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I nominate The Recruit with Colin Farrell and Al Pacino. The cringe inducing scene was Colin Farrell hacking into a CIA computer by typing in some C++ source code at the graphical login prompt.

Rising Sun [imdb] was by far the worst. Swapping heads in video with an outline and a little drag-n-drop maneuver. Awesome.

It's easy to come up with BAD examples, that's the default for movies. What's your vote for the BEST portrayal?

The computer stuff wasn't particularly great in this movie, but I thought this move captured the technology development process very nicely:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085271/

I know this show was intended to be over the top, but the whole premise is cringe-worthy.

example

IMDB

I respect you guys and gals, but you can't say you have seen the worst of all until you have seen "the card player" by Dario Argento.To make it short, the police is chasing a serial killer who likes to challenge the police to a video poker game before killing his victims. If the police loses, he kills them. The Italian policemen, superior in skill to anyone else in the world, decide to beat the killer at his own game by "hiring" a kid found in a bar who allegedly is a video-poker champion.
No need to say it, the movie is full of completely inconsequential computer jargon, the interfaces are lovely and the nerds that try to track down the killer are too good to be true. Calling it a cliché would be an understatement, you don't want to die without having seen it.
BTW, thanks for the CSI visual basic thing, I've always felt like there was something missing in my life...

Yes, this movie exists. And yes, it's godawful beyond belief.

Here's a review I wrote about the movie when it came out. But, really, every detail is awful-- not just the computer scenes, but every scene is brimming from top to bottom with WTF. It also doesn't help that they couldn't get any characters from the original, except WOPR (if you count that.)

Laugh at the old Ham guys all you want. When a real disaster hits and the infrastructure goes down, I bet you'll be going to them and asking for their help.

Yeah .. but when the world ends, that will result in sending submarines to San Diego to track down morse keys that are being randomly tapped by coke bottles hooked into window shades that are blowing in the breeze

Dark Star

And here you had an opportunity to make a Zaphod Beeblebrox joke and completely blew it. At the very least, you could have chosen his cousin Ford Prefect, played by Mos Def to keep with your theme.

To pick a person whose only Sci/Fi role is playing an Ewok....I am disappointed.

but certainly not the coolest. Sorry, couldn't resist.

If life imitates art then we already know the answer.

The coldest brown dwarf ever was that elf in Bad Santa.

No megalomaniacal media baron would screw up GPS to cause Britain and China to go to war. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120347/

Actually, isn't this the definitive sound of Pi? :

Clint Mansell - Pi * r ^ 2 from the soundtrack of Darren Aronofsky's Pi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Cq_QO_4Cx4

Clint Mansell has done all of Aronofsky's music from the been-used-everywhere Lux Aeterna of Requiem for a Dream to Black Swan.

Oh, shameless plug, if you guys are into electronic music, here's a ton of free albums from my friends at Electronica Manila:

* QED Records - Free Electronic Music Netlabel
* Electronica Manila: One
* Electronica Manila: FREE
* Basics: The Electronica Manila The General MIDI Project

Enjoy!

-Naz

Actually, isn't this the definitive sound of Pi? :

Clint Mansell - Pi * r ^ 2 from the soundtrack of Darren Aronofsky's Pi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Cq_QO_4Cx4

Clint Mansell has done all of Aronofsky's music from the been-used-everywhere Lux Aeterna of Requiem for a Dream to Black Swan.

Oh, shameless plug, if you guys are into electronic music, here's a ton of free albums from my friends at Electronica Manila:

* QED Records - Free Electronic Music Netlabel
* Electronica Manila: One
* Electronica Manila: FREE
* Basics: The Electronica Manila The General MIDI Project

Enjoy!

-Naz

Actually, isn't this the definitive sound of Pi? :

Clint Mansell - Pi * r ^ 2 from the soundtrack of Darren Aronofsky's Pi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Cq_QO_4Cx4

Clint Mansell has done all of Aronofsky's music from the been-used-everywhere Lux Aeterna of Requiem for a Dream to Black Swan.

Oh, shameless plug, if you guys are into electronic music, here's a ton of free albums from my friends at Electronica Manila:

* QED Records - Free Electronic Music Netlabel
* Electronica Manila: One
* Electronica Manila: FREE
* Basics: The Electronica Manila The General MIDI Project

Enjoy!

-Naz

Repo Men?

one really shouldn't expect most people to have genuine romantic feelings for a video game character.

And yet when I played Mass Effect 2 I genuinely got aroused by Tali ( Liz Sroka ). Romantic feelings? Possibly but definitely aroused. I don't know if it is Liz Sroka's voice or the fact that the character has a great profile but you cannot see underneath but there were times I had to stop the game just to...um...cool off.

Could it be that those who have trouble sleeping are more likely to engage in interactive entertainment?

The polite term you are looking for is 'evening person' at least if the wiki article on Night Owls is accurate at the time I read it.

And I'm sure the beeping and blinking and flashing and the whirring and humming...sorry.

Ahmen: the small datacenter of computers in the nearby 'home' office next to the bedroom has nothing to do with poor sleeping. It's just like the sounds of the woods, but for IT folk, yes?

No possible mechanism at all. Nope. No falsifiable theory here. Move along now I have 4am backups that are about to kick off.

I want to bone Michelle Yeoh on the wreckage.

Bad example. His clamshell cell phone made the communicator chirp when he opens it, and in a later episode he tells people he used to captain a spaceship:

Denny Crane: [walking through a crowd of reporters] dennycranelaw.com. Pictures, bios, hobbies. I once captained my own spaceship. Muli-talented.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0402711/quotes?qt0401847

I also seem to remember a few quips about his 'other' job, hinting at his work for Priceline. I always got the impression that he was spoofing himself as a running gag throughout the show.

1. Evil twin. Been done. (OK, by someone else, not the person being "twinned").

Did nobody else think of the "Evil Robot Us-es"?

If it's filled with derbies, I think we better get up there fast and close the hat gap we're going to be experiencing soon with the rest of the world.

We've know for a while that people aren't wearing enough hats, but now we know just how big the problem is.

The pictures and video are pretty interesting, but also awfully short. It would be neat to see some combined expressions rather than just simple blinking and mouth movement. Speaking of the movement in the video, was anyone else reminded of Not Quite Human? Haven't thought about that movie in quite a while :)

Also, can anyone say "uncanny valley"? They've definitely made progress, but there's still something... not quite right about it. Considering that the easiest part of creating an android is probably the static external features such as skin, hair, and eyes (lots of practice from movie/TV makeup), it's interesting that a still photo still triggers the cues which tell us "that's not real."

Now only a few things left to do:

1. Create an evil twin bent death, carnage, and annihilation
3. ???
4. Profit! (well, that, or doom the human race)

He did have such a terrible cold.

I was thinking more along the lines of "BUELLER!!!!"

No but if you post like a few secret documents, or are in the wrong place at the wrong time you get flown to a foreign country, stuck into a hole of a cell, get tortured, with virtually no contact to the outside world, you barely get a lawyer if you are US-citizen. And you get charged for treason with the perspective of death penalty, or you don't get a charged with anything if you are not an US-citizen.*
There is definitely something wrong in the US too (namely the right to a fair trial), and saying it's not as bad as Zimbabwe doesn't make it better.

* see Taxi to the Dark Side

too 1980?

you should really watch Hunter Prey http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1270291/
this is how one makes classic in these times. movie is awesome and not lacking one single thing

Suddenly, I have visions of a Big Trouble ending.

I take it you have never seen 2001?

"Second Variety" is still my personal favorite. And it's been adapted both directly (Screamers) and indirectly (Terminator and the Battlestar Galactica remake, which both borrowed pretty liberally).

I'll give you nightmares: imagine if they get George Lucas to do these.

Then we'll all know up-front not to watch it.

And, seriously, except for re-hashing Star Wars, has Lucas actually been directly involved in making anything lately? IMDB shows his producer credits as mostly related to Star Wars/Indiana Jones re-hashes.

Thankfully, as a film-maker, Lucas seems to be more or less done doing anything besides collecting royalties.

You know, I was watching one of the behind-the-scenes extras on the "Get Low" DVD the other day. For those who haven't seen it, "Get Low" is a quiet little movie--low-budget, not a lot of hoopla. But it has a suprisingly powerful screenplay and great performances from Robert Duvall and Bill Murray. Anyway, the producer points out that, even with a very powerful script and great leads attached, it still took over 8 years to get the movie made. He explained that Hollywood has become so fixated on sequels, prequels, franchises, remakes, and comic-book/TV adaptations that getting funding even for a small-budget *original* film, with no potential for a sequel or merchandising, has become a nightmare. Hollywood may celebrate these kinds of movies at Oscar time, but getting a studio to put up even a relatively trivial amount of money for them is almost impossible unless you can attach some hot A-list leads.

And that is why we're treated to a stream of endless rapes of once-great franchises/TV shows/comic books. It's why a 60-year-old Harrison Ford is running around fighting fucking aliens with a bullwhip looking for a goddamn crystal skull, while Steven Spielberg is off-camera bathing in a pile of cash. It's why we get sequels to 25-year-old R-rated franchises with PG-13 ratings and once-great stars just there to collect a paycheck (yep, I'm looking at you Bruce Willis). It's why everyone who has produced even a mediocre comic book superhero has Hollywood fawning over them, while great original scripts go right into the trash bin.

And now it's why we're going to get a shitty PG-13 action-oriented prequel/sequel to one of the great adult science fiction films of all time. It's something no one asked for. It will tarnish the original. And it will suck. But all Hollywood hears is "sequel" and so it's getting the green light.

But you can get out... http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0139809/

If a company was selling dangerous weapons to the Dept of Agriculture, they would get investigated for their practices

But if they sell guns to the Department of Fish and Game, an investigation won't find anything.

Quentin Tarantino makes a point of not doing any product placements in his movies. If one of his characters is shown buying a pack of smokes, or pouring cereal into a bowl, it's always a fictional brand.

Morgan Spurlock made a documentary about product placement, and in it he interviews Tarantino, who explains "that he has been unable to get product placement in his films (he tried to shoot scenes for Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction at Dennys, but they didn’t want any part of the films)".

Rumor has it that Star Trek IV was to originally use an Amiga in the transparent aluminum scene, but Commodore would not loan the studio a computer. Apple, however was happy to. As you all know, the Amiga was a superior, less expensive product, just marketed much more poorly. :-)

.od uoy yltnerappa ,seY

Depends, there are some protections from individuals trading on somebody else's fame, but I'm not really sure that it applies in this case. The name is used as a minor character in historical fiction. I'm not sure how this would be any different than say: Young Einstein

Well, it's about time. That whole "consumer" thing is just so much sick shit. I happen to be a citizen, a taxpayer, a voter, and a PRODUCER

Really? I looked up "runaway1956" on IMDB, but only got this. Have you produced anything I might be familiar with, or was it all indie stuff?

", right? RIM? Bueller?"
What does that mean and why does he repeat it so often?

Ferris Bueller's Day Off: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091042/

HBO - Originally movies, now split between movies and series

Not Necessarily the News? 1st and Ten? The Hitchhiker? Fuckin' Fraggle Rock?!

HBO - Originally movies, now split between movies and series

Not Necessarily the News? 1st and Ten? The Hitchhiker? Fuckin' Fraggle Rock?!

HBO - Originally movies, now split between movies and series

Not Necessarily the News? 1st and Ten? The Hitchhiker? Fuckin' Fraggle Rock?!

HBO - Originally movies, now split between movies and series

Not Necessarily the News? 1st and Ten? The Hitchhiker? Fuckin' Fraggle Rock?!

I'm not saying that that should be part of his legal defense. It's clear that he has no defence - he's completely controlled within the framework of rules defined by his opponents - those who place themselves into a position of unquestioned virtue, despite committing/sanctioning unimaginable acts of horror, nominally on 'our' (I'm in the UK) behalf.

I'm often reminded of Jack Nicholson's character's rant in "A few good men" (below) and wonder whether in fact, the way forward is for those of us who are 'ignorant of harsh reality', those of us who are beneath the blanket, to push those who provide it into offering it to those who are currently left uncovered. Something needs to be done. No longer can a country have a 'hard coating and a soft chewy interior' - internal ethics and morality need to be extended to all levels of society and then out into the world community such that we can all live together in peace (man).

This man, Bradley Manning, apparently took a stand for what he believed was right. Surely it's clear that morality is larger than the rule of law and only partly contains it as a set? Yet, we act as if law is morality. Indeed, take a look at the comments on this thread, "PayPal didn't break any law so everything's ok. waaaa" - again and again. It's quite clear that PayPal must be aware that this man's future in large part depends on his ability to mount a legal defence in his David vs Goliath - style battle yet because 'the rules were not broken', we are to consider that they acted appropriately. Please!

It's one step in a generations-long battle to eradicate hypocrisy and abuse by those in power. Roll-on the next step and the next. Let's get this thing moving!

</incoherent_rant>

-
“Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Whose gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinburg? I have more responsibility here than you could possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That Santiago’s death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And that my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. I know deep down in places you dont talk about at parties, you don’t want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide, then question the manner in which I provide it. I prefer you said thank you, and went on your way, Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon, and stand to post. Either way, I don’t give a damn what you think you are entitled to!” [Jack Nicholson, as Colonel Jessup]

Jack Nicholson (Col. Jessup): “You want answers?”
Tom Cruise (Kaffee): “I think I’m entitled.”
Jack Nicholson (Col. Jessup): “You want answers?”
Tom Cruise (Kaffee): “I want the truth!”
Jack Nicholson (Col. Jessup): “You can’t handle the truth!”

-

PS. wth slashdot? line-height: 40px ? !!

I can't help but wonder if any of the 'ol goats fell over? LOL

I substitute your "Nope" with an overriding "Nope". "I'd buy that for a dollar" was a catchphrase for RoboCop. The similarities between these two films come from the fact that they were both directed by Paul Verhoeven.

I think it is more like the character George Clooney played in The Men Who Stare at Goats.

That movie was so much better than The Men Who Stare at Goatse. I really need to pay better attention when picking a theater.

I think it is more like the character George Clooney played in The Men Who Stare at Goats.