::: metaphlog ::: phlog
Sat, Apr 21, 2007
Shining — The Feel Good Movie of 1980
YouTube justifies what Metaphilm readers have known all along... Shine On, You Crazy Diamond.
Sun, Apr 01, 2007
WARNING! SITE UPDATE COMPLETE. CHANGE URLs
Metaphilm has upgraded its back-end software from pMachine Pro to Expression Engine. This is now complete. Please visit us on the new system. Sorry for any broken links. The new Atom/RSS feed is here. (RSS 2 is here). This old feed will be discontinued in a little while.
Mon, Feb 26, 2007
How Many Great Films Does A Guy Have to Make...
...To Win A Goddamn Oscar? Answers Here.
Tue, Feb 20, 2007
Marshall McLuhan: Film Critic, Political Strategist
Rod Dreher bites into media ecology, at long last...
"Cultures shaped by the printed word prized logic, reason and dispassion. But a global culture conditioned by television – which is to say, by the power of sound and image – to process information a certain way, Mr. McLuhan taught, will revert to pre-modern modes of thought. It will be more emotional, more tribal, less trusting of traditional authority and more inclined to privilege individual judgment. And it will have more political and religious extremism.
If you want to see what can happen to leaders who don't understand the political effect of the revolution in consciousness Mr. McLuhan prophesied, go see the Oscar-nominated film The Queen. The drama, which concerns a crisis in the life and reign of Queen Elizabeth II, is a McLuhanesque parable of how traditional authority and the power that comes with it can slip through the fingers of those who don't understand how television and mass media have utterly transformed everything they've touched."
Fri, Feb 02, 2007
A Bright Guilty World
Film noir, neo-noir, now this: Sunshine Noir. Oh, and while we're at it, "Robert Altman was a great pothead". Thanks to David Velasco for the Artforum links.
Mon, Jan 29, 2007
Star Wars Meets YouTube
Unlike our earlier Matrix link, this fan-created film actually has a bit of humor and style in it. Subsequent episodes aplenty.
Wed, Jan 17, 2007
David Bordwell Speaks, But Is Not Seen
Film students everywhere will want to listen in on Annie Frisbie's podcast interview with omnipresent film text author David Bordwell as he answers her questions regarding cinema, YouTube, and related cineminutiae. Sound quality is not that great due to what seems like Prof Bordwell's phone, but that may be simply a function of UW-Madison's ancient telephony - the whole thing lends itself to the pre-existing undergraduate perception that the professor is, in fact, a disembodied voice narrating the movie of our times...cinematic! Thanks to Annie Frisbie for the link and the interview.
Fri, Jan 12, 2007
Chewbacca: Matchmaker, Mythkeeper, Main Character
It's 2007 and nearly a full thirty years since the original Star Wars came out on May 25, 1977. In light of Episodes 1-3, you owe it to yourself to finally and fully understand the significance of Chewbacca (and to a lesser extent, R2-D2). Keith Martin stands up to the task of reinterpreting post-prequel Star Wars brilliantly. Thanks to Scott Greider for the link.
Mon, Oct 30, 2006
The Meatrix Has You
The sequel to The Meatrix is now up, and it's Revolting. Must-see for Matrix fans and organic farmers (and the foodies who love them) everywhere.
Sun, Jul 09, 2006
A Knight's Tale
Ran across recently Gilbert, the magazine of the G. K. Chesterton Society of North America. In their sample issue online is an interpretation of the Heath Ledger movie, A Knight's Tale, which is appropriately Chestertonian—paradoxical and insightful. Reviewer Art Livingston manages to redeem the movie for me (I liked it, but there was definite wincing going on; now I'll have to watch it again—and isn't that the point of the best reviews?).
“Slowly, I caught on to what the filmmakers had in mind. Only until recently have people paid much attention to minute historical accuracy, and our ancestors would have thought it blatant pedantry to do so. As late as the 18th century, actors trod the boards in performances of Joseph Addison's Cato while being bedecked in periwigs. Similarly, the real Chaucer cared so little for such accuracy that the laws of chivalry bind an ancient Trojan like Troilus. And then the truth dawned on me: this story is being told the medieval way, just as surely as clocks strike the hour in Julius Caesar—without regard to historicism. ”
The article is likely to go away after a while, so if anybody needs a copy, let me know.
Wed, May 10, 2006
Cyber Cinema, 1981-2001
Reader Doug Van Hollen points out “a piece (actually a series of pieces) on cyberpunk cinema and its various hiding places 1981–2001. This guy really knows his stuff and is willing to look in odd places (Batman as the ultimate cyberpunk? And Predator?!), while providing new insights into all the obvious ones.” Thanks, Doug.
Sun, Mar 19, 2006
Sopranos in Drag
Reader Aaron Hoffer sends us a link to an interpretive review of The Sopranos in the Washington Post (12 March 2006), which includes this interesting idea: “The mob story, it might be argued, replaced the Western as the great American epic in the last third of the 20th century. As the counterculture was shredding the myth of the West into a million little pieces with movies such as "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," "The Wild Bunch" and even "Midnight Cowboy," the first two "Godfather" movies were winning Best Picture Oscars. Those films retold the American epic on the urban frontier. "Goodfellas" solidified the idea that "Mafia + Movie = Art."” A story of the American Dream, a sitcom in dramatic drag. A nice read. Thanks, Aaron.
Thu, Feb 02, 2006
It's Out: Philip Seymour Hoffman Wins Oscar
Unbeatable politically correct prediction strategy, or just a wild guess? Check the odds of winning Oscar gold by playing someone both gay and famous at Encyclopedia Hanasiana
Wed, Feb 01, 2006
I Want This To Be A Hoax
From the marketing material for StagKnight: "An entirely independent project, following in the footsteps of Shaun of the Dead, StagKnight boasts better kills, hotter babes, more laughs and one of the most original horror villains ever seen."
Am reminded of lyrics from Roger Water's best solo album, Amused to Death (itself inspired by Neil Postman's best book, Amusing Ourselves to Death -- worthwhile if you've not already read it, especially now that the 20th anniversary edition has an excellent introduction by Neil's very funny son, Andrew Postman):
No tears to cry
No feelings left
This species has amused itself to death.
Am also reminded of lyrics from Leonard Cohen's song, The Future, on the soundtrack to Natural Born Killers:
When they said repent,
I wondered what they meant.
Or as Postman himself said, "What is the antidote to a culture's being drained by laughter?"
Better kills, hotter babes, more laughs: Could it not be the slogan of most videogames? The tagline of most media? The national anthem of most contemporary cultures?
Mon, Jan 23, 2006
Alone In The Dark
It's been a "dark" week in the journalism world of film writing, apparently, and yet this is a very interesting review of Colin McGinn's new book, The Power of Movies, which is the first serious attempt to articulate the theory that film is the medium that allows us to most closely approximate the dreamstate in our Waking Life. Well worth the time for Metaphilm readers who have been subscribers to this theory for a while now.
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