Citizen Kane is largely considered to have lost due to political reasons rather than artistic ones. Hearst drove himself to the point of bankruptcy in trying to crush the film paying theaters not to show it and managed to pay off or otherwise influence enough voters to keep the film from winning.
That said a lot of Oscars are political and judged more on the basis of fickle opinions of people with poor taste than anything. Box office gross also plays a disturbingly large role. When you get down to it the Academy Awards are prestigious in name only having long ago lost any actual indication of a film's merit. In Stanley Kubrick's entire career the only Oscar he ever won was for Special Effects on 2001 despite the quality of his films.
Yes, this is indeed an important case, but how much more solid would this case be if someone had reasonably and politely stated their rights? The refusal to present ID would still stand, but the position of the defendent would be improved and make the police look even more like some sort of Fascist bully (which, regardless of his intent, is sort of the point I think we're going for here).
I think in this particular case we had an officer who likely had the best of intentions, but was not using the best of methods and was violating someone's rights. Then again, the video of this is slashdotted so he could just be an "arrogant [bully]", as there definitely are a fair share of them on the police forces of the world, just as in every other profession.
Of course what you really mean is if you do everything they say when they violate your rights and invade your privacy THEN they treat you politely while abusing your rights. What they are actually doing is treating you like the sheep you are. Note I am not condemning police in general - we are talking about those situations where citizens' rights get violated.
No, not exactly. You simply tell them politely and reasonably that "No. I don't feel that you have a right to demand that and I'm not going to give it to you. I feel it would be a violation of my rights." Like you, the video is slashdotted for me as well, but there's very rarely any need to be anything but polite to an officer of the law. Most often they're simply doing their job or attemping to do it in the way they see best. Becoming abusive and difficult makes things hard on everyone and makes it seem much more like you're going to be a dick to them for no other reason than you hate cops. This is often enough to cause someone to suspect that you may be up to something. If nothing else a great deal of people will then be complete assholes to you in response. In this case, the cop has the authority and you are more likely than not going to end up getting fucked over a lot more than he will.
Wow... thanks. I actually intentionally turned off my +1 when I posted it thinking it was just a silly bit of foolishness and not wanting to abuse my bonus.
Well there are only a limited number of ports to begin with and the administrator may very well have closed off at least one of them. After that you've got simple load-bearing issues as to how many users can be served simultaneously. The system doesn't scale particularly well on its own and you're likely to get a great number of dropped packets from clients even if the host is set to promiscuous.
A mirror or two can help, but not nearly enough to distribute the load. You'll need to get a whole server farm going just to be able to handle a moderate number of requests.
While I realize this is being a tad pedantic and smartass I don't have a credit card and I get along just fine. Hell, I don't want a credit card... ever. The very idea of the system strikes fear into me (owing a corporation money under the guise of convenience). It's splitting hairs, but I do use my debit card almost all the time.
The greater problem is situations where you must give a SS#. Case in point, at my college you must use it as your student ID number if you recieve any form of aid. Likely because they want to make things easier on themselves. In the course of going to college I've been forced to give it out countless times for a variety of inconsequential things. I don't even want to be a part of Social Security....
My school has a convenience store upstairs in the union that sells 20oz. bottles of soda for ~$1.65 or so. Not terribly uncommon in convenience stores. The thing is, they also sell the exact some bottles out of vending machines downstairs. The fountain drink prices are fixed with those in the food court though.
Now don't go giving Jackson the brunt of the blame. From what I've seen Fran Walsh is just an outright idiot that's only working on the damn thing because IIRC, she's his wife. Most of the stupidest comments I hear regarding changes were spoken by her. Then again, on the commentary track for FOTR Jackson said a number of things about how he dislikes wizards and magic... something that's just not at all right. That said though, Gandalf is less a wizard than a sage really. He almost never uses any actual magic as opposed to being sort of generally wise and impressive.
Personally my complaint wasn't just that they did it, but why they did. On the DVD Fran (IIRC) mentions that it wasn't right the way it was written and they couldn't be building up the ring as incredibly desirable and then have Faramir resist easily. Along with other comments about the story being off in places and so on I felt that this showed great disrespect for the book. I'll admit that I'm not even particularly much of a fan of the book, but at least I don't sit around and claim that the story needs to be made "better" and then rewrite it the way I want it to be.
Adapting for a different medium is one thing. Some things need to be cut or compressed slightly. When you change things around regardless though (the original character could reasonably say a line, but you give to someone else) and decide that you don't like the story as written then you've failed to adapt a work and started editing it based on your own whims. If it's not good enough, then don't make the goddamn movie.
Is it just me or is it highly weird to have a black Ford Prefect? I mean, nothing against the guy, I'm sure he'll probably turn out to be an excellent actor, but it just doesn't quite seem right for the part.
Considering that the primary issue is that Microsoft's trademark might be diluted it stands to reason that no one in their right mind would confuse Canadian Teenager with Software Bully. Even in the realm of computer software one is clearly distinct from the other. I doubt a reasonable person would become confused and think that he needed to give a Canadian teen $300 for the latest version of Windows or that he should call him up because he's having trouble with Office.
I have to agree with that intent though. Just leeching off the name is rather sleazy. If intent was unproven, however, I really think that Mike probably had a pretty significant advantage here.
Indeed, I was just about to comment on the fact that the actual content was the smallest part of the page. Especially considering that it spanned at least two pages. That's after giving some small credit to the table of contents. Sadly, I think a diagram to content would be more useful.
There are random missions generated. Taxis, Police vehicles, Fire engines, and Ambulance missions are all continually generated. Now I'll be the first one to admit that they get pretty old and by the time you've managed to do enough to get the secrets from them (especially the ambulance... still haven't gotten that yet) you probably don't want to do any more, but at least give them a bit of credit for it. Any other form of randomly generated mission would likely be just as boring in the same amount of time.
I would have to say that the removal of the scouring failed to respect the tone and themes. Likewise I take offense at gratuitous changes that are not particularly necessary for any reason whatsoever (e.g. Merry present at the battle outside the black gate... no reason at all). Anyhow, I was feeling a bit upset and confrontational about the whole thing, hopefully the extended cut will make it better as I currently see it as the weakest film in the trilogy.
So Timeline was actually worth reading? Wow... I'd totally given up on Crichton.
Best horror for me is only two films: The Exorcist and The Shining. Both are excellent and both remain the only two movies that have ever actually scared me. When a film about demonic possesion can scare an atheist you know you've got a winner.
No no no. On the DVD. The radical alternate ending that was done only with voice-overs and storyboards. They mentioned not going with it due to problems in the proposed cure. Basically it kept the film small with a focus on the core group. It presents a nice return to the original lab and keeps up the tension and focus on zombies (or rather, they're not so much like zombies as it seems more like very, very bad rabies) much better.
As to the other two endings I agree wholeheartedly. They weren't really different in any significant way, which is a shame as none of them were any good.
I have to agree that the handling of Timeline and ROTK were similar. ROTK showed that Peter Jackson doesn't really have that much respect for the story when he can instead have a bunch of ghost warriors running around and rampaging war elephants in place of oh... let's say, the houses of healing.
I don't even like Tolkien. I have serious problems with his style of writing and I'm not terribly into his story (I've read better fantasy even if I do sort of respect him a bit for his role in grandfathering most modern works) but at least I have the decency to accept that what's written is what's written. Yes, cuts must be made, background is often dropped and sub-plots fall by the wayside, but still... the drastic changes made were unwarranted and unnecessary.
Sorry, I hope I didn't ruin almost every movie ever made for you. Tragedy, comedy, what have you, no matter what actually happens in the end the good guys manage to win... somehow. Even though Hamlet is a tragedy and ultimately... well, I don't want to give it away... but in the end wrongs are righted and although everyone doesn't quite live happily ever after, the good guys have won.
If you liked the film version of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen then read the comic and I think you'll suddenly see what's not to like. I do suggest also reading the online annotations along with it as they add significant depth and illumination.
Basically a highly enteraining and literate comic with loads of references to Victorian literature and themes is remade as a typical American summer movie lacking entirely in the charm, wit, or inventiveness of the book accompanied by changes in plot and characterization. It was... tolerable.
I was totally underwhelmed. As a complete zombie-movie fanboy I was lusting after this for a while. Being a bit short on cash I waited until DVD assuming that a DV feature wouldn't look bad at home and might actually end up looking a bit better. Anyhow it just didn't really go anywhere. The first half was ok, but not great and then things meander off to cover some vastly uninteresting characters and become a big fight scene with the zombies almost totally forgotten.
The alternate ending in storyboards on the DVD though? That could have been an amazing film.
Return of the Living Dead from the early 80s had fast-moving, intelligent zombies. It's also largely regarded as the first film in which zombies moan "Braaaiiiinnsss!!"
The high school I went to had Mac classics in the physics and chem classrooms while history, english and other departments had much newer power macs and a few iMacs depending on where you looked. At this same time new (for '99 or so) G3s were being installed in a back room of the library where they would remain unused. Almost all of the PCs in the building were about 4 years out of date or so, but enough to do their job properly.
This wasn't some inner-city school or even poor suburban. This was a school in a wealthy suburb with an excellent school system that people were more than willing to throw buckets of money at. Yet when I took Astronomy my senior year we had to screw around with old Mac classics that would barely run even the very simple program we were trying to use.
Perhaps it's the fault of teachers not requesting newer equipment, stupid administrators, lack of money, a terrible IT office or what have you, but unless computers in schools have changed drastically in the past 5 years or so technology is going to continue kicking their ass.
Slashdot Mirror
Citizen Kane is largely considered to have lost due to political reasons rather than artistic ones. Hearst drove himself to the point of bankruptcy in trying to crush the film paying theaters not to show it and managed to pay off or otherwise influence enough voters to keep the film from winning.
That said a lot of Oscars are political and judged more on the basis of fickle opinions of people with poor taste than anything. Box office gross also plays a disturbingly large role. When you get down to it the Academy Awards are prestigious in name only having long ago lost any actual indication of a film's merit. In Stanley Kubrick's entire career the only Oscar he ever won was for Special Effects on 2001 despite the quality of his films.
Yes, this is indeed an important case, but how much more solid would this case be if someone had reasonably and politely stated their rights? The refusal to present ID would still stand, but the position of the defendent would be improved and make the police look even more like some sort of Fascist bully (which, regardless of his intent, is sort of the point I think we're going for here).
I think in this particular case we had an officer who likely had the best of intentions, but was not using the best of methods and was violating someone's rights. Then again, the video of this is slashdotted so he could just be an "arrogant [bully]", as there definitely are a fair share of them on the police forces of the world, just as in every other profession.
Of course what you really mean is if you do everything they say when they violate your rights and invade your privacy THEN they treat you politely while abusing your rights. What they are actually doing is treating you like the sheep you are. Note I am not condemning police in general - we are talking about those situations where citizens' rights get violated.
No, not exactly. You simply tell them politely and reasonably that "No. I don't feel that you have a right to demand that and I'm not going to give it to you. I feel it would be a violation of my rights." Like you, the video is slashdotted for me as well, but there's very rarely any need to be anything but polite to an officer of the law. Most often they're simply doing their job or attemping to do it in the way they see best. Becoming abusive and difficult makes things hard on everyone and makes it seem much more like you're going to be a dick to them for no other reason than you hate cops. This is often enough to cause someone to suspect that you may be up to something. If nothing else a great deal of people will then be complete assholes to you in response. In this case, the cop has the authority and you are more likely than not going to end up getting fucked over a lot more than he will.Wow... thanks. I actually intentionally turned off my +1 when I posted it thinking it was just a silly bit of foolishness and not wanting to abuse my bonus.
No. I'm making a juvenile expansion on the parent comment along the lines of grep|finger|mount|fsck
Well there are only a limited number of ports to begin with and the administrator may very well have closed off at least one of them. After that you've got simple load-bearing issues as to how many users can be served simultaneously. The system doesn't scale particularly well on its own and you're likely to get a great number of dropped packets from clients even if the host is set to promiscuous.
A mirror or two can help, but not nearly enough to distribute the load. You'll need to get a whole server farm going just to be able to handle a moderate number of requests.
While I realize this is being a tad pedantic and smartass I don't have a credit card and I get along just fine. Hell, I don't want a credit card... ever. The very idea of the system strikes fear into me (owing a corporation money under the guise of convenience). It's splitting hairs, but I do use my debit card almost all the time.
The greater problem is situations where you must give a SS#. Case in point, at my college you must use it as your student ID number if you recieve any form of aid. Likely because they want to make things easier on themselves. In the course of going to college I've been forced to give it out countless times for a variety of inconsequential things. I don't even want to be a part of Social Security....
My school has a convenience store upstairs in the union that sells 20oz. bottles of soda for ~$1.65 or so. Not terribly uncommon in convenience stores. The thing is, they also sell the exact some bottles out of vending machines downstairs. The fountain drink prices are fixed with those in the food court though.
Now don't go giving Jackson the brunt of the blame. From what I've seen Fran Walsh is just an outright idiot that's only working on the damn thing because IIRC, she's his wife. Most of the stupidest comments I hear regarding changes were spoken by her. Then again, on the commentary track for FOTR Jackson said a number of things about how he dislikes wizards and magic... something that's just not at all right. That said though, Gandalf is less a wizard than a sage really. He almost never uses any actual magic as opposed to being sort of generally wise and impressive.
Personally my complaint wasn't just that they did it, but why they did. On the DVD Fran (IIRC) mentions that it wasn't right the way it was written and they couldn't be building up the ring as incredibly desirable and then have Faramir resist easily. Along with other comments about the story being off in places and so on I felt that this showed great disrespect for the book. I'll admit that I'm not even particularly much of a fan of the book, but at least I don't sit around and claim that the story needs to be made "better" and then rewrite it the way I want it to be.
Adapting for a different medium is one thing. Some things need to be cut or compressed slightly. When you change things around regardless though (the original character could reasonably say a line, but you give to someone else) and decide that you don't like the story as written then you've failed to adapt a work and started editing it based on your own whims. If it's not good enough, then don't make the goddamn movie.
Is it just me or is it highly weird to have a black Ford Prefect? I mean, nothing against the guy, I'm sure he'll probably turn out to be an excellent actor, but it just doesn't quite seem right for the part.
Considering that the primary issue is that Microsoft's trademark might be diluted it stands to reason that no one in their right mind would confuse Canadian Teenager with Software Bully. Even in the realm of computer software one is clearly distinct from the other. I doubt a reasonable person would become confused and think that he needed to give a Canadian teen $300 for the latest version of Windows or that he should call him up because he's having trouble with Office.
I have to agree with that intent though. Just leeching off the name is rather sleazy. If intent was unproven, however, I really think that Mike probably had a pretty significant advantage here.
Indeed, I was just about to comment on the fact that the actual content was the smallest part of the page. Especially considering that it spanned at least two pages. That's after giving some small credit to the table of contents. Sadly, I think a diagram to content would be more useful.
There are random missions generated. Taxis, Police vehicles, Fire engines, and Ambulance missions are all continually generated. Now I'll be the first one to admit that they get pretty old and by the time you've managed to do enough to get the secrets from them (especially the ambulance... still haven't gotten that yet) you probably don't want to do any more, but at least give them a bit of credit for it. Any other form of randomly generated mission would likely be just as boring in the same amount of time.
I would have to say that the removal of the scouring failed to respect the tone and themes. Likewise I take offense at gratuitous changes that are not particularly necessary for any reason whatsoever (e.g. Merry present at the battle outside the black gate... no reason at all). Anyhow, I was feeling a bit upset and confrontational about the whole thing, hopefully the extended cut will make it better as I currently see it as the weakest film in the trilogy.
So Timeline was actually worth reading? Wow... I'd totally given up on Crichton.
Best horror for me is only two films: The Exorcist and The Shining. Both are excellent and both remain the only two movies that have ever actually scared me. When a film about demonic possesion can scare an atheist you know you've got a winner.
No no no. On the DVD. The radical alternate ending that was done only with voice-overs and storyboards. They mentioned not going with it due to problems in the proposed cure. Basically it kept the film small with a focus on the core group. It presents a nice return to the original lab and keeps up the tension and focus on zombies (or rather, they're not so much like zombies as it seems more like very, very bad rabies) much better.
As to the other two endings I agree wholeheartedly. They weren't really different in any significant way, which is a shame as none of them were any good.
Sounds wonderful! I'll have to hurt people until I get a chance to see it. Thanks!
Pompous? Inventive? I merely see it as a linguistics scholar having a bit of fun working out his own imaginary languages.
I have to agree that the handling of Timeline and ROTK were similar. ROTK showed that Peter Jackson doesn't really have that much respect for the story when he can instead have a bunch of ghost warriors running around and rampaging war elephants in place of oh... let's say, the houses of healing.
I don't even like Tolkien. I have serious problems with his style of writing and I'm not terribly into his story (I've read better fantasy even if I do sort of respect him a bit for his role in grandfathering most modern works) but at least I have the decency to accept that what's written is what's written. Yes, cuts must be made, background is often dropped and sub-plots fall by the wayside, but still... the drastic changes made were unwarranted and unnecessary.
The good guys win.
Sorry, I hope I didn't ruin almost every movie ever made for you. Tragedy, comedy, what have you, no matter what actually happens in the end the good guys manage to win... somehow. Even though Hamlet is a tragedy and ultimately... well, I don't want to give it away... but in the end wrongs are righted and although everyone doesn't quite live happily ever after, the good guys have won.
If you liked the film version of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen then read the comic and I think you'll suddenly see what's not to like. I do suggest also reading the online annotations along with it as they add significant depth and illumination.
Basically a highly enteraining and literate comic with loads of references to Victorian literature and themes is remade as a typical American summer movie lacking entirely in the charm, wit, or inventiveness of the book accompanied by changes in plot and characterization. It was... tolerable.
I was totally underwhelmed. As a complete zombie-movie fanboy I was lusting after this for a while. Being a bit short on cash I waited until DVD assuming that a DV feature wouldn't look bad at home and might actually end up looking a bit better. Anyhow it just didn't really go anywhere. The first half was ok, but not great and then things meander off to cover some vastly uninteresting characters and become a big fight scene with the zombies almost totally forgotten.
The alternate ending in storyboards on the DVD though? That could have been an amazing film.
Return of the Living Dead from the early 80s had fast-moving, intelligent zombies. It's also largely regarded as the first film in which zombies moan "Braaaiiiinnsss!!"
The high school I went to had Mac classics in the physics and chem classrooms while history, english and other departments had much newer power macs and a few iMacs depending on where you looked. At this same time new (for '99 or so) G3s were being installed in a back room of the library where they would remain unused. Almost all of the PCs in the building were about 4 years out of date or so, but enough to do their job properly.
This wasn't some inner-city school or even poor suburban. This was a school in a wealthy suburb with an excellent school system that people were more than willing to throw buckets of money at. Yet when I took Astronomy my senior year we had to screw around with old Mac classics that would barely run even the very simple program we were trying to use.
Perhaps it's the fault of teachers not requesting newer equipment, stupid administrators, lack of money, a terrible IT office or what have you, but unless computers in schools have changed drastically in the past 5 years or so technology is going to continue kicking their ass.