Archive for September, 2007

Fantastic Fest 2007 Micro Reviews

by Drey on September 28, 2007 in Geek, Movies with No comments

I know you can go over to Aint It Cool and read Harry and Massawyrm’s more involved reviews, but I thought I’d summarize my thoughts on what I saw for those who may be interested.

Diary of the Dead – I didn’t actually see this movie as I don’t usually like zombie movies. George Romero was hanging out with the fans afterward and he seemed like a cool guy. Diary was not part of his “of the Dead” series of movies. It presupposes a world where no zombie movies exist, so when a group of college kids stumbles across a zombie outbreak, they must learn about it the hard way.

Wicked Flowers – Japanese indie film about a group of people trapped in a series of rooms. They have to watch a short play in each room and piece together the answer to a question before a time-released toxin kills them. It’s David Lynch meets “Cube.”

Time Crimes – One of my favorite films of the festival. The world premiere of Nacho Vigalondo’s first film. A clever, tightly constructed, no special effects time travel story in the vein of Primer, but more accessible. Nacho is a really great guy and he hung out for the entire festival. He told me he was very worried that no one would like his movie, but it was a festival favorite.

Aachi and Ssipak – Completely insane Korean anime about a future world where the only fuel left is human feces. Wildly original and hyperviolent.

The Entrance – Awful B movie about a cop who investigates a bunch of criminals drawn into a deadly game by a fallen angel. They actually do the scene where the rookie cop makes the late night call to the detective on the case: “I know this is going to sound crazy, but I’ve been doing some digging on the Internet and there might be something to this demon thing after all!”

Spiral – Genius thriller/black comedy. It’s The Office, but Tim might secretly be a serial killer.

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time – Satisfying anime tale of a high school girl who discovers she can leap back and forth in time. Not as wondrous as a Miyazaki, but still well done and touching.

Southland Tales – Reviewed elsewhere. It’s growing on me.

Sex and Death 101 – Daniel Waters (Heathers) film about a man who discovers a list of every woman he’s ever had sex with as well as every woman he *will* have sex with until he dies. Very funny black comedy with a slight sci-fi element. Renewed my crush on Winona Ryder. The director and most of the cast were there, drunk out of their minds. Winona thought it was next week and didn’t show up.

Sword Bearer – Long-winded Russian film about a man who can spontaneously eject a sword blade from his palm, a la Wolverine. I was never clear on what the film was trying to be.

Moebius Redux – I was only peripherally aware of Jean Giraud’s art before this movie, but now I’m a fan. He’s the artistic genius behind the visual design of Tron, Alien, The Fifth Element and one of the founders of Heavy Metal magazine. Fantastic documentary which I highly recommend. It has been playing on Canadian and British TV recently.

Retribution – Boring J-Horror crime drama which tries to be so unlike The Grudge, The Ring, etc. that ends up being really ordinary.

The Cold Hour – One of the best sci-fi movies I’ve seen in a while. I won’t say anything about it at all. You need to walk in to this with no information. You will be richly rewarded. This is a must see.

The Orphanage – Guillermo del Toro presented the two first time writer and director of the film. It was a very atmospheric Spanish ghost story which I enjoyed. There was an especially grisly scene in the film which the writer later explained as his message to the American writer’s workshop that suggested they sanitize the film for American audiences. The message was “Fuck off.”

Death Note – I loved the anime and I was pleasantly surprised at the live action adaptation. It definitely shuffled the story around to make it work for the movie. The characters all remained intact, though: Light was an arrogant, evil bastard and L was a semi-autistic genius who ate nothing but sweets. They were showing Death Note 1 & 2 back to back, but I was too sleepy to stay for the second movie.

There Will Be Blood – I didn’t make it into this one, but apparently this was a big movie for some people. I was waiting in line and PT Anderson walked by. Two guys next to me started flipping out. I was relieved that I wasn’t missing Darabont’s the Mist. I even tried to make Anderson into Darabont with a scruffy beard.

And that was my Fantastic Fest experience. I went ahead and bought a VIP ticket for next year (already sold out) so I wouldn’t have to put up with this waiting in line for three hours and not getting in nonsense again.

GeeksOn

by Drey on September 28, 2007 in Geek with No comments

Today is my one year anniversary of being on the GeeksOn forums, the one and only forum I participate in.

Yay!

Heroes 2.0

by Drey on September 24, 2007 in Television with No comments

Yawn.

I’m done.

Southland Tales

by Drey on September 23, 2007 in Movies with No comments

Don’t worry, I will warn you before the potential spoilers.

I waited in line for three hours for Ain’t It Cool News’ first secret screening at Fantastic Fest. I had no idea what I would be seeing. I just squeaked in to the showing, and by some twist of fate found myself sitting in the VIP seats with Richard Kelly and his entourage, about to watch his follow up to Donnie Darko.

This is in no way a review. It is a reaction, my attempt to deal with what I saw. I had only heard the name of the film and had no idea what it was supposed to be about. At first, I thought it was meant to be taken seriously. It was a serious movie being done very badly. But then I considered that it was a farce. So it became a farce done very badly.

Southland Tales stars The Rock, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Seann William Scott, Justin Timberlake and a Saturday Night Live reunion party. Everyone has been cast against type, something the director did on purpose.

For the most part, I sat there with my jaw literally open because I could not believe what I was seeing and hearing. I’m not talking about a David Lynch flavor of bizarre. I’m talking about a Plan 9 From Outer Space-esque “Did he really just say that?” vibe.

I spent the entire movie thinking that I had just taken a bullet for all of you, for everyone I knew who had not seen it. I was pretty sure I was watching something really bad. But that’s the thing: It’s like it did something to my brain to make me think that maybe it was good. I thought I could give a definite recommendation about it, but I can’t.

If these things intrigue you:

SPOILER ALERT

1. Sarah Michelle Gellar as a porn star
2. A near future Neo-Con nightmare of America
3. An SUV growing an animated dick and fucking the vaginal muffler orifice of another SUV
4. Kevin Smith disguised as a scientist
5. The short dude from the Princess Bride as a transsexual wizard mastermind
6. A rift in the Time-Space continuum which threatens to destroy the 4th dimension
7. John Lovitz as a bloodthirsty racist cop
8. Justin Timberlake as the narrator who quotes from Revelation and then injects himself with an alternate fuel source so he can perform a Killers music video
9. Seann William Scott as the messiah
10. Moby

…then you will have much to love about Southland Tales.

END SPOILERS

When Richard Kelly got up and spoke about the themes and the symbolism in the film, it retroactively made the movie cool. The movie is part IV, V, and VI of the Southland Tales. Parts I, II, and III are each graphic novels, which we all received as we left the theater.

But most people will not get the benefit of the director’s commentary until the DVD and they won’t know to read the graphic novels first. And I’m not sure if what he was talking about was actually up there on the screen.

So I’m still not sure what to tell you. It may be an awful movie or it may be a work of genius.

Cosmic Encounter

by Drey on September 18, 2007 in Geek with No comments

And now in news that isn’t actually a cruel practical joke on Mischa…

Fantasy Flight Games has obtained the rights to Cosmic Encounter and will be releasing a new version next summer. I cannot be more excited. There is no better company to handle the game. I will go ahead and say that it will be the best version ever. It will have gorgeous art and components, as well as lots of expansions.

Hooray for nostalgia!

San Marco

by Drey on September 15, 2007 in Geek with No comments

EDIT: To be clear, this post is entirely fictional. Dan told me how Mischa coveted this game, so I thought it would be amusing to write this post. As it turns out, Mischa had already obtained a copy, so the joke was on me. And, for the record, San Marco is a fantastic game and I wish I owned a copy too.

Last weekend, on my way to the grocery store, I stopped at a yard sale. I really love yard sales, but I haven’t gone to one since I was back in Albuquerque. I have this recurring fantasy of finding a rare Boba Fett action figure.

It looked like the lady who was running the sale had a husband who was a board game collector and he was getting rid of a couple of things. It looks like everything had been pretty picked over before I got there. I saw this game Celtica, which I already had. But there were a few interesting-looking games which I ended up buying: San Marco (mostly because of the cool looking lion statue on the cover) and Ticket to Ride (which I had played before but never bought my own copy). Both games looked like they were in good shape and had all their pieces (though the San Marco box was a little scuffed).

I got a chance to play San Marco tonight at Great Hall. As I was setting it up, the board reminded me of this other game I had played with gondolas going around the board. The board looked like someone had gone a little bit crazy with a map of Venice and Photoshop. It came with the same little cubes you find in every game plus this figure with a little hat. Oh, and there were bridges.

Essentially it is an area control game in the vein of El Grande. I found myself constantly reminded of El Grande, which, having played both, I think is the superior game. San Marco is way more cutthroat and it felt like you couldn’t plan a long term strategy because inevitably someone would screw you over pretty badly. It had an interesting mechanic where one player divides the action cards up and then another player chooses which set of cards they will use.

Anyhow, it was kind of amusing, but it felt too much like El Grande merged with some other game that I can’t remember. When I was packing it up, one of the guys ( I don’t think I had ever actually spoken to him before) came up and offered to trade or buy it. It had only cost me $5, but he offered me $10. Score!

I also got to play this game that let you make cool little sculptures from putty. It took a while before someone guessed that one of mine was a star destroyer.

Meetup

by Drey on September 12, 2007 in Food, Life, Movies with No comments

One of the first things I did when I got to Austin was to sign up for interesting groups at Meetup.com. I get to meet people with similar interests and check out cool new places in Austin.

Right now I’m part of Discovering Austin, a couple wine/coffee/singles Meetup groups, a sushi group, two Landmark groups, and two movie groups. One of the movie groups is the Alamo Drafthouse Fans, which I am an assistant organizer for. That means I get to pick movies, schedule events and get people to come to the Alamo to have a good time!

What I Got Out of It

by Drey on September 11, 2007 in Life with No comments

The actual mechanics of the Forum aren’t all that important. What is important to me is the impact on my life.

I went into it afraid and distrusting of men. I was never going to let a man get too close to me as they were inherently dishonest and possibly violent. That’s gone. Most of my friends in Austin are male. I have no qualms about approaching strangers and engaging with them about anything.

I went in to the Forum convinced that I was broken, deep down. I believed that I was ugly, unattractive, grossly incompetent, and talentless. I thought I had everyone fooled, but it was only a matter of time before I was found out. So I reigned in my creativity and my participation in the lives of others. No need to get their hopes up or to accelerate things so that I would fail them sooner rather than later. I apologized for my talents, I downplayed everything I ever made, and I sabotaged relationships to avoid anyone finding out these dark secrets.

Of course, these dark secrets were all made up. They were things I told myself  as a way of coming to terms with events in my childhood and later life. They became my reality and I never thought to examine them as anything but.

Now I know that I am wildly creative, extremely smart, quite attractive, and worthy of loving and being loved.

Personal growth is neat and all, but the real value is the impact one can have in the lives of others and the world in general.

I had pretty much written off my family. I felt like I had failed them as a son and a brother and I was embarrassed by how little connection I had in their lives. So I told myself that they were bound up in their own problems and that they resented me for having an easier life, so I just go on and live it without them. That was easier than trying to make a difference.

But I realized that I made up all those things about me and them too. That wasn’t reality. It was an invention to explain why I was doing what I was doing. So I created the possibility of a closer reconnection with my family by calling them up and having a genuine conversation. Some of you are really close to your family and this doesn’t seem like a big deal. I haven’t seen my family in years. I hadn’t spoken with my sister in many years. I hadn’t had a real conversation with her since I was in college. I thought she hated me and I was afraid to ever create an opportunity to confirm it.

My sister is one of the strongest women I know. She has faced more medical problems than a lot of entire families combined. She (and my mom and nieces) deals with scenarios that some of you will only see on COPS or the evening news. She struggles to raise three children. She somehow finished college and got her degree during all of this. Where I would have given up and bailed or just shot myself in the head, she has forged on. When my life seems overwhelming and impossible, I can look to her and know that it *is* possible.

I probably would never had tried to begin to re-establish connections or tell my sister who she is to me without going through the Forum.

And this is only a start. The real work lies ahead.

The Landmark Forum

by Drey on September 7, 2007 in Life with No comments

Landmark Education transformed my life in a way that no self-help book, therapy, religion, or philosophy ever has. I don’t want to devalue any of the personal inner work I have done in my life. But compared to the work I have been doing since the Landmark Forum, I think I was just entertaining a lot of neat philosophies that had no lasting impact on my life.

My friend Deborah told me about the Forum last year and I will admit I was highly skeptical about the things she was telling me. Not that they weren’t real, but just not real for me. I already knew about the concepts she was telling me. I had done lots of work on myself already. I was beyond such programs. She offered something that seemed too outrageous to be real and I didn’t believe it. And I was completely, utterly wrong.

I finally attended the Forum here in Austin. I went into it very jaded about what was possible, but at the same time optimistic. I really did want transformation in my life. I really did want to live as an optimal human being. But I wanted it on my own terms and in my own context. And that is not what the Forum is about.

People talked about the Forum like it was The Matrix: no one could tell you what it was really like; you had to experience it for yourself. I thought, “This is bullshit.” But now, on the other side of things, I know exactly what they meant. The experience is highly subjective. I have seen, read and considered many mind-blowing things, but nothing as miraculous as what I experienced during the Forum. It really did feel like I had been unplugged from the Matrix and witnessed a completely different plane of reality.

People will talk about Landmark in this weird, mystical way. What I saw there was the most hyper-rational, scientifically rigorous examination of reality I had ever known.

It’s Just Lunch

by Drey on September 5, 2007 in Life with 2 Comments

As a Christmas gift for myself, I had signed up for the “It’s Just Lunch” dating service for busy professionals. I describe the person I am looking for and the company tries to match me up with someone looking for me. They make reservations at a night restaurant for lunch or after work drinks and I go on a blind date.

This process enabled me to articulate the sort of woman I enjoy spending time with. I told them I liked quirky, creative types who had a spiritual dimension to them, who were honest and expressive. I stressed that it be made known that I was a big movie geek and enjoyed lots of geeky activities. Potential dates should know what they are in for!

For the most part, the service set me up with really nice women who were pretty. But there was never really a spark and oftentimes they were fairly mainstream. They wanted to talk about what we did for a living, not about life goals and plans or being self-expressive.

Originally, I signed up with the intention of finding someone to date. After moving to Austin, I revised that intention as I now just wanted to meet some new people and get acquainted with the city. I gradually came to terms with the fact that I really wanted to find someone to have a serious relationship. I didn’t want to casually date anyone. I wanted to create the possibility of a lasting, loving partnership. While I tried to stay open to the possibility of meeting such a person through a dating service, I felt like I wasn’t going to meet that person in such a way. I thought, “Maybe the person I’m attracted to would never use a dating service or they wouldn’t spend this much money on it.”

So I became cautiously optimistic, but extremely picky. I can see the value of such a service, but I’m not sure if it is the right thing for me.