Truly, this is a sad week in geekdom. The anime world lost one of its great, a man that was and possibly is a legend in and around anime circles. The Japanese animator, Satoshi Kon, passed away this week at a young age of 47. Kon created such titles as The Perfect Blue (possibly my favourite anime movie), Millennium Actress, Tokyo Godfathers and Paprika, as far as full length features go. He was skilled in blending together adult themed storylines with a distorted dream-like tapestry all the while connecting to the audience with its emotional grab. When I think about who my favourite animator is, it falls between Hayao Miyazaki and Satoshi Kon. Well ff it can be considered a deciding factor, I have all of Kon's movies on DVD but not all of Miyazaki's. I am saddened that we will no longer see new ideas, new creations and new worlds from the mind of this master artist. But life is what it is and we have what we have. So thank you for that. Rest well Mr. Kon and peace be to your family and your friends.
I just watched Paprika after hearing about him, I had never heard about him or his movies before, and I was blown away. I think I'm going to take a break from regular anime and watch some of these movies now.
The Artist is director Michael Hazanavicius ode to the silent films of yesteryear. Not only focus on a silent movie actor and movie making, but it in itself is also a silent movie. The movie follows a silent movie actor named George Valentin through the rise and fall of his career. At the start of the film, we see George as this superstar celebrity; he loves the glitz and glamour of being a famous actor and soaks in all the attention he can get. He loves having his photos taken and being adorned on the front pages of newspapers. He is THAT kind of celebrity. At the premiere event of his latest movie, he bumps into one Peppy Miller – a young woman with big ambitions and dreams in Hollywoodland. The lives of the two intersect and an attraction immediately blossoms. The romance could only go so far as Valentin is a (happily?) married man. George’s superstardom reaches its height at a precarious time. And as the 1920s are ushered out, so are silent movies. The new decade brings w...
So as I mentioned in a previous post, I received an Xbox 360 for Christmas from my dad. A great present it was! I've had 3 weeks to enjoy it so I guess I can give you my impressions of it now. First the controller. In truth, I haven't felt a controller this comfortable in my gaming life before. As a child who grew up on the 8-bit generation, with just a directional pad and 2 buttons, there was quite a learning curve getting used to using two analog sticks at the same time. You might say, "Hey Lam, how bout the PS2? You have that machine, and that has analog sticks". True, but of the twenty or so games I have for that, all of them used either only 1 analog stick, or allowed the option to switch on to the directional pad. Using 2 sticks at the same time was at first just uncomfortable. This made for all sorts of trouble as I was playing Gears of War . Luckily for me, I had computer controlled teammates that watched my back. I love the Media Center capabilities...
The topic of concussions in sports is a dialogue that’s been growing the past number of years. Do a search on ‘concussions’ and ‘football’ and you’ll get several thousand hits on the controversy that’s surrounded the sport. It’s a challenging topic as the research is all relatively new, and the topic itself challenges the mentality and philosophy adopted by football loving Americans. Now, I’m not a fan of football or NFL but when I saw this book lying at the local bookstore, my interest was piqued. Although I’m not a fan of football, those that know me know that I’m an unabashed fan of prowrestling. Talks about concussions are also quite a hot topic even within the prowrestling sub-culture. Earlier this year, one of the hottest wrestlers of the current era, Daniel Bryan, retired early at the age of 34 due to a history of concussion related issues. Interestingly, he was not permitted to return to the ring due to the disapproval by WWE’s medic...
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