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kottke.org posts about movies
A list of the Midichlorian counts for
A list of the Midichlorian counts for major Star Wars characters.
Update: Given the subject mattter, I’m not sure a disclaimer is needed, but in case you’re really worried about veracity of the above list, here’s some useful information. (thx, oh no)
Geriatric and other distant sequels
Some upcoming and recently released sequels which are released a long time after the previous movie in the series, some real and some imagined:
Sylvester Stallone returns as the 50-something year-old title character in Rocky Balboa to fight the heavyweight champion of the world.
Police Academy 8: To the Moon. Steve Gutenberg leads a merry band of recruits and Bubba Smith to the moon to form the first extraterrestrial police force. Hijinks ensue. Special appearance by Henry Winkler, who jumps a shark on waterskis in the Sea of Tranquility.
ET 2. Henry Thomas needs the work.
Star Trek 12. William Shatner, Ricardo Montalban, and a wormhole. Enough said.
Sir Sean Connery as James Bond in Goldfinger 2. Turns out Oddjob wasn’t really dead. He and Bond battle it out after tempers flare and hats are thrown at a Florida condo board meeting. Pussy makes crabcakes for dinner.
Jaws 5. I think the shark talks this time.
Rambo IV: Pearl of the Cobra. Stallone has run out of material.
Marty travels forward in time to bring embryonic stem cells back to the present in Back to the Future Part IV.
Harrison Ford is set to star in Indiana Jones 4, slated to be released almost 20 years after the last installment of the film. Ford will be 65 years old at the time of the filming. Not sure how many swashes he’ll be buckling in the this one.
Star Wars: Episode 7. Han, Leia, and their high school-aged kids are ensconced in a Tatooine suburb (Chewy lives in the garage, R2 & 3PO in a little love-nest down the street) while Luke scours the galaxy for little kids with high midichlorian counts. Seventy-year-old Billy Dee Williams will appear as Lando Calrissian.
Clerks 2. Randal and Dante work through a midlife crisis for minimum wage while Jay and Silent Bob kick their habit.
Sharon Stone is still sexy and irritating at 47 in Basic Instinct 2.
Beverly Hills Cop IV. Axel does paperwork at his desk all day. Eddie Murphy does double duty by playing a elderly, sassy, obese black woman.
Karate Kid IV. Sadly, Pat Morita is unable to reprise his role as Mr. Miyagi and a 45-yo Ralph Macchio unconvincingly plays college sophomore Daniel LaRusso. Academy Award nominee William Zabka directs.
Bill & Ted’s Straightforward Trip to Home Depot. Station!
Breakin’ 3: Electric Boogaloo 2.
Disco is Dead. John Travolta runs a wrecking company that is contracted to tear down the very Brooklyn discotheque he danced in as a youth. Intense self-examination of his current path in life follows.
Ei8ht. Gwyneth’s character having been dispatched in the first film, Pitt is free to bring Angelina into this one as wife #2. This time, murders are committed where the first names of the victims match those of the children on the Eight Is Enough television program. I don’t want to ruin it for you, but Dick Van Patten’s head might end up in a box.
Metacritic’s aggregated view of the film critics’
Metacritic’s aggregated view of the film critics’ top 10 lists is always worth a look, both for the information and the information design. United 93 appeared on the most lists and tied with Army of Shadows for most #1 rankings.
Music video for the Softlightes song Heart
Music video for the Softlightes song Heart Made of Sound features handmade typography, Post-It Notes, and stop-motion animation. See also: the opening credits for Napoleon Dynamite, Stefan Sagmeister, and Michel Gondry. (via buzzfeed)
The Queen
Talking about it afterwards, a friend remarked, “I bet way more people in the US would go see this if they knew it was about Princess Diana”. It is and it isn’t, but I agree: the movie concerns Princess Diana and it’s great, so go see it. Trailer here.
10 kick ass opening credit sequences from movies (+
10 kick ass opening credit sequences from movies (+ accompanying YouTube videos). The credits for Se7en will forever be my favorite, if only because they inspired me (in part) to become a designer.
Aha! So that *was* Richard Branson getting
Aha! So that *was* Richard Branson getting wanded by security in Casino Royale.
Update: Branson also appeared in Superman Returns. (thx, charles)
La Jetee
After getting an email from a reader last week (thx, david), I poked around a little and found the cult French film on YouTube:
Some notes on the film:
- It was made in 1962 by Chris Marker and is only 28 minutes long.
- La Jetée is regularly included on all-time best-of lists.
- The film has no dialogue and is almost entirely comprised of still photography.
- Terry Gilliam’s Twelve Monkeys was based in part on La Jetée.
Odd games
Over the holidays, Mike Monteiro discovered there was a Nacho Libre game for the Nintendo DS. Thinking that an arbitrary choice for a movie tie-in game, he started the DS Tie-In Games I Wanna Play group on Flickr to showcase other possible odd media tie-ins for the DS. Some of my favorite submissions so far include: The Passion of the Christ, Birth of a Nation, Empire, Remains of the Day, My Dinner with Andre (Bon Mot controller sold separately), Super Mario Bros, Learning GNU Emacs, Requiem for a Dream, The Cremaster Cycle, and Getting Things Done.
Here’s a couple of ones that I’ve done: Dancer in the Dark and The New Yorker Draw Your Own Cover Electronic Entertainment (with noncompulsory coöperative mode), pictured below.
If you join the group, there’s a Photoshop kit you can download to join in the fun.
Interview with Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy
Interview with Christopher Guest and Eugene Levy about For Your Consideration and filmmaking in general. Interestingly, they don’t write any dialogue for their films (it’s all ad-libbed) but only do three takes per scene to get it right. “It’s the dialogue aspect of this process where you realize how great, how talented this troupe really is, because they’re able to improvise some amazingly, brilliantly funny lines.”
Interview with Steven Soderbergh, mostly about The
Interview with Steven Soderbergh, mostly about The Good German but also about some upcoming projects. “I think for the most part intellectuals don’t make very good movies. It’s an emotional medium and I think you can really outsmart yourself.” That quote reminds me of something I read on Clusterflock last night: “the giants of the imagination can set the giants of the intellect aquiver”.
The kids stayed up past their bedtime
The kids stayed up past their bedtime watching a chainsaw murder movie, so their parents got even by waking them up creatively.
Premiere magazine’s list of the 20 most overrated
Premiere magazine’s list of the 20 most overrated movies of all time. (via lists 2006)
David Lynch, in an effort last month
David Lynch, in an effort last month to promote Laura Dern’s performance in his film, Inland Empire, for consideration by the Academy, set up shop on Hollywood Blvd. with a huge sign and a cow.
Mike Judge’s Idiocracy is out on DVD
Mike Judge’s Idiocracy is out on DVD in early January. Hopefully this one will find an audience on DVD like Office Space did. The movie had a very limited release, possibly because Fox didn’t really want anyone to see it.
A photoessay that follows the path of
A photoessay that follows the path of a diamond from the mines of Africa to the Western jewelry store. “In Angola, Sierra Leone, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, miners work for food but receive no wages” and “last year, grooms spent nearly $4.5 billion on engagement rings”. See also the interview with Edward Zwick, director of Blood Diamond. “By putting your credit card down, you’re essentially endorsing the practices that are involved in getting a resource. This place and that place are, in fact, interconnected.” (thx, blake)
Good news: Harold and Kumar Part 2 is
Good news: Harold and Kumar Part 2 is set to begin filming in January.
A panel of critics at The Guardian
A panel of critics at The Guardian pick the world’s 40 best directors. Anyone missing? (via khoi)
Update: A reader pointed out that this list probably isn’t that current (Errol Morris’ Fog of War is still forthcoming, for example). Oh and please note that the list is comprised of working directors; it’s not an all-time list. (thx, kate)
The Whine Colored Sea issues a challenge:
The Whine Colored Sea issues a challenge: which directors, musicians, artists, authors, etc. followed a masterpiece with a bomb. Spielberg’s Schindler’s List followed by Jurassic Park 2 is a good example.
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