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Star Wreck Released as Download
Arto Rantala writes "After seven years of production, Star Wreck: In The Pirkinning, the Finnish Star Trek / Babylon 5 parody movie, was finally released on DVD a month ago and is now available for download. In spite of its practically zero budget, the film has a hilariously captivating story, top notch CGI and even a couple of performances from professional actors. Download it now and buy the DVD if you like it! I know I did. You can also obtain it directly from the .torrent"
P2P software allows small artists to cheaply and easily distribute their work worldwide. RIAA/MPAA fears that some day people will realize that there is a lot of high quality entertaiment outside Hollywood.
I think the people making the film have the right to decide the language used in their production. I'm sure they had their reasons to use Finnish instead of English. Seeing comments from people like you who don't seem to appreciate the diversity in this world, I begin to understand the French who carefully try to protect their language.
For the record, we are Finns, not fins. Here http://www.yourdictionary.com/images/ahd/jpg/A4fin .jpg are some fins.
You suggested that Finns are often angry and drunk. Well, where I live (student village in Espoo, Finland) people are often happy when drunk.
As a Finn myself I'm still skeptical about the international appeal. The film has received very good reviews and feedback, but it's all domestic. Speaking with the authoritative voice of a person who hasn't actually seen it yet, the fact is that In The Pirkinning makes extensive use of its Finnishness.
The subtitles of the previous installments don't seem to be there for allowing English-speakers to comprehend what's going on as much as compounding the funniness inherent in Star Trek in Finnish. They certainly don't work half as well on their own. Not only are a lot of nuances lost when converting Finno-Ugric speech into terse Latin-influenced Germanic writing, but someone relying on subtitles won't even notice the overtranslations - replacements for words that usually are just lifted from English - and has to skip a crucial part of the constant wordplay. Calling 'warp' 'twist' isn't funny. Calling 'warp' a Finnish word that can mean 'warp' 'twist' or 'perversion' while simultaneously displaying an English translation calling it 'twist' to an audience that fully well knows that it's 'warp'... that is funny precisely in the way that good jokes mess with your head. If you can't see why, that likely was my point.
As TNG episode "Darmok" tells us, even universal translators wouldn't guarantee full understanding, unless they were superadvanced subspace translators that interfaced directly with their users' brains feeding them required knowledge, but I digress. Even if the language barrier was removed the average outlander would hardly notice that Info's named after a bookstore chain, much less that his motto is from the old advertisements of said chain. He likely wouldn't have the right misconceptions about the Russian Mafia (even, or in fact especially, if he was actually Russian). Even if I was explaining the hilarious multi-faceted pun that is Garibaldi-equivalent's name I wouldn't know how. Juxtapositions are kinda lost on those who aren't familiar with both of the juxtees, too. And these things go on throughout the movie!
Don't get me started on the onslaught of sight gags or how much is conveyed by tone of voice.
Star Wreck is a fan movie. It's basically zero-budget. There is simply no other fan movie coming even close to it. I think it is quite interesting to notice that unlike on most fan films, people always start (intentionally or intentionally) comparing SW to real movies like Hollywood stuff. That never happens on discussions about fan films.
Somebody below this even said 'this shows that Hollywood still rules' and 'at least George Lucas can direct professional actors'. Yeah, and does he do that in his bedroom? :D
Hollywood never produces anything like this, because a term Hollywood movie means at least some $$$ put into it by default. Even the worst of the worst have some budget. The reviews which compare SW to Hollywood stuff are a massive victory to the makers of this movie.
They just show that the flick is so neat for a fan flick that people can't treat it as such anymore :D
-el