Category: Film
French-Tasmanian betting markets in everything
Tasmanian millionaire David Walsh takes that speculation to a new level by buying the life of an artist. He has entered a unique arrangement to film an artist's entire life until he dies. The French artist Christian Boltanski will be filmed 24 hours a day in his Paris studio. The Herald Sun reports that the video will be streamed live to Walsh's $70 million Museum of Old and New Art once it opens in 2011. Boltanski will be paid a fee until he dies so the longer he lives, the better a deal it is for him. Boltanski is currently 65. Boltanski has called the deal a game, to win he must stay alive at least eight years. Walsh is essentially gambling that he won't. Filming began yesterday.
The full story is here and I thank N. Mehra for the pointer.
Assorted Movie Links
- Larry Ribstein on How Movies Created the Financial Crisis.
- A perceptive review of Avatar. The best graf:
…[T]he more blatant lesson of Avatar is not that American imperialism is bad, but that in fact it’s necessary. Sure there are some bad Americans–the ones with tanks ready to mercilessly kill the Na’vi population, but Jake is set up as the real embodiment of the American spirit. He learns Na’vi fighting tactics better than the Na’vi themselves, he takes the King’s daughter for his own, he becomes the only Na’vi warrior in centuries to tame this wild dragon bird thing. Even in someone else’s society the American is the chosen one. He’s going to come in, lead your army, fuck your princesses, and just generally save the day for you. Got it? This is how we do it.
- And finally. this is not a good way to open the NYSE.
Projects to ponder, and let’s drink a toast to fixed costs for once
Hans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at
Montreal's McGill University, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits
that disappeared millions of years ago in birds.Larsson believes by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken
embryo's development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told
AFP in an interview.Though still in its infancy, the research could eventually lead to
hatching live prehistoric animals, but Larsson said there are no plans
for that now, for ethical and practical reasons — a dinosaur hatchery
is "too large an enterprise."
The longer story is here and I thank Bookslut (one of my favorite blogs) for the pointer. Here is Larsson's home page.
The racial politics of *Avatar*
Chris Hayes pointed me to this article, with this good passage:
Think of it this way. Avatar is a fantasy about ceasing to be white, giving up the old human meatsack to join the blue people, but never losing white privilege. Jake never really knows what it's like to be a Na'vi because he always has the option to switch back into human mode. Interestingly, Wikus in District 9 learns a very different lesson. He's becoming alien and he can't go back. He has no other choice but to live in the slums and eat catfood. And guess what? He really hates it. He helps his alien buddy to escape Earth solely because he's hoping the guy will come back in a few years with a "cure" for his alienness. When whites fantasize about becoming other races, it's only fun if they can blithely ignore the fundamental experience of being an oppressed racial group. Which is that you are oppressed, and nobody will let you be a leader of anything.
I also enjoyed Ross Douthat's take.
Critique of *The Phantom Menace*
Despite some moments in poor taste, I thought this was one of the funniest productions I've seen, ever. It's the only 70-minute video I've ever watched through, if that gives you another measure. That said, I don't think he actually understands the movie he is criticizing. Nor does he see fit to mention which famous economist Palpatine most resembles.
I thank Scott Cunningham for the pointer.
Avatar
It was entertaining but I was expecting to be awed by at least one scene, as happened in Terminator, T2 and Titanic, and I was not. The plot is identical to that of Battle for Terra, right down to the "tree of life." Many scenes I felt like I had seen before. Here is the helicopter gunship scene from Apocalypse Now, here is the men in robot suits battle scene from Alien (and one of the Matrix movies), here are the sky islands from Castle in the Sky, here we have the Dances with Wolves scene(s). I am all for homage but this was pastiche.
The aliens were gorgeous, leggy, blue fashion models. Nice, but Star Trek did the green alien girl thing forty years ago. Personally, I like my aliens to be a little bit more well, alien. All the way to another planet just to find that the girls are blue and the horses have eight legs instead of four? Sad.
I insisted on seeing it in 3D but the effect was not revolutionary and there is still some eye strain. In the end I would have preferred 2D.
I was entertained but I was not enthralled.
*Avatar*
Yes, it is showing already in Leon, Nicaragua, as Bryan Caplan had predicted. You should see it. Cameron has absorbed a lot from Princess Mononoke. The aliens don't seem to trade much or accumulate capital. Like the Olympics ceremony in Beijing, it raises the bar for a lot of subsequent efforts. The crowd seemed unmoved by the theme of "las indigenas." It has interesting themes on disability and also the diversity of intelligences. The three hours go by very quickly. It's not perfect. People who can reach other planets still fire bullets from machine guns. Dubbing makes all the dialogue sound corny and thus it limits the impact of the real clunkers, which do come every now and then. I'll see it again, in 3-D next time.
Condom Law: NSFW
The AIDS Healthcare Foundation is lobbying California to require the use of condoms in porn movies. Their argument is that this is an employee safety issue–like requiring workers to wear hard hats–and so should fall under the Cal/OSHA laws.
But in an op-ed at Forbes.com Alex Padilla points out that to fall under the law will require classifying porn stars as employees rather than as performers and that has surprising consequences.
…the adult film industry would have to make every performer an employee to satisfy the California's Division of Occupational Safety and Health, better known as Cal/OSHA, laws. This would be detrimental: California's anti-discrimination laws prohibit requiring an HIV test as a condition of employment; therefore the adult film industry's current testing process, in which every performer is tested for HIV monthly, would be illegal. Nor would adult film producers be allowed to "discriminate" by refusing employment to HIV-positive performers. As a result, untested and HIV-positive performers would be able to work in the industry, raising the risks of HIV outbreaks–particularly since condom breakage or slippage can occur.
My suspicion is that the AIDS lobbyists are not really so concerned with the performers but they do want to increase condom use by the general public and they think seeing more condoms in porn movies will help with that goal. A legitimate goal perhaps, but more likely the industry will move to Nevada or will further go online amateur.
Hat tip to Ed Lopez at Division of Labor.
Film in 2009, for me
Tyson, I Love You Man, District 9, Up, Bruno, Let the Right One In, The Hurt Locker, and Man on Wire are what come to mind as my favorites of the year, without much thought. Coraline was good too. What do you recommend?
Markets in everything: department of yikes
This possibility had never occurred to me:
Racial attacks like the ones behind the
arrest of 32 suspects in Denver are part of a trend spreading across
the country, gang experts said Saturday.As part of the trend, black gang members videotape the assaults in
trendy tourist districts and sell them on the underground market as
entertainment."They knock a young white guy out with one blow to see if his knees
will wobble and surround them and take their money," said the Rev. Leon
Kelly, who runs a Denver gang-prevention program. "It's a joke."
Here is the full story and I thank new reader Mark for the pointer. By the way, am I wrong in thinking it a bit unusual how the words "black" and "white" are thrown around so casually in this story?
Why do vampires attract so many readers and viewers?
Here is a WaPo piece which suggests it has to do with the transition from adolescence. I recall another piece suggesting it had to do with the female fascination with gay men (is there one?).
Vampires are hardly "my thing," but I do like early Anne Rice, The Night Stalker, Herzog's Nosferatu, and I thought Coppola's Dracula movie was better than its reviews. On the other hand, I couldn't get five pages into Twilight. (Should I try True Blood?)
I believe vampire books and movies offer a few attractions:
1. You know from the beginning that the plot twists will have to be extreme. Few movie makers offer up vampires who think pensively, talk inordinately, and live out ambiguous endings, sitting around in coffee shops. A real vampire story is going to deal with death.
2. We are fascinated with the idea that people may be something other than what they appear to be. You will notice that discovery and detection of vampires often plays a key role in the plot lines, sometimes commanding an inordinate amount of attention.
3. Vampire stories offer a platform for exploring the theme of pure, limitless, and eternal desire, yet without encountering the absurdities that might result from planting that theme in a realistic, real world setting, such as a man who loves cheese studded with raisins above all else.
4. Vampires play "hard to get" with women and they (for a while) embody Old World ideals of chivalry, in a plausible [sic] fashion. Yet since they are fundamentally different beings, we can enjoy watching their strategies while simultaneously distancing ourselves from them.
5. Men may like vampire movies for date movies, for uh…priming reasons. The movies prompt dramatic, emotional reactions in their companions. Women may feel that such movies "test" how their men respond to highly fraught stories, with a potential for demonstrating protectiveness. Or vice versa.
6. Vampires do not seem to mind social disapproval, and in this sense many teens look to them as role models.
7. Some of the popularity is arbitrary with respect to the vampire theme itself. There is a clustering of production in any successful cultural meme, once that meme gets underway. You might as well ask why there is so much heavy metal music today.
8. Viewers and readers, who know vampire lore and thus vampire vulnerabilities, feel better informed than the high-status people who, in the drama, are fighting the vampires.
9. There are few successful songs or paintings about vampires, so the story-based aspects of the topic appear to be important in setting their popularity.
Here is an unorthodox answer to the question.
NASA FAQ 2012
NASA scientists are frequently being asked questions concerning 2012 and for this reason they have created a
Q: Is there a planet or brown dwarf called Nibiru or Planet X or Eris that is approaching the Earth and threatening our planet with widespread destruction?
A: Nibiru and other stories about wayward planets are an Internet hoax. There is no factual basis for these claims. If Nibiru or Planet X were real and headed for an encounter with the Earth in 2012, astronomers would have been tracking it for at least the past decade, and it would be visible by now to the naked eye. Obviously, it does not exist. Eris is real, but it is a dwarf planet similar to Pluto that will remain in the outer solar system; the closest it can come to Earth is about 4 billion miles.
Sigh…. I too fear for our planet.
Measuring the movie critics
If you want to get a sense of the zeitgeist but can only read one review, you might prefer Rene Rodriguez, whose low standard deviation from the mean review score makes him very nearly a living critical average. If you are interested in an alternative perspective, Mick LaSalle's high standard deviation places him further from the critical pack than any of these peers. Reviews from both Michael Wilmington and Marc Savlov are so regularly and respectively positive and negative that they should perhaps be taken with a grain of salt.
The source article, which contains much more information, is here. You'll find a visual representation of the critics's stances here. Hat tip goes to Eric Barker.
If you're wondering, I don't have a "favorite movie critic." I judge movies by the preview, the director, and by mentally aggregating the first five reviews I happen to read. This works well for me. If I had to go by a single source, by far it would be Variety magazine, which offers separate assessments of a movie's goodness and of its popularity with various demographics, a luxury which non-insider publications do not always have.
African Film Library
It is now on-line and offers access to many of the very best African cinema. You can pay for and download African movies, with 24-hour access; here is a brief summary. This is a landmark cultural achievement. Even for many cultural omnivores, African cinema remains a largely untilled pasture. Even Wikipedia does not have a good article on African cinema. I've seen about thirty African films in my life and loved roughly twenty of them. My advice is to select randomly or to pursue their recommended and "most popular" features.
Where the Wild Things Are
There are moments of great beauty and wonder in Where the Wild Things Are and also moments of fear and anger. It's not a kid's movie but the 11-year old liked it and the 8-year old thought it pretty good. I thought it was great but unlike my sons I have lived all the roles. The movie has a libertarian sub-theme that I don't recall from any of the 10 sentences in the book.