completed. We had to get the timed cut done so JP Hosuton, our composer, could record the soundtrack. He worked with a lot of rough images, layered un-composited green screen shots and a lot of frames with just text describing what the hell was supposed to be going on. The task of creating the CG virtual sets has fallen to me and I now find myself esconced in my basement edit suite working on a Hackintosh (thank you, Mark!) with just Final Cut Pro, PhotoShop and Cinema 4D to craft and piece together the necessary elements for all 230 separate shots – most of which contain 4 to 10 layers of footage. Wheee! Sounds like work – but it is fun. I am liking what is coming out. It looks good. I wish it was going faster. I wish I had some staff to do things for me – like get another beer. I wish – well – as they used to say: “If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.” Wishing won’t get me closer to completing the work. All there is for me to do is to just fucking do it. And that I am. Here’s a song clip for you. It’s one of JP’s great tunes – it takes place during the visitation from the Ghost Of Christmas Past where she shows Scrooge how his lust for money lost him love for Alice. Let me know what you think. There’s more to come. Much more. P. S. It is definitely odd to be spending the dog days summer cutting together snow scenes. Having a blog fills me with a sense of obligation – and resultant despair when I fail to oblige. I used to plough out 3 to 4 posts per day when I first started my blog a few years ago but that has since tapered off to a more reasonable 1 per day – or so. Lately I’ve been remiss and haven’t kept up with the flow of information across the smoothed rocky shores of my mind. I like going to that water’s edge to draw a drink for you to share but I haven’t been able to the past few weeks because I’ve just been so damned busy. I am still working on the post for the Ruffus The Dog Christmas Carol – and I’m writing scripts for a children’s series for a friend because it’s fun and it pays the rent – and I was working on a proposal for a new web series called My Kitteh! which is a collaboration with my talented wife Karen Valleau which promises to be lots of fun – and I’m making plans for another production which I hope to fund and put before the cameras before the year is out. And I’m also looking for other revenue generating work. So, as you can see, it’s been challenging to do all of the above and follow an exercise regime I’ve convinced myself is necessary to stay alive and mobile and keep up with the blogging too. This week requires a great deal from me but next week I should have enough free moments in my usual ADHDay to plant some brain seeds here for you to watch grow into something resembling a better metaphor than what I attempted to make work at the beginning of this sentence. See? I can’t even write. P. S. Speaking of monkeys – here’s Jonathan Coulton’s “Code Monkey” – enjoy! I'm going to be slowly making some changes to the website both in format and content - and I'm pretty sure even the URL will change. It's going to be more of a personal news aggregator with a featured video blog from yours truly. We'll see how long that lasts. So bear with me - thanks.

Enter your email address here to receive updates from the team. The idea of the "gaming community" needs to die. The virtual worlds of video games hold lessons for the real one. We could learn a lot about how to organise our politics by studying the best video games grounded in democracy, writes Simon Parkin. Simon Parkin looks back at 66 years of a British institution. When Simon Parkin's grandfather moved into a nursing home, his grandmother was left alone in her cold house. Who has it worse, he wonders? Violence isn't unique to cinema or games - they're just the latest recruit to the aftermath blame tradition.

Vol. LXI, No. 18 Wednesday, May 2, 2007 11 a.m. and 8 p.m.: Bye Bye Birdie; Bucks County Playhouse, New Hope, Pa. Also Thursday and Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 4 and 8 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. 7 p.m.: Darla Rich Quartet; Fedora Cafe, Lawrenceville. 8 p.m.: Los Folkloristas; State Theatre, New Brunswick. 8 to 10:30 p.m.: Princeton Country Dancers’ Contra Dance; Suzanne Patterson Center. 8 p.m.: Falsettos; George Street Playhouse, New Brunswick. Also Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m., Thursday at 2 p.m., Saturday at 2 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. 7 p.m.: Princeton Junction Neighborhoods’ Coalition Community Forum; Senior Center, West Windsor Township Municipal Complex, Clarksville Road. 7:30 p.m.: Singer-songwriter Bruce Hornsby; McCarter Theatre. 8 p.m.: Jazz guitarist Stanley Jordan; Frist Campus Center, Princeton University. 8 p.m.: The Deacons; Mill Hill Playhouse, Trenton. Also Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 3 p.m. 4:30 to 6:30 p.m.: Twilight Garden Tour of Indoor Display Garden; Duke Farms, Route 206, Hillsborough. Also Saturday from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. For reservations call (908) 722-3700. 7:30 p.m.: Mrs. Packard; Berlind Theatre. Also Saturday at 3 and 8 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. 7:30 p.m.: MIMA Music concert with drummer Chuck Staab and cellist Daniel Hawkins; Princeton University Chapel. Free. 7:30 p.m.: Jigu! Thunder Drums of China; McCarter Theatre. 8 p.m.: The Goodbye Girl; Off-Broadstreet Theatre, Hopewell. Also Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 2:30 p.m. 8 p.m.: Lust N’ Rust; Kelsey Theatre, Mercer County Community College. Also Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. 8 and 10:30 p.m.: Comedians Paul Venier and Darryl Knight; Catch A Rising Star Comedy Club, Hyatt Regency. Also Saturday at 8 and 10:30 p.m. 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.: Church Rummage Sale; Christ Congregation Church, 50 Walnut Lane. 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.: Annual Heirloom Plant Sale; Morven Museum & Garden, 55 Stockton Street. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.: Kite Day, Terhune Orchards, 330 Cold Soil Road. Also Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. 10 a.m. to noon: Princeton Regional Health Department rabies vaccination clinic; Community Park Pool, 380 Witherspoon Street. Free. 2 and 4 p.m.: Harry the Dirty Dog; Kelsey Theatre, Mercer County Community College. 3 p.m.: Raising Awareness Destination: Darfur meeting; Princeton Public Library. 3 and 8 p.m.: Jesus Christ Superstar; State Theatre, New Brunswick. 6 p.m.: Princeton Child Development Institute benefit gala with comedienne Judy Gold; Westin Princeton. For reservations, call (609) 924-6280. 6:30 p.m.: Darla Rich Quartet; Java Moon Cafe, 4110 Quakerbridge Road, Lawrenceville. 7 p.m.: Alice in Wonderland; Cor Unum Theater, Stuart Country Day School. Also Sunday at 2 p.m. 9 p.m.: Princeton University Wind Ensemble’s Concert Under the Stars; 1879 Green. 5 p.m.: Chamber concert by Greater Princeton Youth Orchestra; Dorothea’s House, 120 John Street. Free. 7:30 p.m.: Westminster Faculty Recital with soprano Faith Esham; Bristol Chapel, Westminster Choir College. 8:30 a.m.: Registration for Stuart Country Day School’s Tartan Golf and Tennis Classic; Bedens Brook Club, Skillman. 11:30 a.m.: St. Paul School annual Golf & Tennis Outing; Cherry Valley Country Club, Skillman. 7:30 p.m.: Second Chance Cinema, Climates; Kresge Auditorium, Princeton University. Noon: Recital with soprano Beverly Owens and pianists Esma Pasic-Filipovic and Amy Shortt; Witherspoon Street Presbyterian Church. 6:30 p.m.: Closed meeting of Princeton Regional Board of Education; John Witherspoon Middle School. 6:30 to 10 p.m.: Tuesday Night Jazz with The Franklin Alison Jazz Quartet; Witherspoon Grill, Witherspoon Street. 7:30 p.m.: Princeton Regional Board of Education public planning session workshop; John Witherspoon Middle School. 7:30 p.m.: Mrs. Packard; Berlind Theatre. Also Wednesday and Thursday at 7:30 p.m., Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 3 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. 8 p.m.: Cool Women Poets; Barnes & Noble, MarketFair, Route 1. 8 p.m.: Mercer County Community College Chorus; Kelsey Theatre, Mercer County Community College. Free. Town Topics® may be purchased on Wednesday mornings at the following locations: Princeton McCaffreys, Coxs, Kiosk (Palmer Square), Krauszers (State Road), Olives, Speedy Mart (State Road), Wawa (University Place); Hopewell Village Express; Rocky Hill Wawa (Route 518); Pennington Pennington Market. Copyright© Town Topics®, Inc. 2011.

The programmers of this year’s Cannes Film Festival were clearly a bookish bunch. Though the annual cinematic confab on the French Riviera only officially kicked off today, an early snapshot of the festival’s breakout successes is already taking shape. Of particular interest to us: Many of the films currently cresting in the Cannes zeitgeist also happen to be literary adaptations. Here’s a selection of some of the most noteworthy early Cannes standouts to have originally sprung from the mind of an author, not auteur. People are talking about “We Need to Talk About Kevin,” the long-awaited third feature from Scottish filmmaker Lynne Ramsay (“Ratcatcher,” “Morvern Callar”). Though each of Ramsay’s first two films was celebrated for its rough-edged verite storytelling and astringent but deeply resonant portrayals of its characters’ inner lives, she may best be known as the director who was originally slated to adapt The Lovely Bones before Peter Jackson pulled rank and tragically elected to adapt Alice Sebold‘s bestseller himself, to ruinous results. Ramsay took her time to recover from that disappointment and ultimately found an equally compelling and devastating book with which to rebound in Lionel Shriver‘s We Need to Talk About Kevin. The story revolves around two parents (played by Tilda Swinton and John C. Reilly) trying to cope with the nuances of their culpability in raising a son who recently embarked on a violent high school killing spree. Family dramas don’t get much darker than this one. This is the kind of film that should come with a skull and crossbones warning to new moms: Watch at your own peril. But judging by the above clip, anyone with the emotional stamina to endure the unendurable will be richly rewarded with stellar performances and an expertly crafted narrative. Shifting gears into the realm of plot-driven high-octane testosterized filmmaking, “The Killer Elite” has been grabbing headlines declaring it the big commercial breakout of the festival after it was picked up for U.S. distribution today by Open Road Releasing. It’s not hard to see the appeal: The film features a trifecta of tough guy thespians in a spy caper about a special forces agent (Jason Statham) who recruits his former mentor (Robert DeNiro) to help him hunt down a rogue group of British covert operatives and their corrupt onomatopoetically named leader, Spike (Clive Owen). If that weren’t enough intrigue, the crime bestseller upon which the film is based — The Feather Men by Sir Ranulph Fiennes — has already spawned its own drama surrounding the author’s disputed claims that the story was based on true events. Either way, we’ll line up early and often to see Owen in anything, not to mention a juicy villain role like this one. Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar is a living legend who happens to have one of the most amazing heads of hair in show business. As such, he has made a habit of wowing audiences at the Cannes Film Festival with each successive masterpiece. This year Almodovar will take to the Croisette’s with “The Skin I Live In,” his adaptation of Thierry Jonquet‘s harrowing novel, Tarantula, about a cosmetic surgeon (Antonio Banderas) determined to avenge his daughter’s rape. We’re particularly eager to see Banderas return to his roots in Spanish cinema, playing a psychologically complex character in a film by a world-class director. Before he became known for bringing a little Spanish salsa to bland mass-produced entertainment, as Puss in Boots in “Shrek” or as the hapless paterfamilias in the “Spy Kids” movies, Banderas spent the first decade of his career as Almodovar’s go-to leading man in classics like “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown” and “Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!” But once Madonna caught sight of him and introduced him to mainstream audiences via her “Truth or Dare” documentary, Banderas became part of the Hollywood machinery. So after two decades churning cheese, we’re eager to see Banderas speak his native tongue in a role worthy of his talents. Full disclosure: This film stars Ryan Gosling and we’d be constitutionally inclined to endorse a corporate instructional video if he were doing the narrating. Fortunately, “Drive” comes fully loaded with a top-tier director in Nicolas Winding Refn (“Bronson”) and a taut and twisty narrative about a movie stunt driver who earns extra cash driving getaway cars for criminals. Based on the James Sallis book, the film features Gosling front and center as the film’s taciturn protagonist being eaten alive on the inside from his own compulsion to court danger. If this clip is any indication, “Drive” has makings for a minimalist modern day Steve McQueen movie.

17 things no one probably have told you yet (comics by alex... | | | whomp whomp whomp. How to change what others think, believe, feel and do is at the core of many professions. Here are the inner secrets of persuasion and changing other people. Welcome to Dumb Little Man! Each week we provide a handful of tips that will save you money, increase your productivity, or simply keep you sane. Follow up mix to "99 songs to make your homework better". This one is more awesome. Some artists include: Alt-J, the xx, Two Door Cinema Club. @EvanNite A very trippy and powerful optical illusion. http://www.GreenITers.com To learn on eco-green innovations that can make a difference on this planet. It takes about 30 days to form a habit. The ones that are good for you require cultivation and determination. The starting phase is the (Hardest, especially if you want to change an old habit into a new one. This is why giving yourself a challenge fo... Psychology as we know it is a relatively young science,...

Voici – Chile, I love you, Chile I adore you! She loves to be en route, he follows her wherever she goes. Now they have gone to South America. To rediscover themselves better… In order to test the durability of a relationship, what’s more dangerous than spending the holidays together? Far away from home, together 24 hours a day and no possibility of escaping and going back to one’s own place. The only thing to do: be patient. Knowing the risks of such a journey, Audrey Tautou and M. nevertheless dared to meet the challenge […] For the first enamored getaway after a couple of months of romantic idyll, the “bankable†actress of French cinema who is very successful with Ensemble, c’est tout at the moment and the collector of victories in the music business have chosen Chile. And if Mathieu first thought that he could benefit from the journey to relax after months of working, he obviously didn’t count on the desiderata of Miss Tautou. Because with Audrey, holidays are not about that. Pretending to be tourists is what Amélie Poulain likes. And the singer didn’t have any other choice than to follow the rhythm. Did he really expect such a travel? No time to ask that question. Being a devotee of sweet idleness, he could chill out in the sun on the terrace of a restaurant of Valparaiso. But the break would be short. In fact, Audrey who is a real runaway, prefered to take her boyfriend to the sinuous coasts until Zapallar, armed with her backpacker’s guide and her camera. In Zapallar the couple swayed through the picturesque lanes hand in hand. And Audrey who loves to adopt the local culture found a way to test her rudiments of Spanish under the impressed look of her “machistadorâ€. Because what’s most important ultimately, at some far place in the world or at home, is to be together. That’s all. © 2007 Voici Translated by Manila for Audrey-Tautou.org Scans belong to Audrey-Tautou.org (thanks Cassie!)

As widad is cat die hard fan,we had rewards her to watch puss in boots last Sunday (1) just nice.actually im quite dissapointed as im hoping for something that not only good entertainment for kids but adults as well.i am expecting something like kung fu panda 2.erhmm (2) not much laughing part but the story line is good (3) me and widad were sleeping when the goose come to the town looking for her child.tgh2 climax bleh lak tersleep.huhuh (4) however,amirul enjoy the movie eventho his sister was sleeping soundly in the cinema.uhukss (5) rating :2/5 – this is my opinion, dont feel offended with my view.

With Breaking Bad heading into its final season, recapper Matt Roden takes a look at where the show has landed itself – out of a premise, and into the wilderness – and how that makes it more interesting than it has been in recent times. Spoilers ahead! While businesses and charities may make their mission statements known to all, artistic endeavours rarely do, and for seemingly good reason. “High concept” films, with their bored Hollywood exec-friendly pitches (think Snakes On A Plane or Cowboys Vs. Aliens), seem to exist only because no one had to think beyond that one line of intention — meaning they probably got the afternoon off. Audiences often tire of the idea before it reaches the cinema – which is maybe why recent flicks like the Transformers-meets-Godzilla-styled Pacific Rim and the “Die Hard with a President”-marketed White House Down did less business in their initial release than the studios had hoped for. Quality television is the same: if your show can be summed up in one line, can it contain the depth, the nuance, and the multitudes that equal high art? One can imagine show runners like The Sopranos’ David Chase and Mad Men’s Matt Weiner gritting their teeth at the thought of condensing their multi-season narratives into a single tagline. And yet Breaking Bad, always included within this era’s echelon of well-respected dramas, has been labelled from the get-go by its creator Vince Gilligan with just such a shorthand: “From Mr. Chips to Scarface”. Has knowing that end point from the start of the show damaged our chances of being surprised? Do Not Pass Go. Do Not Collect Supporting Characters. Even if you haven’t seen the films that Gilligan’s referring to, or Breaking Bad itself, the suggestion is clear. From mild-mannered to outlandish, from well-behaved to villainous, the catchphrase wraps up the show’s intentions and outcomes all at once. “We will start here and end there” it announces, affording you the seemingly prescient luxury of knowing where you’re headed before you even embark. Compared to The Sopranos’ ambiguous end shot and Mad Men’s constant vault of secrets, Breaking Bad is like the over-accommodating dinner host, letting you know every flavour you’ll be encountering before they even set the table. This has lent the show a different, pulpier vibe: we know the what, we’re tuning in for the how. And the hows have been awesome. The minutiae of drug-making and distribution is absorbing, the show’s acting is enthralling, its cinematography captivating. The moral decline of a sympathetic man was riveting. And then, like the action films it has increasingly mirrored in its ever-expanding (and exploding) set pieces, Breaking Bad has become less and less surprising. Just as we know Tom Cruise is going to get out okay, we know each week that Bryan Cranston’s Walter White is going to grow worse. And, for me at least, that’s gotten a little tedious. Unlike the other prestige dramas with which it shares critical respect and awards, Breaking Bad has never been a soulful meander through life’s odd (if illegal) instances; instead, it presents a clear-cut race from A to B. Yes, in its quieter moments, the show has pondered paths untaken and familial pressures. But especially in its later seasons, Bad has often seemed like a sprinter on an obstacle course, running at the finish line but ignoring the hurdles and hindrances that make the race interesting. Supporting characters are tools of the plot (who knows what lawyer Saul gets up to after each meeting?), and even ‘main’ characters remain unexplored. We know wife Skylar once wrote stories, and sister-in-law Marie works as a nurse, but we’ve never heard a peep as to where these mismatched sisters met their polar opposite partners. As the show has barrelled towards its pre-prepared point of completion — as Walter White has become the bad-ass drug boss that we were promised from day one — it has drifted from a humanistic exploration about a man scared of a fatal disease and the idea of not being able to provide for his family, to a show about a pride-filled murderer who’s a terror to those around him. With that change has come a shift in its moral compass. Articles (like these already linked to, in the Huffington Post and the Atlantic) point to Breaking Bad’s moral clarity, to the fact that we can see through White’s justifications to his true motives. But while Walt’s initial dalliances on the dark side played with our ethical allegiances, does anyone really have sympathy for the devil? The show remains tightly scripted, brilliantly acted, and beautifully shot, but the last half-season — full of high octane stand-offs and mass killings — has had little human content. Did we somehow sign up for an A-Grade snuff film? Dealing Drugs Is Bad, Mmm-kay? If you judged Walter White’s deeds only by the online recaps, you’d think that unchecked pride was the worst sin a person could commit. (I don’t have the stats, but I guarantee a huge uptick in the usage of “hubris” on pop culture sites since the show’s first screening.) Breaking Bad has lingered long on Cranston’s cragginess, as we gasped at the malevolent act of poisoning a child, and we watched Jesse fall into a rave-cave of despair after murdering the naïve Gail. Despite these evil-doings, it’s White’s chutzpah that we’re primed to see dismantled, not his legally defined criminality. The show has always framed Walter and Jesse’s drug dealing in the same context as much of the other crime on the show – everyone “breaks bad”, from hapless Ted’s tax evasion to Marie’s petty theft. Recent episodes have elevated meth lab montages and inmate killings to music video glamour. But these crimes are not cool. Walt is bad-ass because he rigs a bomb to a wheelchair and choreographs a train heist. He’s straight-up bad because he pumps a community full of a mentally and physically disfiguring, highly addictive, very real substance. Every television portrayal of narcotics need not replicate the social exploration of The Wire (which managed to both humanise dealers and users and show the systemic rot that drug culture imbues), but Breaking Bad sometimes seems as blind as its protagonist to the problems its ‘product’ can cause. Without the brief, infrequent sequences in Breaking Bad that have shown off strung-out hookers and junkie parents, the reality of the drug would barely register. Fans have fetishised the mythical ‘Blue Meth’ into harmless oblivion, its real world implications forgotten, now to be synthesised in your kitchen and used for decorating cupcakes. Have we swung so far into the realm of super-villainy — of mega-magnets and exotic toxins — that our initial glimpses of Walt’s bad side, and the scenes of a struggling conscience that made the show so compelling in the first place, have been eclipsed? Let’s Give Thanks For Hank The shining light tempering my recent disappointment in the show is Hank Schrader. Once portrayed as a knuckle-headed bruiser, he has steadily matured and deepened as a character, just as Walter has stagnated into the villainous Heisenberg. Hank’s slow determination stands in contrast to Walter’s eureka-like flashes of brilliance. His moral code does too. Hank’s job in the DEA puts him not only at odds with Walter, but also with any whiff of cool that Breaking Bad may have lent to the idea of “cooking up” for cash. With Breaking Bad’s mission statement met, and its Scarface identified by Hank, it’ll be both thrilling and gratifying to watch a criminal come to justice in the show’s unheralded last chapter. Here’s hoping the tables turn on Heisenberg completely, and that his scrabble to stay out of jail brings back the buzz and humanity to Breaking Bad. With our journey from A to B complete, let’s see Gilligan and his team swerve any which way but obviously in these final episodes, and this pulpy, tragic morality play come to a legitimately shocking and satisfying conclusion. Breaking Bad returns on Monday August 12, screening at 6.30pm on Showcase — fast-tracked from the USA. Matt Roden helps kids tell stories by day at the Sydney Story Factory, and by night helps adults admit to stupidity by co-running Confession Booth and TOD Talks. He is 2SER’s resident TV critic — each Tuesday morning at 8.20am — and his illustration and design work can be seen here. You can read his Mad Men recaps here.

Merry Christmas, Stanley Kubrick fans. Devotees of the director have received some mouth-watering news this holiday season as seventeen minutes of footage cut from the stone cold sci-fi classic "2001: A Space Odyssey" has been found. The news was confirmed by legendary effects master Douglas Trumbull who, while working with Dave Larson on a now canceled documentary on the film "2001: Behind the Infinite—The Making of a Masterpiece," learned that Warner Bros. had found the footage in pristine condition sitting in a studio vault in a salt mine in Kansas. The footage is said to be comprised of scenes and sequences cut by Kubrick following the film's premiere in order to tighten up the pacing. According to IMDB these were the cuts and changes made at the time and which are now likely among the uncovered footage: -Some shots from the “Dawn of Man” sequence were removed and a new scene was inserted where an ape pauses with the bone it is about to use as a tool. The new scene was a low-angle shot of the monolith, done in order to portray and clarify the connection between the man-ape using the tool and the monolith. -Some shots of Frank Poole jogging in the centrifuge were removed. -An entire sequence of several shots in which Dave Bowman searches for the replacement antenna part in storage was removed. -A scene where HAL severs radio communication between the “Discovery” and Poole’s pod before killing him was removed. This scene explains a line that stayed in the film in which Bowman addresses HAL on the subject. -Some shots of Poole’s space walk before he is killed were removed The biggest question now is what to do with the material. Undoubtedly, this is holy grail type material for Kubrick fans and cinema lovers in general. Already regarded as the crowning achievement in sci-fi pictures, another seventeen minutes of scenes sounds too good to be true. And while we're just as curious as anybody to see those scenes, we really hope Warner Bros. doesn't try and create some kind of "2001: The Premiere Cut" with the footage. Kubrick cut those scenes for a reason and the film as we now know it is the vision that he wanted. However, as bonus material in a new DVD/BluRay edition of the film, with commentary from the usual suspects like Jan Harlan, Douglas Trumbull and those who worked on the film, that would be something truly special. The Kubrick/WB relationship is one of the great and rare director/studio relationships of all time. The studio famously gave Kubrick all kinds of latitude and freedoms regarding nearly every aspect of the production of his films (right down to the newspaper advertising) that filmmakers today can barely dream of. We hope that Warner Bros. honor Kubrick and the newly found footage in a manner that befits the late director. We're definitely curious and with chatter now picking up about this material we figure an official statement from Warner Bros. will be right around the corner. [The Film Stage]

Gus Van Sant likes telling stories about troubled young men. He went on the road with them in My Own Private Idaho, then followed them into therapy for Good Will Hunting. And, thanks largely to the success of the latter, he amassed enough Tinseltown kudos to be allowed to turn his attentions to one of cinema’s all-time mama’s boys – the very troubled Norman Bates. The controversial result has been the most baffling movie sideshow of the past year, a “shot-for-shot”, full-colour “re-creation” of Psycho. Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 original was a low-budget quickie. Deliberately shot in black-and-white, it became a classic. But anyone who missed seeing this masterfully realised, black-humoured horror may wonder what all the fuss is about. Van Sant’s new version is slow and not very frightening. It’s less a remake than a film-school-style experiment. Assignment: choose a famous movie, keep most of the dialogue, music, action and framing. Change the cast and the sets, bring it up to date by shooting it in colour. But just how different can the new flick be? The answer? Too different. Some of Van Sant’s tinkering is jarring (“That is NOT the Bates house!... But ooooh, love the new shower curtain!”). Other tweaks are more subtle, like caged birds here and a big spider there. Some, however, are downright inexplicable – why is there a fuzzy shot of a cow edited into the midst of one of the murders? Unfortunately, most of the new version’s ‘improvements’ prove to be no improvement at all. We can now know exactly how deeply Norman enjoys spying on Marion – far more information than most of us needed. We can now see that celebrated shower scene in colour, with an ample spatter of scarlet blood. We can even hear the famous knife enter tender flesh in digital, THX, multi-channel sound. By the time Norman arrives and gags at the bathroom carnage, we’re way ahead of him. Van Sant also makes one truly subversive change: he turns the whole story’s sexuality on its head. Hitch’s Marion Crane was doe-eyed Janet Leigh, a gorgeous middle-class fantasy. In contrast, Anthony Perkins’ Norman was an asexual weakling, no match for the domineering Mother Bates, and so, at first, Norman seemed sad and almost sympathetic. Flash-forward 38 years and the new Psycho offers a miscast, unappealing Anne Heche as Marion, looking almost completely androgynous. Vince Vaughn’s Norman is the sexy one, a bathhouse hunk with bulging pecs and pouty lips, while Marion’s boyfriend Sam Loomis (who was pretty forgettable in the original) is played as a cowboy fantasy by Viggo Mortensen. Vaughn’s performance is certainly daring but he, too, is miscast. He is simply too big to be pathetic, and gives Norman a creepy nervous laugh (like the sound of a sheep choking in mid-bleat) that leaves no doubt that the character is, well, a psycho. The laugh is funny, but it means there’s no surprise when Norman turns out to be even crazier than he seemed. To its credit, Van Sant’s Psycho does have lots of laughs – this is no accident, as even Hitchcock’s original is full of dry humour. But the biggest snicker comes in the closing credits, which include: “Special thanks to John Woo for his kitchen knife.” It conjures up the delicious thought of what the Hong Kong action master might have done with his own “recreation”. But Woo was wise enough to provide only the blade, leaving the butchery to Van Sant. Almost everything that's good is copied from the original, almost everything that is new is bad. So what is the point? Unless you're keen to ogle Vaughn and Mortensen, it's cheaper, better and much more satisfying to rent the original.

Enjoyed coffee at Java. Tucked away but worth finding. We only had coffee here on this occasion. We would visit again! I Visited java whilst having a break in Padstow it's a little coffee shop tucked away in the old cinema the staff were friendly and nothing was too much trouble with lovely home made chocolate brownie which was perfect in every way the added bonus of free wifi was great to check emails whilst enjoying my coffee and cake in... More We had our morning coffees here every day for a week. Don't know why this place isn't busier - might be something to do with being tucked away between a pub and a camping shop - plus it doesn't have much of a shop front presence. This meant we were always able to get a seat, so not complaining! Smooth... More We were having a great day in Padstow and felt the need for a good cup of coffee. At which point we spotted the sign for Java just up the road. Java is a small coffee shop run from what used to be the foyer of an old cinema, and what a welcome we got. Thandi our 16 month old... More Highly recommend the tasty crab sandwhich at this friendly ,personable cafe and hugely impressed with the flat white This little coffee shop, tucked away in the old cinedrome in town, is great for enjoying a very good coffee and has friendly staff, with an added bonusof catching up with your emails as it is one of the only places with free wifi available in town. Visited just before Easter it .had just opened a very warm welcome by H coffee was excellent very reminiscent of Nice in France which i visit often. Can also recommend the Chocola't in hot milk . There was a very good selection of cakes to accompany what ever beveradge you desired. Will make it a regular stop on visiting Padstow.... More If you own or manage Java, register now for free tools to enhance your listing, attract new reviews, and respond to reviewers.Manage your listing

Galaxy Cinema 6 770 Cary Towne Blvd| Cary NC 27511 |Record #5494 | Opened: December 23, 1977| Closed: November 11, 2012 Current Organ: none | Also Known As: Imperial Cinema 4| | Previously operated by: Fairlane-Litchfield Theatres, United Artists Theatres, Madstone Theatres| Return to the top of this page or Return to the main page Last featured 7/3/2004. Last edited 12/16/2012. Buy movie tickets, look up showtimes, watch trailers and more!

Year Released: 2005 MPAA Rating: Unrated Running Time: 85 minutes Click to Expand Credits: Melvin Van Peebles. The director who stuck it to the man with “Sweet Sweetback’s Baad Asssss Song”, a film showing an independent black character rallying against the white world and surviving, helped to change the face of cinema forever by giving black Americans a stronger voice. Standing alone this accomplishment would prove the crown jewel in the cap of most artists, however Melvin Van Peebles is not most artists. The riveting documentary “How to Eat Your Watermelon in White Company (and Enjoy It)” directed by Joe Angio profiles Van Peebles before, during and after the success of “Sweetback”, showing an entertainment pioneer that was able to successfully transcend mediums and raise consciousness as he went. A streetcar operator who was fired for writing a book based upon his experiences because his boss did not believe a black man should be able to read or write, Van Peebles found himself attracted to filmmaking. Upon learning that under French law, a published author could receive a temporary director’s card to bring their work to the screen and seeing how the French people were more accepting of his short films, Van Peebles relocated to Europe. Teaching himself French and working for a volatile political humor magazine on the side, Peebles set out to get his film made. His first feature “La Permission” (The Story of a Three Day Pass) dealt with the story of a black man on three day leave from the army falling in love with a white French woman and societies inability to accept such a union. The film was a hit and ended up at the San Francisco film festival, however American critics were shocked to find that the artistic French director they had been expecting was in reality a disgruntled black man from the States! With twists and turns such as this marking his life, Peebles is quickly shown to be much more than the guy who made “Sweetback”. Not finding films about the black man’s place in the world Peebles makes his own. Not relating to any music made about black America, Peebles releases his own records. Not seeing any theater realistically portraying the black lifestyle Peebles writes his own plays and becomes the only black playwright to this day to have two works running simultaneously on Broadway. What is most amazing is Peebles justification for his actions, stating that he was a filmmaker, musician and playwright not so much because he loved the mediums but because he wanted to create the type of art that he felt was missing from the world. Told through old footage, pictures and interviews with both Peebles and the people closest to and inspired by him “HTEYWIWC” is a wild trip through Peebles’ life considering how many hats he wore. Peebles admits that the only reason he made so much money off his various endeavors was because people were too afraid to join him and thus he had to fund everything himself. While his films may be rough by today’s standards and even Peebles son, actor/director Mario Van Peebles, is first to admit his fathers singing voice resembles a “frog on crack” the fact that Peebles dared to dream as large as he did and break down doors where no one else would is a testament to artistic perseverance in any medium. If anything, one wishes the film would have spent even more time with Peebles in his personal life. While the fact Peebles is a notorious ladies man is addressed directly there never seems to be any candid footage by those interviewed on how they felt about Peebles and his sometimes rough exterior. It would have been nice to have seen how Peebles’ children felt about their legend of a father but this is a minor gripe in an otherwise gripping portrait of a Renaissance man. Most people dream of making a film half as influential as “Sweetback” and the fact that Peebles accomplished that and so much more is awe inspiring. Seeing how “HTEYWIWC” succeeds in showing this success and also the nuts and bolts behind Peebles marketing genius in such an entertaining manner, Peebles has won yet again. Posted on June 18, 2005 in Reviews by Greg Bellavia If you liked this article then you may also like the following Film Threat articles: - EXCESS HOLLYWOOD: THE CLANSMAN IS YOUR FRIEND - BATTLESHIP CONTEMPKIN - A BELLY FULL - BAADASSSSS! (DVD) - TEN FILMS TO HELP YOU JUDGE A POTENTIAL SUITOR Popular Stories from Around the Web

Full Moon Scimitar Dir/Scr: Chor Yuen Orig Story: Gu Long Set Design: Chan King-sam Cast: Derek Yee, Liza Wang, Wong Yung, Lam Kin-ming 1979 / Colour / D Beta / Mandarin / Chi & Eng subtitles / 94min Chor Yuen joined Shaw Brothers Studio in 1970. His first commercial success was The House of 72 Tenants (1973, included in this programme). But the several films after that all flopped. In 1976, he adapted Taiwanese martial arts novelist Gu Long’s Killer Clans (itself a rip-off of Mario Puzo’s The Godfather ) for the screen and broke all records. Since then he had made more than 20 Gu Long films. Full Moon Scimitar is a perfect combination of two genres, the martial arts film and romantic drama which Chor Yuen likes most, the wenyi-wuxia . A young swordsman seeks fame by defeating every renowned kung-fu master and in the course of this, loses the woman he loves and ultimately, his own self. The plot itself has a number of loopholes, but Chor Yuen is able to gloss over them with a mysterious and dream-like style, set off by Chan King-sam’s outlandish design of sets, such as the den which is the headquarters of the Satanic Clan and the Magic Sword Mansion. © Licensed by Celestial Pictures Limited. All rights reserved. ||Cinema, Hong Kong Film Archive The contents of the programme do not represent the views of the presenter. The presenter reserves the right to change the programme should unavoidable circumstances make it necessary.

— Mae West as Lady Lou from She Done Him Wrong, 1933 You are Here » News Chat » Felicity Jones slips up and reveals Green Goblin in Amazing Spider-Man 2 July 17, 2013 Felicity Jones slips up and reveals Green Goblin in Amazing Spider-Man 2 — Posted by Ryan Actress Felicity Jones recently had a slip up in an interview pertaining to Amazing Spider-Man 2. She referred to her boyfriend in the film as “the Goblin” leading many to believe that the Green Goblin will appear in the film. With so many villains popping up, it’s making a “Sinister Six” scenario seem more and more likely. While many were thinking that Harry Osborn would somehow be Venom, it now seems like he may be Green Goblin. It makes me wonder how significant of a role Norman will have in the film. This post was written by : First and foremost, Ryan Brown is a fan. He has been an avid fan of both the theater and cinema since an early age and his passion for both has been continually growing ever since. When dissecting a film, he focuses on all elements of film-making including some fan/cult factors. He believes that character development is the foundation of a good film and usually starts his analysis of a film from there moving forward. His writing style may be influenced by his background of narrative and argumentative studies in the subject, but he tends to enjoy a more conversational style to better interact with the readers, unlike some other pretentious and pompous writers. Around the Web

GLENDALE, CA -- (Marketwired) -- 11/18/13 -- Hutchinson and Bloodgood LLP, a leading Certified Public Accounting and Consulting Firm serving... ...http://in.sys-con.com/node/2875656 Nov 15 (Infostrada Sports) - Scores from the U.S. PGA Tour OHL Classic at the par-71 course on Friday in Playa del Carmen 63 Robert Karlsson... ...http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/11/15/golf-pga-scores-idINISS66912920131115?feedType=RSS&feedName=golfNews Empire Of The Sun Steven Spielberg This film revolves around the life of a young boy 'Jamie', torn apart by war during the Japanese invasion of... ...http://www.thehindu.com/features/cinema/cinema-columns/my-five/article5350967.ece By Keith Weir LONDON (Reuters) - A multi-million dollar payment to a jailed German banker was an "insurance policy", Formula One Chief Executive... ...http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/11/06/britain-ecclestone-trial-idINDEE9A50A620131106 CALGARY, ALBERTA -- (Marketwired) -- 10/24/13 -- Gemini Corporation (TSX VENTURE:GKX) is pleased to announce that Ms. Susannah Pierce and Mr. Peter... ...http://in.sys-con.com/node/2848324 "Feifei, my father a letter from us...

To The Daily Sun, This is not to cause any grief for our valued poll workers, but there is a problem in my opinion. My vote is very valuable to me and the same for Betty. My understanding is there were no write-ins for Ward 5 councilor in the primary. I will be honest, as the day progressed we decided that we knew the outcome in Ward 5 so we continued on with our day. The people including us, deserve to know that every ballot is counted. When there is something foreign to the completed ballot — such as a "write-in" — the ballot will be kicked out to the side. Those ballots still need to be counted as to why the kick out! Obviously this did not happen, and if I had voted and wrote in a name to give the voters of Ward 5 a choice for city councilor in November election I would DEMAND my write-in be part of the count. If the city clerk knows of this shouldn't "the box" be opened with a room full of witnesses — not for a recount — but to examine the ballots that were segregated? Or will this primary go down as a black mark for Laconia elections? Last Updated on Thursday, 19 September 2013 10:06 To The Daily Sun, This is in response to Bernadette Loesch's letter in the September 12 Sun: Bernadette, I have to say I find your take on the GOP's motivations in regards to voter rights to be interesting, if misguided and uninformed. Your take on the Supreme Court's decision to strike down one provision within the Voting Rights Act as a repeal of voting rights laws and protections is paranoid at best. Either you didn't understand Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act, the Supreme Court decision, or both. This is something I have addressed below, but first let us go over the points you brought up in your letter in the order you presented them: 1. "We are witnessing many, many states cut back on the number of days for registering to vote." Really, which states? Even with the so-called 'Motor-Voter' laws out there that allow registering to vote on the day of the election? As long as the person registering to vote can prove they live where they say the live — the same criteria required for 'regular' voter registration — then how is this a problem? 2. "Requiring a valid I.D. in order to vote." Everyone should be concerned with voting and maintaining the legitimacy of elections at local, state and national level. When ineligible people can vote with impunity it puts the entire electoral process into question. Those ineligible to vote include non-citizens, convicted felons (unless they've had their voting rights restored by the court), non-residents voting in districts where they do not reside, and those voting using absentee ballots that aren't theirs. Having to show an ID to prove you are who you say you are is a means of ensuring the legitimacy of the process. Valid IDs are NOT difficult to obtain despite claims to the contrary. Remember, you already have to have them to cash checks, receive government benefits, apply for credit, register to vote, and a whole host of other activities that no one seems to find burdensome. 3. "Many voter district lines have been redrawn (better known as Gerrymandering) in order to assure that a particular senator or representative doesn't have a snowballs chance in hell of having an honest race with real competition from the other party." This has been going on since 1812. Every 10 years district lines are redrawn to reflect the change in population as defined by the census. If you think it is only Republicans Gerrymandering, you are sorely deluded. Democrats are just as good, if not better, at redrawing district lines to benefit their party while locking out the opposition. In fact it was Democrat Elbridge Gerry, governor of Massachusetts, who redistricted Massachusetts to benefit his party. This is where the term Gerrymander comes from. 4. "Some states cutting back on 'Vote by Mail'." No, states aren't cutting back on absentee balloting (the so-called 'vote by mail'). Where did you got this idea, out of thin air? What states are trying to do is to improve the system. There are two problems involved with absentee voting at present, both which disfranchise eligible voters: fraudulent ballots obtained by using someone else's name; and absentee ballots not being sent in a timely fashion, which prevents them from being filled out and returned by the due date. This last one has been a problem for a long time and particularly for members of our armed services, denying them their constitutional rights, the very same rights they are protecting. 5. "Assigning 'Poll Watchers' to make sure that only people qualified to vote are able to cast their ballot." You act as if this is something new. It is not. It has been around for a very long time, is not a partisan device, and is used in places where voting fraud has been a problem. In some cases poll watchers have been court-appointed in districts where rampant fraud and voter intimidation has affected elections. (Philadelphia's 20th Ward during the 2012 election is but one recent example.) Let me ask you the following, Bernadette: If voter ID is such a bad thing, then why do a large majority of the American people (75 percent) support it? This is according to a Washington Post poll run back in early August. (You can look it up yourself.) You accuse the GOP of "trying to eliminate as many voters as they can", yet all they really want to do is reduce the number of ineligible voters from committing voting fraud. How is that a bad thing? The five things you listed as "evidence" of "borderline voter fraud on a massive level" are indicative of your ignorance of history as they have not been a GOP-only issue by any means. They are are not evidence of any wrongdoing by either party. As I mentioned at the beginning, I must address your mistaken belief that the U.S. Supreme Court has gutted the Voting Rights Act. Only one part – Section 4 – was found to be no longer relevant and unconstitutional. It required only some states — not ALL states — to put forth to the Department of Justice any proposed changes to their election laws. Why should such a provision pertain to only a few states and not the rest? Back when the Voting Rights Act was passed (1964) some states had laws that made it difficult, if not impossible for black Americans to vote. The states listed in Section 4 were sanctioned in order to make sure that any changes in their election laws did not disfranchise eligible voters for any reason, and particularly race. Those states now have some of the highest voter turnout rates for minorities in the nation. So why did they still have to submit changes to election laws to the DOJ? That was the argument brought before the Supreme Court in Shelby County, Alabama v. Holder, Attorney General. This is 2013. Stop acting like we're still stuck in 1963 and that Jim Crow still holds sway in the South. Or do you have so little faith that we've somehow managed to move past that part of our history and that minority voters will once again be locked out of the voting booth? If you do, then the problem is with you and not the rest of the nation, and certainly not the GOP. Dale Channing Eddy Last Updated on Wednesday, 18 September 2013 10:44 To The Daily Sun, The Arts in New Hampshire would be nothing without the summer playhouses (i.e. Winnipesaukee, Streetcar Company), live performance centers and film theaters that once dotted the landscape in the Granite State in their heyday. Fortunately for us, the Lakes Regions' towns and New Hampshire in general have many performing arts theaters, some of which remain today, thanks to kind-hearted owners/ donors, philanthropists and "patron lovers of the arts." One merely needs to look at the town history in Plymouth, Lebanon, Keene, Manchester, Concord, Franklin, Portsmouth and Bethlehem for starters. They have taken the initiative and follow-through to restore the historic structures of old that once fostered the performing arts in the earliest days of New Hampshire's grandeur and socialization. I will revisit my hometown of Pittsfield, Mass in November for a performance of Gordon Lightfoot at the newly renovated Colonial Theatre that was for decades an uncomely faux-fronted art and painters supply store called Miller's. My children and I attend the shows in Keene, Lebanon, Plymouth and Concord, N.H., these days, where one cannot help but look up at the chandeliers in each one and admire the elaborate and intricate ceiling art and brilliant colors before the performances begin. The "full house lighting" entices you to focus on and appreciate the ambiance of the magnificence Capitol Center as if it was being dedicated for the first time each time one visited for the St. Paul's School Nutcracker performances of the past. There are various "Colonial Theaters" around the country, many of which remain dormant and dark to this day. They are ubiquitous. They were not merely "theaters" as we think of in cinema, but stage performance venues for live shows with noted acts. In Franklin, N.H., the efforts of many advocates have resulted in a magnificent hall that harbors an array of musical performances from folk to dance to plays and fundraiser/0benefit shows. I have had the privilege of performing there (guitar/vocal) in the past for a local annual talent show designed to raise money to replace the balcony seats and an egress to meet the local safety codes. Volunteers did it. They accomplished that based on a show I just attended there in 2013. I must say that the acoustics of the room were the best offerings I had ever played in, in years. But the little city of Franklin did it! Yes, Franklin! Today, that same Franklin Opera House (FOH) thrives with local support and has attracted, with renewed vigor, a downtown crowd and an "local lakes area patron following". Once harboring the police station's needs in the "green room", the newly renovated facility now resounds with music, applause and laughter with comfortable seating and sellout crowds. Kudos to a caring Franklin, N.H. Local restaurants grew and thrive around the theater, especially on performance nights, pre and post shows. Even Tilton's eateries benefit. In Laconia, on Main Street, there is a "Colonial history" as well, its marquee and interior longing for the name and the sounds of live music, theatrical plays, summer-stock "On Golden Pond" performances, an opera or a Hal Holbrook "Mark Twain Tonight" impersonation. The same level of performers at the Flying Monkey (and at the Silver Center) in Plymouth could be at The Colonial — economy boosters. Congrats to Alex Ray for his insight and success to date in Plymouth with The Flying Monkey – a gamble that paid off for a noted restaurateur who was hesitant about going for live shows! He succeeded. The Colonial Theater is more than a memory; it's a building asking for compassion, love and revitalization. It begs to be the next Capitol Center for the Arts and downtown Laconia needs to embrace it to survive financially and culturally. With historic theater restorations come supportive restaurants, cafes, bars and nightlife. That alone fosters new patrons and revenue for downtown merchants and the city, like spokes radiating from the hub of a wheel or a symbiotic relationship like ants on a peony plant. The peony may never flower without the ant that helps the bloom. We are the ants and the theater is the flower! The Laconia Colonial Theater was once referred to, in 1915, as "one of handsomest play-houses in New England." Benjamin Piscopo built the theater in 1913-1914 and it accommodated 1,400 people in comfortable seats of a renaissance era. Main Street and Canal Street stores did not flourish until the theater was opened, a feat that could happen again if desired and supported by the masses. Canal Street was merely a conduit between Beacon and Main back then. The famed Perley Canal (#10) runs beneath part of the famed theater, for back then it was a planned aqueous diversion from the Winnipesaukee River to the Laconia Street Car Co. buildings, now a vibrant condo complex that ultimately saved those historic structures and bricks from the wrecking ball. One historical reference cites that the stage at The Colonial was used for recitals, meetings, high school graduations and cooking classes. It operated for 86 years, fostering entertainment in center city. It harbored movies, vaudeville shows, the music of John Phillip Sousa and most notably, the "world premiere" of the movie, "Return to Peyton Place" in 1961, based on the novel by a local author, Grace Metalious. The world premiere, not just the U.S. premiere. Circus performances traversed the stage as well. Elephants they say! In 1952, The Colonial Theater was host to the premiere of the Greater Laconia Home Cooking School series. Miss Madeline D. Linehan, a Julia Child or Rachel Ray of sorts (because of her apparent captivating personality), taught the virtues of homemaking and cooking that attracted a dedicated following of ladies to the auspicious stage venue. From 1980 to 2000 we know that the theater operated as a movie theater, finally subdivided into five removable sections like a Cinema 8 appealing to the diversity of films offered and moviegoers' desires to have a cinema selection for both adults and children locally. In 2003, a New Durham couple tried valiantly to revive it as a movie theater/pizzeria. (I moved to the Lakes Region in 1999). That moment in 2003 was inspiring to all of us, especially when the marquee was re-lit, as if on Broadway. The lights dimmed and died shortly thereafter for movies alone could not sustain it. "Live shows" were needed! And still are! Sadly, that was probably not what the theater cried out for ... it probably "screamed in silence" for live performances, the same shows that we attended each year for the Frates Creative Arts Center annual dance recitals for my daughter, but relegated to a Gilford Middle School auditorium venue. Broadway North's dance recitals/performances were placed in Gilford as well when if fact they both might have been "Colonial potential" and held "in Laconia" along with high school concerts/choral presentations by Debbie Gibson. Frates's studios are on Canal St., a few steps away — advocates of the live arts to this day. What resulted from the segmented cinema renovation was the partial elimination of the Colonial's historic interior, plush seating and the ability to stage live stage shows with noted acts of interest, both national and local acts. Live performances (on stage) died in the 1960s, history tells us. One theater patron remembers beautiful, glowing purple nightlights, and another friend of mine remembers, as a child, a "Raggedy Ann and Andy" performance with live, over-sized, costumed actors who accompanied a cinematic film presentation with the same characters. The stage engaged the patrons and the elegant lobby beckoned you in! Long hidden or gone today in the theater are the cranberry-colored drapes/curtains and gold-leaf stage front moldings and the "stage right and left" balcony seating for side views of live shows, never mind the warmth and "ambiance" as depicted in a 1914 colored postcard I found that made me wanderlust back to the days of Laconia's passion for the "live" arts. With the passing of the Laconia opera houses, the Colonial remains one of the last bastions of the "arts" that can still be saved to this day. If Franklin, N.H., could achieve it, Laconia can take pride in knowing that this city can do the same with a larger population of residents, some 17,000. The last revitalization of the downtown was in the mid-to-late 1960s; the same urban renewal project that razed critical historic buildings that older residents and I personally wished were still preserved today for posterity. Ancient postcards on a Weirs Website don't suffice and historic photos in a Warren Huse history book don't appease us. Community action does! The Colonial art deco marquee now hangs(ominously and threateningly over people) in desperation, with missing or burned out bulbs. Delivery trucks uncaringly park nearby or occasionally brush the ornate edges, causing the hand-tooled metal filigree and molding to tear open in ragged fashion unbecoming and insulting to its rich heritage. A haphazard aluminum shield, poorly constructed, covers the ornate art. How sad is it that no one will champion the efforts to save the Colonial! No specific plan seems to be in order even after consultants were hired and meetings were held with residents passionate in saving her — some 200 at the first meeting. Don't tell me it is not feasible — 8 to 9 other towns did it! Rhetoric rains prevalent (something must be done you say!), but actions are nonexistent, yet the downtown cries out for business and patrons — the patrons a "new Colonial" would foster and grow. In the next 2013 mayoral or official election in November, pick the person(s) who supports her renovation. Ask them what they will do to save the theater and revitalize the downtown. If they say nothing positive, don't vote for them! Hold them and the City Council accountable. Apathy is a disease and it's rampant. It is "music and the arts" that attract the locals and Lakes Region visitors (year-round); those desiring a vibrant nightlife and community atmosphere in summer and winter. With few exceptions, there is little of either in the city's heart today. The cure to what ails the "arts" is standing right before our eyes at 615 Main. Save the Colonial and light the marquee brightly before it can no longer be saved and lit. It is Lakes Region history and relegated to limbo, but should be the priority and responsibility of all of us and this city's management to resurrect its soul before the heartbeat subsides. A transfusion is needed. Think about what "you" can do personally to help save her, and the downtown. Last Updated on Wednesday, 18 September 2013 10:37 To The Daily Sun, It was recently written that the "Northern Trespass" documentary on Northern Pass will play at the Franklin Opera House on Friday, September 21. It should have said Saturday, September 21. Last Updated on Wednesday, 18 September 2013 10:24 To The Daily Sun, Nick Vazzana's letter regarding low wages was spot on. It is just amazing what has happened to American workers since the 1980s. I remember making $9 an hour running a lathe 30 years ago and I still see jobs starting around that or a hair more. Nick mentioned McDonald's but the chief offender is Walmart. Walmart makes government all the fatter. Casino capitalists don't know or don't want you to know that every Walmart in America costs the people about a million government dollars from social programs that these same casino capitalists want to destroy. Because of the low wages Walmart pays, the majority are eligible for Medicaid, food stamps, WIC, rent help and more. Because Walmart refuses to pay a decent wage, YOU pay it for them. That is capitalism? Throwing the worker onto the dole machine? Helping people in need shouldn't be due to greedy parsimonious corporations. Last Updated on Wednesday, 18 September 2013 10:20

- About AMP - AMP Community - Art News & Media - Online Resources - Websites We Like - AMP Newsletter Archives - Search AMP CALL FOR WORKS Video Slink Uganda Seeking 3 minute videos or shorter by African-Diaspora artists for Video Slink Uganda, a 2012-2013 apexart Franchise project apexart Franchise Exhibition in Uganda: Feb 6th - March 6th, 2013 Artistic Directors: Paul Falzone and Marisa Jahn (REV-) Ugandan video halls (or "bibanda") are often no more than small huts where viewers pay a few cents to watch pirated DVDs on television screens. Located in the majority of villages and towns throughout Uganda, they are the only form of popular visual entertainment and have a wider audience than television and newspapers combined. Numbering in the thousands, these bibanda reach millions of Ugandans each month. So-called 'fine art' never broached their corrugated walls. Until now. 'Video Slink Uganda' is a curatorial project that involves burning five short-form experimental videos by contemporary African diaspora video artists onto pirated DVDs that will be viewed by millions of viewers in individual homes and bibanda. A "VJ" is a local performer/pirate who translates Western films into the primary local language of Luganda, acting as both translator and commentator-making jokes, providing context, and acting as a central node of distribution to the bibanda. In keeping with this tradition of viewership, we will involve several VJs in translating these works of contemporary art for Ugandan audiences. 'Video Slink Uganda's gesture of detournement recalls contemporary works such as Chris Burden's on-camera hijacking of a television news anchor, Negativeland's re-mix of a U2 album shopdropped into music stores in the late 1980s, The Yes Men's subversive self-insertion into the mainstream media, embedded art practices by artists such as Artist Placement Group in the late 1960s, electoral guerrilla politics such as Mr. Peanut, the life-sized tap dancing peanut who won 7% of the vote in his mayoral run in Vancouver, and countless undocumented interventionist projects. 'Video Slink Uganda' similarly reaches out towards new audiences in Africa and frames their viewership not as passive and silent but as active participants in the performative production of 'art.' By embedding experimental film into Uganda's existing black market cinema and culture of re-translation, 'Video Slink Uganda' raises larger questions about origination, authorship, translation, and the complexity of colonialism. 'Video Slink Uganda' draws upon the artistic directors' experience as organizers of media screenings in Ugandan bibanda with existing relations to local audiences and VJs. The project will be documented with specific focus on the audience's reception of the works and the VJs' involvement. 'Video Slink Uganda' also draws upon the artistic directors' decade of curatorial experiences curating, producing, and writing about experimental forms of curation-shopdropping, embedded art practices, and media hijacks. Through a series of cinematographic and installational translations, 'Video Slink Uganda' operates on a syncretic economy whose currency is the slippage that occurs between and through transposition. Submission Deadline and Instructions . Submissions due Sept 15, 2012 (early submissions greatly . Videos should be no longer than 3 minutes. . Either (a) Email your video (attachment should be no more than 10 Mbs) OR (b) Upload your video to YouTube/Vimeo/etc. Then email the link to hello at rev-it.org along with the following attachments: curriculum vitae/resume (2 pages max) and statement about the work (1 page max). . Email the link to your video to [email protected] along with the following attachments: curriculum vitae/resume (2 pages max) and statement about the work (1 page max). . Be sure to include contact info (name, email, phone number) on the top of each page . Please include the words "Submission: Video Slink Uganda" in the subject line of the email. . Due to limited funds we are unfortunately only able to offer the artists a modest stipend of $100 for their video contribution. Stipends for future exhibition opportunities will be determined at a future point in time when venues are secured. We believe in compensating artists and will seek to provide stipends through future exhibition opportunities. . You will be notified in early October about the status of your Contact: Marisa Jahn: 917-902-5396 * hello [at] rev-it.org About the Organizers Marisa Jahn is an artist/writer/curator/activist and and the co-founder of REV-, a New York City-based non-profit organization that furthers socially-engaged art, design, and pedagogy. She was a 2007-9 artist-in-residence at MIT's Media Lab and the editor of three books about culture and politics-("Pro+agonist: The Art of Opposition" (2012), "Byproduct: on the Excess of Embedded Art Practices" (2011), and "Recipes for an Encounter" (2010). Paul Falzone is an activist, media scholar, and filmmaker whose work has appeared in a wide variety of conferences, publications and film festivals. He earned his PhD from the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania and is currently Director of Peripheral Vision International, a nonprofit organization that produces and distributes advocacy media in East Africa. The apexart Franchise is an open call for curatorial proposals for projects from anywhere in the world other than New York City. Three winning projects are selected by a jury each year and are presented by apexart. REV- is a non-profit organization that furthers socially-engaged art, design, and pedagogy. The organization derives its name from both the colloquial expression "to rev" a vehicle and the prefix "rev-" which means to turn-as in, revolver, revolution, revolt, revere, irreverent, etc. from Franklin Furnace

By Amy Silverman By Olivia LaVecchia By Monica Alonzo and Stephen Lemons By Chris Parker By Michael Lacey By Weston Phippen I can't exactly pinpoint why I was so taken with Homer's Revenge by Tucson invitee Brooke Grucella. It's a large image composed of wood panels painted with ordinary house paint, as well as spray paint, nailed to a back gallery wall that's been painted bright rose. Stylistically, it's a possible cross between Lari Pittman and 1980s Kenny Scharf, with a bit of manga and Saturday morning cartoons thrown in to confused me. The multi-panel piece depicts an eyeless, dark-haired, green-skinned female with braces and freckled cheeks, on whose forehead appears an exploding nuclear mushroom cloud. She may or may not be wearing a tennis outfit and may or may not be standing on an elliptical trainer decorated with a death's head that dissipates into thin air. One arm ends in a pile of chili fries and clutches a scepter with a red ball face with horn-rimmed glasses; surrounding and threading through the images are gooey cloud formations, but that's only a guess. In any event, the sheer complexity of Grucella's piece commands a second and third look. I know exactly why I was pulled to Jason Rudolph Peña's painting, One of Us. It's taken from a scene in Freaks (1932), one of the most gut-wrenching, pathos-laced films of all time. It's an unforgettable cult movie that used real carnival sideshow performers commonly displayed for their deformities before such indignities were finally outlawed. The black-and-white cinema classic painted a sympathetically human image of such carnival performers, with "normal" people cast as villains. Peña has used the movie image of Schlitze the Pinhead, who was born Simon Metz in Yucatán, Mexico, with microencephaly, a condition resulting in a cone-shaped skull suggestive of the ancient Mayan practice of head binding and impaired mental abilities. Though a male, he was usually displayed as a female. Peña's piece freezes an excited Schlitze, who is barely intelligible in the film, in a scene in which "she's" being told by co-performer Phroso the Clown that her dress is very pretty and that when he goes to Paris, he will get her a hat to go with it. For me, the image produces instant heartache. Peña's effigy is bathed in a golden light, its poignant title valiantly including Schlitze in a much larger community. I would be remiss if I didn't mention Colin Chillag's Being-Towards-Others, a half-painted, half-drawn canvas of a woman adorned with tattoos chatting poolside with a drink in her hand. Chillag used the left side of the canvas as a carefully labeled palette of color swatches, turning the painting into a study of the artist's painting process. In the sculpture department, several pieces popped out. My pick of the litter includes Pete Deise's Pelvic Triangle, a roiling and spiky metal sculpture with seemingly non-existent welds and pristine white powder coating. While suggestive of the folk tale of the shark-toothed vagina dentata, it also calls to mind the painfully twisted maze of childbirth. Aaron Dunham's From the Depths, the Measured Climb Back to Self recycles wood from an Arizona gamble oak hit by lightning; sanded satin smooth and oiled, parts of the charred tree thread sensuously through each other in a flame-like configuration. Hector Ruiz's Kill Your Idols, a gold foil-covered bull stuck with old Spanish swords and Native American arrows, rather than typical bullfighting paraphernalia, was a huge hit with the kids in the crowd, mainly because of the golden poop that Ruiz added as a finishing touch. Randy Slack's sculptural installation, mein Everest, pairs a 1951 VW Beetle the artist painstakingly restored over four long years with a large painting of what appears to be an old ad for the Volkswagen bug. It's an oversize shrine to the profound bromance between man and motorized machine that I have never been able to relate to. In the category of photography, there was no ignoring Jehu's (nee photographer Jason Grubb's) Sudan, an enormous black-and-white print of an African male whose face is twisted in agony. His anguished expression metaphorically captures the political and social turmoil of the upended African nation, rocked for years by civil war and perverse human trafficking for purposes of forced labor and sexual exploitation. And I'm still trying to figure out how Brandon Sullivan created his digital projection, With an H. It's an ornately framed image of a woman looking into the distance; while she doesn't move, her hair does, as if blown by some unseen wind. As for the bad and/or boring, Smoke by Melissa Martinez and Greg Richard gets a thumbs-down. The badly burned remains of a lightning-struck tree mounted on a metal stand just doesn't cut it, even as minimalism. Saying that something is art doesn't make it so. And I simply didn't get Part and Parcel by Steven Hofberger. The artist painted Greek figures, the outline of a blimp, and biomorphic shapes resembling bacillae on the side of a wooden packing crate, covered with a wash of orange that allows the pentimento of pre-existing shipping marks to emerge. Yes, crates are cool as a medium, but not enough to imbue Hofberger's image with much meaning or interest.

|Register Now | Log in| |Home: BigScreen Journal - Newton, NJ: Newton Theatre Closes| The historic Newton Theatre in Newton, New Jersey closed at the end of September 2010, according to an article in the New Jersey Herald: Pure economics, including consumers' desire for movie options and 3D capability and the cost of showing first-run films at their release date, led to the closure of the historic Newton Theater last week, its operator said. Built in the 1920s, the two-screen theater consistently advertised movies on its classic marquee, at $7 per ticket, until big black letters announced "Theatre Closed" on Friday. "It's a real shame," operator Nelson Page, of Teaneck. "People from the town have always supported the theater." But a lack of popularity from outside the town's borders took its toll. "After 14 years, I could see the handwriting on the wall," he said. "We have a very large theater to the north in Middletown (N.Y.) and one to the south at the (Rockaway) mall. That siphoned away the regional aspect of the theater." Click the Read link below to read the full article. Moviegoers in Newton now will need to travel a little bit to watch a movie in a theater. The nearest theater is AmericanPlace Sparta Theatres in Sparta, followed by the Clearview's Succasunna Cinema 10 in Succasunna and AMC Rockaway 16 in Rockaway (about 14-15 miles away). No comments found. Be the first and let us know what you think! |Commenting on Journal Articles is available only to our readers who have customized this site, which makes it easier for you to complete the form and for us to contact you with any questions or concerns about your comments.| Please login or register a new account before continuing. Our registered members enjoy more features, including: Basic accounts are free -- sign up today! Log in to retrieve your saved settings. |The BigScreen Cinema Guide is a service of SVJ Designs LLC. All graphics, layout, and structure of this service (unless otherwise specified) are Copyright © 1995-2013, SVJ Designs. The BigScreen Cinema Guide is a trademark of SVJ Designs. All rights reserved. 'ACADEMY AWARDS®' and 'OSCAR®' are the registered trademarks and service marks of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part I Ah. More Twilight. Here’s what I wrote about this first chapter in this climactic two-parter back in November (read full review here): “[It’s] very challenging to look at The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 and not want to laugh. Easily [author Stephenie] Meyer’s most insane bit of over the top and giddily silly prose, the basic truth is not a heck of a lot happens here. Sure Bella and Edward get married, and yes the supercilious teenage heroine does get pregnant, but as far as plot is concerned there’s just not a lot of there, well, there. The book is page after page of brooding and pouting and worrying and wedding preparations, and when the final moments do indeed come they’re so freakishly out there and idiotic it’s almost stupefying that a person of even subterranean intelligence could have taken them seriously.” (Releases on Saturday, Feb. 11) Downton Abbey – Season Two So, um, yeah, Downton Abbey…honestly, I have no idea what to write. Easily the most fantastically popular BBC series to play on PBS in decades, this show has met with bushels of acclaim, has one all kinds of awards and has a fan base as far as I can tell roughly the size of Texas (okay, so that might be an exaggeration, emphasis on the ‘might’). But for all the hoopla I’ve never seen a gosh darn episode, and even though I should probably remedy that oversight on my part at some point I’m just not feeling the impetus to do it. Be that as it may, the second season is now available on Blu-ray, and considering its lofty position on the Amazon top ten list (it was second behind the latest Twilight film the last time I checked) I’m sure the majority of you out there don’t need me to tell you that. Glenn Close. John Malkovich. Michelle Pfeiffer. Uma Thurman. All are absolute perfection in director Stephen Frears (The Queen) and writer Christopher Hampton’s audacious and spectacular adaptation of the 1782 masterpiece Les Liaisons dangereuses byPierre Choderlos de Laclos. Heck, even Keanu Reeves holds his own in most scenes, his tragic battle with Malkovich filled with a fire and fury we’ve seldom (if ever) seen from his since. Sadly, a review copy of Dangerous Liasons has not arrived. That said, considering it’s one of my personal favorites I can admit to purchasing a copy from Amazon this very morning. Let’s get this out of the way first: Worst. Tagline. EVER. I’m sorry, but, “Love means never having to say you’re sorry,” is seriously horrible in more ways than I care to state. Anyone who has ever been in love knows ‘sorry’ is the one word you almost can’t do without. Period. End of sentence. No more debate on the subject. With that said, Paramount’s Blu-ray of Love Story is sublime, filled with images that are every bit as poetic now as they probably were back in 1970. As for the movie itself, I may hate that line, but Arthur Hiller’s epic saga of romance is kind of spellbinding, and if that finale doesn’t make you cry than your heart must have been surgically removed from your chest. I can’t say Anonymous was a movie I was anxiously looking forward to. Not because I didn’t want to see a drama toying with the idea that William Shakespeare didn’t actually write his legendary plays and that Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, actually did, but more because Roland Emmerich, the man behind such works of ‘genius’ like Independence Day, the Godzilla remake, 10,000 B.C. and 2012, was the one calling the shots. His is not exactly a name that screams ‘art house’ or ‘quality character-driven’ filmmaking, and as such my reservations towards the man actually persuaded me to skip the press screening when it played theatrically and go to an entirely different motion picture (In Time) instead. That was a mistake on my part, not just because In Time was a relative waste of, well, time. The simple truth is that Anonymous, for all its over-the-top flourishes, for all its historical (or lack thereof) legitimacy, for all the things that make it something of a tedious slog at times, is still quite entertaining when all is said and done. Rhys Ifans is borderline spectacular as de Vere, while the great Vanessa Redgrave steals every scene she’s in as Queen Elizabeth I. Emmerich does a fine job (for the most part) bringing this story to life, and I know have to wonder if someone had been allowing him the opportunity to helm scripts as solid as this one maybe we’d have been spared a decade of disaster film mediocrity. A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas Here’s what I wrote about this one back in November (read my full review here): “The 3D use is blatantly over the top, the film embraces, almost celebrates its R-rating and it is filled with just enough in the way of ribald lunacy it’s hardly a total chore to sit through and very rarely bores. It’s just not my cup of tea, that’s all there is to say about it, A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas hardly a slice of holiday fruit cake I’d willingly take a bite of ever again.” Mitchell just posted his Blu-ray Review of the non-3D version of the film; check it out. La Jetée / Sans Soleil Chris Marker’s short La Jetée is one of the most influential science fiction films of all time. Period. End of story. Nothing more to say on the matter. Sans Soleil, made in 1983 (two decades after La Jetée), is its own, utterly peculiar, magnificently enthralling, sci-fi entity. Together, these two pictures showcase a gifted filmmaker bending the cinematic medium to his own will, and it’s easy to see why in many genre circles Marker is considered an absolute master the likes of which few can compare to. A Star is Born (1937) The original Technicolor 1937 classic starring Janet Gaynor, Fredric March and Adolphe Menjou comes to Blu-ray courtesy of the folks over at Kino, and any fan of legendary Hollywood cinema owes it to themselves to give it a look. While the Judy Garland/James Mason film will always be the better known, this version is still without question the superior one, building to the kind of weepy, old school melodramatic climax that is virtually guaranteed to reduce viewers to puddles of blubbering mush. Phantom of the Opera at the Royal Albert Hall For Phantom of the Opera enthusiasts, this Blu-ray presentation of the 25th anniversary staging of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s shockingly enduring smash at the Royal Albert Hall in London is an absolute must as far as a purchase is concerned. Technical specs are phenomenal across the board, picture and audio as pristine and as astonishing as any a person could have possibly hoped for. As for the those of us who are not fans of Sir. Webber’s obnoxious (and I say that as lovingly as I can) rock opera, this disc is worthy of mild appreciation, nothing more, and I wouldn’t suggest giving it a second glance as you pass legions of them sitting on the shelves at your local Best Buy. OTHER NOTABLE RELEASES (Support this site! Click title to buy from Amazon!) · Casino Royale (1967) · The Cat in the Hat (2003) · The Deadly Spawn · Filth to Ashes, Flesh to Dust · A Fish Called Wanda · It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World · Metal Shifters · The Rebound · The Retrievers · The Reunion · The Sunset Limited · Throw Momma from the Train In many ways, Tom Tykwer's (Run Lola Run, Perfume: The Story of a Murderer) latest drama is a modern-day Sunday, Bloody Sunday set in Berlin and revolving around a seemingly happy couple who both simultaneously fall in love with the same man. In reality, it is actually far, far more than that. Bracing, full of adrenaline, never quite going where you expect it to, this sometimes crushing melodrama is as poignant as it is debilitating, everything building to the type of climax that mixes playfulness, sensitivity, and tragedy in a way that feels fresh and new. 5 Star Day Surprisingly good fantasy/comedy/drama/romance with Cam Gigandet and Jena Malone that works far better than it arguably has any right to. Built on a flimsy premise (guy tries to disprove astrology by seeking out three people born at the same time and place as he), the movie boasts a shockingly literate and character-driven script by writer/director Danny Buday that belies its silly and unbelievable origins. It doesn’t always work, and there are more than a few scenes that had me cringing as I watched them, but overall this is a solid piece that kept me engaged all the way from start to finish. Definitely worthy of seeking out as a rental. Karen Cries on the Bus Columbian import about a woman, Karen (Ángela Carrizosa), breaking things off with her successful yet crass and incredibly uncouth husband after ten years of dysfunctional marriage. The movie is basically your straightforward tale of self-discovery and independence, and while the whole thing can be more than a bit familiar writer/director Gabriel Rojas Vera does a splendid job of holding it all together and keeping the focus on Karen at all times, right where it needs to be. New Tricks – Series 6 The adventures of Superintendent Sandra Pullman (Amanda Redman) and her team of seasoned cops continues, the unit tackling another cadre of Cold Cases abandoned by the police force at large. Fans should keep watching, as this is one show that just seems to get better and better with each subsequent season. How James Marsh’s (Man on Wire) latest documentary didn’t get nominated for the Academy Award this year is way beyond me, as it’s easily one of the very best to have played the festival circuit and to have hit theatre screens in 2011. Granted, the way it ends, what it builds to, isn’t exactly heartwarming, life-affirming or all that touchy-feely in any way whatsoever, Marsh pulling no punches as he chronicles the landmark 1970’s experiment of Nim, a chimpanzee pulled from his natural environment and raised like a human child. Unsettling, to be sure, Project Nim is still pretty outstanding, and to my mind is one of the best pictures of any kind hitting store shelves today. Fantastic Israeli import about three teenagers from wildly differing backgrounds pinning their hopes on soccer as a way to get out of the dire situations afflicting they and their families alike. While the film doesn’t manage to avoid all inspirational sports drama genre clichés, it does sidestep around a heck of a lot of them, all three of the kids more interesting and three-dimensional than they at first appear. Spectacularly shot by director of photography Ram Shweky. Coming and Going Alex is an independent woman with a law degree and an affinity for one night stands. Lee is an insecure OB-GYN who can't seem to get anywhere near women outside of the examining room. When a freak accident leaves Lee with a temporary disability, their lives intertwine in a wild comedy where love can be hell on wheels! (Description reprinted from Amazon.com) Fireflies in the Garden To an outsider, the Taylors are the very picture of the successful American family: Charles (Willem Dafoe) is a tenured professor on track to become university president, son Michael (Ryan Reynolds) is a prolific and well-known romance novelist, daughter Ryne (Shannon Lucio) is poised to enter a prestigious law school, and on the day we are introduced to them, matriarch Lisa (Julia Roberts) will graduate from college—decades after leaving to raise her children. But when a serious accident interrupts the celebration, the far more nuanced reality of this Midwestern family’s history and relationships come to light. (Description reprinted from Amazon.com) Last Man Standing Abby Collins is a former Marine who is now a happily married housewife but soon discovers she will need to put her highly trained operative skills to use when her past comes to haunt her. (Description reprinted from Amazon.com) In 2002 the military captured and imprisoned a supernatural entity at a secret underground base known as Stormhouse. In the final four days of their experiment, a "ghost whisperer" is brought to Stormhouse by the government to make contact with the captured entity. But her arrival triggers a series of events which lead to the entity's escape, plunging the base into a horrific nightmare leaving everyone on board fighting for their lives! (Description reprinted from Amazon.com) What Happens Next After rich businessman Paul Greco (Jon Lindstrom) retires early, his imperious sister Elise (two-time Emmy Award nominee Wendie Malick) tries to get him to settle down with the woman of her choosing. But Paul seems more interested in developing his friendship with Andy (Chris Murrah), a charming young man he meets at a dog park. (Description reprinted from Amazon.com) OTHER NOTABLE RELEASES (Support this site! Click title to buy from Amazon!) · Brontes of Haworth · The Elephant in the Living Room · Father Dowling Mysteries: The First Season · Geek Charming · Masterpiece Classic: Far From the Madding Crowd · Northern Lights: The Complete Collection · Rocko's Modern Life: Season Two · Song of Lunch

LONDON — Munich-based sales company Beta Cinema has sold Uberto Pasolini's "Still Life" to key territories ahead of its international preem in Venice. Wild Bunch secured the title for Benelux, while… Jeff Robinov has departed Warner Bros. as president of Warner Bros. Motion Picture Group, culminating several weeks of mounting tensions among executives at the Burbank lot. The announcement came… Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson reteam for a comedy that's exceedingly affable and good-natured, if also undeniably long in the tooth. Updated 5:56 p.m. PDT As news swirled of layoffs and retrenchment across the visual effects industry, Rhythm & Hues studios was officially sold to an affiliate of Prana Studios. Prana is often called… Helmer Chad Hartigan's second feature is Americana of a very immediate sort, a tale of redemption that may leave its viewers with an uncanny sense of peace. In December 1990, hip-hop magazine The Source published the first in-depth study of the then-nascent "gangsta rap" trend in a special issue. The cover story was unusually prescient, touching on… As anticipated, consolidation-related layoffs hit Universal Music Group's distribution arm on Friday, with approximately 50 staffers let go. "Work It" is a return to the men-in-drag days of "Bosom Buddies" with the thinnest of recessionary twists. Indie film lending cratered with the 2008 global credit freeze, but has regained balance at a downsized volume that seems sustainable and steady, say film finance executives. In these hard times, it seems oddly fitting for a tuner titled "Working" to have been downsized (from 17 thesps in its 1978 debut to the current six) and its score partly outsourced (to "In the… Domestic Film DAILY PROVIDED BY: Box Office Frozen2Daily: $1.8M Cumulative: $100.8M Disney -26.74%

Catalan public diplomacy, soft power, and noopolitik: A public relations approach to Catalonia's governance Author: Xifra, Jordi Source: Catalan Journal of Communication & Cultural Studies, Volume 1, Number 1, 1 August 2009 , pp. 67-85(19) Abstract:In this article, we provide a brief introduction to stateless nation-building and public diplomacy based on the case of Catalonia. On the basis of Manuel Castells' idea of informational society and the concepts of soft power of Joseph S. Nye, and noopolitik of John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt, we show the rich contribution of these phenomena in understanding the theory and practice of public diplomacy of non-state actors, such as stateless nations, in order to build their national identity. Furthermore, when we talk about public diplomacy, soft power and noopolitik, we are talking about governance rather than government (diplomacy, hard power and realpolitik). Accordingly, we suggest that a noopolitikal model of public relations can contribute to effective governance for both public and private actors. Through some examples of the current policies in Catalonia, this article advances a public relations approach to governance. Document Type: Research Article Affiliations: Universitat Pompeu Fabra. Publication date: 2009-08-01 - The Catalan Journal of Communication and Cultural Studies (CJCS) is committed to publishing research and theoretical articles in the fields of media studies, popular culture and cinema, public relations and advertising studies, social communication, new media, language uses in the media, communication and cultural policies, social and national identities, gender studies, sports and leisure, tourism and heritage, among other related issues. CJCS publishes double blind peer-reviewed articles and its aims and scope cover not only Catalan media and cultural systems but also other social contexts. - Editorial Board - Information for Authors - Subscribe to this Title - ingentaconnect is not responsible for the content or availability of external websites

Belajar animasi 3D tidak cukup hanya sekedar belajar menggunakan software animasi 3D. Kita perlu memahami proses pembuatan film animasi. Pengetahuan ini akan sangat membantu mengintegrasikan pekerjaan kita dengan pekerjaan dari tim yang lain. Tulisan di bawah ini mungkin bisa memberi gambaran bagaimana proses pembuatan film animasi itu berlangsung: By Matt Hurwitz Dec 3, 2004, 22:45 Ah, quiet suburban life. That’s what Bob Parr, the former Mr. Incredible, and his superhero family wanted, right? Not quite. In Walt Disney Pictures/Pixar Animation Studios’ latest animated feature, Bob (voiced by Craig T. Nelson), his wife (Holly Hunter) and their three super-kids are brought back to active duty due to the misdeeds of an old nemesis, Syndrome (Jason Lee), and his fellow evil-doer, Frozone (Samuel L. Jackson). Pixar–whose roster of groundbreaking computer-animated films includes Toy Story (the first all-CG feature film), A Bug’s Life, Toy Story 2, Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo–stretched its home-grown technology further for its latest feature venture. The Incredibles marks Pixar’s first foray into animated human protagonists, as opposed to animals or toys, and will showcase technical advancements in rendering photorealistic CG hair, both long and stubbly. Also on the list of firsts: The Incredibles is Director Brad Bird’s Pixar debut, and Bird (The Simpsons, King of the Hill, The Iron Giant) is the first Pixar director to be recruited from outside the company. (He joined the company in 2000, after the Warner Bros. release of The Iron Giant.) Rick Sayre, supervising technical director for The Incredibles, explains that the production pipeline varies for each Pixar film project. “It’s very specific to the way we work and to our software. Even the department structure varies from film to film.” The supervising technical director is responsible for setting up that pipeline and the accompanying departmental structure, and deciding in what ways the company’s proprietary software and procedures will be pushed–or identifying any third-party software that will be required to do the job. “Then, once the show is up and running, I ride shotgun with the director, helping him negotiate the production process.” Computer-animated feature films go through the same four stages as animated and live-action films: development, preproduction, production and post. In the development phase, storyboards are drawn based on a text treatment of the film to serve as the blueprint for the action and dialogue. For The Incredibles, Pixar story artists then created “story reels” to depict writer/director Brad Bird’s script. It was in these reels that the timing of sequences was first addressed and fine-tuned. “In a typical animated film, the storyboard is only about the story. It’s like an illustrated script,” explains Sayre. “It shows the emotional interaction between characters, but there’s very little to do with camera, camera moves or composition. Brad’s storyboards, or story reels, are essentially like an animatic. They’re very specific, with 3D camera moves and the beginnings of effects.” Story reels for The Incredibles were created using a new combination of technology for Pixar. Working in Adobe Photoshop, story artists drew scenes on Wacom Technology Cintiq LCD tablets instead of first drawing on paper and scanning those drawings in for manipulation in the computer. “It saves that step of drawing, cleaning up and scanning. And with the Cintiq tablets, as the artist’s pen touches the tablet, the image appears on the tablet screen–rather than the whole hand-eye coordination issue of drawing with your hand while having to look up at a screen to see what you’re drawing. This was the first time they could get back to a drawing process that they were really familiar with.” Finished drawings were then treated in Adobe After Effects, to apply any camera movement or rough effects that needed to appear in the reels. The Character Team After the storyboards and reels are completed, the animation process begins, though not before a few preparatory steps are accomplished. The characters to be animated must first be created in the digital world. This process, which entails character sculpting, rigging and shading, is handled by a character team comprising technical directors and artists. Basic character design is first worked out via physically sculpting a maquette figure of each character based on illustrations from the art department. While for past feature projects, such as Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo, Pixar artists would have scanned the maquette into the computer using a touch digitizer (accomplished by drawing a grid onto the figure and identifying each grid point in 3D space using a pen-like digitizing instrument), a different process was applied for The Incredibles. In a manner similar to the revised illustration-to-reel process, Pixar artists omitted the step of scanning their previsualization maquettes into the modeling system. “This time we did it entirely without digitizing,” says Sayre. “We had a small team–two people–of digital sculptors. They literally just looked at the maquettes, talked to the head animators, the director and character designers, and sculpted directly into the machine” using Alias Maya software. “We’ve always had the opinion that 3D scanning is valuable if you’re trying to match something directly, like tracing. But there are plenty of artists who don’t need that step. A really good artist can just draw.” The characters are then rigged using Pixar’s proprietary rigging software. Rigging a character entails putting in the bones, joints and controls that enable a character to be choreographed. Rigging defines the ways in which a character moves when animated and encompasses everything from simple limb motion to facial expression. “This film was a big departure for us because it’s all about humans, as opposed to animals or toys,” says Sayre. “We had to almost completely overhaul the character rigging process to come up with a system that was more anatomically based, with bones, muscles and skin. You want the audience to feel like the characters are, say, being put in jeopardy, and the subtleties of how skin and bones move relative to each other help accomplish that.” Not to say there’s no hint of cartooniness. “Nobody’s going to mistake them for real humans. They don’t look like anybody you’ve ever seen.” Once the characters are modeled and rigged, they’re shaded. Shading defines the way the surface of an object or character responds to light, both in terms of color and texture. “A good analogy is the difference between human skin and plastic. They have might the same color, but the human skin is going to have light scattering around inside it, whereas plastic will have light bouncing directly off of it.” Clothing and Hair While the digital sculpting, rigging and shading of characters was handled by the character team, another group of artists focused on modeling the characters’ clothing and hair. “We actually had to tailor the clothing,” notes Sayre. “The difference between an ill-fitting suit and a well-fitting suit is how it’s tailored. It’s quite a challenge when you have a character who, earlier in the film, is a trim Mr. Incredible, and then later, he’s an aging superhero with a big gut.” Pixar clothing simulation artists first visualized the Incredibles wardrobe items using off-the-shelf commercial tailoring/patterning software, then brought these models into Maya for pixel manipulation by the company’s proprietary plug-in suite. The wardrobe models then moved into Pixar’s simulation software. Animators may or may not have the clothing design completed before they begin their character work–and it’s not required unless the character is to have several costume changes. “Even in that case, you don’t actually need to have the costumes completely figured out before you begin animating, but from a production flow, there are a lot of incentives to have the basics of what clothes the characters are going to be wearing buttoned down before you get into production. For a character such as the intriguing Mirage, for instance, you’ll need to know if she’s wearing a dress or a pant suit in a shot because it affects the way she’s going to be able to walk,” explains Sayre. The final prep step is layout, the animation equivalent of blocking a shot. The layout crew choreographs the characters and uses a virtual camera to create shots that capture the emotion and story point of each scene. Layout often produces multiple versions of shots to provide the editorial department with choices for cutting the scene for maximum storytelling effect. “The layout artists break down how long each shot will take, working closely with the editorial department. They determine basic things like where the camera will be in a shot, if and how it will move, what characters are in the shot, and, if so, how they will move, very broadly, relative to each other.” Once layout is complete and the scene has been cut, the final version is released to animation. These artists animate the characters by making use of the work of their predecessors in the production chain. “The animators don’t have to deal with all of the chewing gum and bailing wire details that the technical directors do. They’re able to see the characters in a much higher-level interface. Their interface is more on the level of, ‘Here are the characters, and here are some controls that I can grab and manipulate,’” explains Sayre. “It’s quite an achievement that we’ve gotten it so that we’re doing skin and muscle and bone with high-level controls they can actually see. They don’t have to just work in skeletons or cut-ups. The skin will be in the same place it will be when we render it out at film quality.” One of the systems responsible for providing the animators such control is the arrangement of Pixar’s computer processing and storage systems into a Model Farm, Image Farm and Render Farm. The Model Farm, a collection of Network Appliance FAS960 filers, contains all of the intellectual property–created in the steps described prior to animation–to generate the components that make up each frame or object. Pixar artists have called this collection of modeling data a “digital backlot.” The Image Farm is a pool of storage containing the completed image frames. A third area, the Render Farm, actually generates those completed frames, pulling together the information from the Model Farm in a process referred to as rendering. The Render Farm consists of 1,024 Intel Xeon processors inside eight RackSaver BladeRack supercomputing clusters running Pixar’s RenderMan software. The Render Farm features two terabytes of memory and 60 terabytes of disk space. “The Render Farm is a room full of about 2400 CPUs that just crunch away. [The artists] beat so incredibly on these things–almost 0.25 million NFS operations a second–they would absolutely be destroyed” if precautions weren’t taken. To ensure their supercomputing clusters aren’t overloaded by sheer number of operations requested of them, DNFS caches sit between the Render Farm and the Model Farm filers. Accessing a volume of 3D imagery via DNFS cache reduces the amount of traffic to the server, allows artists faster access to the imagery and, therefore, decreases render times. During animation, the digital artists access the intellectual property (the characters’ shading, textures, etc.) using a collection of proprietary dynamic shared objects (DSO) in combination with the RenderMan shading language. The data is compiled quickly, allowing the textures to be represented without having to utilize the resources that would be required during complete rendering. This process allows the animators to get a sense of how the characters will appear when finally rendered while still allowing them to manipulate characters easily during the animation stage. After character animation is finished, several other steps take place to complete the scenes. “You have to remember, in animation, everything is production designed. If there’s a can of soda in the scene, an artist has to design it. They’re actually modeled and then shaded so that they can be set-dressed and the final set can be built.” Simulation teams make sure the simulated physics of hair and clothing resemble the physics of the real world. Effects artists also get to work, adding effects animation to both objects and characters, if effects are part of the personality or movement in a given scene. The Syndrome character, for example, has the ability to capture another character and move them around. “That’s an effect that moves, but the motion of that effect was actually done by an effects artist, almost as an algorithmic animation,” says Sayre. “Effects artists essentially design digital contraptions to produce those effects.” The effort actually follows in the steps of classic cel animation, which also employed the work of effects animators. “We actually had one artist who had previously drawn completely hand-animated 2D effects for the former Sullivan/Bluth Studios, for both live-action and animated feature films. He was so well versed in effects animation that he was sculpting lightning bolts in 3D in the computer. It was amazing.” The Directors of Photography Computer animation also utilizes the talents of another artist, who works under a title common to live-action film work: director of photography. “Like in live action, the DP orchestrates for the crew the process of placing lighting in the set.” The Incredibles actually had three DPs: Janet Lucroy, who concentrated on lighting, Andy Jimenez, who concentrated on camera, and Patrick Lin, who focused on the layout and composition aspect of the camera. The animation DP’s background must be a varied one. “Janet, for instance, actually has a painting, fine art background, as well as a CG background. Because these films are so heavily art directed, heaving a strong art background is crucial.” The sets are lit in a phase called master lighting. Using “digital light,” scenes are lit in a manner similar to stage lighting. Key, fill and bounce lights and room ambience are defined and used to enhance the mood and emotion of each scene. During the shot lighting phase, which takes place after animation is completed, lighting is finessed specific to how a character moves within a shot. “The DPs have many of the standard tools available that a DP would have on a set. We have the equivalents of filters, obies, flags, barns, etc.,” explains Sayre. Animation is reviewed in a process that, again, borrows from the classic animation period. The director and supervising animators view work in progress through occasional walk-throughs, visiting individual artists’ workstations. Animation sequences are viewed in dailies to ascertain the current state of a scene or sequence. The team views footage on a color-calibrated CRT monitor as well as with widescreen projection to assure the accuracy of color decisions. Sets and props are reviewed in a process called a “sweatbox,” a term borrowed from the classic animation era of Walt Disney Studios. (Many of the Pixar artists came to Pixar from Disney, after all.) “All of the department heads jam into the office of the editor, and if there are any problems, you’ve got all of the right people there to hash it out right then.” A much smaller group of people–the department heads, the director and the producer–assembles in the studio’s largest screening room, with its 2K DLP digital cinema projector, and views shots to be finalized. In addition, film dailies are screened, though not to the extent as in previous projects. “Previous to Finding Nemo, film dailies were an important part of the process, but now they’re really just something for me and the DP. The DP is concerned with color contrast and creative issues, while I’m mostly concerned with making sure everything looks as good as it possibly can on film. All of the finals and approvals come from watching sequences digitally projected in our main theater.” While the computer animation field still draws on the process of its cel animation heritage, to some degree, it has evolved many of its own disciplines, with specialists now required for things never imagined in those days. Sayre says, “I’m sort of an old-timer. Back when I started, there wasn’t coursework in computer animation or anything like that. It’s been really fascinating to see this industry evolve.”

Among Sarris' prettiest disciples at the time was a blond post-deb from Richmond, Va. named Molly Haskell, who wrote bulletins for the French Film Office—a promotion arm for Paris moviemakers—and devoured Andrew's column in New York's The Village Voice. When they were introduced in 1966, Sarris, a squat, slovenly son of Greek immigrants, was still ill at ease with women and particularly with a wellborn knockout like Haskell, 11 years his junior. "I took one look at Molly," he recalls, "and my first reaction was that it was hopeless—she was so pretty and spoke French." Molly, understandably, had reservations of her own. "Andrew had a completely movie idea of how to pay court," she laughs. "He would say things like, 'You have a lot of Southern charm,' or some asinine thing like that." Andy admits now, with a sigh, "I wasn't a good make-out man." Three years later, in 1969, they were married in an Episcopal ceremony. And soon her career began to catch up with his. "If you called up Andy for an article," reports Rafe Blasi, an editor on the now defunct Show magazine, "he immediately asked if there was something Molly could write." But it was more than a case of shilling for the woman he loved. "Andy's instincts were very sound," says Blasi. "He knew she had talent." The most conclusive proof came this year with the publication of her first book, From Reverence to Rape, tracing the sexist treatment of women in films in the last five decades. Among many raves, the New York Times declared that Haskell demonstrated "all those abilities that lesser feminist writers can only claim for their sex." Either Sarris or Haskell would have hooted at a movie scenario as implausible as their own happy ending. Molly, a descendant of Revolutionary Army General William Campbell and Confederate General Wade Hampton, grew up in the genteel splendor of the FFV, the First Families of Virginia. Andrew was raised in blue-collar Brooklyn and Queens where his parents were on relief for 11 years after his father's real estate business went bankrupt in the Depression. Molly is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Sweet Briar College, whereas Andrew survived a "mediocre" performance at Columbia University. And while Molly capped off college with a graduate year in Paris at the Sorbonne, Andrew fumbled into a succession of demeaning odd trades including messenger duty and editorial flunky on a crossword puzzle magazine. Their struggling years are now behind them. Sarris runs (but doesn't edit) a stable of four junior reviewers at the Voice including Molly. On the side he's an associate professor of film at his alma mater, and she moonlights for Viva. Molly is busy on a novel, and Andrew, who just finished a book on John Ford, hopes to start a memoir and novel himself. They screen, usually together, at least 20 movies a week. The favorite family auteurs include Howard Hawks, Alfred Hitchcock and Jean Renoir. Andrew, who "never had many friends" before he met Molly, has at 45 found his social life blossoming as much as Molly's career. "They have both grown in marvelous ways since their marriage," says New York Times critic Vincent Canby, Andrew's best man at his wedding. "Ten years ago nobody would have taken Molly seriously—she was a pretty face. It's a perfect combination because Molly has the social graces Andrew lacks." The Sarrises have just bought a five-and-a-half room co-op on New York's Upper East Side. They already had a condominium on the beach in Quogue, L.I.—a gift from Molly's mother—where they shuttle weekends during the summer. For the present they are sharing the mortgage payments. Of course, a starlet, or even a working Hollywood grip, out earns a critic. Sarris, for all his teaching and royalties (from six books) made $28,000 last year, and Molly brought home $15,000. "We're living way over our heads," Andrew says with a tinge of anxiety. Then, shrugging it off in a reviewer's impression of Walter Matthau, he adds, "but then that's the only way to live these days." Andrew Sarris was a latent bloomer, living vicariously through movies and, until he was 32, in his mother's apartment in Queens. Yet Sarris was not just another New York film nut. In importing France's so-called auteur theory to America, he revolutionized not only film criticism but also Hollywood's understanding of itself—the director had now emerged as the star. And to a new movie-mad generation of college kids, Sarris became the Samuelson of cinema—his encyclopedic The American Cinema became required reading.

Today’s entertainment picks: v Canfield Fair, 8 p.m.: the World’s Largest Demolition Derby begins at 8 p.m. at the grandstand; canfieldfair.com. v Party on the Plaza, 5 p.m.: It will be an unofficial party for Youngstown State University football tonight on the plaza in front of Warehouse 50 on Central Square, downtown Youngstown. v Scrappers, 7:05 p.m.: The last home game of the year is tonight at Eastwood Field in Niles; call 330-505-0000 for tickets. v The Classics, 7:30 p.m.: Crowd pleasing vocal group in the beach-like confines of the Paradise Patio, at Trax Lounge, 4250 New Road, Austintown; 330-799-2249. v Summerdance, 4 p.m.: Electronic jams at this annual music event at Nelson Ledges Quarry Park; nlqp.com. “America’s Next Top Model” (9 p.m., The CW): Forget the runway, how are your blogging skills? On “America’s Next Top Model,” the contestants are forced to act as fashion correspondents in a challenge led by Perez Hilton. “Side By Side — The Science, Art and Impact of Digital Cinema” (9 p.m., PBS): It’s a digital vs. celluloid smackdown as today’s most successful film directors debate the merits of the technologies. tv listings, b6 Youth chorus seeks new members The Salem Youth Chorus is seeking new members. For information or to schedule an audition, call 330-607-6320. The chorus is open to teens (age 14 and up) who want to sing and enjoy challenging repertoire in a demanding but supportive musical and social environment. Students contemplating studying music in college or already doing so will find the SYC an excellent way to reinforce their singing, sight reading, solfege and musicianship. It is also a good way for those who participated in high school music programs to stay involved in singing. The chorus rehearses once a week throughout the season, alternating at rehearsal sites in Boardman and Salem. The rehearsal schedule intensifies prior to performances. The Salem Youth Chorus was founded in 2007 in order to provide teens and collegiate aged young adults with the opportunity to sing choral music as crafted by the compositional masters. It has toured the U.S. and England to perform at cathdrals, and has released four CDs. Fans who couldn’t get into the packed Mumford & Sons concert at the reopening of the Forest Hills Tennis Stadium can request a refund. The West Side Tennis Club, which owns the venue, said Thursday it will offer refunds “to those of you who didn’t have an optimal experience” at Wednesday’s concert. The show was the first in more than 20 years at the 90-year-old stadium, where the Beatles, Jimi Hendrix and the Rolling Stones once performed. Some concertgoers had trouble getting into the packed venue, and the statement said the stadium is dealing with “growing pains.”

"Your soul - it aches relentless from the fear That they will never guess - so unfair that They can make you feel so small And the fear you know is real" In our last episode, I had gone on what I thought was a harmless trip to the cinema with a friend, Sarah. She quickly revealed her true intentions of getting her hands down my pants, and when I refused her, I made a new enemy, one that would haunt me for a long time. Monday morning. School was just around the corner. Any minute, Id be there. Soon, I would spiral into a deep paranoia. Every turn would bring a new look of suspicion. Every breath would yield a new rumor. Every thought would hold a new worry. The day was pure hell for me. It was Monday morning and the dread that filled me was overwhelming. Every minute that ticked by tied my stomach in a new knot. Every second brought me closer to the inevitable confrontation with Sarah. I always dread going to school, but that day was different. I was scared, scared that the entire school would know about Saturday night, and our "date" gone awry. Sarah was out there, and she hated me. I rejected her! How dare I? In her eyes, the fact that I didnt sleep with her meant only one thing: that I was gay. The natural thing for someone like her to do would be. of course, to tell the entire school. And that was my fear. What would happen if she started telling everyone that I was? She had no evidence, but whos was the stronger case? I was this nobody new kid and I could have had Sarah, one of the most popular and sought after girls in the school and I refused. Now how is that going to look? My only hope was that Sarah didn't say anything. It certainly didn't make her look good, true, but what if she put two and two together? She was a very smart girl and Im sure she would have caught on even if I had done what she had in mind. Could she have caught on already? The more I thought about it, the bleaker things looked. I just had to hope that she hadn't, or wouldnt, said anything. If I'm labeled as gay, or outed even, I thought, having my Friday and Saturday nights free will be the least of my worries. Even now, I wonder if Sarah actually had me figured out. But then, there were different worries: if she does, would she go advertising? And if she did publicize it, where would that leave me? Once there was suspicion out there, and then if there was "proof" to go along with it, how could I lie and convince people that I'm not gay? I just had to pray Sarah kept her mouth shut, otherwise, worst case scenario, I could be outed and kicked out of my house in under a week's time. School came. Perhaps it was my paranoia, but I think I heard whispers behind my back. No confrontation occurred with Sarah, just a contest of dirty looks between us in study hall. There was no clear winner in this battle, and as the day ended, the round did as well. It was a draw. The next day, there was still no confrontation. I was a bit relieved, but I was still worried. Sarah could lash out at any moment, and I could be through. That afternoon, I was at work. As a cashier at a local grocery store, I dont have the most glamorous job, but it pays all right. That Tuesday, I had the late shift, until ten, so I had a half-hour lunch break. I went to a sandwich shop in the attached shopping center with a friend of mine, a fellow cashier named Rachel. She's nice and we get along really well. She's called my house a couple times, to see what my hours were, and we've ended up talking for an hour or two. We get along famously. She has a boyfriend, luckily, so she can't have the hots for me. I just worry that her boyfriend might get the wrong idea about our "friendship". It's too bad that she's taken-- I wouldn't have minded a pseudo-relationship with her. We split a grinder and Rachel started the ball rolling. "I heard about you and Sarah." I almost choked on the bite in my mouth. "What's that look for?" she asked. I swallowed hard. "Nothing. I, ah, I guess I just didn't know that it was public knowledge." "Well, it's making it's way around. What happened?" I told her the story of the events of the evening, saying that I was still having a hard time getting over my last girlfriend in my old town. "I'm ready for anything right now. Certainly not what she wanted to do!" I think she was favorably impressed by the load of bullshit I had just given her. "So you're not gay then?" Without changing my expression, I said, "Why the hell would you say that?" "It's what Sarah's saying." "Jesus Christ! That's just what I need! I'm having a hard enough time making friends as it is. If people hear this and believe it, I'm through." "Well, I'll be your friend, no matter what. You know that." "Thanks, Rachel. That means a lot to me." Another pause. "I'm not, you know, gay." "I didn't think so. And if you were, that's okay. I'd be a little disappointed that I could never have you," she said with a smile, "but I'd still be your friend." In that moment, I realized how much I hated myself for lying right to her face and doing it so easily. Did she know how much it tore me up inside? Did she know how much I wanted to tell her? Did she know how much she had touched me by saying those nice things, and how terrible it felt that I was deceiving her? No. I couldn't. Not yet, not now. Someday. So I changed the subject. "What is it about me?" "What do you mean?" "You know, Sarah tried to get her hands down my pants... Katie, that girl from my math class, fell head over heels for me--" "--Lisa is fawning after you--" "--Lisa, from work?" I asked. "You noticed it too?" "Everyone's noticed it." So she tried to explain what my supposed "sex appeal" was during the remaining fifteen minutes of lunch. She came up with a list of attributes, most of which made me laugh. "A tall, dark, and handsome new kid... youve got mystery, nice eyes, a nice body, and youre quiet. Youve got that charismatic Clark Kent thing going on. Youre funny... youre smart... youre the perfect man: a piece of meat with personality and heart!" I'm not really sure how many of those are true, except for being quiet and new. But that's what she told me and that was one of the highlights of that day. We rushed back late to work, but luckily no one noticed. I didn't need another black mark on my record! They rest of the day was boring, but nice. I was in a good mood and very happy. Rachel might not be my best friend, but at least I know that shell remain a friend if she were ever to know the truth. After a few days, I was confronted about Sarahs rumors by almost all of my friends. She pinpointed specific people to tell, in order to destroy me. Ultimately, Sarah achieved nothing with her "rumours" except making herself look bad. I dont know exactly what she went around saying, but apparently, it wasnt terribly convincing. Quite a few people did, in fact, ask me what had gone on between us and if I was gay or not. It hurt to deny who I was, but it was for my best interests, so I simply shrugged off Sarahs allegations. It was very hard for a while, but then I calmed down. I really am disgusted at how easily I lied. I guess I've found out some of the people who might be okay with it, and others that would be completely intolerant. I guess if anything positive came out of this whole Sarah ordeal, it was the fact that I learned more about these people that I know. I know a few that I fell maybe able to handle it, of course, that doesn't really matter, because I'm not coming out in high school, now am I? The Sarah ordeal did give me something else that I am grateful for... His name's Josh and he's in a couple of my classes. We never really talked to each other much, but we do sit next to each other in our History class. A week or so before Sarah dropped her bombshell, we had been engaging in small talk more and more, and we became the kind of casual school friends that you say hi to in the hall and talk to in class. Josh is rather cute, I might add. He's not really the kind of guy that most people would notice, though. He has blonde hair and beautiful bluish-green eyes. Hes of average height and has a swimmers build. A handsome face, too. Nice smile and a strong, and unbelievably cute, nose. Hes not the most attractive guy by anyones standards, but there's something about him that makes him appealing to me and I think it might be that nose. I have a tiny little feeling that he might be gay, too. I dont know how to tell, and its probably nothing more than wishful thinking, but I have this strange feeling about him. A few days after Rachel confronted me, I realized that Sarah had gotten to Josh as well. He acted differently one day. More friendly and outgoing, it seemed. I wondered why. And then, out of the blue, he just asked, "Are you gay?" I paused for a second because I just wasnt expecting it. I looked into his eyes for a moment, trying to read him to see why he was asking. I took a deep breath. "Sarah got to you, too?" "Im sorry to hear that. I have no clue where she got that idea," I answered enigmatically. "I mean, just to say that about me, it makes her look bad. Is she really that conceited?" He apologized for asking. "I should have known, I shouldnt have asked." He seemed quieter for the rest of the day. I don't know why Josh seems gay to me. He doesn't act gay, if there is a certain act that gay people must adhere to, but he does act different from other guys. It's really hard to explain. Maybe it's just because I'm starting to have feelings for him. He did have quite an interest in finding out if what Sarah said was true, and seemed almost a bit disappointed when I gave my evasive reply. I guess only time will tell... ©1997 Oasis Magazine. All Rights Reserved.

Four out of five of the nominees for Bafta's EE Rising Star award, announced on Monday, are female after an all-male shortlist last year. Juno Temple, Andrea Riseborough, Elizabeth Olsen, Alicia Vikander and Life of Pi actor Suraj Sharma have been tipped as the future stars of cinema. Previous winners include James McAvoy, Kristen Stewart and Tom Hardy. It is the only accolade voted for by the public and will be announced at the ceremony on 10 February. The judging panel, which included Pippa Harris, deputy chair of Bafta's film committee, director Kevin Macdonald, actor Benedict Cumberbatch and film critic Mark Kermode, selected the final five from hundreds of submissions made by film industry figures. Jury chairman Harris said they had "a very tough job" making their selections. British actress Juno Temple, 23, who attended the nominations launch at Bafta headquarters in London, said: "I'm so honoured to be up there with this extraordinary young talent - people I'm inspired by and people whose films I go and see." Temple's breakthrough role was in Notes on a Scandal (2006), alongside Cate Blanchett, and her other film appearances include Atonement (2007), The Dark Knight Rises (2012) and she appeared most recently with Matthew McConaughey in dark comedy Killer Joe. Temple said she had heard of the Rising Star award previously in her career, but never imagined she would be a nominee. "It's about people looking at your body of work and congratulating what you've done. That's cool, because I've definitely made some choices that people are either going to love or hate. But I like that, it keeps people on their toes." Temple's forthcoming movies include fantasy film Horns, in which she has been working with Daniel Radcliffe, and Disney film Maleficent, with Angelina Jolie. Elizabeth Olsen studied at Tisch School of the Arts before she took Sundance by storm in 2011 starring in acclaimed films Martha Marcy May Marlene and Silent House. The 23-year-old stars in the forthcoming Spike Lee remake of Oldboy, opposite Samuel L Jackson and Josh Brolin, and said: "Being considered for this award is a huge honour. "So many actors whom I admire have been recognised in this category and I'm very thankful to Bafta and the jury for selecting me." Riseborough, 31, who has had roles in Shadow Dancer, Never Let Me Go, Brighton Rock and Happy Go Lucky, recently finished filming with Tom Cruise in sci-fi thriller Oblivion, set for release in April. Speaking about her nomination she said: "Bafta nurtures new talent throughout the international film community so I am so very grateful to be given this fantastic opportunity." Meanwhile Swedish-born actress Alicia Vikander, 24, who trained with the Royal Swedish Ballet for nine years, made her big-screen debut in Pure by Lisa Langseth. She has had major roles opposite Keira Knightley in Anna Karenina and period drama A Royal Affair with Mads Mikkelsen. This year's only male on the shortlist, Suraj Sharma, got his break when he was picked from 3,000 hopefuls to star in Ang Lee's epic adaptation of the novel Life of Pi. The 19-year-old had no acting experience prior to the role and was living with his parents in the suburbs of South Delhi. However, film critic Kermode insisted the Rising Star award was not strictly for newcomers. "You can be someone who has a track record," he told the BBC. "It's trying to pick people on the cusp of stardom and I do think that all of the nominees are in that position - whether it's Suraj Sharma who's literally arrived at that moment, or Andrea Riseborough who's got a very solid career already." Last year, Kidulthood star Adam Deacon won the award, beating Chris Hemsworth, Chris O'Dowd, Eddie Redmayne and Tom Hiddleston.

Director: Jacques Richard [Henri Langlois: The Phantom of the Cinematheque] is an absorbing and rewarding tribute to a colossus of French film. One of the co-founders of Cinematheque Francaise, Langlois almost single-handedly preserved some of the finest films ever produced in France, including [The Cabinet of Dr Caligari] and [Blue Angel]. From 1936 to 1976, this visionary eccentric devoted his life to the preservation of film, effectively becoming a keeper of cinematic memory. Director Jacques Richard devoted seven years of his life to the gestation of this sympathetic yet warts-and-all documentary. He sifted through all available film archives, conducted more than 80 interviews - including with directors Claude Chabrol and Philippe Garrel - and amassed some intriguing anecdotes to memorialise this giant of cinema. Of his subject, Richard has said he was "a visionary, a filmmaker with the talent of an architect to whom the state never gave enough financial means to preserve what is today one of the most important film archives in the world. He also left us a unique cinema museum." D/P/S Jacques Richard WS Pathe International L French w/English subtitles TD video/B&W col/2004/212mins Jacques Richard was born in Angers, France, in 1954. His films include Ave Maria (1984), Cent francs l'amour (1986). Does America have a ruling class? How does one join it, and should one even want to? Written by Lewis Lapham, American Ruling Class explores the US's most taboo topics: class, power and privilege in … More » [Born Dead] is Jacek Blawut's powerful and intimate observation of Robert Jurczyga, a 23-year-old man incarcerated in remand centres since he was just 15. Close to his release date, Robert volunteers… More » Despite landmines, kidnapping, assassination and death by dehydration and starvation, thousands of determined Shiite Muslims have been pouring across the Iran-Iraq border since the fall of Saddam Hus… More » Nominated for the Documentary Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, [Enron] is a tight, fascinating chronicle of arrogance, conspiracy and greed. Throughout the 1990s Enron grew with astonishing speed to bec… More » Ever thought you've seen it all' [Modify]'s in-depth look at the extremities of body modification will make you think again. ... Exploring methods such as major piercing, tattooing, subcutaneous impl… More »

'Suite' is a mini musical melodrama. It is a meditation on being a nobody in a world where everybody wants to be a somebody. Borrowing footage from 'The Sweet Life' by Italian neorealist filmmaker Federico Fellini, performance artist Inez de Vega sings about the futility of life without youth, beauty and fame while wishing she was one of the director's celebrated heroines from the 1960s. Inez de Vega is an Australian artist whose performances are captured in moving image and still photography. Her cinema-infused works play with our inherited screen culture to create theatrical representations of psychological neurosis, trauma and female subjectivity. For more information about her practice, please visit the following website: inezdevega.blogspot.com Loading more stuff… Hmm…it looks like things are taking a while to load. Try again?

||… that the most controversial Faroese tradition – from an outsider's point of view – is probably the pilot whale killing, in Faroese “grindadráp”. Probably no kind of animal slaughter has been subject to the same level of public scrutiny or has evoked so many emotions and anger as pilot whaling in the ||... that many myths, rumors and stereotypes about pilot whaling in the Faroe Islands pend around the world. Pilot whaling is often seen described, especially on the internet, as a "brutal mass slaughter", “blood thirsty sport “ or a “massacre” performed as “a rite of passage into adult life for participating young men" that takes place “annually”. It's also often claimed that the Faroese kill the whales "just for fun" leaving them to rot on the beach after the killing. These are highly exaggerated claims - and often based on incorrect facts or misunderstandings. People who are truly concerned, might be interested in facts, not fiction. To get the facts right, please go to: http://whaling.fo/ - or just read on. ||...that the truth is: “Grindadráp” is not a hunt as such, but a “dráp” meaning a kill – i.e. the Faroese do not regularly take to sea just to hunt for pilot whales, but only kill those which are sighted swimming close to land. There is no required whale hunt for the young men on these islands. No rites of passage are connected to the practice. The communal processing is open to anyone on the island who wants to participate regardless of age or gender. ||... that at irregular intervals throughout the year, although most often in the summer months, schools of pilot whales sighted by chance around the islands are driven into authorised whaling bays where they are made to beach and are killed with knives in the shallows. ||... that behind the dramatic spectacle of the pilot whale killing is a killing method that has developed over centuries under the close scrutiny of experts whose task it is to oversee the simple technology yet considerable skill and organisation required to kill a whole group of whales as quickly as possible. The killing method is no more brutal than killing in most abattoirs in the world but the fact that it takes place under open air where everybody can see it, and in water where the blood of course colours the sea, makes it seem much more dramatic. ||... that the "grindadráp" is not done simply for entertainment or tradition. The Faroe islanders have hunted long-finned pilot whales for centuries as a way to provide food stocks during the winter - and they still do. This practice provides much needed winter food to a people who have a vested interest in maintaining adequate whale populations. ||... that the whales are not left to rot on the beach. Locals pride themselves on using 90%. Any leftovers which can't be eaten, like the bones and intestines, are dumped in the sea with strong currents. ||... that the whale meat is never sold, but divided amongst the community. Because you can’t grow vegetables on the islands the meat and blubber has been very important for the survival of the inhabitants in the past. It's still regarded to have vital importance. The meat and blubber is still shared and distributed among households according to a thousand years old distribution rules which benefit the ill, the elderly and the poor. Any surplus is donated to hospitals and elderly care facilities. Thus, the pilot whale killing does not exist for commercial reasons. On the contrary - the pilot whaling has been an important part of social life for the Faroese because the joint meat sharing is regarded a sign of great solidarity between the islanders helping each other to survive in the harsh natural environment on these islands. ... that pilot whaling is such an integral part of Faroese culture that the Faroese look upon pilot whale meat pretty much in the same way as most people in the world look upon beef from cattle or pigs. ||... that the pilot whale is not an endangered species. Since 1584 the pilot whaing has been monitored. Since then Faroe Islanders have taken an average of 850 whales yearly out of a North Atlantic population of 750,000 - some years more, some years less. The pilot whaling has not at any time had any significant impact on the stock as a whole since the whaling began. Excavations show that pilot whales where part of the diet in the islands 1200 years ago already. In a 2008 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species report, the organization changed its classification from "Low Risk/least concern" to "insufficient data" in 2008, and listed anthropogenic sound, such as sonar, as the greatest threat to the species. That same report classified the Faroe island practice as "probably sustainable." ||... that lately fewer and fewer pilot whales have been killed (only a couple of hundreds a year) mostly due to the fact that local medical researchers discourage the Faroese to eat the whale meat, because the meat has become too polluted by heavy metals, like methylmercury, and other toxins, like pcbs and ddt, and thus become unfit for humans to eat. This message was just as shocking to the Faroese as it would be for most people in the world if researchers told them that they should stop eating meat from cattle because it is unfit for human consumption. Because of the warnings, human consumption of whale meat has decreased considerably in the Faroes. In general people don't serve pilot whale to children any more and especially young women prefer not to eat it either. It is probably just a question of time before the pilot whaling tradition will stop by itself. ||... that some Faroese, however, have difficulties believing that the wale meat is seriously dangerous for older people to eat. They are reluctant to give up pilot whaling because they remember very well how the Faroese have been plagued by severe economic crises so many times in the past, where people would not have been able to rescue themselves if they hadn't had the opportunity to go back to basics and use the natural resources at hand - among others pilot whale meat, which has saved many lives in the Faroes during times of economic crises. As late as in the beginning of the 1990'ies there was a severe economic downfall where almost a fifth of the Faroese population had to emigrate because they lost their jobs and homes, while part of the remaining population would probably not have been able to survive and stay on the islands if they did not have their bare hands to trust in and could harvest natural resources like pilot whales. Today a new crisis threatens. A few years ago there were ferry connections to four countries. These connections are motorways to the outside world. But the ferry company suffered economical problems and had to close two of the ferry connections - to Scotland and Norway. In a worst case scenario a severe crisis could totally isolate these remote islands from the rest of the world - i.e. an oil crisis. This is why the Faroese are still afraid to give up on the ancient skills to live directly off what nature has to offer, because you never know when the next crisis hits or the world outside could be on fire again leaving the Faroe Islanders all to themselves. Therefore it is still a matter of survival to them. ||... that most campaigns against pilot whaling have failed or just not served their purpose. Probably because many of the campaigns have been quite aggressive and hostile towards the Faroese people. These campaigns seem therefore to work in reverse, making the Faroese more convinced that – even if most of them, in many ways, live a modern life today – they should hold on to their old traditions. The same old traditional ways of utilizing nature that have helped them survive on the islands for so long which also is why they have preserved their traditions more so than most other western countries. ... that in the Faroese opinion the modern world has removed itself further and further from it’s origin – nature itself and from nature within us. They think that the old ways of living in and off nature in a sustainable way, respecting and keeping nature's balance intact, are in imminent danger of being exterminated because mass media and the entertainment industry (among others) have "disney'fied" our relation to animals and alienated humans from their true origin - nature itself - especially people in urban areas who live relatively protected lives and never have to deal with being directly or personally responsible for their own survival. Instead of living off what our close natural environment provides (which sometimes means that killing wild animals is necessary) people have become increasingly dependent on the modern world's systems which basically are built on a heavily polluting agriculture and a destructive mass industry that exploits and pollutes nature, exhausts the soil and utilises animals in a torture-like way. The Faroese argue that in the modern world it has become "normal" to domesticate animals and breed them under most unnatural circumstances with the sole purpose to fulfill egotistic needs of humans in the most convenient way (for humans) so we won't notice the unpleasant discomforting facts: people are meat eaters – and thus in fact predators who need to have animals killed to meet those needs. But having grown up with Disney's way of portraying animals - not least Flipper in TV and Kelkoo (the Orca) in the cinema - it is difficult to face this truth about ourselves and much easier to displace the facts and just let somebody else do "the dirty work" somewhere where we don't have to watch it happen. You could say: in that sense no meat eater is better than any Faroe Islander - they're just being hipocrits. ... that the Faroese think, that everyone who eats meat should realise that it is a fact we can't run away from: humans are predators (as long as they eat meat) and to get meat on the table there must be shed blood, one way or the other. But it seems that people will rather displace this fact and get upset with some of the few people left on earth who still kill wild animals in their vicinity for food, because they take personal responsibility for their own survival rather then being too dependent on industrially produced food that mostly has to be imported a long way. To the Faroese the pilot whaling is just their traditional way of providing food to themselves and they don't understand why people get so agitated by that. The ask the question: Is the industrial way of providing food really more humane? ||... that one can always argue whether some sea mammals are more intelligent than some mammals on land or not. But the Faroese ask: Who's to determine how intelligent an animal has to be to earn the right not to be eaten by humans? There is not scientific evidence enough to indicate that whales – e.g. pilot whales – are much more intelligent than some of the most common domestic animals on land people kill for food. Pigs are in fact some of the most intelligent mammals – more so than dogs, for instance, that some claim are at the same intelligence level as pilot whales. ... that the Faroese emphasize that they are very concious of keeping nature's balance intact while utilizing what nature offers and still being human and sensitive enough, not to make the whales suffer unnecessarily. The Faroese take in fact pride in striving to make the killings as swift as possible not to distress the animals more than necessary. They respect the animals in their own way - and consider the pilot whales to be a precious gift from God, they are very grateful for. ... that in the opinion of the Faroese the schizophrenic, industrial, modern way of living is hypocritical, much greedier and much more cruel and more dangerous than the Faroese traditional life style will ever be. They say that, in fact, the modern life style of people throughout the world today has proven to be the real threat to the world and it's inhabitants – humans as well as animals. The Faroese are not to be blamed for the pollution of the seas and the contaminated whale meat. The Faroese think that people should rather concentrate on protesting and campaigning against the ignorance the modern way of living causes instead of suppressing the last remains of a tradition that represents a well tested, sustainable and basically much more balanced and in the end more life-sustaining lifestyle - if it hadn't been for the pollution. This is how the Faroese look at it. That is why they for so long have been prepared to fight for what they regard as their natural rights: to harvest, in a sustainabe way, what is available at this high latitude, where you can't grow vegetables just as they've done for more than a thousand years – also even if it means that the campaigners have succeeded in making them a scapegoat in the world media. ||... that the Faroese say that they have lived through many trade embargos and boycotts before and seem not afraid of doing that again, because they know that "if everything else fails, we could always kill a few whales to fill our empty stomachs! Heavy metal or not." ||... that the Faroese do not regard themselves as an endangering factor to the whale population because the stock had not diminished until later years even if the Faroese have been killing around 850 pilot whales on average almost every year, at least fromthe year 1584 when they started to monitor it. This an average amount they have never increased – unless they were absolutely forced to because of famine. Even if the population on the islands has tripled the last 100 years the number of whales killed did not increase which proves that the Faroese have taken care of the stock also long before the mercury pollution was known. The tragic irony of it all, some would say, is that if the campaigners succeed in getting large crowds of people or even countries to boycott Faroese products or to refrain from travelling to the islands this will isolate the Faroese people even more, making them less susceptible to other ways of thinking that could change their minds, and it might very likely cause an economic crisis in the Faroes which, consequently, will force the Faroese to live off what is at hand in their own environment – e.g. killing pilot whales! ||... that more information and facts about pilot whaling can be found here:

Mr. Clean is Nepal Prime Minister N. P. Upadhyaya Kathmandu: All that glitters is not gold. Temporary illusion could be there. The manner new Nepal Prime Minister Dr. Babu Ram Bhattarai is being eulogized for his "clean" image that he is in possession as of today, analysts here wish to declare him as Mr. Clean and will continue to take him with that nomenclature as long as he remains to what the analysts have coined for him. Too much praise, which is incessantly pouring in may rebound, Dr. Bhattarai should understand if he is a full-grown political celebrity. He must refrain from such unwarranted admiration. In addition, the Madhesi Front with whose "calculatedly prearranged" support he has become the country's 35 Prime Minister should well comprehend that his Premiership would be always challenged by some disgruntled leaders of the 'Front' who have been told to join his cabinet for extracting some political gains that ultimately be neither in his own interest nor in the larger benefit of his own nation. Dr. Bhattarai would soon begin to exasperate sooner than later. Mr. Clean-the new Nepal PM should understand that the European lobby with a bit of US element have been made to enter his cabinet for extracting a variety of legal/ illegal and seen and unseen extraterritorial political gains. The Indian lobby, the moderate bunch seated inside Delhi's South Block as is being given to understand, which has definitely elevated Dr. Bhattarai to this new post would try to use and over use new Nepal Prime Minister to "institutionalize" in Nepal the Indian permanent interests that are aplenty. The Indian moderates won over the hardliners who conclude that the Maoists can't be "trusted". Yet the Delhi reasonable offered a "last chance" to the Maoists. Delhi's shift in looking at the Maoists is visible. But for how long? Chances are fair that Mr. Clean could be used as a political tool by the Indian establishment or else why the Indian media and the regime across the border went out of the way in praising this modest Nepali political persona from remote Khoplang village who though has spent half of his total age right being in the Indian Union-either in the name of pursuing higher studies and also while remaining engaged in the so called People's War-which flourished under Indian care. No longer a secret. String must have been attached though as of now it remains in an invisible form. Analysts presume that it would be made visible with a big bang. That Nepal PM's arms will be mercilessly twisted by the Indian ruling elites has already come to the fore which gets reflected in the quick message of congratulations sent to Dr. Bhattarai by his Indian counterpart, Dr. Man Mohan Singh, (who is himself a proxy and is nicknamed as Junior Sonia) who says in his laudatory message, (sic), "Our relations are special and characterized by intense people to people interaction and an open border". Dr. Singh apparently wants to remind the Jawaharlal Nehru University, JNU, graduate that India has 'special relations' with Nepal and thus he should act accordingly. To recall, the general population in Nepal abhorrently rebuke this Indian claim that Nepal and India have "special" relations. The word "special" is taken as an insult in Nepal by the general public save a few interested quarters. As regards the open border, the Nepalese population will take a sigh of relief the open border is fenced and a visa regime comes into effect. Pressure is being built in New Delhi to tame Dr. Bhattarai. Moreover, analysts in Kathmandu would be more than interested in knowing as to how the JNU scholar, now the Nepal PM, would expedite those good old days 40 points demands which he had himself forwarded to the then Nepal Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba for its realization. # (Submitted to Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba on 4 February, 1996 by Dr. Babu Ram Bhattarai on behalf of the United People's Front Nepal). To recall, out of those 40 point Maoist demands, the first nine ones were directly related with doing away with the several unequal treaties, understanding and agreements and many more that the Indian regime, as the Maoists had claimed then, had imposed on Nepal unilaterally at different intervals of history. # (The nine point follows at the end of this story for the record). The daddy of them all was the demand for the abrupt abrogation of the most notorious 1950 Treaty of Peace and Friendship with India. Neither peace nor cordial friendship, the treaty could bring. Now the question is that whether the Maoists, more so the new Nepal PM Dr. Bhattarai who had himself demanded the scrapping of this treaty with Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba as back as early 1996 will take the much needed and required "political initiatives" for freeing his own country from the clutches of the Indian regime from his own reading? It would be these nine point demands whose positive materialization in Nepal's favor will at best determine the political shrewdness of Mr. Clean. Or he will stand exposed. Analysts here have some tips for Dr. Bhattarai. He can seek the good offices of his good old days 12 point Indian friends, Professor Sukh Dev Muni, Shyam Saran and Sitaram Yechury in pressing the Indian regime for addressing the genuine Nepali grievances more so of the Nepal Maoists itself, to be more precise. (It were these Indian luminaries who jointly had drafted the 12 point Delhi agreement, it was talked then). They may drop in Nepal any moment to see their Nepal friend assuming the post of Nepal Prime Minister. High excitement must have been there. Perhaps the new Nepal Prime Minister can talk straight, if he collects the needed courage, with his Indian counterpart about the Nepali ailments because the way Dr. Man Mohan Singh has sent Bhattarai the congratulatory message in haste ( undiplomatic one) does remind the Nepalese population that both Dr. Singh and Dr. Bhattarai were "brothers" who unfortunately got lost in India's KUMBHA fair-Mela. If so, then Dr. Singh may listen to his brothers' genuine plea. Nevertheless, the fear among the Nepali academic circle is also that what if Nepal Prime Minister gets carried away by his New Delhi's old friends? Will Bhattarai be able to withstand the excessive pressure that may approach from these quarters to keep China at a comfortable distance? Moreover, apprehensions are also that Prime Minister Bhattarai who enjoys a "distanced and cool" relations with the middle Kingdom will continue with his current posture against Beijing as he possess today or he is just pretending it to be so in order to keep the Indian mentors in a good mood without exhibiting his internal political plans for China which could be not to annoy the Chinese regime at the cost of his old friends in New Delhi. Tight rope walking it would be for Mr. Clean indeed. In fact, Bhattarai can't ignore the Chinese friendship which is already in an advanced stage. To go along with China is his compulsion. He must tread the path adopting an equi-distant or even equi-proximity theory in the conduct of Nepal's relations with both India and China. He can't simply brush it aside under his personal whims. Even if he dares to do so under alien pressure, which is sure to approach him sooner than later, then he will have to face his own party's grumblings for a variety of political reasons. The wrath from the national population will follow instantly. Having said all these, Bhattarai will have to go on a political course that will be more guided by the Madhesi Front preferences as it is puzzling to the lay men on how to take the formation of this cabinet? Whether it is a Maoist's led government or a government of the Madhesi Front who exhibited their sagacity in picking up the Prime Minister from the Maoists camp? The fifty-fifty presence of the Madhesi parties may any time pull the legs of Bhattarai if he ignored the Madhesi demands. How this Front and why this set has supported him is any body's guess which perhaps Bhattarai knows better. The Front practices unstable politics. Chair is what matters for the men engaged in the front. This has been the experience gained so far. Apart from these, wisdom would demand that Bhattarai seduces the "traditional parliamentary forces" to enter into his team. Bhattarai should also keep in mind that the "excluded" parliamentary parties equally remain in the good book of the 12 point regime which elevated him to power this time around. The NC and the UML, now in opposition, can crate problems for his government. Schemes are being devised on how to corner new Nepal PM and his party whom they brought from the 12 point capital. An internal party squabble, that is in existence still, may flare up any time if he fails to satisfy the men belonging to various lobbies. Moreover, Chairman Prachanda may not have digested Bhattarai's elevation to this post which he aspired for himself. Clearly, Prachanda will use Dr. Bhattarai's good offices to mend his disturbed relations with the South Block mandarins. Chairman Dahal may exploit from Bhattarai's introvert nature. In all, Dr. Bhattarai has not so many things to boast, Nepalese intellectuals understand it better as to how the RAW men had sneaked in Nepal and had lobbied for Bhattarai's elevation. The RAW men, Alok Joshi included, were here mid August, 2011. Later Ambassador Prasad stamped this new equation upon his arrival in Nepal. Whether the RAW team this time met the Nepal ex-King or not remains yet a mystery. To recall, the RAW men had enjoyed a lavish dinner at former King's private residence, Nirmal Nivas, on May 28, 2011, late evening. Yet, Mr. Clean's modesty and honesty must be recognized. He deserves deep appreciation for his workaholic nature. But to keep his image clean, he must begin cleaning his own house first as it is in the rumor in Kathmandu's informed citizenry that his wife, Madame Hisila Yami-Bhattarai while serving the Civil Aviation ministry in the recent past had amassed astronomical amount of wealth. Why not to clear this allegation and assure the people that those were just allegations made by some vested interests to malign his family members? Analysts now wish all the best to Nepal new Prime Minister, Mr. Clean, hoping that the national past glory and pride will be revived during his upcoming not so good-not so bad Prime Ministerial tenure. # First Nine Points demand related to Nepali nationalism follows: 1) Regarding the 1950 Treaty between India and Nepal, all unequal stipulations and agreements should be removed. 2) HMG should admit that the anti-nationalist Tanakpur agreement was wrong, and the Mahakali Treaty, incorporating same, should be nullified. 3) The entire Nepal-Indian border should be controlled and systematized. Cars with Indian number plates, which are plying the roads of Nepal, should not be allowed. 4) Gorkha recruiting centers should be closed and decent jobs should be arranged for the recruits. 5) In several areas of Nepal, where foreign technicians are given precedence over Nepali technicians for certain local jobs, a system of work permits should be instituted for the foreigners. 6) The monopoly of foreign capital in Nepal's industry, trade and economic sector should be stopped. 7) Sufficient income should be generated from customs duties for the country's; economic development. 8) The cultural pollution of imperialists and expansionists should be stopped. Hindi video, cinema, and all kinds of such news papers and magazines should be completely stopped. Inside Nepal, import and distribution of vulgar Hindi films, video cassettes and magazines should be stopped. 9) Regarding NGOs and INGOs: Bribing by imperialists and expansionists in the name of NGOs and INGOs should be stopped.

Over the past decade, Turkish-German director Fatih Akin has established himself as one of world cinema’s most distinctive voices, mixing sophisticated cultural critiques with a healthy appreciation for life on the edge. He first came to international attention with his 2004 breakthrough feature Head-On, which gained notoriety when the German press discovered that his lead actress, Sibel Kekilli, had previously starred in several pornographic films. The ensuing uproar brought the film to mass awareness, albeit as the object of scandal, but it didn’t overshadow the film’s evident strengths—or Kekilli’s performance, which won several German film awards. After Crossing The Bridge, a boisterous documentary on Turkish music, Akin returned to fiction with 2007’s masterful The Edge Of Heaven, whose German title, which translates as From The Other Side, telegraphs his interest in the permeability of national and interpersonal borders. Although Akin’s filmography is dense and diverse enough to negate any notion of a prevailing style, his newest feature, Soul Kitchen, still came as a minor shock. After establishing himself as a serious, politically minded filmmaker and a de factor spokesman for Germany’s large Turkish population, he shifted course with a lively comedy about a Hamburg restaurant. The titular dive is a favorite in a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood, one whose regular customers derive comfort from its reliably flash-fried entrees. But when financial troubles threaten, Soul Kitchen’s owner teams up with a temperamental chef who just stormed out of his high-end kitchen. What follows is at times the stuff of National Lampoon movies, including a sequence where the chef mixes liberal quantities of an aphrodisiac powder into a celebratory dinner, with predictable results. But while it isn’t among Akin’s most political movies, it is one of his most personal. The 37-year-old filmmaker, who recently became a father for the first time, recently told The A.V. Club that he conceived the movie in part as a farewell to the nightlife of his native Hamburg, and to a life he’s leaving behind without reservations, though not without regrets. The A.V. Club: In a 2008 interview with Der Spiegel, you said you didn’t feel you had the eye for telling stories about Hamburg anymore. What changed? Fatih Akin: I was wrong. Somehow it was challenging me. I really missed shooting in my hometown. I went to many exotic places—I shot in Turkey, I shot in New York. But because my social life is based in Hamburg, the kindergarten and my physiotherapist and my office and my company, I thought “It’s really not very attractive and not exotic for me anymore.” But I was wrong. There’s always something to discover. The city was always so good to me. I was born in that city, and it always protected me and supported me every time. I felt like I had to give the city something back. With the experience I got abroad, I took it as a challenge not to shoot the tourist places of Hamburg, but to find a way to shoot the personal places of Hamburg—on the one hand, my own places where I have memories, and on the other hand, places that will really be exotic. My set designer Tamo Kunz and I, we really like places that will disappear in the future. Many of them already don’t exist anymore, but I can preserve them with a camera; I can hold them. When you see The American Friend by Wim Wenders with Dennis Hopper and Bruno Ganz, Wenders shot that in Hamburg, and it’s such a unique, beautiful Hamburg which doesn’t exist anymore. Film can be time travel, and that was the purpose. AVC: You’re a father now? FA: Yes. I have a kid. AVC: You’ve talked about how now that you’re a father and you’re in your mid-30s, your lifestyle has changed. You aren’t going out five nights a week and partying until dawn. So was part of the impetus for this movie to document not just places that will soon no longer exist, but a part of your life that is passing away as well? FA: It was meant also as a farewell to a certain lifestyle, yes. Preserving the neighborhood is one thing, but also I had a feeling that I had to say goodbye to the streets and to the clubs and the concrete. This thing, the nightlife, was very important always to me, from very early. I started to go out to my first clubs at the age of 12. It was interesting to observe people and to see what’s going on, and I will always like urban culture, but all this poison that comes with this lifestyle, after a while, I really was exhausted. You go out and all of the sudden you’re the oldest person. I go to an electro party, and all the girls and kids are tiny, and I’m in the middle of 30. I think that was the time to me to say goodbye. It was very important to do the film, because I know that Head-On and The Edge Of Heaven were about geopolitical things, but for me, this was very important and very personal, this lifestyle. This film is like a transition, but I wanted to end it with a film, to celebrate it with a film before I get too old. I was almost too old before I did Soul Kitchen. I had to do it at this time, or never. Sometimes filmmakers do films about their past or the good old days. I didn’t want to—now I’m 37, it’s easy to say that I don’t know what I will do in the future—but I like the idea to always be in the same eyeline as my heroes. I hope I can do films for a long time, and maybe one day I’ll be 70 and I still can shoot, and my heroes will be 70. AVC: Rather than trying to do romantic comedies about teenagers when you’re 70? AVC: As you say, this movie is less overtly political and generally more lighthearted than the movies you’ve made recently, but it also seems very personal in a lot of ways. You’ve DJed parties like the characters in Soul Kitchen, and the restaurant is based on a place from your life. FA: All my films are very personal. They’re auteur films, in a way. I’m the scriptwriter, I’m producing it, and I’m the director. Soul Kitchen is more like a diary. The other films were really more like my reflections about the world and my issues. I want to change the world. I want to make it a better world, whatever that means. Soul Kitchen is very liberated from these things. It has other problems; it has other issues. Although it’s very light and silly and we tried to make a commercial hit out of it, which it was in Germany and a lot of other countries in Europe—Greece and Italy. I was trying to make it commercial without selling my soul. It is like a diary. I was in those clubs; I was carrying this drunken woman home. We always had the temptation, because these people were so beautiful, but they were drunk. I was not stealing turntables, because they were too heavy, but I was stealing records at a time before I could afford them. A lot of the world in the film is really much about the filmmaking. I don’t think I will ever do a film about filmmaking. I think it’s too boring; there’s a lot of insider stuff. The best film about filmmaking, I think, is Day For Night by François Truffaut, and 8 1/2. There’s nothing to add, I think. They told it how it is. I could really use the world of the restaurant as a symbol for the filmmaking. The chef is really much like a director, cooking and improvising. The owner of a restaurant is really much like the producer of a film. The customers are like the audiences; the dishes are like films. You even have film critics with the critics of the restaurant. It was really an opportunity to do a film about filmmaking. It went so far that I was wondering what Adam [Bousdoukos] was acting as, and I was asking him, “What are you doing there?” and he said, “I’m imitating you, man. That’s you.” AVC: Are you tempted to tell people to go fuck themselves if they want warm gazpacho? AVC: Looking at Soul Kitchen in the context of your other films, even in this relatively light comedy, it’s still about the conflict between tradition and modernity. The food at this restaurant is lousy, but people like it because it’s what they know, and even if the new food is better, they don’t want it because it’s new. FA: This aspect is about filmmaking, also. I am not a democrat in many aspects, especially about films. There’s a very bad thing happening all over Europe; more and more arthouse movie theaters are closing. There is still an audience, but less. DVD, Internet, and maybe less education gives them less impact. More and more beautiful arthouse cinemas—certain arthouse cinemas are like churches to me, they are very, very spiritual; watching a film can be a spiritual experience—and what is happening is that other places like multiplexes open up. The multiplexes also play the arthouse films, but these films cannot compete. Certain films need time to get discovered. They need to breathe. They need people to speak about them on the street. They don’t have tons of money to advertise, or George Clooney, so when arthouse films are playing in multiplexes, after one weekend, if they’re not a hit, they’re out. This is such a tragic thing. But this is democracy, this is the market, this is capitalism. If I really had the power, I’d treat the cinema culture like they did in the Soviet Union, I would really do that. I would force the people to see certain films. I took this to the European parliament, I was asking for it. They invited me to speak there about auteurism, and I was like, “Hey, you have the European funding for films. You spend a lot of money for them. But you also have to advertise for them, or you block cinemas, and for that, you need money. You have to support the films.” Making them is just half of the journey—these films have to find an audience. AVC: You must have known going in that Soul Kitchen had the potential to be the commercial hit that it turned out to be. How was it different to make a movie knowing that many more people might see it? FA: It was a challenge. I was asking myself, “Can I be commercial without selling my soul? What is the most commercial I can be?” That was one of my targets. I really worked very hard, not just making the film, but also doing all the advertising. We were analyzing how Obama won the election, and we tried to copy his Internet system; we tried to work a lot with Twitter and blogs and Facebook. I’m not really into that world. I’m collecting vinyl, so I had to learn to use these tools, in a way. It became a success in that way. It was not just a bit better than the other films, it almost doubled it. To get all the respect for your work is one thing, but you really want them to be seen. I have a certain amount of people who are watching my films in Germany, but now with Soul Kitchen, it’s almost 1.3 million, something like that. AVC: Not many people in the U.S. have seen your first feature, In July, but that was a fairly traditional romantic comedy. How does Soul Kitchen compare? FA: Head-On and The Edge Of Heaven worked somehow better than In July. Head-On had like 800,000, but the thing with [Head-On star] Sibel Kekilli was porno scandal stuff; they were real notorious people, and it made people curious somehow. Not on purpose, but that helped. The next one I’m going to do is more serious and darker than Soul Kitchen, but if the success of that movie helps more people have an interest in what I’m doing next, besides my main audience, that would be nice. Growing my audience is a target of mine. AVC: It’s refreshing that you’re so honest about it. A lot of directors will make a more commercial film and then come up with all kinds of ways of not admitting that’s what they’ve done. FA: Cinema is a collective experience. Many people sit together, there’s a lot of seats, and you want those seats to be filling up. I’m not that egoistic, to say “No, I only want to do a film for me, I don’t care.” That’s not true. For sure I do them for me, but I hope I can share it with as many people as possible. I can’t hide or fool you, anyway—everything is there. AVC: You said you want your films to change the world somehow. What do you mean? FA: I mean I reflect the world which is surrounding me—which I put a kid into. I can’t accept the world how it is. There are certain things I don’t want to accept, and I reflect these things. I know that the cinema or art can change things. Rock ’n’ roll changed things. Rock ’n’ roll was not just Jimi Hendrix playing guitar. Rock ’n’ roll was much more; the new Hollywood culture was rock ’n’ roll too, and it really made me think about a lot of things. Through films I had discovered, certain things inspired me to read certain books, and these books made me think in certain directions. I’m not the only one. I’m one in a million. I don’t believe that cinema can change the world with a huge impact, but maybe one drop. Maybe this talk is naïve, maybe I will speak different in five or 10 years. Maybe my opinion about the world will change. But right now, I have the status quo I have. I say this because you have the Dennis Hopper guys and then you have the rumors like, “Hey did you know that these people are right[-wing] now and they’re voting for the Republicans?” And I say, “I don’t believe it!” but maybe it will happen to me. I don’t know, but right now I don’t want that to happen to me. AVC: Tbere’s a power just in that kind of determination. FA: Filmmaking is entertaining, and should stay entertaining. Literature and music too. Bob Dylan changed so much just through his lyrics; just the things he was singing about made a lot of people follow him. I think after a while, he was scared about it, and then he was plugging in an electronic guitar. When I was a kid, 10, 11, or 12 years old, I was how boys are or should be—I was into war. You had to become a soldier. And Hollywood knows this, and they work with that with films like Top Gun, which came out when I was 12. The girls in my school were falling in love with Tom Cruise, and that’s why all the boys wanted to be in the Navy or become soldiers. I was one of them. But not so long later, when I was 14 or 15, I discovered films like Platoon, or Mississippi Burning by Alan Parker. I was 16, and I remember watching Mississippi Burning, and the next thing I did after I left the cinema was become a member of Amnesty International. Film has an impact. Definitely I don’t want to preach with the films. I want to entertain, I want people to see the stuff and to be entertained with it, but you can smuggle stuff in there with it. There’s The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, the John Ford film, Liberty Valance one night breaks into a newspaper and beats up the newspaper guy. They really almost kill the guy, and the last thing he says is that it’s very important to keep the freedom of press. This is a political message in a Hollywood Western. Look to Iran or China: Filmmakers in China get arrested just because they do films. That means people see your films. Hollywood used that. The Pentagon isn’t going to give Francis Ford Coppola helicopters because of his opinion about the war in Vietnam. They support Stallone, and that means he can get the helicopters. It means that there is power. You don’t have to be a preacher. AVC: It also means that every action movie has to be favorable to the military in some way, or they won’t get to borrow tanks. FA: I think the Pentagon has an office in Hollywood where you can send your script and ask them for support, and they have script doctors, and they tell you what to do or not to do. And the military knows about the power of cinema. AVC: Of the projects you’ve mentioned doing in the future, one is a movie about immigrants coming to the U.S., and the other is a life of the great Turkish filmmaker Yilmaz Güney. Where do those stand? FA: I’ve been working for a long time on Güney. I interrupted my work for a while because of another show. I love Güney and his cinema. I think his personality is very fascinating, but this is like a good DJ track. When you first start, you need to have one record on the side that you know will work, so when nobody is one the dance floor, you play that track. Güney is something like that. Güney is the track I need to save. If nobody’s liking my films anymore, I need to go to the Güney. I’m writing several things. I can always change—sometimes something will interrupt my plans and change things. Soul Kitchen wasn’t on my map, actually. I was working on The Devil when I decided to do Soul Kitchen. I still write about immigrants, and I still write other stuff, and I’m not sure what will come next. It’s a bit like gambling in Vegas. You put a lot of coins in different machines, and you hope that one will make it.

files/pictures/picture-35.jpgPress Release from Brewster Parsons VENICE, CA. – Nov. 14, 2011 – The artists and producers from visual effects studio Brewster Parsons are very proud to detail their contributions to the sensational Kinect for Xbox 360 spots from advertising agency twofifteenmccann and Anonymous Content director Malcolm Venville. "The Kinect Effect" debuted on October 31 in :74 and shorter lengths across the U.S. and Europe. Currently appearing at www.youtube.com/xbox , the spot will screen in theaters and during high-profile broadcast and cable events throughout the holidays. "In this film, viewers can see how in its first year, the phenomenal Kinect for Xbox 360 has inspired people to experience the world in new ways," Venville said. "The clients on this project were great to work with and I enjoyed my collaboration with them and I'm also especially grateful to the creative team for their commitment to this script." According to Darcy Parsons, executive producer for Brewster Parsons, the project's creative vision kept growing to embrace the surprising number of applications that scientists, educators, tinkerers and others keep dreaming up. "From our earliest discussions, the spot evolved into this inspirational film that presents amazing solutions people have discovered using the Kinect," she said. "The story was refined throughout the filming, editorial and post phases, and we all remained fluid and open to all the new ideas this unique project inspired." Standing behind the campaign for twofifteenmccann are chief creative officer Scott Duchon, creative directors Paul Caiozzo and James Robinson, art director Nik Daum, copywriter Neil Bruce, director of integrated production Tom Wright and senior producers Mai Huynh and Colleen Wellman, among many others. To capture live-action footage of actors in hospital, classroom, auditorium and other settings, Venville, producer Mark Hall, director of photography Richard Henkels and their crew traveled to the Czech Republic. Also on the location team that worked through production services company Stillking Prague was Brewster Parsons VFX supervisor Simon Scott, who shared many insights into the project's production and post-production workflow. "We pride ourselves on the craft of commercial filmmaking, and being intimately involved with this project early on allowed us to really contribute in a meaningful way," he began. "By planning, prevising and attending set we could suggest many ways in which to get the best out of each visual effects scene. This allowed us to develop a shorthand and trust with the agency that helped move the project forward quickly and very efficiently." On location, the live-action footage was captured on an ARRI Alexa camera system. For creation of the final picture, the main tool was Autodesk Flame, which served as the hub for conforming DPX files provided by New Hat and colorist Beau Leon in extended range... a trick that provided Simon Scott more latitude for color correction within the compositing process. "With the lifted blacks we had all the detail, and later this got crushed back to the right levels for broadcast," Scott explained. "Flare and After Effects were ultimately the main 2D support tools for retouching and matte extraction." Together with the director, the DP, the producers and production designer Chris Jones, Scott helped to formulate shrewd production strategies to achieve the all desired storytelling objectives. As one example, in the hospital setup, a tablet computer fed the monitor with arbitrary images, while off-camera, an assistant matched the doctor's hand movements by scrolling the on-screen image manually. "This created a rich interactive light on the doctor and TV frame, which helped the composite feel both beautiful and realistic," Scott said. To achieve a similar result in the physiotherapy scene, the live-action crew used a half-silvered mirror to capture practical reflections of both the boy and the background. And in the classroom scene showing a young girl interacting with an on-screen image, a simple previs animation was used on the green screen set to allow the actress to match her actions to the final DNA composite. "In that scene, we were also very careful to build the set at the correct aspect ratio in order to preserve the natural light on the background," continued Scott. "We let light from the windows interact with the screen, which allowed us to lift the lighting off the screen and create a more authentic composite." Several animations play important roles in the spot, from the readout of the robot moving through space in the bomb disposal scene, to the boy interacting with the physiotherapy game and the teacher interacting with the solar system. Brewster Parsons' artists primarily used Photoshop, Illustrator, Cinema 4D, Flame, Flare, Maya, VRAY and After Effects. "Most of what was seen in the final composites was prevised, so that Malcolm had a good idea of how to direct the action where the subject was interacting with the Kinect," Scott added. Additional agency credits go to business director Peter Goldstein, management supervisor Melissa Hill and account executive Justin Charness. Christjan Jordan of Arcade edited the spots, with support from executive producer Deanne Mehling, post producer Kirsten Thon-Webb, and assistant editor Andrew Leggett. Key contributors for Brewster Parsons include designers Alex Komin and Chris Saunders, CG artists Spatial Harmonics, compositor Emily Bloom, and producers Chandra Irving and Rebekah Koerbel. The spot's music is courtesy of Q Department and sound designer Brian Emrich, and the final audio was mixed by Rohan Young of Lime Studios via audio producers Jessica Locke and Bruce Hortwitz. For more information on Kinect for Xbox 360, please visit www.xbox.com About Brewster Parsons Brewster Parsons is an A-level visual effects studio specializing in photoreal imagery, extraordinary color and brilliant design solutions. Established in Venice, California, in 2007 by Darcy Parsons and award-winning VFX supervisor Simon Brewster, the artists and producers of Brewster Parson collaborate with leading directors and creatives to produce stunning visual content for all media platforms. For more information, please call 1.310.736.1663 or visit www.brewsterparsons.com

Online edition of India's National Newspaper Saturday, October 15, 2005 Metro Plus Madurai Published on Saturdays Classic and contemporary Ga ga over gongura There's more to `gongura' than most natives of Andhra Pradesh know Be your kid's role model Parenting is no child's play Once again romance The expectations from cine goers are high for Cheran's new film titled "Thavamai Thavamirunthu", releasing for Deepavali. After "Autograph", he has been put on a pedestal by the Tamil audience, who are craving for meaningful cinema. Cheran's ... A. R. Murugadoss is the man to watch out for after a hat trick of hits "Dheena", "Ramanna" and now "Ghajini". He has a distinct style of narrating stories and packages his films slickly to cater to today's audience. His films are also ... Zorro is back! Seven years after "The Mask of Zorro", Antonio Banderas is back as Zorro in "The Legend of Zorro", releasing worldwide, including Chennai on October 28. Catherine Zeta Jones is once again teamed with Banderas and she plays Elena, Zorro's wife, in ... Ravi Teja's rise as an action hero has been slow and steady, and his reach in the B and C stations is impressive. Now all eyes are on his latest release "Bhageeratha", directed by cameraman-turneddirector Rasool. The film has Shriya for glamour ... More twists and turns The serial "Kolangal" (Sun TV, Monday-Friday, 9 p.m.) continues to rock with more twists and turns involving Abhi, the central character played by Devayani. Abhi's concern for her best friend Usha (Deepa Venkat) is taking the viewers by surprise ... Swing into action Toon Disney is calling out to children across the country to tune into `The Legend of Tarzan', and participate in the "Tarzan jungle josh" contest and win fantastic prizes. All kids need to do is follow the show closely from Monday to Friday, ... A Jain temple that's seen some glorious days, writes SUBHA J RAO Is KBC-2 turning out to be a celebrity show? Many Bollywood personalities are making special appearances on the show. First, Saif Ali Khan and Preity Zinta, then Ajay and Kajol Devgan, and now, John Abraham and Bipasha Basu for the Dusshera ... Managing Madras eye Some dos and don'ts to prevent red eye Metro Plus Bangalore Chennai Coimbatore Delhi Hyderabad Kochi Madurai Mangalore Pondicherry Thiruvananthapuram Tiruchirapalli Vijayawada Visakhapatnam See the earlier stories Lead | Life Style | Fashion | Music | Personality | Eating Out | Madras Miscellany | Issues | Arts & Crafts | Information Technology | Shopping | Heritage | Miscellany | News: Front Page | National | Tamil Nadu | Andhra Pradesh | Karnataka | Kerala | New Delhi | Other States | International | Opinion | Business | Sport | Miscellaneous | Index | Features: Magazine | Literary Review | Life | Metro Plus | Open Page | Education Plus | Book Review | Business | SciTech | Entertainment | Young World | Property Plus | Quest | Folio | Comments to : [email protected] Copyright © 2005, The Hindu

“Hard Times Come Again No More” was written by Stephen Foster. “David, little David, help me now, c’mon little David…” Excerpts from David Hood Q&A, Soho Hotel Cinema Audience member: Do you have a theory about what the magic of Muscle Shoals was? 762 more words Thinking back about my youth, I plead guilty to foolishly narrowing my musical tastes. By the time I reached my late teens, I graduated from Top Forty AM radio to the hipper, rock sounds found on the FM dial. 568 more words

There are plenty of movies that dwell on the reality that high school and especially the teenage years are a horror story all on their own, even without the influence of a masked killer. According to such cinematic recollections of youth, the real horror that young people face today are feelings of inadequacy, peer pressure and severe depression. This is the story of Lindsey, a girl who has just lost her parents to a violent car crash and who is severely shy to the point of being socially awkward. Fortunately, she just made a friend at school who may help her to come out of her shell and learn to interact with people again. Of course, if you look at the cover you may realize as I did, that sometimes certain antisocial recluses are better left alone. Let us watch this BLEEDING THROUGH and see if it leaves any kind of impression, or at least a proper stain on the viewer’s consciousness. Because this film is very slow moving and bases itself on a single pivotal moment, I am going to be especially vigilant in not giving away any plot details. Without saying anything directly about the happenings in this film, let me just say that this movie seems like a perfect hybrid between JENNIFER”S BODY and CARRIE. One concession I will make as if you haven’t figured it out for yourselves already by looking at the cover art is that young Lindsey eventually achieves a type of superhuman, non-zombie undead state and starts killing everyone in her life. Of course most of the victims deserve her wrath, but at least one of them is an innocent character who actually cared about her from the very beginning. It’s little moments like that in the film that dull the revenge motif this film works so long and hard to develop and makes much of the character development seem wasted as it appears everyone in her life is potential fodder once she “changes” whether they deserved it or not. But thankfully, most everyone in her life is an absolute wanton jerk of some sort or another even if none of the ways they actually hurt her ever seem practical, likely or realistic. At one point in the film, someone very close to Lindsey betrays her just for the sake of doing so, all so she can be publically humiliated by someone who has apparently been waiting in the closet for days in order to spring the cruel joke upon her in the closet at this exact moment. Once you see the scene you may agree that it may seem like a particularly devastating turn of fate for a shy girl who finally learned how to reach out to someone, anyone after being so cruelly mistreated by most every other character in the movie, only to be told that she was ultimately nothing to anyone. However, most of the scenes of bullying and abuse just seem contrived, needlessly elaborate and every character in this film exists only so they can ultimately accost Lindsey in some fashion and later so they can be killed by her for it when she snaps. There are plenty of films like this, of course but most of them have the good sense to give us a main character that is still somehow lovable, even as she doles out terrible acts of vengeance. As an undead killer, Lindsey is even more monotone, quiet and forgettable than she was as an unpopular young girl. With a pocketknife as a weapon, the strength of a monster and the monotone of a vampire she works her way through the cast with joyless efficiency that the viewer may share. I will give this film respect for developing the characters more than most horror films, but in the end I can’t say that I felt anything for any of them because everyone acted in a cliché manner than only teenagers in horror films do: obnoxious, oblivious before being ultimately erased. Admittedly I may not have been this movie’s target audience. I think if you are a teenage girl who is nervous about becoming a woman, Lindsey’s deadly “becoming” in this movie may seem allegorical, if not symbolic of the myriad of life changes that a girl experiences as a girl reaches pubescence both physically, socially and emotionally. But as a straight horror movie I have to admit that I have seen feminine hygiene commercials on network TV that make a bigger deal of the horrors of “bleeding through” than does the wrist dripping femme fatale in this film. Special Features include Feature Commentary by the director and Sandy Behre (Lindsey), extended and deleted scenes and trailers. BLEEDING THROUGH is for Sale everywhere on 01/22/13. Special thanks to Independent Cinema for the advance copy.