Batman might be dominating the movie news right now, and though I’m excited to see it, I think I’m looking forward to Choke even more than the man in black.
Chuck Palahniuk is by far my favorite author, and his book to movie transition has proven itself in the past (Fight Club, anyone?) so I can’t imagine Choke is going to be any different.
Lest I ruin the story, I don’t want to dive too deep into the plot line (though I will say that the book was fantastic), but just make sure you keep this one on your radar, because you don’t want to miss a movie like this.
How did Yiying Lu’s “Fail Whale” go from an unfortunate placeholder to an entire social media brand?
As with most things on the Internet, it was a little bit of skill mixed with a whole lot of luck, and some randomness thrown in for good measure.
If you’re unfamiliar with the Fail Whale phenomenon, or if you’d like to know a little more about the behemoth beast, then check out ReadWriteWeb’s “The Story of the Fail Whale” and see what you’ve been missing.
Apparently I’m a little late to the party on this one, but The Boston Globe’s The Big Picture is a fantastic photo blog that uses huge and beautiful pictures to tell stories that normally only get a thousand words inside of the newspaper.
Dodge Quest is an RPG that puts you in charge of a man named Coronet as you try and make him happy.
One day, Coronet, a clerk at the tool shop, makes the decision to propose to Lucy, a daughter at the flower shop. As he arrives at the flower shop, he finds that his rival enemy has made the ultimate move before him…
Not knowing how to reject the proposal, Lucy blabbers out “I’m only interested in guys that drive a DODGE”.
As gullible as he may be, Coronet believes her words, and goes on many missions in pursuit of the DODGE.
Upon attaining the DODGE, will he also find happiness…?
The rules are simple:
The game requires players to complete one mission a day and earn money.
There is no raise in levels, but purely a matter of gaining money.
After completing one mission, the hero must sleep for 8 hours in real time.
After 8 hours, the game can be continued, and a new mission will begin.
The music is fantastically 8-bit, the graphics are the same, and the story seems compelling, so I think that Dodge might have a winner on their hands with this one.
Lenore Skenazy of The New York Sun left her 9-year-old son at Bloomingdale’s with “a subway map, a MetroCard, a $20 bill, and several quarters, just in case he had to make a call.”
Several hours later…he turned up at home, safe and sound.
Surprised?
Half the people she told that story to were, but for what reason? Have we come to distrust our fellow man so much that we feel the need to keep children under lock and key so that they have no chance to foster any type of independence? I think we have, and Lenore would agree.
The problem is not that we aren’t aware of the risks, and haven’t heard stories of what can happen, it’s that “we all know that story — and the one about the Mormon girl in Utah and the one about the little girl in Spain — and because we do, we all run those tapes in our heads when we think of leaving our kids on their own.”
Except, instead of making them safer, locking them up just makes them dependent and afraid of the world.
The statistics show that this is an incredibly rare event, and you can’t protect people from very rare events. It would be like trying to create a shield against being struck by lightning.
So perhaps it’s time for everyone to just relax a little bit, trust a little bit, and give a little bit, because otherwise, what kind of world have we created for ourselves?
Sift Heads Sniper Game is a half movie, half sniper shootout game that manages to tell a story along the way.
Each mission revolves around a certain person or persons that you must shoot, and as you progress your way through various levels, the story manages to progresses along with you in a believable way.
Did you know that Adidas was owned and founded by a man named Adi Dassler?
In case you didn’t, Adidas wants to give you a full rundown of the story, though with their beautiful combination of stop motion, claymation, and video inlays, it’s definitely worth the time it takes to sit through a bit of an Adidas history lesson.
36 Exposures wants to find out, and has created the 36 Exposures Challenge to put photo and creative skills to the test.
Unlike a digital camera, where you can shoot away and then just pick the ones that you like later, film cameras had an element of choice involved that meant each photo had to serve a purpose; thus, creating “conscious intentionality”.
To bring back that idea, FILE challenged artists to articulate a concept, project, or theme, and then use a camera to photograph the images to accompany it with only one roll of film.
Though the contest deadline has passed, it’s definitely an interesting idea that could serve as inspiration for your own ‘one roll story’, and I’m sure the submissions will be impressive, so bookmark the site and be sure to go back, because you never know what one roll can do.
I Am Legend felt like a good idea that no one knew what to do with.
There were a few shining stars:
Will Smith’s acting was superb, in a Tom Hanks on an island sort of way, and you really feel for him as he navigates the empty streets of New York with Sam, his devoted dog, and his slowly fading sanity as he tries his best to cure the zombied world around him.
The CGI work was also superb, and you will easily believe that New York was stripped bare and left to sit for a few years to give it that true, hasn’t seen humans in a while look and feel.
However, there were also a few disappointments:
The story was…less than superb. It starts out slow, which is fine, since Will is, after all, alone, except for his dog, so he doesn’t exactly have a lot to do. He spends his time driving around the emptied streets in abandoned sports cars, hunting for deer that now roam those streets, teeing off on the back of an aircraft carrier, and, when he has a few spare moments, trying to cure the zombie disease that has killed off the rest of the world. And hiding from darkness. This takes up most of his time, and most of the first half of the movie is spent setting this groundwork for the story that you think will come.
Unfortunately, the second half of the film doesn’t do much better. There are a few moments when the pace picks up, and you begin to feel as if something is actually going to happen, but they’re few and far between, and you’re soon lulled into a sedated state as you begin to simply watch Will live. Then, the end of the film arrives, and it comes so abruptly that you hardly have time to comprehend what’s going on. Just as quickly as it began, the lights flick back and on you’re left sitting in your chair with a strong feeling of “Meh.”
The story also suffers from the problem of “Well, isn’t that convenient.” Every time something needs to happen, it does, and every time you see a movie cliché building, it doesn’t fail to disappoint. I can only think of one twist that I didn’t see coming, but even that twist seemed forced and didn’t make much sense when you consider what was discussed during the preceding parts of the movie. The ending basically rounded out the whole film, as it managed to be both conveniently timed and cliché filled.
I Am Legend just feels like a film that relied on a lot of CGI and Will Smith to cover up a thin plot and poor, cliché details. It lacked the scare that it needed to be a good horror film, the emotion that it needed to be a good ‘man on an island’ film, and the twists and turns it needed to be a good action/adventure film. Instead, it forces its way through a butchering of Richard Matheson’s story, and avoids anything that could have made this a great film.
I Am Legend felt like a good idea that no one knew what to do with.
