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 | | Sam & Max Season 2: Beyond Space and Time
category: video game | | santa possessed by a corporate demon? moai heads need saving from an erupting volcano? a gay eurotrash vampire is creating an army of the dancing undead? time travel? spacefaring mariachis? it's all there in sam & max season two, one of the best things to happen to games in years. telltale are bringing back the adventure game with a vengeance, masterfully synthesizing and amplifying the very best that the genre had to offer not just as an example of how much more gaming could be, but also as a reminder of how much more it used to be. | | -- nir |
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|  | | Dean Spanley
category: movie | | I bought this primarily because parts of it were filmed at Voewood - a rather attractive country house in the village where my parents live. It turned out to be one of the nicest, most heart-warming films I've seen in a long time.
It's based on a 1936 novel written by Edward Plunkett, the 18th Baron of Dunsany, called "My Conversations with Dean Spanley." The person conducting the conversations is one Henslowe Fisk (Jeremy Northam) who is struggling to maintain a relationship with his elderly father (Peter O'Toole) as a result of the father's refusal to mourn the death of his other son, Henslowe's brother Harrington who was killed in the Boer War. Whether by coincidence or design, Fisk Junior encounters Dean Spanley (Sam Neill) three times during the course of one day and, intrigued by the Dean's interests and behaviour, persuades him to come to dinner. Acquiring the necessary beverage to ensure the Dean's attendance draws in local middleman and Mr Fixit, Wrather (Bryan Brown). Soon, both Wrather and Fisk Senior are also listening to Dean Spanley's rather unusual reminiscences...
To say any more would give away too much of the plot - this is the sort of film it's worth seeing without even watching the trailer. It's a gentle, beautiful looking Edwardian period piece that makes the most of East Anglia's towns (and occasional chunks of New Zealand countryside!) and a stellar cast on top form. | | -- apopheniac |
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|  | | The Ninth Configuration
category: movie | | Unless they've been living under a rock for the last couple of decades, moviegoers in the UK will be aware of the film critic Dr Mark Kermode. He's an authority on horror movies in general (he has a Ph.D in the subject) and The Exorcist in particular, which he often calls the greatest film ever made. The Exorcist was written by William Blatty, who went on to write and direct The Ninth Configuration. Understandably then, the film often crops up when the good Doctor talks about underrated movies, and on his recommendation I got myself a copy. I'm glad I did.
The basic story concerns Army psychiatrist Colonel Vincent Kane (Stacy Keach) who turns up to treat a group of patients who are being cared for at an abandoned castle which has been pressed into service as a military psychiatric hospital. Inside, all is bedlam. The atmosphere is a mixture of "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest" and "M*A*S*H". One patient in particular presents a challenge: Captain Billy Cutshaw (Scott Wilson) is an astronaut who aborted his mission to the Moon a few seconds before blastoff. Kane decides to use unconventional methods in an effort to produce a cure, but soon it's difficult to tell who is trying to cure who...
Blatty uses the film to investigate the meaning of good and bad, and it documents his own personal search for divinity amongst humanity. "If you believe in Satan because of all the evil in the world," Kane asks Cutshaw, "why don't you believe in God because of all the love?"
The film is well worth seeing - and if you see it before you read any of the links above, you'll enjoy it even more. Highly recommended. | | -- apopheniac |
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|  | | Sunshine
category: movie | | despite it's flaws, this is a BEAUTIFUL film which should be a must-see for anyone interested in the mysteries of outer space. "sunshine" has a mystical premise that i wish had been followed to fruition. the film starts strongly with a theme of sun-worship and achieving godhead but unfortunately dissolves momentarily into a slasher film! much of the action is slightly unexplained, so that during parts of the film you're left wondering what's going on. this might possibly add to the increasingly claustrophobic feel of the film if it was intentional. however, it seems more likely that there were chunks of the film taken out during the editing process (i am sure there is a "director's cut" lying around somewhere). that said, i honestly loved this film. the spaceship itself is the product of incredible imagination and creativity. it's as if they created an entirely functional universe just for this film. the characters (with maybe one exception) are very well developed, and the moody acting gives us a real compassion for their nearly impossible situation. danny boyle seems to have a thing for ethereal/angelic-looking actors, and here is no exception; they are used to full advantage. the camera loves them, and boyle caresses the faces of his stars with extreme and lingering close-ups. behind the white light of the films flaws, i believe that there is a profound message that we as viewers connect with, almost though osmosis. i am not sure if this is the result of a collective consciousness in regards to sunlight and the sun, but i think that it is possible to truly understand this film without knowing that you understand it. | | -- Ortali |
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|  | | Antennas Direct ClearStream 4 Ultra-Long Range Digital TV Antenna
category: product | | This one was sensitive during setup, with small differences in the vertical alignment making for big differences in the signal strength and overall reception. Ultimately sacrifing a second connection point to the J-Mount I used to install it in favor of mounting it somewhat higher up made all the difference. The DB2 and DB4 antennas I had before worked fine most of the time but yielded unwatchably bad reception in times of bad weather, but the worst I've seen with this one are a few minor artifacts. A Radioshack quad-shielded RG6 coax cable also helped. Get a Tivo HD and you've got yourself an incredibly versatile and inexpensive setup. | | -- nir |
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|  | | goopymart
category: person | | "goopymart" is actually will guy, an artist from san francisco that has developed a huge following by posting his art on flickr. absurd yet highly relatable, his cartoons focus mainly on cats, monkeys, and the world of tech. | | -- Ortali |
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|  | | Towelhead
category: movie | | On the surface, this film may look like an atypical and raunchy coming of age film. However for many of us that remember our adolescence, this is probably the most honest film ever made on the subject. Jasira is a 13 year old girl who is discovering that adolescent sexuality can be a very complicated thing. Timidly, she tests the waters of her sexiness, getting mixed results from both her peers and the adults in her life. The film shows that we do not always have a clear grasp on the boundaries of our sexual motivation. The film is brilliantly cast, and includes some real standout performances from Aaron Eckhart (as the kind but intuitively misguided neighbor), Peter Macdissi (as the fey yet dangerously bipolar father), and of course Summer Bashil (as the free-spirited protagonist). Although there is pretense that the story is about the cultural identity of Arab-Americans during the Gulf War, the plot clearly focuses on the idea of sexual boundaries. I am not sure why there wasn't more buzz when this film first came out. I personally think that it should be required viewing in sex-education classes, it has that much to say. | | -- Ortali |
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|  | | Twitter
category: website | | "What are you doing?"
It's a simple question, and the challenge of answering it, very publicly, using no more than 140 characters has kept me engaged for more than a year. I use it as a micro-blog tool, when I haven't got the time to update my web pages, and I also use it to find out about how my friends are doing, and stuff that's going on in general. I can update my entry by logging on from a web browser or just by sending an SMS message from my phone (hence the 140 character limit). I find the whole idea fascinating, and I blogged about it in some detail a while ago.
Once you've got a Twitter account, your friends can "follow" you and see what you're up to. Likewise, you can subscribe to the updates (or "tweets") of people you know. You can also follow an ever-increasing selection of celebrities who have embraced Twitter enthusiastically, from Shaq to William Shatner, or from Stephen Fry to Wil Wheaton.
You can even follow the tweets of fictional characters; Jeph Jacques runs Twitter feeds for most of the characters from his Questionable Content webcomic. How on earth he manages it without going mad is beyond me, but they're all very entertaining - once you know the backstory of the comic, anyway.
Even the graphic that appears when the site is overloaded has taken on a life of its own. The "Fail Whale" - as shown above - has its own fan club.
If you want to follow me, you can find me on Twitter as headfirstonly. | | -- apopheniac |
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|  | | Burnout Paradise
category: video game
pc, playstation 3, xbox 360 | | Nir might be infatuated with the adrenaline fest that is Grid, but for me the racing game above all others has always been Criterion's Burnout series. I've got Burnout and Burnout 2 for the Gamecube, and I still play them, but if you've got an XBox360 or a PS3 then you're in luck; you can play the newest, biggest, brashest game in the series, Burnout Paradise.
There are racing games where you have to race round a circuit. There are others where you might even be able to race around the same circuit in the opposite direction. But in Burnout Paradise, you pull out of the junk yard where you picked up your first car on to the streets of an entire city. You decide which street to drive down, and pretty much the entire landscape is open for exploration. Cruise up into the mountains and check out the Wind Farm and the Observatory, or hang out downtown in the financial district. The traffic - and the type of cars you'll encounter - will change accordingly.
Pull up at any set of lights in the game, and you can start an "event" - there are several types of challenges available. You can pick from a direct race against other computer drivers, or try to beat a time trial, run everyone else off the road, "Mad Max" style, evade teams of cars determined to run _you_ off the road, or pull ridiculous stunts to rack up points. Completing these events successfully means you soon start to stack up a collection of ever-crazier cars - there are over seventy of them, and each one drives differently. Get bored with the single player challenges, and you can go online to drive round town with your pals. Hook up a bluetooth headset, and you can heckle them while you burn them off at the lights. Sweet.
I bought the game when it came out last year, and I'm still hooked on it thanks to an ever increasing selection of downloadable content - much of it free - that makes the game even more engaging and challenging. Don't fancy driving a car today? Use a motorcycle from the Bike Pack. Fed up of driving in brilliant sunshine? Drive in fog instead, or at night. At the weekend I downloaded the "Legendary Cars" pack, which gives you cars looking suspiciously like Doc Brown's DeLorean (yes, the wheels retract and it hovers), ECTO-1 from Ghostbusters, KITT from Knightrider, and the General Lee (and yes, you can sound the horn as you pull off a ludicrous jump from the unfinished section of freeway in town).
Criterion are even expanding the city with the "Island" pack due to come out later in the year. Can't wait. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to beat my time in the Krieger Uberschall 8 and get that sweet custom version... | | -- apopheniac |
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|  | | Taking Chance
category: movie | | HBO films has been turning out quality product for a long time. "Recount", "John Adams", "Elizabeth I","American Splendor" are just a handful of the amazing products they have screened over the years. "Taking Chance" is another nicely done film to add to the list. Based on a true story, "Taking Chance" is a small and quiet tale of a soldier escorting another soldier "home". It is a very respectful look at the process that a fallen soldier's body goes through, from death to burial. Kevin Bacon hands in a stellar performance as Lt. Col. Michael Strobl, a Gulf War vet who has sat out the current war in Iraq as a war numbers analyst in order to spend time with his family. In what appears to be an act of redemption, he volunteers to escort the body of Private Chance Phelps to its final resting place. What is most interesting to me is the depiction of how much respect the military gives the body of the deceased, even when no one is looking. At every turn, the coffin is saluted slowly. The dead's personal effects are handled lovingly, cleaned by the military morticians and cared for by the escort. Even the fact that there is an escort is a surprise to me. The film contains very little dialogue, but Kevin Bacon allows himself to look haggard here, and the beautiful score adds to the poignant subject matter. It could have easily spiraled into a majorly patriotic and pro-service recruitment film, but instead "Taking Chance" stays rather neutral and at moments, even anti-war. This visually arresting film does try to show soldiers as real human beings, who feel loss just like everyone else, if not more acutely. And for that alone, it should be appreciated.
| | -- Ortali |
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