Serious science fiction is a demanding cinematic genre; that’s why you see so little of it! Most of what passes for science fiction is out-and-out comic fantasy. In the last year only three marginally serious science fiction films made it to wide release: Catching Fire, Divergent and Transcendence. Sadly, they’re all pretty awful and Transcendence … Continue reading What’s the opposite of Transcendence?
Tag: review
The New SmugMug
Websites compete in a brutal Darwinian struggle for eyeballs and clicks: adapt or die is an understatement. Every few years users get "upgraded" whether they want it or not. Generally things move in a better direction. Even twenty-something web programmers aren't completely stupid but setbacks and complete disasters are not uncommon. My new SmugMug layout - click … Continue reading The New SmugMug
Review: The Signal and the Noise
There is nothing like being right to make an impression. After calling the majority of congressional districts in the 2012 US election Nate Silver enjoyed his 15 minutes of fame. Before his election prediction I was only dimly aware of Nate Silver. I knew he worked for the New York Times, but that's no longer … Continue reading Review: The Signal and the Noise
The Myth of Sisyphus: Camus’s Absurd Prototype
In 1942, with World II raging, readers of The Myth of Sisyphus could easily identify with Camus's absurd man. Not only is man absurd he has reduced his entire world to absurdity. Now, seventy-plus years later, Sisyphus readers are more likely to politely yawn and wonder what the fuss is about. Camus's themes are not … Continue reading The Myth of Sisyphus: Camus’s Absurd Prototype
Oz the Gratuitous and Purile
This is not the Oz you're looking for! The original Wizard of Oz, the one we have all seen many times, is on a very short list of nearly perfect movies. Everything about the 1939 film is superb in excess. It's as fun to watch today as it was over seventy years ago and you … Continue reading Oz the Gratuitous and Purile
King Hobbit Kong
The pre-Hobbit hum was not harmonious. It started with the interminable legal battle over who would direct the Hobbit and how to split any spoils. After Peter Jackson's cinematic Lord of the Rings triumph people assumed he would be The Hobbit guy but an envious and embittered clique of Tolkien's heirs felt the weren't getting … Continue reading King Hobbit Kong
Ooh Promethean Tentacles
Hey let's wander around in the dark and feed vagina snakes. Prometheus breaks the first rule of movies: don’t make your audience think! Any movie that violates this taboo gets exactly what it deserves and Prometheus is begging for it. Let’s get the good stuff out-of-the-way. Prometheus looks great. It throws up one fabulous tableau … Continue reading Ooh Promethean Tentacles
Evil Queens are getting Hotter
There’s not a lot of good news out there. Our currencies are being sodomized by economic imbeciles. High unemployment has demoralized the masses and forced lobotomized bureaucrats to get off their entitled asses and redefine it. The suck---oops stock---market has returned SFO for a decade. CO2 levels are rising. The seas are not subsiding; they … Continue reading Evil Queens are getting Hotter
Blurb: Nick Lomb’s Transit of Venus
Nick Lomb’s Transit of Venus 1631 to the Present is the best illustrated astronomy book for general readers since Terence Dickinson and Alan Dyer’s The Backyard Astronomer's Guide. Everything about Lomb’s book from its eye seizing cover, rarely seen historic photographs and charming well researched commentary is first class. Transit is the type of work … Continue reading Blurb: Nick Lomb’s Transit of Venus
The Hunger Games: a Libertarian Dead Teenager Movie.
I’ve always enjoyed watching teenagers die. Even when I was a teenager, back in the early Pleistocene, I couldn’t get enough adolescent annihilation. Now that I am a certified, some would say certifiable, drooling old fart boomer I enjoy it even more. Youthful folly: it’s riveting entertainment for the elderly. Given my macabre inclinations I … Continue reading The Hunger Games: a Libertarian Dead Teenager Movie.
Analyze the Data not the Drivel 