BBC documentary about Tetris. Go figure.
A hard to find documentary about Tetris and its creator Alexey Pajitnov. Also covers the rivalaries between Nintendo and Atari and the absurdities of buying copyrights for software from a country that doesn’t believe in property, much less intellectual property. Ultimately, a great documentary about a very important game.
A lot of stuff on Penn & Teller’s show “Bullshit” I agree with but it was definitely a hard sell when watching them tackle the topic of “Recycling“. I mean, everyone knows that recycling is good, right? Right? I watched with a skeptical eye but came out questioning my views on the issue. Watch it. Both informative and funny. It’s like the chocolate and peanut butter of entertainment.
A nude anti-war protest almost ended when god tried to sweep out the protesters to sea.
“According to other witnesses, waves washed over a few of the women and a riptide pulled them out to sea. Those who tried to save the others were pulled out, too. There was widespread panic and the fog made it hard to see. In the end, about eleven women were washed out.
It wasn’t immediately clear how many knew how to swim though it is believed that all of the women were returned to dry land. The Coast Guard was called in to retrieve the flailing protesters.”
The goal was to spell the word “Peace” using the naked bodies of the participants. It seems to me a pretty typical exercise for the anti-war crowd but organizer Crystal Kleinhaus claims the idea came from elsewhere.
Kleinhouse says she got the idea for the Southern California event after she accidentally took too much of a prescription drug. “I saw all these beautiful naked women traipsing around a beach. Then the sky opened and all these bronze angels wearing polka-dot bikinis and purple wings flew down and we all made huge letters with our bodies. It was awesome!”
And people wonder why I migrated to the right. I was driven there, dammit! Yes, I know for every granola-crunching, hybrid-driving smug bastard there’s a son of a bitch driving a 4×4 with a gunrack and barbecuing baby animals.
When I lived in Vancouver protests were far easier to find. You would just follow the sound of the drum circle the smell of patchouli and the “Free Mumia” posters at every corner until you would come across them. Maybe I just got a little too close for comfort. Colour me jaded. Better yet, Colour Me Badd.
” Turkish-made film commonly known as Turkish Star Wars because of its notorious bootlegging of Star Wars film clips worked into the film. … all » Released in 1982, Dünyayı Kurtaran Adam was created in Turkey caught in the midst of massive political upheaval. As a result, American-made films were not easily acquired and were often remade with a Turkish cast and setting. The musical soundtrack is entirely lifted from Western film hits of the time, primarily using Raiders of the Lost Ark. There are also scenes incorporating the music of Moonraker, Flash Gordon, Battlestar Galactica, Planet of the Apes and Disney’s The Black Hole.”
I’m not sure what there is to research. I did have a fun time making funny faces though.
Saw “Children Of Men” last evening and was quite impressed. I’m not much for dystopia but this definitely one of the better films I’ve seen this year. I’d recommend shelling out the cash and seeing it in the theatre for the camera work and sound alone. It’s that immersive. And if you’re like me the 5th row.
I have about $75.00 worth of Chapters/Coles/Indigo gift cards in my wallet and no idea which books to buy. Any recommendations? Leave answer in the comments.
Hilary Clinton puts in her bid for president.
Jimmy Carter’s book “Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid” seems to have caused a bit of controversy and ultimately led to the resignations of 14 members of the Carter Center’s Board of Councilors.
In a letter to President Carter, the group wrote that the former president had abandoned his role as a peace broker in favor of malicious partisan advocacy, portraying the complex Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a “purely one-sided affair,” which Israel bears full responsibility for resolving.
The letter also cites a “disturbing” passage from Carter’s book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, which appears to call for Palestinians to end acts of terrorism only if Israel abides by its obligations under international law and under the proposed road map — a peace plan guided by the United States, European Union, United Nations and Russia. The passage appears to condone violence against Israelis, said the signatories.
“We can no longer support your strident and uncompromising position,” said the letter. “This is not the Carter Center or the Jimmy Carter we came to respect and support.”
Equating Israel to a terrorist state seems to be an argument amongst the left and you can choose to agree with it or not. That being said, it’s no surprise that Jewish support for the Liberals in Canada is dwindling.
In a nutshell: Apartheid?! What the fuck?! Can you use a more loaded word, Mr. Carter?
Geez. Were I one the chosen people I’d probably quit too.
I once thought that head transplants were the thing of science fiction but apparently not. Who fucking knew.
Even more disturbing is this film about a successful experiment in which they kept a severed dog head alive.
To call the video for 30 seconds to Mars “From Yesterday” unpretentious is like calling the Scissor Sisters “possibly homosexual”.
From the letterbox, chinese subtitles and the 3 minute preamble before the song even starts to the crazy plot about an ancient Chinese child emperor’s birthday wish for them to be his guest. It’s a good thing that Jared Leto found that magical map that transported him and his band into the past. It gets better from there. For real. Two words: Samurai Fights
It’s hard not to like the Bears. Unlike their more flamboyant cousins who host home renovation shows, Bears seem a lot more down to earth and generally nice. Beers and high-fves all around. I’m sure that were there to be an outdoorsy-type show hosted by Bears it would kill in the ratings. In the meantime here’s some videos by Bears where they take a good-natured and funny look at themselves.
I worked with a Bear once. He wasn’t too into into the outdoors but was a big sci-fi nerd, collected action figures and a fan of Buffy. I’m not sure if that disqualifies him from the club though.
Article about American Apparel founder Dov Charney from The Economist:
DOV CHARNEY courts controversy. The 37-year-old founder and chief executive of American Apparel, the largest T-shirt manufacturer in America, has been called a brilliant businessman, an amateur pornographer, a Jewish hustler and a man with a social mission. He is admired for single-handedly creating one of America’s most successful fashion retailers, for devising his company’s sexually suggestive approach to advertising and for treating his workers much better than his rivals. He is also envied, loathed and criticised for all of these things.
Google video is hosting a 50-minute documentary about the Stanford Prison Experiment.
From Wikipedia:
“The Stanford prison experiment was a landmark psychological study of the human response to captivity, in particular, to the real world circumstances of prison life, and the effects of imposed social roles on behavior. It was conducted in 1971 by a team of researchers led by Philip Zimbardo of Stanford University. Volunteers played the roles of guards and prisoners and lived in a mock prison built in the basement of the Stanford psychology building. However, the experiment quickly got out of hand and was ended early.”
An excellent German film called “Das Experiment” is based off these events.
Mark Steyn ponders why the Iraqi government has an affinity for the song “I will always love you” originally by Dolly Parton.
“Amazing. All over Baghdad, folks were switching on the radio to find Whitney ululating “I will always love you-oo-oooaahooeauooooeeeuoaaaoooo…” And, all over Baghdad, folks in the next apartment were sighing, “Terrific. Saddam’s got those Shi-ites at Number 23 wired up to the cattle prods again. Might as well forget about getting any sleep tonight.””
Top movie body counts of all time. I was surprised that two of the Lord Of The Rings films claimed the top two spots. I suppose when waging battles against a zillion computer-generated orcs it’s hard not to.
From 89 Rock Cliches:
“83. The Third-Single Power Ballad
It’s a well-documented fact that any successful album’s third single will be a power ballad. Doesn’t matter if it’s rock, pop or even R&B. Country albums are exempt from this phenomenon, however, as they’re 50 percent power ballad already.”
Some friends and I had a gift exchange this year and I was given the book “Stephen Harper and the Future of Canada”.
For the person who gave me the it, I can’t imagine how difficult it must have been to purchase it - especially seeing as they didn’t vote for him in the last election. It would have been like me getting them the new Michael Moore book or god forbid a subscription to Adbusters.
From the 100 or so pages I’ve read already, I actually enjoy it as it’s giving a greater idea about the context in which someone like him came about. It’s also interesting to see the reasons behind the creation of the Reform party where it was more a reaction against the policies of Mulroney’s PC party than it was Turner’s Liberals.
Adam Daifallah has a better review than me.
“Harper was in his mid-20s when he began his intellectual journey to ideological conservatism. First, he was frustrated with the goings-on in Ottawa. The Mulroney government, with its centrist policies and obsession with Quebec, was turning into a major disappointment for small-c conservatives.
Second, while studying for his master’s degree in Calgary, he and a close friend, John Weissenberger, devoured serious political texts that shaped their right-wing outlook. They read such philosophers as David Hume and Edmund Burke, economists such as F.A. Hayek and contemporary conservatives like William F. Buckley. Harper and Weissenberger were fans of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, leaders who were bringing real conservative change to their societies. Why couldn’t the same thing happen in Canada?”
