Film Notes* I'm thinking of going to the screening at the Boston Public Library this Saturday June 4th (sponsored by the Newbury Film Series). :) Cost is $35 per person (or $20 for filmmakers/students), and tickets are sold online only (so none are available at the door). The screening will benefit their new youth filmmaking program: Reel Vision. Doors open at 7pm. Screenings and Q&A start 7:30pm, and there's a reception after, with music and a cash bar, at 9pm. To purchase a ticket, go here. To see the films screening that night, go here.
* Boston Filmmakers' Expo returns June 9. It's fairly inexpensive ($30 until June 6 or $35 at the door), but I'd have to take the day off to go. I need to check with on this one. ;-) There are some interesting panels being offered. If the panel descriptions are accurate, I think I can learn a lot.
*I'm spreading around the link to Vendetta: A Christmas Story because I find it amusing. :) Reverend, if you're reading this, I'd love to watch more of your collaborations. (Hi to Sean!)
*My sister has made me a CD today of some short films: one's an HP Lovecraft film & the other's called "Prey Alone." Or you can find them on the following links (according to my sis): http://www.cthulhulives.org/toc.html and http://www.cgchannel.com.
Weekend FunI suppose everyone has big plans this weekend. Personally, I'm going to relax and try to get a few things accomplished .. starting tomorrow. Today, after work, I'm heading to a Viewing Party at maramcc's (I *finally* understand where the handle comes from! lol) with atomicpagan so that'll be the start of the fun weekend. Last weekend, I hung out with LJers L., solonia and Irvin (among others). Maybe May should be renamed Month of LJ, or better yet, Gathering of Friends since I've also seen L.L., G.P. and heard from Jo (fey-fey). :D
In keeping with that line of thought, I figured I'd give Glen a little plug. If you're in the Pittsburgh, PA area tonight and like ska, check out The Slackers at The Brew House. For the New Yorkers, there's a show tomorrow (the 29th) at The Bowery Ballroom.
If any LJers go (and if you know my real name), please be sure to tell Glen I say Hi and give him a big hug from me. :) You can also mention that D.F. (same first name as mine - different last initial) had a baby girl last week. ;)
Wow! I still have almost a half hour left before I've got to leave for work. I feel like I have so much free time right now. I'm not rushed nor late this morning! (not yet anyway) Woohoo! :D
(cross-posted on Greatest Journal and Live Journal)
Movie Meme*cross-posted on my live journal*
Well, Solonia suggested I take up the mantle next, so I guess it's my turn. =)
1. Total number of films I own...
Like l_squaredd and Solonia, I have too many films (on VHS & on DVD) to count. I started counting what's in our collection and decided to give up at 313 because I don't feel like fishing through boxes. lol So, to quote Solonia, "over a hundred, under a thousand." ;-)
2. The last film I bought...
I'm not sure. I think it was Jim Henson's The Storyteller for my youger sister.
3. The last film watched at home...
Sunday I watched Earthsea and then Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
4. Five films I watch a lot or that mean a lot to me...
Wow, this is difficult. I'm not sure how to narrow this down to five. lol I guess I'll choose ones that have meaning (for whatever reason) and that I can watch a lot (not necessarily that I do watch them a lot).
I. Shall We Dance (1937). Fred and Ginger are wonderful together, and the character of Cecil Flintridge is hilarious. The scene where Cecil calls from the police station makes me laugh every time I watch it. The jazzy tap dancing in Central Park on roller skates is brilliant. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to ... Watching all the old Astaire and Rogers movies (along with Shirley Temple when I was but a wee one) made me desperately want to take up tap dance. :P
II. The Pink Panther. Fantastic Blake Edwards film that introduces the world to the bumbling Inspector Closeau, played by the talented Peter Sellers. My family always loved watching the Pink Panther movies together. No matter how many times we watched them, my mother laughed out loud as if seeing it for the first time; her laughter is contagious & soon we'd all be wiping tears from our eyes from the experience. *vbg*
movie with similar feeling: Monty Python and the Holy Grail
III. Signs. My reasons for including Signs are similar to Solonia's reasons for choosing The Sixth Sense. I'll start by saying M. Night Shyamalan rocks. *g* I'd love to make the kind of films that he makes. The movie attracted a wide audience, including those who wanted to solve the mystery of what the movie was really about and those who recognized that crop circles = aliens. ;-) I know a few people who went to see this, who usually avoid anything to do with science fiction, and enjoyed it. There's also another reason I chose Signs (which, imho, is a very spiritual film) - what to me is the underlying theme: Everything happens for a reason, even if we can't see it at the time. Everything is connected. In many ways it reminded me of one of my favorite X-Files episodes, "All Things," written by series star Gillian Anderson.
movies with similar feeling: Dragonfly, The Mothmen Prophecies, The Five People You Meet in Heaven, What Dreams May Come
IV. Star Wars (original trilogy). Star Wars is the first movie I remember seeing in the theater. It's also the first movie where I saw a female character who was as smart and as tough as the guys. It made me want to create something that would move others to feel what I did when I first watched it, something that people would lose themselves in. At the time (keep in mind, I was in kindergarten *g*) Star Wars was action-packed, funny, imaginative, intelligent, visually exciting. The release of the next two movies was an event itself. I so wanted to be a Jedi. *g* I hear the theme song, and I'm immediately transported to the Rebel Alliance.
movies with similar feeling: Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E.T.
V. The Fifth Element. Bizarre, touching and filled with great performances, the more I see this movie, the more I like it. =)
Yellow Submarine. Okay, so I'm cheating and including a sixth choice. :P The Beatles, Blue Meanies, Pepperland, singing, psychadelic cartoon strangeness ... what's not to love? :D
5. Which five people are you passing the baton onto and why?
Anyone who wants to give it a go. :)
That was fun. (hehe)
Side note: Signal Room's official website is now up. Check it out! =)
Invisibility and Force Fields R Us
Which Incredibles Character Are You? brought to you by QuizillaThe above quiz was found on LJ user cretkid's journal. =)
I lost another piece of my tooth yesterday. *sigh* On a brighter note, I'll be visiting my grandmother this weekend. ;)
Exotic Cities, Ducks and DisastersNo, the ducks and disasters aren't exotic. Neither is one related story-wise to the other. ;-) I'm just a bit bored, waiting for a friend to call and decided to do a little websurfing. These are some of the topics I found.
MSN.com has a great article 5 Cities on $250 a Day. Buenos Aires seemed to be the best bargain; the lucky correspondent even got a lesson in Argentinian tango. ;-) The other cities visited are London, Bangkok, San Francisco and Florence, respectively. (Speaking of Florence, there was a Globe Trekker episode on when I got home from work today - Italy, from Rome down to the tip, and then a little Globe Trekker extra: shopping in Florence. *bg*)
This story is funny and sweet: Secret Service Guards Mother Duck
Get your cameras ready! Billions of butterflies descend on California!
Just in time for the "Amityville Horror" remake's release the truth behind the Amityville Horror is revealed to those of us who hadn't heard the story behind the story before. According to this article, the Lutzes were not as truthful as we were led to believe; the house is just a house. I'm a little disappointed. Of course, there's also sites like The Amityville Horror Truth Website which lean in the opposite direction. That site has a transcript from a story on the house at abc.com. Oh, and before I forget, the official website hosted by George Lutz himself and the Warrens investigate: Amityville - enjoy the read & come to your own conclusions.
Somehow, I don't find the following comforting: Hole Drilled to Bottom of Earth's Crust, Breakthrough to Mantle Looms
That leaves the two articles I came across on disasters of both the astronomic and the volcanic kind. First, thecollision with Asteroid 2004 MN4 has been ruled out. Well, that's a relief. Let's hope the predicted trajectory doesn't change. Otherwise, I'm heading for the hills on April 13, 2029. Second, we have a little article out of Australia on super volcanoes. I wonder if that's a new term or have volcanoes of the size mentioned in the article always been called super volcanoes.
I think I'm growing tired of waiting for my friend to call or show. I still have to do my taxes if you can believe that, so perhaps, I'll take the phone off the hook and get at least one thing accomplished this afternoon. ;-)
House of D, part 2: the trailerL2 mentioned to me that she'd seen the House of D trailer on apple.com trailers. For some reason, I hadn't even thought to look over there! lol (*shakes head*) I just viewed the trailer, and now, I'm even more excited to see this film. Robin Williams is an amazing actor, and I always look forward to projects that he's in. From the clips I saw, Tea Leoni does a wonderful turn as the mother of the boy, and the young actor himself seems very talented. I wanted a longer trailer. :)
As L2 had mentioned to me (over on Live Journal) she likes movies that are character driven. So do I. In fact, I love good storytelling, period, and adding compelling characters while weaving a captivating tale will definitely keep my attention. A lot of it, too, has to do with how the story is told, and I have a good feeling about this film.
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Other examples, imho, of good storytelling in the movies (or television):
Farscape
Hero
Lord of the Rings trilogy
The Five People You Meet in Heaven
What Dreams May Come
The Matrix trilogy
Sliding Doors
and more ...
House of DDavid Duchovny has a blog. I was not aware of this until now. I had heard about "House of D" but promptly forgot about it again as I often do (my mom's been telling me to eat more blueberries & apples to combat my recent forgetfulness - we'll see if it works) until I saw a little link on blogger. Wow. Very cool. :)
His movie comes out April 15. You can win advance tickets by entering a contest (here). Deadline for that is this Wednesday, April 6.
I'm very happy for David Duchovny and plan on checking this out; the premise seems cool, and I enjoyed his directing in The X-Files so I'm interested in what he does with this film. Now, if we can just get Gillian to direct something! I *loved* the episode "All Things" & wish she'd direct and write more!
R.I.P. Karol Jozef WotjtylaI'm taking a moment to join the worldwide community in remembering Pope John Paul II who died today at age 84.
PKW Widescreen!The "Farscape: Peacekeeper Wars" DVD that I won was waiting for me when I got home today! =)
I want to watch the Making of PKW documentary, but I got home so late, and my sis would prefer I wait for her to watch it. I'm going to *try* to be patient. ;-)
Thank you, Tony Tellado from Sci-Fi Talk! :D
*doin' a happy dance*
Walking to Help the HungryProject Bread's annual Walk for Hunger is coming up on Sunday, May 1, and I plan on walking again this year (with, hopefully, a few new faces joining me! *g*).
If you'd like to make a pledge online/sponsor me, click here. Thank you!
To find out other ways to help ease hunger in Mass., please visit this page. =)
March is Women's History MonthMSN's got an interesting article, in honor of Women's History Month (March), Eight Great Women, Five Awful Ones.
Like the title suggests, the article notes eight amazing women and five who weren't so nice. ;)
Some I'd never heard of before, like The Trung sisters and Phung Thi Chinh:
Trung Trac and Trung Nhi, sisters and widows of Vietnamese aristocrats, led a major uprising against Chinese invaders in AD 39. Trung Trac ruled for four years before the Chinese conquered Vietnam again, but resistance continued for the next 1,000 years. Many women figured in the resistance, notably Phung Thi Chinh, who fought while pregnant, paused to give birth, and rejoined the fight with her baby on her back.
Sound like a certain Peacekeeper we know? *g*
Or how about Ida Wells-Bartlett, described as a "precursor to Rosa Parks"?
Of course, I *had* heard of some of them, most notably Mary Mallon (Typhoid Mary), Countess Nadasy (Elizabeth Bathory) and pirates Mary Reade & Anne Bonney.
In the article is also a link to seven women explorers, also a great read.
Ugly Doll in the Movies!Hey, it's Ugly Doll! :D
http://www.apple.com/trailers/sony_pictures/zathura/
(not that this matters, but my little niece loves her Ugly Doll that we got her -- actually, we'd gotten her two*g*)
*this is cross-posted to my live journal as well
MediterrAsian CookingMediterrAsian.com takes the best of Mediterranean and Asian diets and offering healthy, tasty meal options. I could definitely subscribe to this. Add some chocolates for dessert, and I am a happy person. :P
In honor of my cousin N. studying abroad in Greece, I took a look at their breakdown of the Greek diet. N., does this sound about right? *g* Actually, I was told by her that she & some new friends (six) had gone out to indulge one night: cheese sticks, fried zucchini with white sauce topping, lamb chops, two orders of calamari, feta with oil, bread, salad, cheese melt (four types of cheese w/ a tomato), and two liters of wine (though she says "it was the really cheap wine though"), and 3 liters of water. That's what she could remember. The total cost (for the six people) came to 60euro (N. kindly noted that 1euro=$1.30), plus they got live Greek music. Though I could've skipped the lamb and calamari, the rest would have been promptly devoured by me. It just sounds soooo good! :D
Anyway, I thought I'd share the site for those who might be interested.
(I've also cross-posted this to my live journal.
Happy Birthday, SherbertHappy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to you! =)
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The following was originally posted on my LJ, but I know not everyone reads it so, I'll repost here. ;-)
I love this. Filmmaker Scott Weintrob took his Canon digicam, his PowerBook G4 and a boom box to the streets of L.A. to record a music vid for the rerelease of the song "Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)" by C+C Music Factory. He shot, edited and burned the video to DVD within a week. Macs rock. =)
Also, on March 11, I received my Walking Papers today. I'll be signing up online, too, to collect pledges soon and will post that link when I do (just in case anyone wants to pledge me!) ... If anyone wants to join me this year, just let me know before May 1. I know a lot of people walk it on their own or volunteer for the Walk for Hunger each year, but if you want company, you know where I am. =)
Scary Dolls and Needy ToysOver the weekend, I was surfing the net for various blog sites and took a peek at one of Blogger.com's spotlighted blogs: PopGadget.net.
On this site is a collection of posts about unusual or just really cool gadgets and toys for popular culture. :) One post in particular caught my eye, and I followed the link to
Little Apple Dolls. The site design is almost hypnotic. lol I spent several minutes simply watching what happens when I rolled my mouse over certain pieces of text. (Yes, I am easily amused sometimes. *bg*) The dolls are as beautiful as they are creepy, and the tales about each character, the Children of the Inbetween Place, are haunting. They would definitely frighten most children, but teens and adults who are fans of the Goth world will love them, I bet. I'm almost tempted to get one myself. *g*
There's also a fun write-up on the Furby, which the author describes as the most annoying toy on the market, and another on a similar but lesser known toy, the Needies. :)
Angels, Hobbits and DragonsI found all of the following in a post (well, posts if you count the Dragons television program) on Neil Gaiman's blog.
* This story is just too freaky. In "a place where angels and gargoyles are said to keep company" (according to local historians), five dogs have leaped off a bridge to their deaths, one in front of the owner.
* Scientists have recently confirmed that the hobbit-sized human remains discovered in Indonesia were most likely a new species of human. This might explain, in a way, the folklore of dwarves and elves (like in LOTR). I'd always believed the myths were derived from those born with a medical or genetic condition causing dwarfism, and the legends about giants (like in "Jack and the Beanstalk") were made up to explain those with acromegaly or gigantism before doctors had discovered the cause, but it could be that the stories were passed down about an actual, completely different species of human. I find that fascinating. Just as fascinating (to me anyway) is the program on Discovery about "Dragons", which I missed. lol
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Unrelated to angels, hobbits or dragons is a chilling new short story by Michael P. Dunn (aka wordboy on the Dom) called "With Eyes Open ..." published in the current issue of Deep Magic. Have a read and be sure to let him know what you think. :)
Tribeca/Amazon Short Film CompetitionTribeca Film Festival is coming up April 19 - May 1. I heard on the radio this morning that Robert DeNiro is offering/hosting a short film contest in conjunction with Amazon.com. The top five entries will be shown at the festival, and in June the winning entry is announced. The winning entry gets a pre-paid $50,000 American Express card to fund future films! :) Deadline is April 13 and details are over at the Amazon site.
Podcasting and the SaturnsI got home to find waiting for me my voting ballot for the Saturn Awards. Woooohoooo! :)
Also, last night I received an email announcing that Podcasting has arrived at Sci-Fi Talk which is really cool; I can now listen to shows on my iPod. :) But the best part of the email was a little contest for their listeners. The first two people to respond to the email win a copy of the Farscape: Peacekeeper Wars DVD. Guess who was one of the first two people to respond? That's right! .. ME!!!!! :D *vbg*
*does a little happy dance*
