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2008-06-22T16:04:00.000+12:00

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Georgie on the Big Screen

2008-06-13T12:13:00.005+12:00

Wow, this is happening a lot sooner than I thought but the first George W. Bush biopic will be released (in the States, nothing about New Zealand) on October 17 this year. It will be directed by Oliver Stone and is called simply W.

Josh Brolin, of No Country For Old Men fame will play the current president. It should be interesting, though I dislike Oliver Stone - a project like this is too tempting to not watch. Especially for Anti-Bushers.

Best Films of 1996

2008-06-12T16:29:00.002+12:00

OK, so I complained about 1997 being a shit year but at least I could still get 10 films on a list of movies that I quite like. 1996, while being host to one of my all time favourite films of all time - Fargo (the fourth time that the Coen Brothers make the top spot - I think I'm a fan of those guys), was really disappointing. I can't even manage a top five, if you were to ask me "based on what you've seen from 1996, what would you nominate for best picture?", I would say those three before stummering out something like......... Happy Gilmore? Maybe my problem is I just haven't seen enough films, I've only seen two of the best picture nominees from the Oscars (Jerry Maguire and Fargo).

Fargo (Joel & Ethan Coen)
Bottle Rocket (Wes Anderson)
Scream (Wes Craven)

Best Movies of 1997

2008-06-11T12:41:00.005+12:00

Man, Deconstructing Harry is by far the weakest number one we've had so far. I don't mean to say anything bad about it but I can't believe how weak this year actually was. This does mark Woody Allen's second top finish - it's just a surprising one. While overall I reckon that's an interesting top five, 1997 has proven to be the weakest year so far - I didn't think that'll happen until the 80s.

Deconstructing Harry (Woody Allen)
Waiting For Guffman (Christopher Guest)
Boogie Nights (Paul Thomas Anderson)
Wintersleepers (Tom Tykwer)
The Fifth Element (Luc Besson)
Open Your Eyes (Alejandro Amenabar)
Lost Highway (David Lynch)
The Castle (Rob Sitch)
Men In Black (Barry Sonnenfeld)
Scream 2 (Wes Craven)

Best Movies of 1998

2008-06-11T12:24:00.005+12:00

What to say? This is one weak year. While 1999 could muster six amazing films, 1998 can only really give up two. Oh well, The Coen Brothers claim their third top spot. Aren't they awesome?

The Big Lebowski (Joel & Ethan Coen)
Rushmore (Wes Anderson)
A Bug's Life (John Lasseter)
The Thin Red Line (Terrence Malick)
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (Guy Ritchie)
Antz (Eric Darnell & Tim Johnson)
The Truman Show (Peter Weir)
Pi (Darren Aronofsky)
American History X (Tony Kaye)
Pleasantville (Gary Ross)

Best Movies of 1999

2008-06-10T16:42:00.006+12:00

Out of the 21st Century now and into the 90's. After this point I think the lists are going to start becoming smaller as I become less familiar with each year. This year was one good year, I mean - look at that top six. That's six movies I'm quite fond of.

Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze)
American Beauty (Sam Mendes)
Fight Club (David Fincher)
Toy Story 2 (John Lasseter, Ash Brannon & Lee Unkrich)
Election (Alexander Payne)
Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson)
The Matrix (Andy & Larry Wachowski)
All About My Mother (Pedro Almodovar)
Office Space (Mike Judge)
The Virgin Suicides (Sofia Coppola)
Run Lola Run (Tom Tykwer)
Go (Doug Liman)
Bowfinger (Frank Oz)
South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (Trey Parker)
Scarfies (Robert Sarkies)

Best Movies of the 00's (so far)

2008-06-09T15:33:00.026+12:00

As part of my "Favourite Movies Project", I've been going through my favourite movies, year by year. I've just finished going through all of the years in this decade so it's time to take the 112 films I've designated as "noteworthy" and narrow it down to a top 20. Fun times!

1) Adaptation (2002)
(Directed by Spike Jonze, Written by Charlie Kaufman)

Donald Kaufman: Okay, well here's the twist. We find out that, that the killer really suffers from multiple personality disorder, right? See, he's actually really the cop and the girl. All of them are him. Isn't that fucked up?

2) Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
(Directed by Michel Gondry. Written by Charlie Kaufman)

Joel: Is there any risk of brain damage?
Howard: Well, technically speaking, the operation is brain damage, but it's on a par with a night of heavy drinking. Nothing you'll miss.

3) Amelie (2001)
(Directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet. Written by Jean-Pierre Jeunet & Guillaume Laurant)

Narrator: With a prompter in every cellar window whispering comebacks, shy people would have the last laugh.

4) The Triplets of Belleville (2003)
(Written & Directed by Sylvain Chomet)

Triplets [singing]: Swinging Belleville rendevouz/ Marathon dancing, doop-de-doo/ Voodoo, can-can, balais, taboo/ in Belleville swinging rendevouz...

5) Lost In Translation (2003)
(Written & Directed by Sofia Coppola)

John: Why do you have to point out how stupid everyone is all the time?

6) Match Point (2005)
(Written & Directed by Woody Allen)

Nola Rice: You're gonna do very well for yourself, unless you blow it.
Chris Wilton: And how am I going to blow it?
Nola Rice: By making a pass at me.
Chris Wilton: And what makes you think that's going to happen?
Nola Rice: Men always seem to wonder.

7) I Heart Huckabees (2004)
(Directed by David O. Russell. Written by David O. Russell & Jeff Baena)

Dawn Campbell: There's glass between us. You can't deal with my infinite nature can you?
Brad Stand: That is so not true. Wait, what does that even mean?

8) O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)
(Written & Directed by the Coen Brothers)

Pete: Well hell, it ain't square one! Ain't nobody gonna pick up three filthy, unshaved hitch-hikers, and one of them a know-it-all that can't keep his trap shut.
Ulysses Everett McGill: Pete, the personal rancor reflected in that remark I don't intend to dignify with comment.

9) Donnie Darko (2001)
(Written & Directed by Richard Kelly)

Rose Darko: I don't think telling any woman to forcibly insert an object into her anus is something that should go unpunished.
Edward Darko: I think we should buy him a moped.
Rose Darko: I think we should get a divorce.

10) No Country For Old Men (2007)

(Written & Directed by the Coen Brothers)

Man: Just how dangerous is he?
Carson Wells: Compared to what? The bubonic plague?

11) The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
(Directed by Wes Anderson. Written by Wes Anderson & Owen Wilson)

Eli: I did find it odd when you said you were in love with her. She's married you know.
Richie: Yeah.
Eli: And she's your sister.
Richie: Adopted.

12) The Incredibles (2004)
(Written & Directed by Brad Bird)

Mr. Incredible: Of course I have a secret identity. I don't know a single superhero without one. I mean, who wants the pressure of being super all the time?

13) Ratatouille (2007)
(Written & Directed by Brad Bird)

Django: Food is fuel. You get picky about what you put in the tank, your engine is gonna die. Now shut up and eat your garbage.

14) Secretary (2002)
(Directed by Steven Shainberg. Written by Erin Cressida Wilson)

Peter: Are you doing something sexual?
Lee: Does this look sexual to you?

15) Serenity (2005)
(Written & Directed by Joss Whedon)

Mal: Zoe, the ship is yours. Remember, if anything happens to me; if you don't hear from me within the hour; you take this ship and you come and you rescue me!
Zoe: What? And risk my ship?
Mal: I mean it. It's cold out there, and I don't want to get left.

16) In My Father's Den (2004)
(Written & Directed by Brad McGann)

Celia Steimer: One day, in a town on the edge of the world, the tide went out and never returned. The sea just left without warning.

17) Gosford Park (2001)
(Directed by Robert Altman. Written by Julian Fellowes)

Mary Maceachran: Nobody can stab a corpse and not know it.
Robert Parks: Really? When was the last time you stabbed a corpse?

18) Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
(Directed by Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Davis. Written by Michael Ardnt.)

Frank: Who is that? Nietzsche? So you stopped talking because of Friedrich Nietzsche? Far out.

19) Thank You For Smoking (2006)
(Written & Directed by Jason Reitman)

Heather Holloway: My other interviews have pinned you as a mass murderer, blood sucker, pimp, profiteer and my personal favorite, yuppie Mephistopheles.

20) Juno (2007)
(Directed by Jason Reitman. Written by Diablo Cody)

Paulie: I still have your underwear.
Juno: I still have your virginity.
Paulie: Would you shut up?

Wowsies.

2008-06-09T14:50:00.003+12:00

60% of NBA players are bankrupt by five years after their retirement.
(h/t: Marginal Revolution)

Reminds me of a quote from the first couple of pages from the book I'm reading now: Zuckerman Unbound by Philip Roth. Basically, the main character, Zuckerman - a novelist has just released a bestseller and has heaps of money coming his way.

Gone were the days when Zuckerman had only to worry about Zuckerman making money: henceforth he would have to worry about his money making money.

The Optimal Obama Supporter...

2008-06-09T14:41:00.004+12:00

...would be a black male under 30 with a college degree.

Well, that's the conclusion I grab from this cool like widget from the NY Times that looks at how the different groups voted... It shows some very clear obvious trends.

Like,

Men like Obama - Women like Clinton.
Blacks like Obama - Whites like Clinton.
The young like Obama - The old like Clinton.
Graduates like Obama - Non-Graduates like Clinton.

The income is less clear, it's moving slightly in the expected direction (rich like Obama - poor like Clinton) but it's not as clear cut. The poor seem quite divided, the West Virginia poor like Clinton by 65% and the Maryland poor like Obama by 41%. As you move up to the income scales the results become a little more centralised.
(h/t: David Farrar)

The End of my Favourite Cup

2008-06-08T23:45:00.004+12:00

I just walked down to the kitchen to find my favourite cup of the last seven years on the bench, it was broken. Why? Was someone merely clumsy? Or is there more sinister elements afoot? Revenge for the mug I broke a couple of days ago maybe?

There was nothing I liked more than to drink ginger beer from that cup. With its blue swirls and frosted style it once belonged to a whole family of four... or six of these beautiful cups which were systematically destroyed until only one remained... man, I wish I named him/her. That cup lasted a good while after its brothers and sisters and has always had a place with me in my flats.

So, I need a new favourite cup. What to do?

On totally unrelated news, I just finished watching the final episode of Arrested Development - now that was one nice way to end the series. Could it be the most incestuous show ever? (with maybe the exception of some soap operas)

Best Movies of 2000

2008-06-08T13:01:00.004+12:00

Wow. Weak year. The Coen Brothers grab their second top spot though O Brother is probably the weakest of all the top films so far (with the possible exception of No Country For Old Men - but that needs time to fully cement itself in place. Fact is, the Coen Brothers did their best work in the 90s)

O Brother, Where Art Thou? (Joel & Ethan Coen)
State & Main (David Mamet)
Memento (Christopher Nolan)
Almost Famous (Cameron Crowe)
Best In Show (Christopher Guest)
Chicken Run (Peter Lord & Nick Park)
High Fidelity (Stephen Frears)
Small Time Crooks (Woody Allen)
X-Men (Bryan Singer)
Dinner Rush (Bob Giraldi)

Best Movies of 2001

2008-06-08T12:49:00.004+12:00

2001 is the biggest year so far - I've considered 20 films from that year to be noteworthy. The top film, Amelie, would be one of most important films for me ever.

Amelie (Jean-Pierre Jeunet)
Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly)
The Royal Tenebaums (Wes Anderson)
Gosford Park (Robert Altman)
Monsters Inc. (Peter Docter, Lee Unkrich & David Silverman)
Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki)
Shrek (Andrew Adamson & Vicky Jensen)
Mulholland Dr. (David Lynch)
Ghost World (Terry Zwigoff)
Moulin Rogue! (Baz Luhrmann)
Waking Life (Richard Linklater)
The Man Who Wasn't There (Joel & Ethan Coen)
Ocean's 11 (Steven Soderbergh)
Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (Peter Jackson)
Zoolander (Ben Stiller)
Y tu mama tambien (Alfonso Cuaron)
The Closet (Francis Veber)
Rain (Christine Jeffs)
The Score (Frank Oz)
Buffalo Soldiers (Gregor Jordan)

Best Movies of 2002

2008-06-07T16:40:00.003+12:00

Those first four films on the list are so deliciously weird, 2002 certainly provided some excellent "weird" films that I love so much. Oscar winner Chicago rounds out that top five. Adaptation is the film that made me interested in film, before that I was a fairly apathetic film viewer.

Adaptation and Confessions of a Dangerous Mind makes the second and third Charlie Kaufman penned film to make the top five. George Clooney and Paul Thomas Anderson also make their second apperance in the top five as directors.

Adaptation (Spike Jonze)
Secretary (Steven Shainberg)
Punch-Drunk Love (Paul Thomas Anderson)
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (George Clooney)
Chicago (Rob Thomas)
Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (Peter Jackson)
City of God (Fernando Meirelles & Katia Lund)
Catch Me If You Can (Steven Spielberg)
The Hours (Stephen Daldry)
The Bourne Identity (Doug Liman)
Dirty Pretty Things (Stephen Frears)
One Hour Photo (Mark Romanek)
Ice Age (Chris Wedge & Carlos Saldanha)

Best Movies of 2003

2008-06-07T16:33:00.004+12:00

Until recently, Scarlett Johansson could have secured herself a second first place finish after Match Point in 2005 but The Triplets of Belleville - an amazing animated french film has displaced her from that honour. Me repeating myself doesn't stop there - Finding Nemo is the third Pixar film to end up in the top five and the fourth to appear in these lists. Tim Burton and the Coen Brothers have also now made two apperances in the top ten.

The Triplets of Belleville (Sylvain Chomet)
Lost In Translation (Sofia Coppola)
American Splendour (Shari Springer Berman & Robert Pulcini)
Finding Nemo (Andrew Stanton & Lee Unkrich)
Shattered Glass (Billy Ray)
Big Fish (Tim Burton)
Kitchen Stories (Bent Hamer)
Intolerable Cruelty (Joel & Ethan Coen)
Goodbye Lenin! (Wolfgang Becker)
21 Grams (Alejandro Inarritu)
X2: X-Men United (Bryan Singer)
Matchstick Men (Ridley Scott)
School of Rock (Richard Linklater)
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (Gore Verbinski)
Bad Santa (Terry Zwigoff)

Best Movies of 2004

2008-06-07T15:59:00.004+12:00

Ahhh, 2004. My first year of university. Though with the exception of Eternal Sunshine, Mean Girls and Shrek 2 I saw the majority of these films the next year. I remember it as the year of Fahrenheit 9/11 and the Passion of the Christ. Two films that greatly disturbed my experiences with cinema that year, the former for its horrible documentary practises and the latter for highlighting my preference to not watch a film that was solely about someone getting cruificied. 2004 nevertheless turned out to be an important year of cinema for me - especially the film that came in first - one of my most favourite films of all time.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry)
I Heart Huckabees (David O. Russell)
The Incredibles (Brad Bird)
In My Father's Den (Brad McGann)
Napoleon Dynamite (Jared Hess)
Sideways (Alexander Payne)
Night Watch (Timur Bekmambetov)
A Very Long Engagement (Jean-Pierre Jeunet)
Mean Girls (Mark Waters)
Garden State (Zach Braff)
Shrek 2 (Andrew Adamson, Kelly Asbury & Conrad Vernon)
The Bourne Supremacy (Paul Greengrass)
The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (Wes Anderson)
Primer (Shane Carruth)
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azakaban (Alfonso Cuaron)
Team America: World Police (Trey Parker)

Best Movies of 2005

2008-06-06T18:50:00.003+12:00

Finding a list of movies was a bit harder for 2005 than it was for 2006. Though I haven't seen the most popular film at the Oscars that year: Brokeback Mountain or any foreign film it seems. Nevertheless...

Match Point (Woody Allen)
Serenity (Joss Whedon)
Me & You & Everyone We Know (Miranda July)
Good Night & Good Luck (George Clooney)
Sin City (Robert Rodrigeuz & Frank Miller)
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (Nick Park & Steve Box)
Batman Begins (Christopher Nolan)
Capote (Bennett Miller)
The Squid & The Whale (Noah Baumbach)
The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Garth Jennings)

Top Movie of 2010?

2008-06-06T16:04:00.004+12:00

I'm going to make a bold useless prediction right now. The Yiddish Policemen's Union is going to be the best movie of 2010.

Fresh off watching the awesome No Country For Old Men, I was reading up on the Coen Brother's next film: Burn After Reading (trailer below - looks promising) when I found out that a couple of projects down the line, the Coen Brothers intend to adapt Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policemen's Union which I'm in the middle of reading. I must say, that this is a match made in heaven - I was thinking as I was reading how perfect it will be if the Coen Brothers made a movie from it - it's scheduled to be released in 2010 but knowing reality will probably be delayed - especially as two of their movies will be released before we get to see this. This is one project I'm excited about.

Best Movies of 2006

2008-06-06T15:54:00.005+12:00

Looking back at 2006 I think it was a pretty good year for movies. I've managed to come up with a nice big list of cool movies that I quite liked from that year - and still plenty of quality movies I'm sure are out there. Of course these movies all have the benefit of being fresh to me. Most of them I saw only last year. It'll be interesting to see if these movies can handle five years of time.

Little Miss Sunshine (Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris)
Thank You For Smoking (Jason Reitman)
The Science of Sleep (Michel Gondry)
The Prestige (Christopher Nolan)
Day Watch (Timur Bekmambetov)
The Departed (Martin Scorcese)
Scoop (Woody Allen)
The Lives of Others (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck)
Casino Royale (Martin Campbell)
Brick (Rian Johnson)
The Bothersome Man (Jens Lien)
A Prairie Home Companion (Robert Altman)
V For Vendetta (James McTeigue)
Stranger Than Fiction (Marc Foster)
Cars (John Lasseter & Joe Ranft)
Running With Scissors (Ryan Murphy)
Fast Food Nation (Richard Linklater)

Best Movies of 2007

2008-06-06T14:46:00.005+12:00

One thing that obsesses me is the constant battle of ranking my favourite things. So I've decided to embark on a journey of ranking my favourite movies of all time. I'm going to do this at a painfully slow pace - year by year. I'll start with last year - not that this list means much as I've yet to see a lot of 2007 movies. I rarely venture to the theatre and mainly watch movies by renting them on $3 or $1 days at the rental places. I've seen a few though - enough to put together a collection of more than ten movies that I enjoyed last year. So I haven't started too badly.

No Country For Old Men (Joel & Ethan Coen)
Ratatouille (Brad Bird)
Juno (Jason Reitman)
Sweeney Todd (Tim Burton)
There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson)
Eagle vs. Shark (Taika Cohen)
Planet Terror (Robert Rodriguez)
Death at a Funeral (Frank Oz)
Sunshine (Danny Boyle)
The Bourne Ultimatum (Paul Greengrass)
Zodiac (David Fincher)

Favourite Movies Project

2008-06-06T13:11:00.007+12:00

This is going to be an index page for my favourite movies project. Where I intend to track my favourite movies of all time. I'm going to go year by year. I can't remember why anymore... but here's all the links...

Decade by Decade
The 2000s

Best Movies By Year
2007 - No Country For Old Men (Joel & Ethan Coen)
2006 - Little Miss Sunshine (Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris)
2005 - Match Point (Woody Allen)
2004 - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry)
2003 - The Triplets of Belleville (Sylvain Chomet)
2002 - Adaptation. (Spike Jonze)
2001 - Amelie (Jean-Pierre Jeunet)
2000 - O Brother, Where Art Thou? (Joel & Ethan Coen)
1999 - Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze)
1998 - The Big Lebowski (Joel & Ethan Coen)
1997 - Deconstructing Harry (Woody Allen)
1996 - Fargo (Joel & Ethan Coen)

Linky. Well. One Link.

2008-06-05T16:31:00.000+12:00

Awesome post on Brain Stab.

Clean Day.

2008-06-05T15:59:00.004+12:00

One exam down!

Yesterday saw me finish off my first exam - Economics of Health and Education - and I now have a nice week and a half before my next three - which occur in two days, otherwise known as hell.

So today is Clean Day, my room needed a good clean and it now smells like vacuum cleaner and spray and wipe. My axolotl, Napoleon also needed a clean so I spent an hour doing that. He's now completely stressed out as he hates anyone interfering with his kingdom.

It was also cool how Barack Obama secured the nomination last night. About time - now we got to get onto the election - what an epic one that shall be.

Finally, Arrested Development quote of the moment from the third season. By my favourite character Tobias: Okay, Lindsay, are you forgetting that I was a professional twice over— an analyst and a therapist. The world's first analrapist.

May in Movies

2008-06-01T18:46:00.004+12:00

I watched a lot of movies in May. 21 to be exact, that brings my total for the year up to 86. The best movie I watched was The Triplets of Belleville which scored a perfect 10/10 for me.
Coming up next would be the Akira Kurosawa film The Hidden Fortress. This is only the third Kurosawa film I've seen and I must watch some more.
Coming up in third place tied with a 9/10 rating are The Lady Eve (review), To Be or not to Be and No Country For Old Men.
And some special consideration for: Planet Terror (review), Raiders of the Lost Ark (review) and There Will Be Blood.

Happy June

2008-06-01T18:28:00.003+12:00

I woke up this morning to the news that we have hit a new month: June. This fact scares the shits out of me. What the hell am I going to do when this month is over? I'm going to be so fucked.

I watched Hairspray last night. I must say that I admire the campy fun, everything else just seemed so forced - the acting, the script, the songs, the computer generated helicopter shot at the start. How are you supposed to have fun when you're being forced to?

Murder

2008-05-30T12:54:00.003+12:00

Former University of Otago lecturer Clayton Weatherston has been committed for trial after pleading not guilty to murdering ex-girlfriend Sophie Elliott.

From the ODT.

Depositions are over for the Sophie Elliott murder which I've been following since day one. As an economics student at Otago myself I found this quite shocking.

It's interesting that Weatherston has elected to plead not guilty. I'm no lawyer but the evidence seems pretty damning and everyone I've talked to seems convinced of his guilt. It'll be interesting to see how it plays out.

This could be quite dull

2008-05-30T12:00:00.005+12:00

Mr English raised the issue in Parliament today, and said if Mr Benson-Pope urged people to vote for Labour it would amount to election advertising under the Electoral Finance Act.

From the ODT.

You know. I really hope that this election isn't all about violations of the Electoral Finance Act. I can't think of a more boring way to conduct an election.

Which is better?

2008-05-28T11:53:00.005+12:00

My Favourite Paragrah of the Moment.

2008-05-27T14:55:00.002+12:00

I would have just said, "the man was fat" but I guess that's why I'm not a novelist.

Rabbi Heskel Shpilman is a deformed mountain, a giant ruined dessert, a cartoon house with the windows shut and the sink left running. A little kid lumped together, a mob of kids, blind orphans who never laid eyes on a man. They clumped the dough of his arms and legs to the dough of his body, then jammed his head down on top. A millionaire could cover a Rolls-Royce with the fine black silk-and-velvet expanse of the rebbe's frock coat and trousers. It would require the brain strength of the eighteen greatest sages in history to reason through the arguments against and in favor of classifying the rebbe's massive bottom as either a creature of the deep, a man-made structure, or an unavoidable act of God. If he stands up, or if he sits down, it doesn't make any difference in what you see.

From Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policemen's Union. A book I picked up at the library randomly based solely on the cover. I hadn't even heard of Michael Chabon at the time. I was then further convinced by all the praise and the crazy sounding plot.

I've been very impressed so far.

The end of one particular kind of madness.

2008-05-24T11:13:00.004+12:00

It's over.

Internal assessment is over. Such a thing just makes me so happy.

This essay I wrote ended up being one I just couldn't care about. I am so bored with a topic like "media imperialism". It's my own fault really, what could I expect after doing papers like "understand contemporary media", "political communications in new zealand" and "theorising digital media". I'm burned out on the media after doing my fourth paper on it.

It's a relief that this is my final semester (providing nothing awful happens.... again.). Though it should be added I still find all aspects of microeconomics to be fascinating - macro bores me.

I stayed up until 4am writing before deciding to go to bed, I think I should have just done what I did last week and stay up all night fueled by unhealthy amounts of coffee but I decided to sleep. I woke up and felt ruined for the rest of the day. And today. I felt pretty good last week - I'm clearly not up for sleeping 4-5 hours at a time. It's either none or nine.

After handing in the essay I was so tired that I made my way to the AV center in the library and just watched Battlestar Galactica for four and a half hours. I had recently found out it was in the library and heard it was good so I thought I'll give it a shot. I don't know if it was the crazy talking but it was pretty fucking good. I totally want to watch more.

The way home was surreal, it was raining and everything just seemed weird, from the polynesian singers who had hidden themselves in some crevice of the postmodern library outside to the pot smokers who meet every friday at four o'clock or something who were just standing there - smoking in the rain. Just seemed weird to me.

The next couple of days will be dedicated to relaxation. Before I start getting into exam prep. The madness has only just began.

Review: Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

2008-05-20T21:40:00.002+12:00

Well, the new one has had its premiere in Cannes so I thought I'd give the first one a watch. Introduce myself to the whole Indiana Jones thing. It's good for someone who studies pop culture to actually acquaint myself with some of it.

The most interesting thing about the movie for me though, watching it 27 years after it's been released was that I felt that I had watched it all before - everything seemed so familiar. My theory is that the entire movie has been parodied and referenced by so many different people that you could actually reconstruct the entire movie from them. The first place you'll start would be The Simpsons and then you'll move on.

The movie itself was great - everything you could want from an action film really. And what most action films have been aspiring to do since. I'll have to grab a copy of the second and watch it as soon as I can me thinks.

8.5/10

Cake & Lentil Loaf

2008-05-20T19:02:00.004+12:00

It was my turn to cook last night... I managed the cheapest night of the year so far. Spending a mere 59c on new ingredients and using stuff we already had like brown lentils (about $1 worth), carrot (30c?), 1 egg (30c maybe?) and a couple of other ingredients such as herbs to make lentil loaf. Throw in some rice and mixed veges and you got one of the cheapest student meals out there.

Also made a chocolate cake on my flatmate's orders. She bought all the ingredients, I supplied the labour. Turned out alright.

Talking about cake... because I haven't posted a video in a while. Here's the music video for Crowded House's Chocolate Cake song (from their Woodface album)

Little Rocket Ships.

2008-05-20T18:59:00.002+12:00

Calvin and Hobbes.

Hunting Zebras.

2008-05-20T18:32:00.002+12:00

Pearls Before Swine.

Who even cares?

2008-05-20T18:11:00.005+12:00

Why must the likes of TV3 rabbit on about the "golden rules" of politics? Apparently Phil Goff has broken them by acknowledging that Labour are behind in the polls and that they might lose the election and by discussing leadership after Helen Clark steps down.

What are these golden rules? They're just a buzz-phrase that reporters/journalists throw out that have no real significance in, well, anything. Phil Goff does something different, like stating the obvious and suddenly he's broken the golden rules. He might as well have raped a table. The media are just trying to make a mountain out of a molehill (to use an often-used phrase).

It's a pity that we live in an environment where the media are looking to grab onto anything to make a story out of. It would be so much nicer to live in a world where things were less sensationalised and rather have more intelligent discussion going on. I guess this just doesn't add up to big dollars for the media though. Pity.

One can hope?

2008-05-20T16:26:00.006+12:00

National leader John Key wants to have a referendum on MMP. While he didn't say whether it will be simply MMP vs FPP or with STV thrown in it is still scary. While I don't actually object to there being a referendum on the subject (it seems like a reasonable one to me) and while I don't think that FPP will be voted back in. A referendum on the subject sends chills down the part of my spine that is interested in electoral systems. The prospect of returning to FPP seems awful. MMP may have its oddities but FPP is a system that delivers results like:

The 1978 General Election. Labour gets 40.4% of the vote compared to National's 39.8% but National wins anyway by 11 seats. The Social Credit party manages to get 16.1% but only one seat to show for it.
The 1981 General Election. Again, Labour beats National in the popular vote but still loses to National by 4 seats. The Social Credit gets even more of the vote - 20.65% any only manages to increase their seats by one.

So, we have a system that allows a party that gets less votes than another to win? Some may accuse of MMP of allowing this to happen (i.e. in a situation say in 1996, where NZ First could have signed up with Labour/Alliance combination) - the fact remains that those parties in power would have still represented the majority of the population.

I could spend a while discussing the negatives of a FPP system. Idiot/Savant has a large number of posts about MMP here that can be read. The main problems I have with MMP is the 5% threshold (which should be lowered) and the overhang seats (excellent example: the Maori Party) which affect the proportionality of the seats.

The Newspapers have seemed to all run editorals on the subject: my "favourite" is from the Hawke's Bay Today by Louis Pierard which attacks the existence of minor parties as the major failing of MMP, a system that, according to Pierard, makes a mockery out of our politics and takes honour and dignity out of the system.

Bah, that's enough for me.

Didn't know it was that bad...

2008-05-19T23:47:00.003+12:00

Unknown to me, I'm on ACT's mailing list and I got an e-mail today from them asking for my vote. One bit of the e-mail was interesting..

The average New Zealand worker is now $450 a week poorer than the average Australian worker.
If we were a state of Australia, we'd be the poorest - $100 a week poorer than Tasmania.
If we were a state of the USA, we'd be 51st and last - $120 a week poorer than Mississippi.

I must say, I didn't know it was that bad. If I could be bothered I'd be tempted to check those figures. Seems a bit dodgy. I did do a little looking about Mississippi on wiki though. They were once the fifth richest state in the USA. That's what slave labour can do for you.

Joss Whedon is back!

2008-05-19T20:37:00.002+12:00

Joss Whedon, the man behind some of my favourite TV shows of all time like Buffy and Firefly is working on a new show: Dollhouse. A trailer of which can be seen here though the show's not due to appear until January next year. Now that is a bummer.

This is probably my most anticipated new series for now, along with Alan Ball's new series True Blood which will be premiering the 7th of September in the States (according to wiki anyway).

Such a long time... sigh...

More Pearls Before Swine

2008-05-18T14:31:00.004+12:00

After finding out about Pearls Before Swine the other day I thought I'll post a couple more...

Truth.

2008-05-18T13:29:00.002+12:00

From PHD Comics. I tend to deviate between Mid-Center, Nearest Exit and Against the Wall.

Hehehehe

2008-05-17T13:58:00.003+12:00

It felt so good to get a sleep after doing the all-nighter, I'm still a little screwed up from it. My hands are shaking a little, I'm finding myself walking around aimlessly a lot and I keep getting words wrong but I'm sure that'll all pass soon. It needs to, because I've got more stuff due next friday.

I found out about comic Pearls Before Swine from a post by Scott Adams and up at the top is today's. I like it.

10am

2008-05-16T10:00:00.004+12:00

Argghhhhhhhh. This all nighter has left me feeling wasted.

Luckily I don't have far to go. I've finished essay number one and have about 800 words to go on essay number two and I'll be all done...

And still have 6 hours to go. 8 cups of coffee consumed. Yeeech!

8am

2008-05-16T08:02:00.002+12:00

After taking an hour break to go home and eat I am now just back over where I was before I decided to be a moron and click two wrong buttons in succession.

Nearly finished one. Start next one soon.

We have 8 hours to go.

6am

2008-05-16T05:46:00.001+12:00

Ten hours to go.

In my sleep-deprived state I have just wiped out 500 words by forgetting to save.

I hate things.

2am

2008-05-16T01:50:00.003+12:00

It's 2am in the morning. I'm on four cups of coffee and have 14 hours to write an additional 1000 words for one essay and start and finish another 1000 word essay. Why do I do this to myself?

I wonder if I'll do it next week when I have a big essay and a decently sized assignment due on Friday. Sigh.

Diablo Cody's Thoughts.

2008-05-15T15:47:00.002+12:00

Am going to watch a movie in my room tonight. I have a recommendation from Spielberg(!) in my bag. (Who is this Fellini dude, anyhow?)

Diablo Cody's Twitter is an interesting read. What I expect from the writer of Juno really.

Template change... again.

2008-05-15T13:19:00.001+12:00

Like the title... I can't stay happy with a template so I did the old switcheroo.

Review: Spider-Man 2 (2004)

2008-05-15T01:39:00.002+12:00

God, when did Spider-Man become so fucking emo?

**spoilers!**
OK, we're two years after the events of the first film, a film that I liked and it appears that Peter has not moved on emotionally at all. He still wants to fuck Mary Jane and every single time he sees her it just seems to open up some emotional wound for him that causes him to go for some emo drifting around New York City. As Peter Parker he acts as a seriously sad bitch, he has no money, he's nearly failing class and he works for a man that demonises him. Things seem to be going well for everyone else but everyone else is also miserable, Harry still wants a hug from his dead father, auntie blames herself for her husband's death, Mary Jane wants to fuck Peter but he's in emo-land so she settles for an astronaut.

Are you serious? An astronaut? Do we still send people into outer space?

There's a villian called Dr. Octopus and he's crazy... like the last villian. Peter decides giving up everything he wants isn't worth being Spider-Man so he throws his little uniform away and becomes a nerd instead with spiffing glasses. Crime rises but Peter doesn't care, he can now finally have his shot with Mary Jane, but tough luck pal. She's getting fucking married. You knew that. He tries to convince her with a smashing argument but she is somehow not convinced.

The entire plot becomes ridiculous as the movie progresses. Scenes full of plot holes arise, for instance: no one (including Mr. Super Spider Senses) notices that a man with four huge metalliac arms enters a bank until he thows open the vault door. Later in the film, the said man with the metalliac arms is given one clue (Peter Parker) to find Spider-Man and then KILLS him. Oh, wait, he didn't. Because Peter Parker has super powers. Right. That was lucky otherwise you would have killed your only clue and then you wouldn't have got your precious whatever that glowing shit was.

And don't get me started on the ending. Don't get me started on that awful speech that is repeated throughout the film. Don't get me started on the phrase "with great power comes great responsiblity". Don't get me started on the useless sequences.

We should just talk about J.K. Simmons. He's fucking awesome. I wish the rest of the movie could just live up to him.

I'll finish with a picture... from the first movie because that was so much better.

Quality Journalism from Jon Stewart

2008-05-14T13:58:00.003+12:00

Lee Sigelman @ The Monkey Cage has a post commenting on a report by the "Project for Excellence in Journalism" on The Daily Show. (which screens in NZ on C4 Tue-Fri 10pm)

The Daily Show is one of my favourite shows but the idea that it should be taken as journalism is laughable. It's a comedy show that works as a meta-text rather than an actual text as it spends most of its time looking at the media's coverage of events rather than the actual event.

This report happened because in a poll of which journalists were admired the most, host Jon Stewart came in fourth. Really, this is reflective of the state of the rest of media rather than on the Daily Show. The questions that the report should be asking is why does no one admire the media anymore?

An interesting stat though on the front page...

Daily Show viewers are highly informed, an indication that The Daily Show is not their lone source of news. Regular viewers of The Daily Show and the Colbert Report were most likely to score in the highest percentile on knowledge of current affairs.

Seems that people who watch the show are quite likely to get their news from other sources as well and are able to distinguish between satire and reality.

The conclusions of the report seem to be: The Daily Show has a skewed focus on Washington politics and can completely ignore other big stories (such as the Virginia Tech shootings - with good reason, there is nothing funny about that). The Daily Show also has a liberal bias, the show producers say this is because the show is anti-establishment. It'll be interesting to see if the show changes if Obama wins the White House in November.

Finally, I pulled up the Wikiquote page for The Daily Show, it has a section that has some taglines. Let's see how The Daily Show defines itself:

More people get their news from the Daily Show with Jon Stewart... Than probably should.
The Daily Show - the only news program with no credibility left to lose.
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. We're getting a helicopter... soon.
The Most Important News Show... Ever.

What a film that could have been...

2008-05-14T01:08:00.003+12:00

Studying at the moment at 1am in the computer room on campus for my Robert Altman essay that is due on Friday, about three times now its been mentioned that he was dropped for the Ragtime film which turned out (apparently) rather average. I would have so loved to see an Altman version of Ragtime. Pity Altman's dead now.

Awful Policy

2008-05-13T22:41:00.003+12:00

ACT founder and candidate the Hon Sir Roger Douglas said ACT would make the first $10,000 tax-free for full-time income earners, and inflation-index tax brackets to restore 2000 values.

-ACT

(h/t: Deborah @ The Hand Mirror)

How do you justify giving the tax break only to full time workers? Is part time work not important? Not even a little? As Deborah points out this is a spit in the face to anyone that looks after children. This policy completely distorts incentives towards full time work. Sure, that may not seem bad but kinda assumes that everyone can be fitted into a nice little homogeneous box that says that full time work is best for everyone. It's not. I used to kinda like ACT, it appealed to the inner right winger inside me but this policy seems to go against what the likes of Rodney Hide stand for - especially their rhetoric concerning 'choice' - I thought ACT would be the last party that would try to dictate how people can work through the tax system. I am very confused by this policy.

In terms of the other issue raised by this press release - tax bracket creep. I'm in favour of it and I thought it was already in place. A bit of research found that it is - just not to the extent that ACT wants it. It was announced in 2005 and the first adjustment would take place back in the 31st of March 2008 - only covering the period between the 1st of April 2005 and the 31st of March 2008. ACT wants it to cover the period going back to 2000. I'd be seriously more cautious doing that.

I do think that the tax brackets should be increasing by the rate of inflation every year. Not every three years in an attempt to build up a nice little stockpile for election year.

Man... long boring post. One question, did National increase the tax brackets in the 90s? That's something I want to find out.

Album of the Moment

2008-05-13T17:55:00.007+12:00

The album: Hello Young Lovers by The Sparks. Released in 2006. This album is so weird in its theatrics that its impossible to become fully engrossed in their spinning web of irony. Or if, you're not into that - you'll probably find the whole thing rather stupid.

I've got two youtube videos here. One is a music video for one of the singles of the album (Dick Around - this is a shortened version of the song)

And their guest appearance on the Gilmore Girls.

Stupid Vicious Circle

2008-05-13T16:39:00.002+12:00

The sad thing is how true it is sometimes. Not this week... I hope.

So confused right now

2008-05-13T00:03:00.002+12:00

I have a test at 7pm
I study up until then, sending a text message to my flatmate about 15 minutes before test starts saying "i'm screwed"
I arrive. I'm a minute early. But everyone has already started on their tests.
8.15pm, the 15 minute warning before the end of the test arrives much sooner than expected. End result: I finish 29 marks worth of the questions out of 50.
I come home and something doesn't feel right. All that I do though is go to the video store to return The Triplets of Belleville.
I suddenly come to a realisation of what's going on. I get back home and knock very loudly on my flatmate's door to check when I sent that text.
As I expected: 7.15pm
So I somehow lost the ability to read clocks and mistook 7pm for 7.30pm. I'm very annoyed with myself. And very confused.
I'm also probably fucked. I needed 40% to get terms and I doubt I achieved that. I think I answered the questions fairly well but 20 out of 29? God I hope I did.

Quick Film Reviews: The Procrastination Edition

2008-05-11T23:32:00.009+12:00

I was meant to be busy this week so I procrastinated and watched a whole bunch of films.

The Triplets of Belleville (2003 - Sylvain Chomet)
I gave two films 10/10 last year - Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid and Band of Outsiders and this becomes the first film this year to receive that rating. Every single frame was injected with so much energy and originality that I was giddy for the entire 81 minutes. Finding Nemo, a film I quite liked beat this one for the Oscar of best animated feature. Nemo should have been CRUSHED. But oh well; not everyone's cup of tea I guess. To emphasise the point: 10/10

Mission Impossible III (2006 - J.J. Abrams)
Having not seen the first two I don't really know what to compare this too. As an action flick I thought it worked quite well. 7.5/10

Cars (2006 - John Lasseter & Joe Ranft)
Pixar's weakest film to date. But still quite lovable and pretty. Still good. 8/10

Priceless (2006 - Pierre Salvadori)
Lots of expensive stuff on display. Everything looks pretty and its fun some of the time if it wasn't for that dull predictable plot. And Audrey Tautou, one of my favourite actresses after Amelie looks so skinny, was she always like that? 6/10

Planet Terror (2007 - Robert Rodrigeuz)
Now this was fun. Pure fun. Delivered exactly what they promised. Need to see Tarantino's Death Proof now. I read that the fake trailer at the beginning is actually going to be made into a real movie. Now that is awesome. 8.5/10

The Conversation (1974 - Francis Ford Coppola)
Part of the New Hollywood in the 70s. Coppola made this between the first two Godfather films. Interesting thriller. 8/10

Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936 - Frank Capra)
I always liked that Gilmore Girls by Paris when she is in Stars Hollow for the first time and describes it as a place "that would even make Frank Capra throw up". This is one of those films with those Capra idealistic characters that are so pure and innocent and full of integrity that it'll make you throw up. Other examples is Jimmy Stewart from It's a Wonderful Life and Jimmy Stewart from Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. I'm sure he's got a few more movies that have these characters. If they weren't so lovable in their integrity this film will be awful but Gary Cooper does well here. 8/10

The Lady Eve (1941 - Preston Sturges)
I'm still trying to work out what happened in the end there. It kind of confuses me. No judgement yet.

Thank You For Smoking

2008-05-11T23:20:00.006+12:00

Money...

2008-05-11T22:52:00.005+12:00

No Right Turn talks about social dividends and Universal Basic Incomes here. I've always loved this idea. A pity that no one implements so that we can see if it works in the real world.

As an aside, he also talks about the Qantas Media Awards in another post. (A congratulations to No Right Turn for being nominated) But it's nice that the Otago Daily Times is no longer winning Best Newspaper in the country. Because, quite frankly, it's not. And (for the last five years at least) it was never the Best Newspaper.

One Man Band

2008-05-09T18:09:00.002+12:00

Pixar short film from 2005. I love these guys.

Suplerative Simpsons: Sideshow Bob Roberts

2008-05-09T17:40:00.004+12:00

I find it funny how the people on SNPP seem to differ wildly on their views on particular episodes. . The reviews section includes "terrible" and "SUCKED really, really, really bad" amongst the other reviews and some even seemed "offended" by the attacks on the Republican party.

Being a loopy fruity left winger I loved them. Though there were all soft satirical jabs. I fail to see how they could be offensive.

The basic plot of this episode is as follows: Sideshow Bob (my favourite Simpsons character of all time) is released from prison by Mayor Joe Quimby after some grassroots support for Bob is generated by a right wing talk radio host, Bob is then enlisted by the Republican party to run against Quimby in the latest mayoral election which he wins.

Some of the classic lines...

Barlow: Monty, I'm way ahead of you. If you'll just open that door you'll see the next mayor of Springfield.
[door opens to reveal a water cooler; everyone applauds]
[the cooler bubbles]
Senator: What'd it say?
Barlow: No, no, no, Bob. Bob, come in!
Bob: [enters wrapped in a US flag] A fine "Mahoke" to you all.
Hibbert: Why, he's even better.
Ranier: I agree. I like the human touch.

Bob: That was a big mistake, Bart. No children have ever meddled with the Republican Party and lived to tell about it.

TV Commercial: Mayor Quimby supports revolving door prisons. Mayor Quimby even released Sideshow Bob -- a man twice convicted of attempted murder. Can you trust a man like Mayor Quimby? Vote Sideshow Bob for mayor.

Barlow: Mayor Quimby, you're well-known, sir, for your lenient stance on crime. But suppose for a second that your house was ransacked by thugs, your family tied up in the basement with socks in their mouths, you try to open the door but there's too much blood on the knob...
Quimby: What is your question?
Barlow: My question is about the budget, sir.

Bart: You were just Barlow's lackey.
Lisa: You were Ronny to his Nancy!
Bart: Sonny to his Cher!
Lisa: Ringo to his rest of the Beatles!

And the best one...

Bart: We want the truth!
Bob: You want the truth? You can't handle the truth. No truth-handler, you. Bah! I deride your truth-handling abilities.
Judge: Will you get to the point?
Bob: Only I could have executed such a masterpiece of electoral fraud. And I have the records to prove it! Here, just look at these -- [pulls out binders and floppy disks] each one a work of Machiavellian art.
Judge: But why?
Bob: Because you need me, Springfield. Your guilty conscience may force you to vote Democratic, but deep down inside you secretly long for a cold-hearted Republican to lower taxes, brutalize criminals, and rule you like a king. That's why I did this: to protect you from yourselves. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a city to run.
Judge: Bailiffs, place the mayor under arrest.
Bob: What? Oh yes, all that stuff I did.

Cool Comics

2008-05-09T16:35:00.002+12:00

From Dilbert & PHD Comics.

New Template MADNESS

2008-05-08T15:22:00.002+12:00

I changed the template. This officially counts as procrastination.

I need to get ready for a four o'clock class me thinks.

Best President Ever

2008-05-08T12:53:00.003+12:00

OK, so Josiah Bartlet was fictional. But he was an economist, a fairly left wing economist at that - which makes him pretty rare but not unknown.

He wrote a book called Theory and Practice of Macroeconomics in Developing Countries and that is just cool.

It'll be nice if we had an American presidential candidate who didn't sign up to bad economic policies. Such as McCain and Clinton's support for the Gas Tax holiday. Obama has nothing to do with it but he seems like a lightweight.

Oh well. I liked this video from The Colbert Report. And this from the Dilbert Blog.

Seven Days of Robert Altman: Day Seven

2008-05-07T15:44:00.002+12:00

Day One: M*A*S*H
Day Two: McCabe & Mrs Miller
Day Three: The Long Goodbye
Day Four: Nashville
Day Five: The Player
Day Six: Gosford Park

Robert Altman died about six months after A Prairie Home Companion was released so it proved to be his last and with its permutations on death turned out to be a rather foreshadowing film. It received lackluster reviews but I highly enjoyed it, this film was my introduction to Altman when I watched it at the end of last year. I picked it up at the video store with the firm intention to finally watch one of his movies. (It would later turn out that I would have to study him the next year - stuff like that always amuses me)

The video is of one of the songs amongst the many I could have chosen.

Election Prediction (The Wild Guess)

2008-05-07T14:31:00.003+12:00

I like making a wild guess, getting it down on paper (or blog) and then getting it out months later and having a good laugh. Without further ado, my predictions for the New Zealand Election this year.

National: 53 seats
Labour: 47 seats
Greens: 8 seats
Maori Party: 5 seats
ACT: 3 seats
NZ First: 3 seats
Progressive: 1 seat
United Future: 1 seat

That makes a total of 121 seats with the Maori Party providing the overhang. This situation will call for some complicated coalition building.

I'm also envisioning a situation where ACT and the Greens get less votes, NZ First is booted out completely (Winston Peters doesn't win back his Tauranga seat), the Maori Party get less party votes and National picks up the majority of these votes. That'll look like:

National: 58 seats
Labour: 49 seats
Greens: 6 seats
Maori Party: 5 seats
ACT: 2 seats
Progressive: 1 seat
United Future: 1 seat

That's 122 seats. Oh well, so much can change before election day.

The Primary Goes On!

2008-05-07T11:55:00.003+12:00

I love elections. Today is a hugely important day for the democratic party nominees. It could make or break Hillary Clinton.

These seem to the best place to get results: Indiana (72 delegates) & North Carolina (115 delegates).

Currently Hillary has a 4% lead in Indiana and Obama has a 15% lead in North Carolina. But it's so ridiculously early that those numbers are completely irrelevant. (noon - NZ time)

Movie Maps of the World

2008-05-07T01:13:00.003+12:00

Strange Maps has an advertisement from Volkswagen that shows three different maps of the world if we represent them through movie production.

The most bizarre one is the first one based on "average budget per feature film" where New Zealand ends up utterly huge with the author offering the comment that "Australia could fit in between the North and South Islands"

Could the Lord of the Rings really have distorted the stats so much? Probably. It's a sad fact that New Zealand makes very few films and they're probably not enough in number to bring down the average budget down enough. Also, if we're counting Lord of the Rings, (an overseas financed production) why not count say King Kong, 10,000 BC, Wolverine, Narnia, etc...

If we're going to have a small number of really high budget films with a small number of low budget films then not even the United States could compete on that stat with their small number of really high budget films and a really large number of medium and small budget films.

Sideways

2008-05-07T00:50:00.006+12:00

Review: Bon Voyage (2003)

2008-05-07T00:26:00.004+12:00

How could a film so riddled with cliches and scenes that has already been seen be so entertaining?

I didn't have much expectations when I decided to watch it, my flatmate had rented it and hadn't gone around to seeing it and I was feeling awake and alert that Sunday night. What else was I to do? It was awesome, the film flirts with Hitchcock, Truffaut and others I'm probably not aware of (the IMDB reviewers seemed to mentioning Renoir a lot). It wasn't very substantial but was mere entertainment (those expecting a World War Two drama would have been disappointed).

My flatmate attempted to watch but gave up after about half an hour declaring it 'shit'. I'll give it 8/10.

Awesome Simpsons: Bart's Girlfriend

2008-05-06T17:32:00.002+12:00

I watched The Simpsons today and was greeted with an awesome episode from season six: Bart's Girlfriend. It's been a while since I saw a cool episode, all the ones I seem to be seeing on TV are from the later and vastly inferior seasons. Meryl Streep guests stars as the eponymous character.

The basic plot is that Bart finds himself lusting after Reverend Lovejoy's daughter: Jessica. He tries to pass himself off as a nice boy thinking that'll impress her but he soon discovers that she is a bad girl whose antics far exceed his own.

Some cool quotes... (from SNPP)

Lovejoy: And now my daughter Jessica, who has just returned from boarding school, will read the same passage I just read. I noticed a few of you weren't paying attention.
Bart: [groans] Oh...
[Jessica walks up; a heavenly light shines upon her]
Bart: [gasps] Wow! There is a God!
[the light comes from a lighthouse outside]
Man: I'm telling you the light would work better if it pointed out to sea.
McAllister: Arr, shut up! I know what I'm doing.
[a boat crashes in the distance]
McAllister: Arr, I hate the sea and everything in it.

Lisa: Don't be so hard on yourself, Bart. It's not your fault Jessica doesn't like you.
Bart: Is it my hair? My overbite? The fact that I've worn the same clothes day in, day out for the last four years?

Bart: Excellent! You're incredible, Jessica: your throws, your catches, your spirals, and your loops -- it's like the toilet paper is an extension of your body.

Marge: Have you noticed any change in Bart?
Homer: New glasses?
Marge: No...he looks like something might be disturbing him.
Homer: Probably misses his old glasses.
Marge: I guess we could get more involved in Bart's activities but then I'd be afraid of smothering him.
Homer: Yeah, and then we'd get the chair.
Marge: That's not what I meant.
Homer: It was, Marge, admit it.

Rugby!

2008-05-06T16:45:00.003+12:00

From Stuff...

Evans will earn somewhere in the region of $2 million for his 2 1/2 years with Quins, though it has been speculated that Carter could haul in as much as that for a single year in France.

One thing I don't understand about this is where do the European clubs get the money? Is there really such a big market for players in a region that is dominated by soccer? Then again, even in Europe rugby players make chickenshit compared to their soccer counterparts who are getting $20 million+

One question is, who is earning the most in NZ rugby? How much can the NZRFU actually afford to pay players? They'll need to up the ante or more players will leave. They have the lure of the All Black jersey but apparently you can put a price on that now (about a million or so).

Celebrating with Chocolate.

2008-05-06T16:19:00.004+12:00

I'm about to overdose on the chocolate I bought to celebrate my "victory" over the bank. This all started way back on Friday when I was about to go to the supermarket. I checked my balance online and what did I find? That there was $1.43 left in my account. I found that the bank had taken $22.20 (as you can see - I'm not very rich at the moment) out as "interest charges". It was five o'clock and too late to go to the bank and complain.

So, yesterday I went to the bank and complained and got it reversed. They didn't know why it had happened but I got my money back and would have it the next day. So today I look in my account and find that low and behold I now only had 13c in my account (I had spent a dollar at video ezy to rent a movie). So I went back, turned out I had some bill payments that I had forgotten out sitting there unable to make payment (very little payments) because of the interest fee and the bank had charged me $22.50 for that. They reversed that as well.

So I bought some chocolate (this new chocolate by Cadburys - it's a mixture of dark and milk chocolate). Hopefully I won't have to go back to the bank for a while.

Review: Twilight Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko

2008-05-06T15:55:00.003+12:00

When I said at the start of the year that I should more Russian authors I don't think I meant this.

Nevertheless, I've found myself addicted to the Watch series since last year when I watched the Night Watch movie followed up by the Day Watch movie earlier this year. I got out the books from the library and promptly read them and now just finished Twilight Watch - the third book in the series. If you're into a mixture of magician/vampire/detective novels with a little satire on bureaucracy and some musing on modern Russia then this is will be right down your alley. If not, read War and Peace or something.

Admittedly, this book is not as good as the the first two but has it moments. Lukyanenko keeps up his annoying habit of putting heaps of lyrics in the prose. I don't let Thomas Pynchon do that and Lukyanenko gets the same treatment. What's the point? I don't even bother reading them.

There is a movie called Twilight Watch scheducled for release in 2009 but the setting has been changed from Russia to the States and it will feature American actors rather than Russians. A obviously disapointing movie with the only bright spot being that they've retained the director Timur Bekmambetov. So it should be interesting, the books and the movies are two different beasts with the movies going in a completely diffferent direction to the books. We'll just have to wait and see.

Seven Days of Robert Altman: Day Six

2008-05-06T15:17:00.003+12:00

Day One: M*A*S*H
Day Two: McCabe & Mrs Miller
Day Three: The Long Goodbye
Day Four: Nashville
Day Five: The Player

Ah, the penultimate day and today's featured movie is Gosford Park. This won the oscar for best original screenplay. Beating some of my favourite films like Memento, Amelie and The Royal Tenenbaums. It beat Monster's Ball as well - but I haven't seen that.

The video today is one of the songs sung, which has been a bit of theme for the videos I've posted from Youtube. Mainly because they're about all that can be found. Altman has an interesting relationship with music. Something that totally needs to be explored... just not now.

Seven Days of Robert Altman: Day Five

2008-05-05T10:42:00.000+12:00

Day One: M*A*S*H
Day Two: McCabe & Mrs Miller
Day Three: The Long Goodbye
Day Four: Nashville

So we go from 1975 to 1992. After making what many consider to be his masterpiece he slips a little and he makes films like Popeye. Finally, he makes his "comeback" with The Player. Though, it's not really a comeback, he never really went anywhere. People were still giving him money to sit behind a camera.

The clip below is the seven and half minute opening sequence of the movie. I can't actually watch it at the moment because my internet has seemed to have grinded to a halt. According to the comments there is some kind of error with the clip and there looks like there is a cut. But there really isn't.

I'm a genius!

2008-05-04T23:48:00.002+12:00

I got all the questions right in this quiz I randomly stumbled upon while look at serious news.

Which celebrity is taller?

In My Father's Den

2008-05-04T23:28:00.004+12:00

Chocolate! Biscotti! Tacos!

2008-05-04T18:53:00.003+12:00

I was doing some random searching around on allrecipes for some stuff to try out and figured I wanted to try these recipes out sometime...

Lime Chicken Soft Tacos
Spring Biscotti
Spring and Leak White Bean Soup
Absolutely Sinful Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies (why say chocolate twice?)

Gonna be some fun times. Especially that last one. Sounds yummy.

Blue Velvet

2008-05-04T15:30:00.005+12:00

Just because I can. My flatmate rented Blue Velvet this week so here are some random snapshots from the film.

Seven Days of Robert Altman: Day Four

2008-05-04T14:29:00.004+12:00

Day One: M*A*S*H
Day Two: McCabe & Mrs Miller
Day Three: The Long Goodbye

Well, we're now onto the last film of the 70's that I've seen of Altman's. Tomorrow will be quite a leap in time after this. Many consider Nashville to be Altman's magnus opus - this three hour epic film of five days in Nashville. 24 main characters all just living. It's truly an amazing film, one of the few films that feel organic when you watch it. It truly feels like a living breathing thing. The video is one of the songs - I'm Easy by Keith Carradine, though I would have really liked to have used the 200 years song from the very beginning.

Some Quick Film Reviews

2008-05-04T13:55:00.007+12:00

Seen a bunch of films over the last couple of weeks. So without wasting any more time...

Thelma & Louise (1991, Ridley Scott)
I now finally understand that Simpsons episode where Marge meets Ruth Powers. This is one of those movies that everyone has seemed to have seen except for me... but not anymore! The film itself was really enjoyable. 8/10

Strictly Ballroom (1992, Baz Luhrmann)
I saw Moulin Rouge! about a month ago which introduced me to the exorbitant Baz Luhrmann. The amazing thing is how effortlessly he pulls it off. This film is certainly a charmer. 8/10

A Mighty Wind (2003, Christopher Guest)
Back in first year I randomly got the poster for this film to liven up the hallway in my hall of residence. There was something about those cheery faces that I felt would unsettle everyone else on the floor. I'm a huge fan of the previous movies (Best In Show, Waiting For Guffman, etc...) and this one was nice while not quite living up to those ones. 7.5/10

THX 1138 (1971, George Lucas)
I've never been a big fan of these totalitarian visions of the future movies. They all seem too 1984ish. A good one though. 7/10

Pret-A-Porter (1994, Robert Altman)
This is the eighth Altman film I've seen and this one just felt like Altman going through the paces. It was him applying all those techniques he's known for but for what? It was funny, had some interesting characters and worked. Maybe I'm just experiencing some Altman burnout - seven of those Altman films I saw this year. 7/10

Scones!

2008-05-03T22:03:00.003+12:00

Not doing anything tonight so got out an ancient Alison Holst cookbook and made some Cinnamon Pinwheel scones. They looked a little odd (which all my cooking does - presentation is probably the last thing I care about when I cook) but they tasted alright - which is the important thing. (not saying that presentation doesn't have it's place - if someone plonked a heap of purple mush in front of me then I'd feel funny eating it no matter how good it tasted)

I went for a walk up Baldwin St today - billed as the steepest street in the world but not actually true.

Finally, when I was making dinner some drunk guy walked into our flat. He wasn't too much different from the normal drunk person though he did claim that he would happily drink my dishwashing liquid. Don't think anyone's ever claimed that before. I was tempted to try him out but that stuff's expensive.

Seven Days of Robert Altman: Day Three

2008-05-03T15:57:00.002+12:00

Day One: M*A*S*H
Day Two: McCabe & Mrs Miller

Altman's 1973 adaptation The Long Goodbye, based on the novel by Raymond Chandler bombed at the box office. Initially marketed as a straight-up film noir. Elliott Gould as Marlowe didn't convince anyone. With time, it's been more accepted as what it was: a satire. The video below is the opening of the film - it shows many of Altman's characteristic techniques - a warning though - it's ten minutes long.

Selection Effects

2008-05-03T14:30:00.002+12:00

Tyler Cowen writes...

When it comes to Roman literature there is also a significant selection effect, namely what later manuscript collectors thought was worth preserving and protecting. Many novels were written during Roman times, but not many of them have come down to us and thus the average quality of Roman literature may look artificially high, just as the average quality of today's literary menagerie looks artificially low.

Whenever someone claims to me that movies today are crap (commonly either snobs or oddly people who actually never watch old films and only watch contemporary films anyway - especially the most stale of today's genre - the romantic comedy) I normally spout out something like that. Though I replace "roman literature" with "old movies" and "manuscript collectors" with "those people who preserved film prints". This effect is magnified with old movies, especially silent films since these movies were filmed on Nitrate film stock which without proper care would degenerate into goo. Provided it hadn't blown up first.

But the market also does this work as well, more films were made back in the pre-television days than now but only a handful of them actually survive. With the digital age upon us, it increases the chances that films will survive into the future. But not all of them, the market will sweep aside those films that were picked up by neither the mass consumer or the critic. With the bad movies gone the average quality of these movies goes up.

The same thing happens with all form of culture - music, books, whatever else there is...

Seven Days of Robert Altman: Day Two

2008-05-02T15:39:00.002+12:00

In 1971, a year after MASH, Robert Altman released McCabe & Mrs Miller. His take on the Western. Youtube wasn't very giving with videos. All of them featured Leonard Cohen singing (as he provides the soundtrack) so I decided to give you the trailer.

Another Sunny Day

2008-05-02T15:10:00.002+12:00

It's pouring down with rain and hail here... on and off in the typical Dunedin way. I was in the kitchen making my breakfast and my MP3 player had been providing me with sufficient gloomy music to match the gloomy weather. Until Belle & Sebastian's "Another Sunny Day" came on... a perky cute contrast that starts off with lyrics like this...

Another sunny day, I met you up in the garden
You were digging plants, I dug you, beg your pardon

Oh well... the rain has stopped now... again. The sun's even came out for a couple of minutes.

On to the last city!

2008-05-01T19:51:00.006+12:00

After months of playing Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas I've finally made it to the last city (of three - this one is based on Las Vegas). Normally, I wouldn't bother posting this but with a bunch of controversy over the latest GTA I couldn't resist. My normal game experience normally ends in frustration as I fail to use my rocket launcher to shoot down a helicopter and end up blowing myself up because I can't aim the frigging thing.

Frustrated, I then go out and run over a bunch of children or force some prostitutes to eat some defecation. (OK, you can't do either thing in the game)

There is a comment on David Farrar's blog that's interesting. It's from a "Fletch" who quotes an interview with a former army guy about using first person shooters as part of training for army, police, etc... Well GTA isn't actually a first person shooter (bar a couple of occasions when you have to go into that mode) - you don't actually have to aim your gun - press a button and it'll happen automatically. Press circle and bullets come out and your target dies. The subject matter in the game is no worse than what you'll find in movies. I think the idea of the "immersion" effect of games is no different to the effect found in movies when you watch them in the right conditions (lights out, no distractions). So why should you attack video games when they are so much more artificial?

Anyway, I actually wanted to take a look at Family First, the organisation that's driving the controversy. Unfortunately they're another one of those organisations that seem to consider family values and christian belief one and the same. I hate these guys, I think if they ever want to be taken more seriously they need to actually divorce themselves from their christian side and distance themselves from the religious right.You do not have to be a Christian family to be a loving family that promotes good values.

These are the people that tried to have Californication banned (they were unsuccessful, though they did manage to get a large number of advertisers to withdraw). I took a glance through their recent news to take a look.

This article talks about a study that showed children watching MTV or BET (does BET even screen in New Zealand??) are exposed to something bad once every 38 seconds. Family First add their position at the bottom.

This material can be viewed free-to-air in NZ on C4 , and also on Sky TV e.g. Juice TV etc. Broadcasting standards in NZ are failing our children.

You can't directly compare C4 with the American MTV! C4 complies their programming from a wide variety of sources. They actually play music videos which MTV hardly does. MTV rather shows "a variety of pop culture, youth culture, and reality television shows aimed at adolescents and young adults" (wikipedia) which includes a lot of shit - shows like A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila that has 32 male and females vying for the love of a bisexual woman (this is actually screened in NZ on Sky on their MTV channel which may hit that mark mentioned before - that channel should be banned not because it's immoral but of the awful progamming). C4 and Juice TV would be nowhere near the "once every 38 seconds" mark that Family First is implying.

OK, I've completely gone off topic. I hate Family First, we get it. Watch this Daily Show segment on Gran Theft Auto IV.

What movies were better than their books?

2008-05-01T18:06:00.004+12:00

Entertainment Weekly has a list of 23 disappointing movie adaptations. I must say, what a useless list. The films on the list could have been joined by hundreds of films - most of these felt like just personal gripes by the writes. Nearly every single movie made from a book is worse than its source material. It's the nature of adaptation. You leave things out, you have to change things, it's what needs to happen. Look at the first two Harry Potter films as examples of films that follow their source material to the letter. I consider them awful. Once they started to change things for the third film onwards that the Potter films became... ok.

Anyway, digression aside. A far more interesting (and shorter) list would surely be which movies are better than their source material? Out of the top of my head, some frequently mentioned ones would be the likes of The Godfather (Pauline Kael described Puzo's novel as trash - though I've also heard it described as a masterpiece. Guess I'll need to read it before passing judgement), Psycho (I guess, didn't Hitchcock buy up all the copies and hide them so he could keep his ending a secret?), Fight Club (Well, I hated the novel - the novelist even admitted that Fincher's ending was better), M*A*S*H (paraphasing Altman, the novel by Richard Hooker was awful - full of racism and sexism), Dr. Strangelove (Kubrick completely changed the tone. The novel (Red Alert) was meant to be completely serious), The Shining (Kubrick again - King hated Kubrick's version and made his own inferior version)... That's all I can think of off the top of my head. Time to search for some actual lists...

This New York Times article from 2005 is interesting... mainly for the introduction.

"Honestly, I much prefer the book," a young-looking François Truffaut says, comparing his film "Jules and Jim" to the novel that inspired it. In an old television interview included on the recent DVD of the film, Truffaut recalls finding Henri-Pierre Roché's 1953 novel in a second-hand bookshop. "It made me sad to think it did something films couldn't do," he said of the book, which mesmerized him. "In a movie, if a woman loves two men, one man is nice and the other isn't."
He did more than figure out how to translate that blameless story of a femme fatale whose love swerved back and forth between two best friends; it became his masterpiece. Truffaut succeeded so well that today it's easy to say: "Jules and Jim" was a novel?

This 2003 blog has a post about it. Another 2003 blog post talks about the Lord of the Rings movies and this cracked article here also has a list.

Seven Days of Robert Altman: Day One

2008-05-01T01:42:00.003+12:00

I'm about to write an essay about the late film director Robert Altman - so you should expect lots of writing about Altman on this blog. I find him to be completely fascinating as a director and he's currently my latest favourite director - so far this year I've seen six of his films. With the one I watched at the end of last year that's a total of seven - so I've decided to dedicate this week to Altman and will post a new youtube video every day of an Altman movie.

I start off with M*A*S*H which was the film that broke him into the mainstream way back in 1970. This video has the song that will later become the theme song for the television series... with the lyrics removed of course...

Review: Easy Rider (1969)

2008-05-01T01:10:00.006+12:00

I'm currently doing a course about New Hollywood, the period in film history that started in 1967 when the studios relinquished creative control over to the directors. This period arguably ended about eight years later though Wikipedia puts the time of death in 1982 with Francis Ford Coppola's One From The Heart (which I need to see - I missed the screening on Tuesday). When I saw this on the video store shelf - I had to get it out on $1 day.

Easy Rider, always mentioned after the likes of Bonnie & Clyde and The Graduate is one of the earliest films of New Hollywood and you can definitely see the aesthetic of the period shining through here. I feel that the freedom that the directors had is nicely encapsulated by the words of the characters.

However, I didn't really feel anything for this film. It was good, a very enjoyable 94 minutes of my life. Ultimately, 7.5/10

(As a sidenote: reading the Wikipedia section on the production section of Easy Rider makes director Dennis Hopper sound very intense. Not someone to mess with...)

Dexter

2008-04-29T11:52:00.002+12:00

I watched new TV show Dexter last night after a fairly boring episode (apart from a few scenes) of Desperate Housewives. I remain conflicted about it.

After being a huge fan of Six Feet Under (own all five seasons on DVD), I just can't get the "David" character out of my head.

To me, Michael C. Hall who plays Dexter, is that uptight gay man who runs a funeral home in LA. Not this unfeeling blood splatter analyst from Miami who dabbles in killing serial killers. It's a serious hurdle I'm going to need to get over before I can become a fan of this show. And I'll like to, I did enjoy it - at least I think I did - I'll need to watch some more to make sure. This makes Monday night the only night of television for me. There's nothing else that I'm totally enjoying at the moment.

That's probably a good thing. I so need to do more work.

Oh well, I posted a quick 29 second youtube video below of David from Six Feet Under in a moment from the first episode.

Red Capes...

2008-04-28T19:26:00.002+12:00

Today was the second time that I've seen someone walking around campus as nonchalant as possible with a red cape on this year. I don't know if it's the same girl or if it's two different people and we're seeing the start of a new fashion trend. But it's cool. Though it's beaten by that time I was in the library and a guy in a monkey suit was going through books in the philosophy section.

Monday is my cooking day so I made Dal Makhani, I adjusted the recipe slightly so that I could make in a slow cooker, swapped black lentils for brown lentils (or are they the same thing? Hell if I know, I've never seen black lentils before) and didn't pressure cook anything. Just did it with a saucepan on the stove. Looked just like the picture on the blog without the ginger juilennes that were sprinkled on that one.

Bill Hicks on JFK

2008-04-28T10:29:00.000+12:00

Had a dream last night where Danny DeVito was by grandfather and Jennifer Aniston my grandmother. There was also an election that never ended and I played a huge game of chess that stretched out over a 15 acre field with my 12 year old sister.

Following up on my review of the film JFK... This is Bill Hicks talking about the man and his assassination... not the film.

Review: JFK (1991)

2008-04-27T18:02:00.000+12:00

I watched this film over the weekend. It took me three attempts to actually get through the entire thing, which requires me to make a mental note. No, several mental notes. (OK - three)

1) Don't get out films that are 198 minutes long.
I should repeat this to myself over and over: I do not like long movies. I do not buy into Roger Ebert's (I think he said it) saying that no good movie is long enough and that no bad movie is short enough. Movies should never overstay their welcome. I don't care if you're The Godfather. I have a short attention span.

There are a few exceptions to the rule: Nashville clocks in at 159 minutes, Magnolia at 188, Boogie Nights at 156 and I'm sure there's some more that I'll admit to liking that are over 150 minutes.

The kicker for JFK was that I rented out the director's cut. So what started out as a three hour movie had an extra 20 minutes tacked on.

2) Kevin Costner is Satan
I have this thing about Kevin Costner, I have a theory that it all stemmed from when I studied Dances With Wolves back in high school. Dear lord, I hated that movie so much. Since then no Costner movie has stood a chance.

3) Conspiracy Theories Are Only Fun If Bill Hicks Is Telling Them...
I remember once upon a time when watching a friend's Bill Hicks DVD that Hicks did his own summary of the "Magic Bullet" which was so much better than anything in this movie - I should find a youtube video. Doesn't matter that much anyway - Wikipedia says that the Magic Bullet scene (my favourite of the movie) isn't actually based on fact. Oh well, it was still funny.

One last thing - while reading I found this web site interesting - "One Hundred Errors of Fact and Judgment in Oliver Stone's JFK" almost reminds me of the web sites that attacked Bowling For Columbine such as this one.

Overall: 5/10 for the film. Also note that is in the book, 1001 Films You Must See Before You Die.

That First Post...

2008-04-27T17:37:00.000+12:00

Hello everyone and welcome to Dead Sharks, a flash brand spanking new blog to feast your eyes on. I've done the blogging thing before (like three years ago) and have recently found myself with the urge to blog.

So here we are. I'm a uni student from Dunedin, New Zealand in my final semester of study - I major in Film & Media Studies and Economics. Everyone always says that it's an "interesting" combination whenever I tell them that. When I get sick of hearing that, I tell them my name is Hubert and that I study Marine Biology. Oddly, no one finds that interesting.

Song I listened to while writing that: Mystery Hours by the New Pornographers.