Why hit a Corgi?

Yes I know YouTube’s rife with stuff like this but I feel the need to push this on the world just cos it made me chuckle, also somebody’s got to continue supporting the Mon-stars of rock.

Also while you’re there check out the Saturday morning Watchmen video posted up by the same guy.  A tribute I feel more in tune with Alan Moore’s original intention for the material than the lackluster movie.

Tags: comics, movies, music, video

Wrestle Jam

A couple of weeks ago I managed to spend every night of the week at the cinema catching up with the Oscar nominations. While I didn’t get to see the Oscars, as subscribing to Sky movies is daylight robbery, I did manage to see some excellent films such as Frost/Nixon (my movie of the year) and Darren Aronofsky,‘s The Wrestler, otherwise known as Mickey Rourke Strikes Back.

For those not into watching excellent pieces of cinema; The Wrestler is the story of a washed up 1980′s wrestling superstar. Now destitute, Randy ‘The Ram’ Robinson is living life the only way he knows, and how that affects the relationship with his daughter and would-be squeeze. A major part of the film is Randy’s ties to his past fame, with one particular scene showing him and a young boy playing Wrestle Jam ’88, a fictional NES game from The Ram’s heyday. Kotaku ran a great article about the making of this piece of game art, I suggest you read it and be enlightened. I also suggest you see The Wrestler, it is not bobbins.

Apparently Aronofsky demanded a playable game, which was provided by brother and sister team Kristyn Hume and Randall Furino. All in all the game was a lightly featured clone of Wrestlemania, and even had it’s own 8-bit theme song (linked below). I adore this kind of commitment to building a film’s versimilitude, sure you could have run a video of any old game, or cobbled together some footage but here the production team seem to have gone one step further and made a work of homage from something many would consider no more than set dressing. Bravo!

Tags: art, film, games, movies, video, wrestling

Serenity: Back in Space

Gentlegeeks, but a few times in our lives can we indellibly stamp our mark upon this world dominated by those with fine motor control and the ability to supress excitement at 80′s arcade machines. This is our Waterloo!

Do your duty now, and vote for the name of the new node of the International Space Station. Your choices are Earthrise (pish), Legacy (ohmigodno), Venture (is this Star Trek?) and Serenity. Yes true believer, using the power of the internet we can once again launch Serenity into the black (kinda).

In other Serenity related news I watched Sands of Oblivion this weekend, featuring Adam Baldwin and Morena Baccarin. Don’t bother, even though it has Homer Simpson as the legendary Cecil B. DeMille it still be tripe.

Also, speaking of Waterloo.

Muchos danke to Cinematical

Tags: abba, joss whedon, movies, own the internet, serenity

5 Films You (Maybe) Didn’t Know Were Based on Graphic Novels

Hollywood seems to have picked up a new habit; that of adapting comic books into films. There’s Batman, Iron Man, Spiderman, Superman, the X-Men… OK, so I jest about the unfortunate name legacy left to some of these franchises, but a lot of them have translated successfully into high grossing films.

Now you may be seeing a trend in these movies, there’s a large showing for Marvel and DC’s finest, but there’s still a lot of love out there for the more obscure, more adult comics. I’ve already mentioned the WE3 movie on these digital pages and works like From Hell, Sin City, V for Vendetta and 30 Days of Night have shown that the graphic novel format can translate just as well.

I have to admit I’m not a fan of superheroes in comic books, the trappings of the underwear pervert have formed a gestalt of ideas it seems hard to break out of (with the exception of Animal Man.) Don’t get me wrong, I like the films that have grown from these established characters, but I’m more of a Transmetropolitan kind of guy. With this in mind I went to see The Spirit last week and was thoroughly disappointed; with Frank Miller, a man with an amazing eye for using shadow contrasts, and the source material from Will Eisner, the father of comics I expected a triumph, instead I left the theatre bored and bemused.

To this end I’ve decided to list, for your delectation, 5 movies that you may not know were based on comic books…

A History of Violence

Based on the graphic novel of the same name, A History of Violence tells the story of a cafe owner trying to escape the repercussions of a horrendous crime he committed as a youth. The comic was written by John Wagner, one of the creators of British comics icon Judge Dredd (which also became a film, but a truly abysmal one) and drawn by Vince Locke, famous for his work on the Brief Lives run of Sandman. the film holds an 87% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes and was nominated for two Oscars, one of them for Josh Olsen’s adaptation of the original comic’s script. The film differs quite a lot from the graphic novel, but the central themes and tone are retained effectively.

Road to Perdition

The original Road to Perdition was written by Max Allan Collins, an insanely talented writer of novels and script, as well as directing and writing for a band. The bast. The art for the books was drawn by Richard Piers Rayner, an old DC/Marvel hand and now Middlesborough FC’s resident artist. The books themselves tell the story of a disgraced mafia enforcer trying to raise his son in a world of violence, a theme which is retained in the film version. Sadly David Self‘s treatment of the adaptation was tinkered about with by a rotating group of writers at the behest of Spielberg and resulted in the dilution of the film’s message.

The Crow

Perennial goth posterboy Eric started life as the main character of J. O’Barr‘s The Crow. As the writer and artist James created The Crow as a way of dealing with the death of his fiancée at the hands of a drunk driver, a fact mirrored in the fiction as Eric’s fiancée is killed in the book. In this case I feel the film outshines the comic. O’Barr’s personal misery is evident in the book, but comes across as a little too goth for my tastes. The film was directed by Alex Proyas, director of the fantastic Dark City, and the production of the film famously led to the death of it’s star Brandon Lee.

American Splendor

Yeah, if you’ve seen this then you know it’s a biopic of autobiographic comic creator Harvey Pekar. the film takes aspects of Pekar’s life and mixes them with the elements of his American Splendor series to tell the story of Pekar’s life and the creation of the series he’s famous for. Drawn by different artists, including legendary underground comics genius R. Crumb the comic series is to my mind one of the best examples of exactly what can be done with the graphic novel medium. The film currently enjoys a 94% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes. See it, its bloody good.

Ghost World

Not strictly its own comic book, Ghost World was a story arc from creator Daniel Clowes‘ alt comic Eightball. It tells the tale of two 90′s high school graduates and the decline of their friendship as they transition into adulthood. Directed by Terry Zwigoff the man responsible for Crumb, a documentary about the life of R. Crumb (which I’ve not managed to see yet) the movie garnered Clowes an Oscar nomination for his treatment of his own work.

Tags: comics, films, geeks, graphic novels, lists, movies

More of 2008 in list-form.

One of us had to, and I thought I’d jump on the end of the year bandwagon.

2008 will for me be known as the year I stopped reading, apart from my usual cover to cover of The Hogfather in the run up to Xmas I can’t think of another new (or new to me) novel I read in 2008, there must have been one, but seriously I can’t think which.

2008 was also the year I re-discovered Heavy Metal, both the film and the genre.  In the first instance all thanks to a recent episode of South Park, and the latter just because every album I’ve heard this year has been pretty damned Awesome, also the fact that 2008 was another year without a new Green Day album (Unless you count Stop, Drop and Roll by the Foxboro Hot Tubs, which I don’t) led me down a darker more head-bangery route.

In Movies 2008 showed us all that Pan’s Labyrinth Wasn’t a fluke and when it comes to horror movies Spain is really where it’s at at the moment Rec and The Orphanage really push home everything that’s wrong with Hollywood horror movies and the current trend for SFX in creating what is essentially (Daily Mail Moment Warning) torture porn.  (Ban this sick filth.)

Gigs in 2008 were fewer and further between than I’d would’ve liked, but what are you gonna do?  This year was dominated by the fact that I finally went to see Bon Jovi (no, I’m not being ironic).  Bon Jovi was like a gateway to harder rock’s, the first hit my mum approves of but the rest is gonna cost me, sort of thing.  To finally see them live was akin to being ten years old again only with access to a hell of a lot of beer.  On that note my hero of the year award goes to Twickenham, the home of British Rugby, a fine venue for a gig, and sponsored by Greene King so therefore having the best gig beer tents ever.

Gaming in 2008 saw me first abandon my Xbox 360 in favor of PC gaming, then abandon my PC in favor of the Wii and DS, then abandon Nintendo and buy another 360 (the circle is now complete).  On all formats however RPG’s held sway.

Right.  Enough pre-amble, list time.

Movies.

• Wall e (A Stanton)
• The Orphanage (Technically 2007, but not released in the UK ’till 2008) (J A Bayona)
• The Mist (F Darabont)

Games.

• Guitar Hero World Tour (Activision)
• Fable II (Lionhead)
• The World Ends With You (Square Enix)

Albums.

• Death Magnetic (Metallica)
• Black Ice (AC/DC)
• Along Came a Spider (Alice Cooper)

Disappointments.

• The Kaiser Chiefs (Turns out they’re not all that great)
• Living in a hotel (gets real old real fast)
• Green Day (It’s been four years now FFS!)

Going Forward…

• New Green Day album in 2009.
• Blogging more, sorry Ralph-fans.
• Fighting my crippling WOW addiction (just 20 more levels man.)

All the best for 2009 y’s all.

Tags: games, list, movies, music, new year

Remember the Christmas Special?

http://www.themovieblog.com/2008/12/star-wars-on-stage

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!

Star Wars is so over.

Tags: film, geek, george lucas kills my youth, movies, stage productions

Trailer Trash

Firstly, congratulations to Barack Obama, you carry not just the hopes of your own nation, but those of the entire free world.  Good luck sir.  Now, back to geekery.

I’ve long since learned to get over the fact that as a video-game fan Hollywood hates me and everything I hold in esteem.  If not then why would they continue to give Paul WS Anderson and Uwe Boll money?

Not only does the film industry apparently hate video games, turns out they’re also pretty antsey about anime as well.  After months of letting myself get over excited this weekend I finally saw the trailer for the Hollywood remake of Dragonball.

In case you’ve been living on Namek for the last twenty-five years or so Dragonball is a manga series written and drawn by living legend Akira Toriyama.  It followed the adventures of alien martial-artist Goku and his friends and was inspired in part by the Chinese folk tale Journey to the West.  The narrative covers a period of around thirty years, a total of 519 chapters over 42 volumes.  Toei animation translated Toriyama’s works into two successful anime series.  Dragonball and Dragonball Z originally broadcast on Fuji television from 1986 to 1996.  A third series Dragonball GT continued Goku’s adventures, but was not based on the original manga, and ran for only 64 episodes.

The Hollywood rework of Dragonball doesn’t seem all that bad on paper.  Kung-fu Hustle’s Stephen Chow is producing, director James Wong is best known for his work on the Final Destination movies, so a strange choice to direct what is essentially a children’s movie, but I am a fan of FD so I’m willing to give benefit of the doubt.  The cast includes one of my favourite TV actors James Marsters as the film’s antagonist Lord Piccolo, and Chow Yun Fat as Sensei Roshi.  The rest of the cast is less inspiring though with Justin Chatwin (Tom Cruise’s whiney runt son in Speilberg’s Car-crash remake of War of the Worlds) in the lead as Goku.

After watching the trailer, I’m starting to worry just a little that this isn’t going to be the movie that the franchise deserves, the trailer involves scenes set if not in, then at least outside an American high school, this seems a little out of sync with the world in which the series is based.  The trailer involves scenes featuring Piccolo in which I can’t help but notice that he isn’t green, despite claims that the character would look similar to how he appeared in the anime, in a similar pallette error Emmy Rossum’s portrayal of Bulma Briefs is sorely lacking the original’s blue hair.

Finally and this is where i earn the “Rant” tag, WHERE THE FUCK IS KRILLIN?  I read somewhere that some of the more cartoon-esque characters wouldn’t appear in the movie, that’s fine, I can understand why an anthropomorphic pig, or a talking cat might get the chop but Krillin is Goku’s best friend in both the manga and the Anime.  Former bandit-king Yamcha is the only one of the Z-fighters set to make an appearance in the movie.  The film adds further characters to Goku’s circle of friends which didn’t appear in the manga, and I find it hard to accept that one of these characters couldn’t be Krillin, this is a reimagining of Dragonball, so Krillin doesn’t have to be a short, bald, buddhist monk, but a character portraying several of Krillin’s character traits would have been a kindness to fans of the series.

Tags: anime, geeks, movies, rant

Dead Space Review

It’s dark, my leg brushes something and sends it clattering across the floor. Instinctively I bristle, what else could have been alerted by my clumsiness? A second later I feel it’s safe to breathe out, and as I do an inhuman moan issues from around the next corner. Frozen in place all I can do is watch as the sleek, monstrous form comes into view. Turning towards me with eyes glowing in the darkness, it says ‘Meow?’

Dead Space is EA’s latest game in which you’re a regular joe trapped on a huge industrial capital ship in space as biomechanical monsters try to eat your face. Sounds familiar? It should; it’s the setup for just about any space monster movie ever but don’t be quick to dismiss it for it’s mildly cliched setting, Dead Space captures the atmosphere of such movies with aplomb dropping subtle hints to its inspiration all the time.

As I hinted at in my slightly misleading intro, Dead Space keeps you on your toes, unlike an overzealous feline jonesing for dinner number 3. I can’t say it’s strictly scary but it is tense. The designers have gone to great lengths to keep you guessing from where the next hideous, screaming monster is going to pop up from, and it’s here that the slightly annoying camera comes into it’s own leaving you frantically waving the mouse around to get a bead on a destructible chunk of necrotised flesh. Many are stating that the game isn’t survival horror but I beg to differ, the over-the-shoulder, clunky nature of the camera, light backtracking, ammo management, space-zombies and atmosphere all put it firmly into survival territory in my book. What other game have you stopped yourself from saving because you thought you heard some creature nearby as you were just accessing the save screen?

The only reason I can see that some are loathe to avoid the survival horror moniker is the fact that you’re actually pretty lethal to the beasties inhabiting the ship. Equipped from the start with a tool that lets you cut limbs from your assailants, a single bad guy proves little challenge provided you can catch him at range; but don’t expect this to be the norm. Later on you’ll be beset by bads from all corners and it’s here the game’s other main tool takes over; the stasis tool allows you to slow down time for a target, at the expense of draining it’s own ammo reserve. Together with inspired weapons, such as a remote control buzzsaw, you feel quite well tooled up to take on the Ishimura’s crew but don’t think that you’re going to be running around guns blazing. Without careful management you may end up swinging or throwing blunt objects at the monsters, a less than ideal situation.

I may be a little biased here, I got my copy of Far Cry 2 on Thursday but felt a little disappointed by it, so I decided to swallow the expense and pick up the game on Friday night after work. By midday on Sunday I was watching the end credits. Weighing in at about 12 hours the pace is good, and I never felt like any part was over long nor were there any obvious attempts to artificially lengthen the gameplay.The inventory management and weapon and character customisation, while fairly cosmetic, add to the game a surprising amount, forcing you to make trade offs in your gear. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not Diablo but a nice addition. Story-wise, it’s not Poe. The plot and ineviatble twists are perfectly acceptable and feel built into the game, rather than a last minute addition but never threaten the realms of genious.

Dead Space feels like a slightly brawnier version of Bioshock mixed with Paul W.S. Anderson’s only good movie, Event Horizon, with queues taken from Aliens and Resident Evil 4. Cinematic, tense and brutal it’s superb fun; highly recommended.

Tags: EA, games, movies, review, space, zombies

Watch Stalker now, free

I’m sure some of you non-neanderthals have played S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl, GSC Game World‘s magnum opus. What you might not know is that the game takes much of it’s inspiration from the novel Roadside Picnic by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky.

In 1979 the book was adapted into a motion picture by Andrei Tarkovsky, who directed the original (and by far the best) version of Solaris. Shot in Estonia, the film apparently suffered a great number of setbacks and conditions during shooting have been blamed in causing the early deaths of cast and crew.

The full version of the movie is linked below. Watch and enjoy:

Via Warren Ellis

Tags: games, movies, video