Looper

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Saw Looper this weekend, it’s about a near future where criminals have time travel abilities. Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is a Looper and he kills people that the “mob” wants dead, they’re sent to the past where Joe shoots them and disposes of the body. One instance Joe hesitates and chaos ensues.

The good; time travel, it’s got time travel.  The premise is very interesting, considering the film takes place in the near future of 2044, time travel being invented relatively soon.  There’s also a lot of touches with the production design for this world of 2044, which aren’t addressed directly but are just present.  Some examples are the solar power technology, it’s just everywhere, the vehicles are solar converted, and there are panels everywhere, on house and things, a lovely element to make the world believable.

*Possible SPOILERS* Loopers get paid in silver bars, they find these bars on the backs of the people they kill from the future, when they’re “paid out” the bars are gold, this usually means that they’ve killed their future self to keep the mob clean.  Joe encounters Old Joe (Bruce Willis) during one of his assignments.  This is basically where the time travel stops, because now it’s Joe versus Joe.
What’s great about this part of the movie is that two actors are playing the same person, but they’re not the same character.  Young Joe and Old Joe are two different people with different motivations.  Typically when one version of oneself meets oneself they are allies, but here the relationship between the two remains adversarial, bravo for that.
*END SPOILERS*

The ending was very satisfying… and it fades to white.

The bad; it’s got time travel, I know I mention this in the above, but there is very little time travel, it’s used more as a device to get things started, like a red herring.  Once we get into the movie that’s all we get of time travel.  So I was torn on how to feel about it at this point.
On the one hand, I wanted more time travel, that stuff just fascinates me, and then on the other hand, I liked where it was going with the two Joes.

*SPOILERS* We reach the middle of the movie where a plot point is revealed, and it doesn’t feel organic, this kid named Cid possesses powerful telekinetic abilities that are raw and emotion induced.  Young Joe finds himself protecting Cid and Emily Blunt from anyone that might be looking for him as well as them.  It felt like we left the whole time travel hook completely and are now in a last stand sort of movie where Young Joe has to protect the homestead.
Then there’s the “sex scene” that didn’t really add anything to the movie, and it cut before it got graphic, so why have it at all?

Overall, I enjoyed watching Looper.  Got me thinking and talking about it after the movie, but not in a bad way.  Time travel movies are always tricky, this one does a nice job hooking you in and then takes a turn, for better or for worse?  I can’t say, that’s up to you and how much your mind is willing to stretch and work up a sweat.

2012 Comikaze: Talking With Cosplay Fans (Day 2)

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Better late than never!

 

00:00 – The ultimate mashup of Dr. Who, Rainbow Dash, Team Fortress explains why My Little Pony is such a hit. He says it’s a slice of life but can’t seem to describe it.
02:01 – Sonic the Hedgehog loves how much fun and active he is. He’s a gamer and also a grad student. He tells us why he felt a connection with the X-Men
03:52 – two friends cosplay characters from Dynasty Warriors. One’s known for being intelligent and the other is known for being quiet
06:39 – Lucca (Chrono Trigger) doesn’t like making eye contact. She’s behind on comics because her computer is dead. She confesses she got tackled a few times.
08:22 – Catwoman discusses her thoughts on Anne Hatheway portraying her in the latest Batman movie. Harley Quinn is very passionate about her version even though there are many other ones out there.
11:51 – I get severely tongue tied while talking to this Poison Ivy. Try not to laugh
13:39 – Kitty Pryde (X-Men) tells us how she got into comic books because of her dad and talks about being next to Stan Lee
15:41 – Super hero Ariel and Aurora are both big gamers and showing us an interesting take on Disney characters
17:58 – Flame Princess (Adventure Time) is known for her hot temper and shares her secret for a rigid hair look
20:16 – Leonardo (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) picked this one of the four because he’s smart. Temari (Naruto) is from a sand village and is bad ass. She explains how her fan works and at what point you should be worried for your life. Leonardo is working on some other costumes
23:41 – Stan Lee talks about his latest projects and does some Q&A with the true believers

Actor, Director, Writer Thomas Jane will be at Long Beach Comic & Horror Con

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Raw Studios founder Thomas Jane and Tim Bradstreet will once again be return to Long Beach Comic & Horror Con for the fourth year in a row.

“Raw Studios and The Long Beach Comic & Horror Con have enjoyed a great relationship over the first 4 years of the show,” said Thomas Jane. “LBCHC treats their guests with the utmost respect and friendship. In many ways we consider the show to be our “home base” in terms of representing our company in a convention atmosphere.”

Raw Studios will be on hand to meet with attendees, sign autographs, draw sketches and generally have a weekend full of fantastic conversations. And if you miss them at their booth, Raw Studios will also play host to several panels, which will feature news, Q&A sessions and screenings of some of Jane’s film projects. You might remember seeing the Punisher short “Dirty Laundry” on Youtube over the summer.

You can see Thomas Jane, Raw Studios and many other special guests and exhibitors at Long Beach Comic & Horror Con (LBCHC).  The LBCHC will be open on Saturday, November 3 from 10:00am to 7:00pm, and from 10:00am to 5:00pm on Sunday, November 4. Check their website for regular updates on guests, panels, and hotel information. We hope to see you there.

Source:
http://www.longbeachcomiccon.com/

2012 Comikaze: Zombie Apocalypse Escape

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One of the biggest attractions at the 2012 Comikaze was the Zombie Apocalypse Escape inside the South Hall K. Fans of zombie survival were treated with a large course to test their ability to escape the deadly clutch of zombies.

I met up with one of the course survivors to get his reaction and feelings about the course. We also spoke with Justin McNeal about the Zombie Apocalypse Escape’s learned more about the course, challenges of logistics, the talents behind the scene, who escaped the course with the fastest time, and where the company is headed next.

2012 Comikaze: Talking With Cosplay Fans (Day 1)

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We didn’t capture as much footage of last weekend as we had hoped. Sorry guys. There’s no costume contest video 🙁

Check out some interviews with cosplay fans below.

00:00 – Steampunk fans tell us why they love the culture. It’s very accepting but remember to bring some katanas for self-defense

02:03 – Marvel Girl and a gender bender Catwoman. He loves her because she has good taste. Marvel Girl wanted to take a picture with Stan Lee. She wants another X-Men movie done right and Catwoman agrees. Her favorite moment is watching other fans loose their cool while meeting Stan Lee

04:20 – Henchman of the Mighty Monarch (Venture Brothers) are a little older than most of the kids out at Comikaze but they just as much spirit and enthusiasm. They would love to see a movie made or a Dr. Strange.

07:10 – Tifa Lockheart is a standard cosplay character at conventions and this one picked Tifa Lockheart because of peer pressure. She games a lot and hopes to one day work for Disney.

10:02 – This New California Republic Soldier (Fallout) is somewhat obscure but still gets recognized by gamers. He wanted to cosplay a character that was less known and he really pulled it off. He’s studying history but doesn’t know what he’ll do with the degree. His flag doubles up as a signature canvas.

13:10 – The R2D2 couple caught the attention of many people and cameras. All you could hear is “Awwwww”

14:28 – Walter White (Breaking Bad) is a fan of the show and shares with us the secrets to making the meth used in the show (raspberry rock candy)

16:09 – I ran into a lot of memory card issues while recording this interview. What a shame. Suki (Avatar: The Last Airbender) wanted to show her face entirely. She made the costume herself and worked on her costume for months. She liked the costumes of the movie but doesn’t offer any praise for the movie.

18:25 – Steampunk Storm (X-Men) is part of a group of cosplay friends who really turned heads with their rendition of a steampunk X-Men. It’s hard to tell, but she’s a bit older than she looks (came to this country in the 60’s).

2012 Comikaze: Dot Com (aka Kevin Brown) Is Running for President

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While walking through the halls of the 2012 Comikaze, I noticed a booth that looked very patriotic. The booth was sprawled with red, white, and blue. On closer inspection, I discovered  what appeared to be a campaign booth. Suddenly it hit me. 30 Rock’s Dot Com was here at Comikaze and running for president. Oddly, he seemed to go unnoticed among all the fantastical booths but it looked like he had an important mission to share with the folks. He was at Comikaze for something bigger than comics.

Dot Com was nice enough to tell me about his campaign and didn’t dodge the hard ball questions I threw at him. Is America ready for Dot Com?

Be sure to follow Kevin Brown on Twitter for all the latest campaign news : @dotcom30rock

Fox To Lower Price of Digital Copies and Release Them Earlier

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How do you get people to purchase something that isn’t selling well? Lower the price, of course! That’s the strategy Fox is banking on to boost digital copy sales on services like Amazon, CinemaNow, iTunes, and VUDU.

Not enough? What if Fox sweetened the deal by giving the digital copy an advanced release date over the DVD/Blu-ray?

Starting September 18th, Fox will be serve movies to under the name Digital HD (DHD) and the first title is Prometheus, which will be made available about 3 weeks before the Blu-ray (October 11, 2012). Other titles such as Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, The Watch, Ice Age: Continental Drift will also be available for around $15 before their disc releases.

I am definitely a fan of the VUDU UltraViolet service and think this is a big step in the right direction. Blu-ray prices continue to drop but the sacrafice of sharability, extras, and nice packaging seems like a strong case for digital copies to be significantly cheaper. At $15 dollars, we can arguably call this a bargain. The Blu-ray for Prometheus is currently listed for $27.96 on Amazon. Sure, we get extras that we may or may not watch but at $15 dollars, we’re paying about the same price as one movie ticket.

Chairman of Fox Filmed Entertainment, James Gianopulos, said Fox would offer the new low price for forthcoming movies but what about catalog titles? Shouldn’t those also be repriced?

With plenty of titles in my Netflix/HBO Go queue, the window of theatrical and home video release has never been a big factor in my interest of purchasing digital copies. It’s always been price. Let’s hope the other studios follow or go a step further in releasing titles earlier or at a lower price.

Source: New York Times via Engadget

The Adventures of Pete & Pete Reunion

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Hey Sandy!  It’s the adventures of Pete & Pete the Reunion.  After almost about twenty years since it first ran, the cast and creators reunite for a panel discussion of their time on this gem of a series.  They talked about how the third season hasn’t been released, and probably will never be released, so we’re relegated to viewings on youtube… thank you internets.

Lately my childhood is becoming more and more present in my adulthood, never has there been a time in society where one’s childhood has been so easily accessible, what with everything being released on DVD and reboots and now reunions.  It is possible to go home again.

We also then got treated to a Polaris concert.

And then look who I met after the show?  It’s Dan Harmon from Community.  I talked to him about his recent episode with Duncan Trussell.

Lawless

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I attended a Q & A screening of Lawlesslast night, thanks to Jeff Goldsmith.  The film is another team up by director John Hillcoat and screenwriter Nick Cave, who previously brought us The Road and The Proposition.  This film is based on the book entitled The Wettest County in the World by Matt Bondurant.  It’s about the Bondurant brothers during the prohibition era in Franklin County Virginia, they make moon shine and have run ins with no so nice people.  The film stars Tom Hardy, Shia LeBeouf, Jessica Chastain, Guy Pearce, Mia Wasikowska and Gary Oldman.

The good; it’s Hillcoat and Cave collaborating again, I love their movies.  They manage to blend two genres together, the western and the gangster/mob genre, this melding is much better than that of Public Enemies.
The acting is great, there’s a great sense of family with the Bondurant brothers, normally I don’t like Shia Le-Beef, but in Lawless he’s casted perfectly as the young brother Jack.
Tom Hardy’s portrayal of Forrest, the brains behind the operation, is wonderful, he reminds me of Clint Eastwood in a western, long stares with minimal dialog.
Guy Pearce plays Special Agent Charlie Rakes, and is creepy as all hell.

The action and violence is gritty and visceral.  It gives this film that wild west feel, where frontier justice ruled over any authority.  The pacing is methodical, but not to the point of being slow, and these moments are then punctuated with scenes of violence.

The music for the film is great as well, it’s done by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis (non-comic book).  The score feels period appropriate but then there are songs with lyrics and even those songs are done as if they came from that time.  Great choices.

The bad; it does detract from history, but then again the movie is “based” on a true story.
There’s not enough Gary Oldman, his introduction in the film is superb, I wanted more of him.  We’re introduced to his character, Floyd Banner a wanted gangster, through the eyes of Jack, we see this brutal act of violence with a sense of longing and romanticism that influential youths have, this is what leads him down the road to criminal activity.

Overall a gem of a movie, I can’t wait to see Hillcoat’s next movie, I hope he teams up with Cave again.  During the Q & A Hillcoat mentioned that it’s hard for him to make films in this country, USA, cause there’s not enough time, things are rushed.  I couldn’t agree more.  When people talk about Grindhouse cinema, I might argue that that period of filmmaking never ceased, it just became the  norm.  I highly recommend this movie.

Oh and don’t sit next to old people during movies… during the Q & A this guy brought out a book and started reading…

Why Isn’t Carly Foulkes Verified On Twitter?

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Twitter is a fantastic service that lets you follow people and services. It has given people a voice to be heard by anyone. Naturally, being verified is a big deal. It means you’ve arrived. When a person searches for a Justin Bieber or Alec Baldwin, they’re looking for a window into the mind of the same person they see one TV or heard on the radio.

Since anyone can sign up, we have to deal with parody accounts that add noise, making it difficult for the unknowing user to discern which account is truly theirs. Some fake accounts are even able to amass hundreds of thousands of followers. One example is the fake Will Ferrell account (@itsWillyFerrell) . Even the bio reads: “Here to make you laugh! I am not Will Ferrell. Fan/Parody account. No affiliation with actor Will Ferrell”.

When Biz Stone was on Howard Stone, he discussed the process of verification. It became an obsession for staff members who recently signed on. Biz explained that the program is completely human and is determined by various factors such as parody account generation and confirming the celebrity is truly that user (e.g. personal pics).

We all know that I have a thing for Carly Foulkes. Since my first post about her, T-Mobile changed their marketing approach and put her in all black. Perhaps, T-Mobile thought she needed a new look after the acquisition attempt by AT&T was denied. Gone is the girl next door who wears a summer dress and in is the leather-clad version riding on motorcycles like she’s Trinity.

She may have changed in commercials but I’m still following her on Twitter and sometimes I forget that she’s even the T-Mobile girl. Looking at her stream, you’d find tweets about traveling, pictures of her meals, her cat, and commentary about music/shows she’s at. It’s all standard stuff for someone that has access to these things. Occasionally, we’ll see a pic of her in costumes to remind us why she’s relevant.

But let’s get back to the point. She has over 10,000 followers. Surely, they can’t be all personal friends. My guess is that they are other fans of her adorable work. When you search “carly foulkes” on google, her twitter stream is the second link (first is her Wikipedia page). Somehow, the internet has determined she’s who she is and I question why twitter hasn’t confirmed this. We know the tweets are personal based on the content and plethora of self portraits. Does Twitter just have a thing against Canadians? Is it going to take a scandal with her on the cover of US Weekly?

Here are some examples of spoof accounts that might force Twitter to verify @FoulkesCarly:

  • Parody account by another carrier
  • Parody account of someone goofying on T-Mobile commercial scripts
  • A fake account like @Carly_Foulkes, @CarleyFoulkes impersonating her. Her last name already has an “F” and a “K”. Can you imagine if a porn star used a similar name?

If you thought Carly Foulkes wasn’t on the screen enough, we might see even more of her on the screen in the FX series she’s casted, Powers. Until then, we’ll have to watch her career flourish on TV and YouTube pre-rolls, wondering why she still isn’t verified on Twitter.

There’s only one way to know if she’s verified or not: @FoulkesCarly

Premium Rush

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I saw Premium Rush this weekend.  It’s about Wilee (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt) who’s a bike messenger in New York.  He gets a delivery and from there it spirals down into a world of complications as he tries to just make the delivery.  Sound simple enough right?

The good; this movie is slick, I mean it’s a fairly straight forward story, but the integrate some nice devices.  Wilee uses his smart phone to plot the course to the destination, we get to see this on the big screen, it’s an advertisement for google maps, new gps and the like.  What could’ve easily become a gimmick actually worked well.
Another thing they used reminded me of the Dragon’s Lair cartoon series that came out after the popular arcade game, where Dirk would imagine different scenarios of how to overcome an obstacle, this was also used much later in the CG Action Man cartoon series, but the film uses it as Wilee’s judgement on how to navigate through traffic safely.
They also incorporate non-linear editing with the way they tell the story, and I like it in this case.  We start the movie with an accident shot in slow mo, the movie rewinds to earlier that day, but then it continues to do this through out the film because events are overlapping each other, it was quite impressive to see the same scene covered from a different angle at a further point in the movie.

Wilee as a character is great, Gordon-Levitt plays a very good everyman-good hearted guy.  The script focuses and allows us to understand who Wilee is, his set of rules that he lives by and why he lives by them, we really got to know his motivations and routing for him wasn’t forced.  I gotta hand it to Gordon-Levitt, he did a lot of peddling for this movie.  They also nicely employed the use of a stunt man to do the more tricky bike stunts, this is one instance where motion blur was used to mask that fact, bravo, very well done.

The bad; this movie will under perform, I don’t know who to blame for this one.
Wilee not only has an antagonist in the form of a suit wearing Michael Shannon, but he’s also got bike messenger rival Manny.  Physically this guy looks like he could out peddle Wilee any day, but his “roid” usage and multi-gear bike loses out to Wilee’s endurance and smarts.  So not only is Manny the heel as a messenger but he’s also the love interests’ rival.  If Manny’s role was more prominent it would’ve felt forced, but his presence was appropriate.

Overall I really enjoyed this movie, when I said that the eighties were back I meant it.  Premium Rush felt very much like an eighties movie, but not of the action ilk, just more of an average Joe (pun intended) getting caught up in something crazy that interrupts his everyday world.  Other movies that come to mind are Gleaming the Cube and No Way Out.  Premium Rush is  written and directed by David Koepp, you might know him more for the movies his written; Men in Black 3, Angels and Demons, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, War of the Worlds, Zathura, Spider-Man, Jurassic Park, The Lost World Jurassic Park… well done with Premium Rush Mister Koepp, now I know that Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’s failure rests all on George Lucas.
The story of this film is strong and that’s why the so called gimmicks of non-linear story telling, integrated computer usage and multiple outcomes works.  Future movies, please take note, focus on the story first and don’t let the tricks be the focus.

PS. it also doesn’t hurt that the movie is bookended with Baba O’Riley by The Who, hehe.