February 2005 Archives

[ audio selection | diesel boy - the descent ]

its a monday morning, and my minds still not exactly firing on all pistons. im actually writing this additional intro after having written the majority of the post already, rereading what i wrote, and realizing its absolute shit. *shrug*

not only did last week seem to fly right by, but the weekend did as well. i think it was the first weekend in a very very very long time where i went out 3 days in a row. thats like, wow. ooh, and i watched two movies...constantine (rock!) and kung-fu hustle (fuckin' rock!). i grabbed foodies friday nite at yakiniku with sally, then taiwanese drinks at jennys cafe. yum. satty was a late din with marisol and crew at oh! taisho, and sunday was an ikea run and foodage with margie, who i hadnt seen in months...craziness. so now i have an un-made billy bookshelf sitting in my hallway, which i will most likely put off assembling til tomorrow.

so back to the aforementioned movies. firstly, constantine is not for everybody. it takes artistic liberties with its religious subject matter, which could upset certain people. and its definitely not everyday you see an angel tell you that "you're fucked". that scene btw, rocked. keanu reeves was definitely rockin' as constantine...snarky little fuck. and while he will never be the sting-esque brit constantine people want him to be, hes still a damn good constantine. so go see it damnit...gogogo! a bag of shit movie like hitch should never be making more money.

next up is the kung-fu goodness that is kung-fu hustle. it rocks...go get it on dvd, or wait til march when it comes out here...then see it in the theaters. this movie is some hawtness...stephen chow and his crew of regulars, with the addition of yuen woo pings fight choreography. just go see it. im gonna drink my coffee.

oohs and aahs. capital ship battles...x-wing-esque fighters, and big hairy wookies.

THE ISLAND
oh, and also check out igns set visit to the michael bay production the island, starring ewan mcgregor and scarlett johansson. think logans run meets um...matrix with a freaky medical/biological twist? it sounds interesting, so im game.

SMALLVILLE
one last interesting read. the ny times has a nice article about the rockin' tv series smallville. the series has had a nice continuous run interweving elements from supermans storied past, most notably christopher reeves' character. margot kidder also had a recurring role as well, but the article points out how her and the show had a dispute and they had parted ways. too bad. other notable guests (both mentioned and not) include lois lane (obviously), the flash, perry white, terence stamp (general zod) as the voice of jor-el, and hey...even mr. mxyzptlk, who was "a really hot foreign exchange student." did i miss that episode?

> new star wars eps3 images (via ign)
> the island set visit (via ign)
> the history of smallville (via ny times)

go go tetsujin!

> tetsujin 28 trailer
> tetsujin 28 japanese website

[ audio selection | asian dub foundation - culture move ]

damnit, i cant believe i missed last nites episode of the simpsons. it was apparently the episode where a character comes out of the closet...poosticks. for those that missed it also, it was patty bouvier, one of marges sisters. she was one of my guesses, but my money was on millhouse...or lenny or karl. damn, now ill have to catch it in reruns.

> the simpsons come out of the closet (via ny times)
> prior post when it was first announced

whoa, aicn has a new design. and just when i was getting used to their old-school hand-crafted monstrosity. its not bad...ill get used to it.

spoilerific post today for star wars episode 3, including a bunch of new pics and a brief plot synopsis. read if you dont mind spoilers, but its not like half this stuff hadnt been speculated upon for years. pss...anakins gonna become darth vader. holy shit! coo pics tho, so maybe just stare at the pics and avoid the text. ok, you cant really do that either...ones a pretty big spoiler.

> new sw3 pics (via aicn)
> SPOILER sw3 pics

i think the guy they mention in this post was in my graduating class from cornell architecture. i mean, i knew a bruce engel, and i do vaguely remember him making a 2x4 lamp for something. at least i think it was him...

ok, digging deeper and tracking it back to the source, yep...same bruce. nice guy.

> 2x4 lamp (via gizmodo)
> sandbox design

yoho! new hitchhikers guide trailer! c/o...amazon? right whatev, as long as it works. watch the earth get destroyed, meet arthur dent, ford prefect, zaphod...and marvin, woo marvin.

> new hitchhikers guide trailer (via aicn)

word, a thumbs-up came in today from ign for the upcoming comic book adaption constantine. if youre a rabid fan of the original hellblazer series, maybe you'll never get over the fact that keanu reeves is a non-brit, non-blonde constantine...but id give it a shot just because of all the ridiculously coo pics coming from their camp. its like the way i felt about the cell before it came out and shat on its own plot. gorgeous movie, potentially dodgy script. but this time around the movie just might get the rockin' visuals along with a plot, so im excited. coincidentally tarsem singh, the director of the cell, was originally attached to constantine...with nicholas cage. see, i think that wouldve been a disaster.

> constantine review (via ign)

funny read from wired news. apple products+celebrities=funny shit. the 4 apple stores in the los angeles area get their fair share of regular celebrity customers. some are courteous, some are clueless (but still courteous), and some are just downright obnoxious bizatches. robin williams leaves pics of himself on the desktops for fun, trent reznor frequently buys gifts for nin, jon stewart slips in and out, and fred durst is a cheap-ass. but the rockin' quote for the day comes from an anonymous employee who had to deal with the wrath of melanie griffith, who demanded a pink ipod mini.

"She then proceeded to get pissed off at me personally because we didn't have any in stock," the associate said. "She said we have a special stock of iPods for people like her.... I hadn't seen any celebrities there up until then, so at first I was like, 'Oh wow, cool, Melanie Griffith.' But then she opened her mouth and used me as a doormat, and I was like, 'What the fuck is this shit? Milk Money sucked."

shit thats priceless. ha, and gizmodo apparently liked the same quote...

> apple and celebrities (via wired)

[ audio selection | bob marley - midnight ravers ]

shoot, its monday already. and bugger, its also valentines day. i was wondering why i saw people peddling massive flower trays around the streets today. alrighty then...just a brief one for today. ign has two coo articles with steven spielberg today. the first is a brief dialogue about indy 4 and spielberg executive producing the transformers movie. a year and a half from now for indy 4...keep your fingers crossed. and the second article is a lengthy question and answer with spielberg and tom cruise about war of the worlds. its pretty in-depth, talking about what parts of the movie were in homage to the original george pal movie, as well as which parts were taken directly from h.g. wells novel. definitely an interesting read.

> spielberg talks indy 4 (via ign)
> spielberg and cruise talk war of the worlds (via ign)

ny times looks at the people behind my addiction. crack in digital form...booya.

> world of warcraft (via ny times)

[ audio selection | outkast - pink & blue ]

my new photo hero...check this guys self-made camera. its kinda nice because, you know, it takes pics at approximately 4 fucking gigapixels. thats about 4 football fields worth of photo yo. the former physicist, super-genius, and photo afficianado graham flint is criss-crossing america taking super-massive pics of cities, monuments, or whatever catches his fancy with his custom camera. built using cold-war technology, the custom cam weighs around 100 lbs, and creates pictures that when scanned 1-to-1, fills a dvd with just one pic. thats like, ridiculous. you rock flint...

oh, and happy lunar new year yo.

> ultra-super hyper neo camera (via wired)

did you check the weather this weekend? mid-50s...craziness. its like springs peeping its head out the window. itll probably snow 5 feet next week or something, just to spite us.

itd been a long time since the cornell crew headed out for drinkies, so we met up for happy hour friday nite at double happiness. the happy hour coincided of course with doras bday, so drinks all around. afterwards, a couple of us grabbed vietnamese foodies at pho bang, then walked around soho/e.village since it was so nice out. after hitting up st. marks, we split for home. saturday nite was doras real bday celebrations, so we all met up again for drinkies at guernica on ave. b. got to chat with people i see maybe once every couple months...super. i ducked out a bit earlier than i normally do tho, since i had to be up at 9:30 sunday morning.

COVERING ALL THE BASES
sunday was time with the family/moms birthday/lunar new year etc etc in new jersey. we cover all our bases. the family headed to a taiwanese restaraunt in morristown and met up with some family friends of ours whom we've known for maybe 20+ years...crazy. we knew their kids also, since they were our age. ray was my sis' age, tho he wasnt there, and his sis is a year (or two?) younger than me. but whats kind of sad was that i actually didnt know there was another sister. so im thinking, ok hi thats ginger...but who are you? go me. anyhoo, ate, chatted, headed home...all good. and our tubs clogged.

philip johnson died last week??? i had to glean this info off a reference from a moma article from today...

[ audio selection | chemical brothers - song to the siren ]

oh crap...enterprise got yanked! for those who werent aware (or just didnt give a shit) there has been a star trek of some form or another on air for the past 18 (whoa) years straight...and next season will be the first since where no new star trek episodes will be aired. this is little surprise for many (me included), who saw enterprise as well...crap. and while it was supposedly getting better recently, thanks to the work of manny coto (i never caught an episode, so i cant confirm that), it wasnt enough to stop the axe from coming down. so lets see, crap series gets canned, the last movie (nemesis) tanked, lots of high-profile former trekkies (most noticeably patrick stewart) distancing themselves from the franchise...things arent looking super eh? a break is needed regardless, and many are hoping that this results in rick berman (who has led the franchise since gene roddenberrys death and who many directly blame for the decline of the franchise) losing the helm of star trek. heres just to hoping jolene blalock gets reincarnated or something in a future series...

WAR!
oh, and the new super bowl trailer for war of the worlds is up. still no aliens...but there are explosions. *shrug* i suppose thatll do for now.

> enterprise is cancelled (via ign)
> war of the worlds super bowl trailer (via coming soon via aicn)

i was working on some material for the new tim burton movie corpse bride...promotional artwork, a style guide, etc. so im reading the style guide, checking out the story etc. and as im reading the summary, the summary extends to multiple pages, lays out the whole story, tells me the ending, and fucks me over before i even realize it. gah! so now for the first time (in a while) i ruined the plot for myself unintentionally (when its usually intentional. spoilers, etc). grr...stupid style guides. oh, and the storys a bit fucked up and morbid. you should see some of the character sketches...craziness.

BLOODRAYNE
right, and in other movie news, theres a new "trailer" out for uwe boll's new game-to-movie and soon-to-be masterpiece bloodrayne. yea, masterpiece. i mean, its uwe boll for chrissakes...maker of great works like house of the dead and alone in the dark. the trailer is so godawful that the movie must be good. they must have so much faith the movie will rock that they can afford to make the trailer look like some 3rd-rate tv movie. go go uwe boll!

note: sorry, the pics not really from the movie. its probably some lingerie model the game company (majesco) hired for promo work with the actual game.

> corpse bride
> bloodrayne trailer (via ign)