I go to an art school. Our studio professors are all working artists, and inevitably in every semester, somebody will ask to see a sample of the professor's work. Oftentimes you'll see a very good, very impressive body of work, typically the product of the sort of values and ideas the person is trying to impress upon his or her students.
In my experience, though, there have been a few teachers who have shown work that is thourougly underwhelming or even out-and-out weak. And from that point on, it's impossible to learn from the person, because you just don't respect what they do.
I imagine this will be the same in this programming class for anybody that's played Daikatana.
There are no fundamental, time-honored principles to game design, because it hasn't been around long enough to establish the same sort of rules you find in, say, graphic design. So in a class like this, you'll be entirely dependent on what the teacher has to say. There really won't be an authoritative accompanying text from which you could choose to learn instead of the professor.
All of Slashdot is going to post here that Daikatana sucks, and all of Slashdot is right. If John Romero knew anything about good game design, he would have taken the seemingly unlimited resources afforded him and been able to produce a good game.
I never played Anachronox, although I read that it was very good. Maybe Tom Hall's got some worthwhile things to say. But is there anybody out there that really respects the work that John Romero's done since he left id? The class is obviously the university's way of getting some press (and, in turn, enrollment and tuition) by taking advantage of a celebrity name, regardless of worth.
Everybody here keeps making the argument of "I play GTA3/Mortal Kombat/Super Mario Bros., and I don't jack cars/decapitate people/eat shrooms" and so on. It's an idealistic sentiment, that common sense would prevail, but ultimately frustrating that so many people would share it, because it simply DOES NOT WORK.
There are two groups of people that get things done in American government today: religious fundamentalists and corporate interests. Obviously, the thought of cutting an entire industry off at the knees-- denying its target audience the product because they don't agree with it on a moral level-- is one that belongs to the parents of the far right. The only way you're going to crush the idea here is-- hold your breath, Slashdot-- choosing the other devil, and supporting whatever legislation the video game industry proposes to cover its ass.
It amazes me that we have an industry that pulls in more money than the film industry, and it still doesn't have the sway of the movie studios. The video game crowd is maintaining the exact same policies toward their product-- voluntary ratings, and the middleman (i.e. movie theaters for the former, Wal-Mart for the latter) has the option of respecting the restrictions of the R- or M-ratings-- but at this point video games are being legislated to hell. Maybe it's got something to do with video games not being a valid form of speech *cough*bullshit*cough*, or maybe it's just closed-minded fear of a new medium from soccer moms everywhere.
But still. Come on, Activision and EA. Take a cue from the film industry and put up a fight. Go hire yourselves some lobbyists. You know money is the only way to get things done around here.
Actually, were Lucas a better writer, Jar Jar would not simply have been unimportant to the story, he wouldn't have been there at all.
That's the great trick with writing original fiction-- you can do ANYTHING YOU WANT. And when you're making a movie based on your original fiction by fully funding it yourself, you have complete control.
So let's say Jar Jar didn't exist. Qui Gon and Obi Wan have no transport to the Naboo city? Fine, write in a new excuse to get them there. And have it make sense. Simple as that. That's what your average writer would have done.
A good writer, of course, would have made the sequence work both on its own and as part of the larger tapestry of the story, while being gripping for the audience at the same time. And since we're talking first act here-- and I'm fairly certain George knows three-act structure, I'll give him that-- this is all a part of introducing our characters and laying the foundation for everything that will occur in the second and third acts (essentially giving the audience all the tools they need to get through the rest of the movie).
Star Wars belongs exclusively to Lucas. He doesn't HAVE to include Jar Jar, because he should be able to write his way around that shit. He only has to include Jar Jar if he wants to sell kiddie merchandise crap and piss off twenty years' worth of loyal fan base.
Lucas is the very definition of a wonder boy. He had a stunning success early on that he was never able to top in his later years. (The minor caveat to giving him that label is that he was not entirely from out of left field. American Graffiti was a decent film, especially for such an inexperienced director. But even with that considered, "Star Wars" was a shock to everybody.)
Fortunately for us, he hasn't seemed too interested in commiserating on his one success-- he's done since pretty much what it seems like he's wanted to do, from Indiana Jones to ILM to, uh, Willow. Unfortunately for us, he's insisted on continually tinkering with both our memories of that one success and the product itself for his own amusement and profit (by churning out lackluster sequels, except Empire, and by revising his work years later in "Special Editions" with his in-decline instincts as a filmmaker).
It's testament to the strength of the original movie that a generation was so impressed by it as to put up with the shitty prequels today. But by accepting these shitty prequels and giving Lucas our money,* we're condoning them, and so he's just going to continue on his current path. I don't know any kid that speaks of Episode I with awe in his voice. The recent movies are just not good enough to hold that sway, and the goodwill earned by the first two is all that's keeping the current series afloat. The returns are diminishing.
So what's next for Lucas? Episodes II and III, followed by Indiana Jones 4, of course. Yes, he did great work in his younger days, but these days it's pretty much all shoddy work built on the good craftsmanship of years past. It's too bad. If Star Wars hadn't been the monster success it was, maybe he would have still been challenged as a filmmaker in some way or another. But that's what happens when nobody around you says "no."
All IMO, of course. Please debate.
*I should disclose that I'm not even immune to the problems here, as I was actually watching my Episode I DVD when this story was posted. Sigh.
It's a funny coincidence that this ended up as a story, as I was peering around the Mozilla website tonight trying to figure out an answer to one question:
When now can we expect an official 1.0 release?
I'm not a programmer in any way, so I don't know much of anything about development schedules or whatnot. And all the FAQs seemed to tiptoe around a definitive answer.
Awfully convenient that this became a story; I didn't want to ask in any of the other stories' comment sections, 'cause I didn't want to be offtopic.
...Does anybody know how this would affect the planned upcoming DVD sets?
Fox did pretty well for themselves by the Season 1 DVDs of "The Simpsons," and I remember rumblings that "Futurama" would follow not too far behind.
It'd be a shame if these disappear, too; the commentaries on the Simpsons discs were as amusing as the shows themselves, and the Futurama crew has always struck me as being a bit sharper in their wit.
At least Fox is still putting out quality programming like "That 80s Show" and "Temptation Island 2," right? I mean, right? Who's with me?
It'll hurt consumers? Man. The complaint is so bogus as to be laughable and embarassing. So what if I miss out on another FANTABULOUS offer for the AMAZING X-10 CAMERA!?!
The breathtaking thing is that the selling of a person's PERSONAL information was, according to standard, opt-out prior to this. As if anybody would choose to receive more ads in their day-to-day life, when asked face-to-face.
I can't wait until this lawsuit is taken out back and beaten to a pulp. If we're lucky the issue will get some media coverage, and public opinion will be strong enough to squish out unwanted, intrusive advertising in more states than one.
Kudos to whoever's writing the laws in Vermont. They're choosing for once to benefit the public interest, rather than the typical bend-over for businesses.
I wonder if AMD will start some sort of "size isn't everything" initiative.
Maybe they could offer some sort of conversion system, so that consumers can easily convert between centimeters and inches, and understand that AMD's new 1.5"+ chips perform about the same as Intel's 20mm McKinleys...
I agree with a lot of what you say, but I think you may be asking a bit much.
All the truly valuable science fiction-- which I've heard referred to as the most interesting genre being used today, although I'm not sure I'd go that far-- deals with man's relationship with society and technology (which grew, on a side note, out of the western, which dealt with taming the frontier, or the big scary world; the next natural step was to ask where we go from there).
But you're right, there's nothing out there (with which I'm familiar) right now that's utterly breathtaking. A few reasons for this, in my mind:
1. Sci-fi has been disregarded in pop culture, despite the "rise of the geek," as fetishistic and childish. Because it's not respected, respectable people don't stick up for it.
2. The sci-fi we get is utterly commercial-- Star Trek, movies passing themselves off as sci-fi, etc.-- and so the money behind it doesn't want to tackle weightier issues.
But some things to ponder:
1. Stephenson's doing a pretty fine job. He's examining important ideas in a still-relevant medium, the novel, and he does so in a way that gets him at least a modicum of notice out in the real world. He'll be remembered down the line as one of the people that really gets it.
2. Sci-fi was pretty silly to start with, you know. The B-movies of the fifties-- giant bugs and such-- had the subtext of fears of communism and the dangers of atomic power, but they were still movies with GIANT BUGS AND SUCH. There are gems that we do get these days-- Stephenson, Spielberg's "A.I." (and sorry, folks, like it or not, it wasn't a BAD movie by any means, no matter how misdirected the ending)-- that are just as good, if not better, than anything from the bygone eras.
3. You can't expect a new "2001" every few years because there is nobody out there now operating at the level of Kubrick in 1968. He was, at his peak, probably the finest filmmaker in the world, and "2001" was his opportunity to indulge in his grandest delusions. If he wasn't such a genius, it would have been an atrocious movie. As it stands, it's the byproduct of one of the medium's greatest creators, and something like that's not going to come along every day.
There's talent out there capable of doing wonderful things. You've just got to sift through the rest.
Does this matter all that much? The tech-curious members of the public-- namely, us-- would probably keep an eye on any proceedings as if it were OJ 2, so we're missing out on something. But the court of public opinion has already rendered judgment, and Microsoft has undoubtedly lost as much respect from the whole antitrust ordeal as it ever could.
They'll make any attempts to twist the law that they can-- wouldn't you?-- but the damage in the public's mind is probably already done. Unless any judgments are absolutely absurd in either direction, I don't really think anybody can cry foul here.
The answer to the question is pretty obvious: AMD doesn't feel the need to use their marketing ploy with their budget chips because they're clocked at about the same point as Intel's Celerons. AMD only wants to use the system in areas where they're behind, of course.
I dig AMD. But I'm not a fan of their megahertz-doesn't-equal-performance marketing, because it just seems designed to mislead consumers. And we know most consumers are misled in the first place, but this doesn't strike me as an instance of two wrongs making a right.
I think it's saying something more about the current state of things than the future that the first thing that people have to say about this is "What about the spam?"
But as for the idea itself: I can't see this being a universal thing. A million people leaving a million messages about, say, the new ride at Six Flags? Who wants to read all that?
I really couldn't care less about what John Q. Public has to say about the state of the restrooms in the Burger King I'm stopping at off the freeway. There's a reason I stopped peering into AOL chat rooms: Most people have nothing important to say, but still they say it anyways.
Of course, if there were a moderation system implemented-- rating the comments-- like on Slashdot, it could be interesting. But a system like that would take even longer to set up, and I can't see anybody interested in doing it. It would take the resources of a major investor to get this off the ground, and I may be short-sighted, but I'm not sure where the profit could be had.
The one thing for which I ever shopped online was DVDs, and the market has simply DRIED UP.
I used to be particularly fond of reel.com and dvdexpress.com. The former offered some really spectacular deals-- mostly "loss leaders" on major titles (I remember getting "The Matrix" for $12.49) so they could attract the unsure, never-shopped-online buyer, particularly on pre-orders. (It was the equivalent of CompUSA offering a $500 computer on the front page of their flyer, so that the casual customer might be tempted to wander in.) The latter site had generally better prices on the everyday titles. Comparison shop and you'd find great deals, typically better than with retail stores (even with shipping factored in).
The situation these days is terrible. Reel went bust and became a front for buy.com. Buy offered less impressive prices, but it was still sometimes better than shopping in the "real" world. That fell through, or something, and now Reel is a front for 800.com. It's not even worth the time to look.
DVDexpress is even worse. Like most of the rest of express.com, they just sort of stopped shipping product for a good long while as they figured out their financial situations, then reopened their store some time later-- with the kind of prices you'd expect to pay at Suncoast.
These days, if I'm looking to buy a new DVD, I'll most likely drive to Best Buy. They're not always the cheapest sticker price, but shipping isn't a factor, and except in particularly rare cases, this means the final cost is less. I've found that the websites attached to retail stores-- bestbuy.com, circuitcity.com, and so on-- always sync their prices with their real-world counterparts, so they're only useful if you're wondering how much you're going to pay when you get to the store.
The only beacon of hope? I'm in love with deepdiscountdvd.com. They have some screwy prices at first glance, sometimes even a buck, buck and a half more than the other sites, but this is because they also offer "free shipping:" you're going to pay exactly what you see. The site is particularly nice when it comes to, surprise surprise, pre-orders. My hope is that they don't sell out to one of the larger online retailers, because then shopping online would become exactly what we're all afraid of for the net: it'd be nothing more than a counterpart to a small assortment of large real-world corporations.
I really miss the old days, when those of us willing to brave online shopping were treated to unreal deals just because the sites needed to get attention. This is what ate the sites alive, I'm sure, but damn if I don't love the idea of getting cheaper movies because of some sucker venture capitalist.
And don't even get me started on shopping for books online.
The article is pushing the limits of journalistic credibility to points I'd not ever expected to encounter on a website I respect.
I'm growing increasingly weary of Jon Katz. It used to be that I just had difficulty following his trains of thought, and I attributed it to a lack of focus on my part. But when I actually sit down and try to concentrate on what he's written, I realize that it's both lazy and contradictory.
This article is like so many of his others: it makes broad, sweeping statements phrased in such a way as to imply that there is no room for argument; that the ideas Katz presents are not to be questioned, that they are merely given. It feels like the article is merely an outline of what could be a decent paper. But it would have to be filled in with real research and facts, rather than, you know, kind of a feeling, sorta.
It bugs me that he states that the iMac has not reached the mainstream, without acknowledging that Time Magazine is about as mainstream as it gets. He even points out that Grandma likes playing with the iMac-- how can a computer reach a broader audience than that segment of the population who have the least experience with and the most apprehension about computers?*
(*Look. I just made a statement based on nothing more than an idea that maybe sounds about right-ish, because it fits the point I want to make. It's JUST THAT EASY.)
It sounds like Katz is coming up with his conclusion, then trying to bend the facts to support it, rather than more appropriate opposite.
I never actually shelled out the cash to play the game, so I may be off-base, but I did read all the articles in the gaming magazines hailing it as the second coming. So here goes.
I never expected Majestic to "work" just because I wouldn't have thought anybody would really be able to suspend disbelief enough to enjoy the hassle.
If I had somebody calling me in a panic, I would be less concerned about whether or not, you know, they were going to die or something, than I would be about how many of my cellphone minutes it was using up.
It's like playing the "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" PC game. It's not real, you're not winning any money, and so you're subjecting yourself to Regis for nothing.
I always got the impression that EA got the idea for Majestic from "The Game," the Fincher movie with Micheal Douglas from '97 or so. The difference, though, was that Douglas had no idea what was a part of the game or not, and there was the distinct feeling that he could lose anything at any time, including his life and his fortune.
I didn't have frightened phone calls in the middle of the night before, so I think it'd be pretty obvious where they were coming from as soon as I signed up for the game. There would be too many logistic, liability, and cost issues for EA to do anything physical whatsoever with Majestic, and the only fortune I could legally lose is the $240 a year it would cost to play in what is essentially an underwhelming RPG.
It's nice to see that not all games out there these days are fragfests, but Majestic was pretty much a misguided novelty from the start. A footnote or interesting sidebar in the history books at best.
"Xbox2" sounds cooler than "HomeStation," you know
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Xbox Sequel Rumors
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· Score: 2, Funny
Well, the article's been Slashdotted, but this isn't particularly new news, so there's probably not any need.
There was an article in Wired awhile back about the contractor Microsoft was using to actually build the Xbox units. It had almost nothing to do with the console itself and more about the phenomenon of third-party electronics manufacturers, but if memory serves everything I'm about to spew forth is from there. (I think the Register has gone over it a bit, too.)
Of course Microsoft wants to take over your living room. How much money out there is spent on, say, DVD players, stereo components, video game consoles, and all the rest combined every day? It's a gold mine.
And I'm sure MS was thinking of this when they came up with the cute little name, too: Xbox? As in the variable X? Not just a cool-sounding letter?
COME ON, PEOPLE! It's a CONSPIRACY!
Moving on. It's kind of a shame for the game players, though. I admire Nintendo's philosophy when it comes to designing new systems: it's designed for games, not for running your home entertainment system. The more broad you get in your objectives, the less you're going to be able to specialize. You've gotta give and take when you're designing, and when you need to get both DVD functionality and game playing in one box, you're not going to be able to really push the hell out of the design of one aspect-- passable functionality is probably good enough. Note the apparently inferior quality of the PS2's DVD playback. This is the reason the GameCube doesn't house a DVD player (as well as the added benefit of the difficulty in duplicating a proprietary disc, but see the talk on Panasonic's "Q" from earlier today for that): Nintendo knows its place.
If Microsoft manages to get everything I want in a system for a reasonable price, I'll probably buy it-- I won't discriminate just because it's MS. I doubt they'll ever be able to capture all of the quality in one box that you'd find in seperate components, and so my five hundred FutureBucks are probably secure for now.
I'm more curious about the little yellow squares that seem to be appearing at the upper left of the story headlines.
It's new, and from a purely aesthetic standpoint, it's hideous and distracting. It sticks out like... well, not a green thumb, because a green thumb would fit in. A yellow thumb then.
Why are they there, anybody? I don't think I'm trolling, I'm just curious. The problem is that if they serve a function, then I'll probably have to live with seeing them to use them; if they don't, and they're purely for looks, then they're probably not something one can turn off.
Man. This just goes to show you how picky a person can be over something they get for free.
It's a bit absurd to be replying to this, as there's no accounting for personal taste, but something about it got under my skin.
A favorite is just that-- a personal taste. I'm fully aware of everyone from the Lumiere brothers onward, I just happen to enjoy watching films made during my lifetime more. They're what I've been watching since I was a kid. I'm not unwilling to see anything else, but if I'm spending a night on my couch, I tend to look to that with which I'm most comfortable.
If you're looking for more additions to your list of directors, by the way, I'm fond of Renoir, particularly his "Rules of the Game"-- you may not have heard of it, as they probably didn't mentioned "Grand Illusion" first in whatever matchbook filmschool from which you're listing off all your favorite directors-- but it's not something I can sit down and watch particularly often. "Say Anything" or "Bottle Rocket," on the other hand, are films more aligned with the sensibilities of my time, and as such I can get more out of them.
There's more reason to watch a movie than to learn the intricacies of shot composition in Italian neo-realism. How about enjoyment?
As a poster on Slashdot, you are both immensely disappointing and confoundingly dense. I don't know how you could take any statement that claims that its maker knows everything, particularly considering the well-informed and well-reasoned context, as anything other than a touch of humor.
Alright, you've got me on the defensive here. Allow me to explain.
It was probably an error in my writing to follow a statement about my fondness for "smart dumb comedy" with the admission that I laughed a few times at "Scary Movie." This probably suggested that I considered "Scary Movie" a good example of a smart movie-- if so, well, allow me to correct myself here and now.
I remember Marlon Wayans fondly from "Scary Movie," mostly because I have a friend or two that has made pot-related humor amusing to me in some small way, and I tend to laugh at small touches more than the outright jokes. If his comedy isn't your thing, and you don't buy that Marlon Wayans could ever do quality work, check out "Requiem for a Dream."
But I will stick to my fondness for smart dumb movies. In trying to think of examples off the top of my head, I'm coming up with "Wayne's World," although that's probably just a hold-over from my youth and I haven't watched it in awhile, and "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure," which features exceedingly dumb characters in a subtly clever script set within a conventionally moronic genre, the surfer-dude-buddy-flick.
My favorite comedy is "Rushmore." My favorite directors, in no particular order, are David Fincher, Wes Anderson, Cameron Crowe, and a few other relatively low-key types. As I said, my tastes aren't necessarily sophisticated, but I'd like to think they run towards quality.
So believe me. As I said way at the beginning of my first post, I'm a film student, so I know everything.
Alright people, understand the following disclaimers:
1. I am a student and my major is film, and as such I think I know everything.
2. I actually like some teen movies for what they are-- "Election," most notably, but I didn't think "The Faculty" was that bad, either.
3. I have no problem with Jon Katz, prior to this review.
Here we go then.
I saw this movie last night, as the concept amused me and a friend offered to pay. I regret it immensely.
My tastes are not what I'd call extraordinarily sophisticated; I can be amused by dumb comedy, so long as it's *smart* dumb comedy, if you catch my drift. "Scary Movie" got a few laughs out of me.
"Not Another Teen Movie" did not.
Every bit of humor is obvious and cliched. There is no wit whatsoever to this-- it seems that the makers of the movie are responsible for this heap not because they would want to pander to and work at the level of 12-year-olds, but because that's the best they can do.
It's not enough to say that an adolescent boy could have written this thing. It's more like an adolescent boy could have written it the night before it was due.
Katz gets one thing right: plot is almost non-existant. Unfortunately, without plot, we would need some other cohesive element to this the movie together-- characters, say. But there's so many characters crammed in here, haphazardly and without rhyme or reason, that the whole thing becomes difficult to follow. I've seen just about everything the movies spoofs, so I recognized the "archetypes" of the characters, but each was so bland and unfunny (although I'll admit the token black guy was vaguely amusing at one point) as to completely blend into the next.
I was worried going in that I would have seen all the jokes already in the previews. This was a mistake. I should have wanted to see more of the jokes in the previews, so that I would have known enough to save myself the 82 minutes it took to suffer through this abomination.
Save yourself from it, boys and girls. Go see "Vanilla Sky" instead. It may mess with your head, but at least you'll be thinking about something other than the eight bucks you just lost on your way out of the theater.
As we all know, the P4 is designed to take advantage of high memory bandwidth-- which is why the 845 chipset (or whatever) that used SDRAM was such a flop.
When the P4 was first introduced, Intel claimed that it was designed specifically for RDRAM. If this is true-- and I suppose it doesn't have to be-- then is it possible that the new DDR stuff will actually perform below RDRAM systems? Is the only advantage going to be price?
I'm not really a tech guy, so this is an honest question. I'm not a Rambus fan-- I've got a PIII with the 820 chipset, and I'm not particularly fond of it-- but could it be that the company that everybody hates is actually the better way to go in this case?
Of course, everybody around here is going to be be gushing over DDR over Rambus-- if they choose Intel over AMD, which doesn't seem likely-- but it seems that Intel is either stepping backwards or conflicting with their past words.
Slashdot Mirror
I go to an art school. Our studio professors are all working artists, and inevitably in every semester, somebody will ask to see a sample of the professor's work. Oftentimes you'll see a very good, very impressive body of work, typically the product of the sort of values and ideas the person is trying to impress upon his or her students.
In my experience, though, there have been a few teachers who have shown work that is thourougly underwhelming or even out-and-out weak. And from that point on, it's impossible to learn from the person, because you just don't respect what they do.
I imagine this will be the same in this programming class for anybody that's played Daikatana.
There are no fundamental, time-honored principles to game design, because it hasn't been around long enough to establish the same sort of rules you find in, say, graphic design. So in a class like this, you'll be entirely dependent on what the teacher has to say. There really won't be an authoritative accompanying text from which you could choose to learn instead of the professor.
All of Slashdot is going to post here that Daikatana sucks, and all of Slashdot is right. If John Romero knew anything about good game design, he would have taken the seemingly unlimited resources afforded him and been able to produce a good game.
I never played Anachronox, although I read that it was very good. Maybe Tom Hall's got some worthwhile things to say. But is there anybody out there that really respects the work that John Romero's done since he left id? The class is obviously the university's way of getting some press (and, in turn, enrollment and tuition) by taking advantage of a celebrity name, regardless of worth.
Everybody here keeps making the argument of "I play GTA3/Mortal Kombat/Super Mario Bros., and I don't jack cars/decapitate people/eat shrooms" and so on. It's an idealistic sentiment, that common sense would prevail, but ultimately frustrating that so many people would share it, because it simply DOES NOT WORK.
There are two groups of people that get things done in American government today: religious fundamentalists and corporate interests. Obviously, the thought of cutting an entire industry off at the knees-- denying its target audience the product because they don't agree with it on a moral level-- is one that belongs to the parents of the far right. The only way you're going to crush the idea here is-- hold your breath, Slashdot-- choosing the other devil, and supporting whatever legislation the video game industry proposes to cover its ass.
It amazes me that we have an industry that pulls in more money than the film industry, and it still doesn't have the sway of the movie studios. The video game crowd is maintaining the exact same policies toward their product-- voluntary ratings, and the middleman (i.e. movie theaters for the former, Wal-Mart for the latter) has the option of respecting the restrictions of the R- or M-ratings-- but at this point video games are being legislated to hell. Maybe it's got something to do with video games not being a valid form of speech *cough*bullshit*cough*, or maybe it's just closed-minded fear of a new medium from soccer moms everywhere.
But still. Come on, Activision and EA. Take a cue from the film industry and put up a fight. Go hire yourselves some lobbyists. You know money is the only way to get things done around here.
Actually, were Lucas a better writer, Jar Jar would not simply have been unimportant to the story, he wouldn't have been there at all.
That's the great trick with writing original fiction-- you can do ANYTHING YOU WANT. And when you're making a movie based on your original fiction by fully funding it yourself, you have complete control.
So let's say Jar Jar didn't exist. Qui Gon and Obi Wan have no transport to the Naboo city? Fine, write in a new excuse to get them there. And have it make sense. Simple as that. That's what your average writer would have done.
A good writer, of course, would have made the sequence work both on its own and as part of the larger tapestry of the story, while being gripping for the audience at the same time. And since we're talking first act here-- and I'm fairly certain George knows three-act structure, I'll give him that-- this is all a part of introducing our characters and laying the foundation for everything that will occur in the second and third acts (essentially giving the audience all the tools they need to get through the rest of the movie).
Star Wars belongs exclusively to Lucas. He doesn't HAVE to include Jar Jar, because he should be able to write his way around that shit. He only has to include Jar Jar if he wants to sell kiddie merchandise crap and piss off twenty years' worth of loyal fan base.
You're right on.
Lucas is the very definition of a wonder boy. He had a stunning success early on that he was never able to top in his later years. (The minor caveat to giving him that label is that he was not entirely from out of left field. American Graffiti was a decent film, especially for such an inexperienced director. But even with that considered, "Star Wars" was a shock to everybody.)
Fortunately for us, he hasn't seemed too interested in commiserating on his one success-- he's done since pretty much what it seems like he's wanted to do, from Indiana Jones to ILM to, uh, Willow. Unfortunately for us, he's insisted on continually tinkering with both our memories of that one success and the product itself for his own amusement and profit (by churning out lackluster sequels, except Empire, and by revising his work years later in "Special Editions" with his in-decline instincts as a filmmaker).
It's testament to the strength of the original movie that a generation was so impressed by it as to put up with the shitty prequels today. But by accepting these shitty prequels and giving Lucas our money,* we're condoning them, and so he's just going to continue on his current path. I don't know any kid that speaks of Episode I with awe in his voice. The recent movies are just not good enough to hold that sway, and the goodwill earned by the first two is all that's keeping the current series afloat. The returns are diminishing.
So what's next for Lucas? Episodes II and III, followed by Indiana Jones 4, of course. Yes, he did great work in his younger days, but these days it's pretty much all shoddy work built on the good craftsmanship of years past. It's too bad. If Star Wars hadn't been the monster success it was, maybe he would have still been challenged as a filmmaker in some way or another. But that's what happens when nobody around you says "no."
All IMO, of course. Please debate.
*I should disclose that I'm not even immune to the problems here, as I was actually watching my Episode I DVD when this story was posted. Sigh.
Don't be mad at Larry. Be mad at the idiot that forgot to keep the receipt.
It's a funny coincidence that this ended up as a story, as I was peering around the Mozilla website tonight trying to figure out an answer to one question:
When now can we expect an official 1.0 release?
I'm not a programmer in any way, so I don't know much of anything about development schedules or whatnot. And all the FAQs seemed to tiptoe around a definitive answer.
Awfully convenient that this became a story; I didn't want to ask in any of the other stories' comment sections, 'cause I didn't want to be offtopic.
All those people sending us their credit card numbers weren't venture capitalists?
Oops.
...Does anybody know how this would affect the planned upcoming DVD sets?
Fox did pretty well for themselves by the Season 1 DVDs of "The Simpsons," and I remember rumblings that "Futurama" would follow not too far behind.
It'd be a shame if these disappear, too; the commentaries on the Simpsons discs were as amusing as the shows themselves, and the Futurama crew has always struck me as being a bit sharper in their wit.
At least Fox is still putting out quality programming like "That 80s Show" and "Temptation Island 2," right? I mean, right? Who's with me?
It'll hurt consumers? Man. The complaint is so bogus as to be laughable and embarassing. So what if I miss out on another FANTABULOUS offer for the AMAZING X-10 CAMERA!?!
The breathtaking thing is that the selling of a person's PERSONAL information was, according to standard, opt-out prior to this. As if anybody would choose to receive more ads in their day-to-day life, when asked face-to-face.
I can't wait until this lawsuit is taken out back and beaten to a pulp. If we're lucky the issue will get some media coverage, and public opinion will be strong enough to squish out unwanted, intrusive advertising in more states than one.
Kudos to whoever's writing the laws in Vermont. They're choosing for once to benefit the public interest, rather than the typical bend-over for businesses.
I wonder if AMD will start some sort of "size isn't everything" initiative.
Maybe they could offer some sort of conversion system, so that consumers can easily convert between centimeters and inches, and understand that AMD's new 1.5"+ chips perform about the same as Intel's 20mm McKinleys...
Of course it's compatible with your Betamax tapes. In five years, they'll be interchangable when it comes to propping up table legs and such.
I agree with a lot of what you say, but I think you may be asking a bit much.
All the truly valuable science fiction-- which I've heard referred to as the most interesting genre being used today, although I'm not sure I'd go that far-- deals with man's relationship with society and technology (which grew, on a side note, out of the western, which dealt with taming the frontier, or the big scary world; the next natural step was to ask where we go from there).
But you're right, there's nothing out there (with which I'm familiar) right now that's utterly breathtaking. A few reasons for this, in my mind:
1. Sci-fi has been disregarded in pop culture, despite the "rise of the geek," as fetishistic and childish. Because it's not respected, respectable people don't stick up for it.
2. The sci-fi we get is utterly commercial-- Star Trek, movies passing themselves off as sci-fi, etc.-- and so the money behind it doesn't want to tackle weightier issues.
But some things to ponder:
1. Stephenson's doing a pretty fine job. He's examining important ideas in a still-relevant medium, the novel, and he does so in a way that gets him at least a modicum of notice out in the real world. He'll be remembered down the line as one of the people that really gets it.
2. Sci-fi was pretty silly to start with, you know. The B-movies of the fifties-- giant bugs and such-- had the subtext of fears of communism and the dangers of atomic power, but they were still movies with GIANT BUGS AND SUCH. There are gems that we do get these days-- Stephenson, Spielberg's "A.I." (and sorry, folks, like it or not, it wasn't a BAD movie by any means, no matter how misdirected the ending)-- that are just as good, if not better, than anything from the bygone eras.
3. You can't expect a new "2001" every few years because there is nobody out there now operating at the level of Kubrick in 1968. He was, at his peak, probably the finest filmmaker in the world, and "2001" was his opportunity to indulge in his grandest delusions. If he wasn't such a genius, it would have been an atrocious movie. As it stands, it's the byproduct of one of the medium's greatest creators, and something like that's not going to come along every day.
There's talent out there capable of doing wonderful things. You've just got to sift through the rest.
Does this matter all that much? The tech-curious members of the public-- namely, us-- would probably keep an eye on any proceedings as if it were OJ 2, so we're missing out on something. But the court of public opinion has already rendered judgment, and Microsoft has undoubtedly lost as much respect from the whole antitrust ordeal as it ever could.
They'll make any attempts to twist the law that they can-- wouldn't you?-- but the damage in the public's mind is probably already done. Unless any judgments are absolutely absurd in either direction, I don't really think anybody can cry foul here.
...is a GPS transmitter that can locate the nearest four drunken cuties in the bar.
Why do I want to be stumbling around in a bar full of drunk MEN?
The answer to the question is pretty obvious: AMD doesn't feel the need to use their marketing ploy with their budget chips because they're clocked at about the same point as Intel's Celerons. AMD only wants to use the system in areas where they're behind, of course.
I dig AMD. But I'm not a fan of their megahertz-doesn't-equal-performance marketing, because it just seems designed to mislead consumers. And we know most consumers are misled in the first place, but this doesn't strike me as an instance of two wrongs making a right.
I think it's saying something more about the current state of things than the future that the first thing that people have to say about this is "What about the spam?"
But as for the idea itself: I can't see this being a universal thing. A million people leaving a million messages about, say, the new ride at Six Flags? Who wants to read all that?
I really couldn't care less about what John Q. Public has to say about the state of the restrooms in the Burger King I'm stopping at off the freeway. There's a reason I stopped peering into AOL chat rooms: Most people have nothing important to say, but still they say it anyways.
Of course, if there were a moderation system implemented-- rating the comments-- like on Slashdot, it could be interesting. But a system like that would take even longer to set up, and I can't see anybody interested in doing it. It would take the resources of a major investor to get this off the ground, and I may be short-sighted, but I'm not sure where the profit could be had.
File this one under "nifty in theory."
The one thing for which I ever shopped online was DVDs, and the market has simply DRIED UP.
I used to be particularly fond of reel.com and dvdexpress.com. The former offered some really spectacular deals-- mostly "loss leaders" on major titles (I remember getting "The Matrix" for $12.49) so they could attract the unsure, never-shopped-online buyer, particularly on pre-orders. (It was the equivalent of CompUSA offering a $500 computer on the front page of their flyer, so that the casual customer might be tempted to wander in.) The latter site had generally better prices on the everyday titles. Comparison shop and you'd find great deals, typically better than with retail stores (even with shipping factored in).
The situation these days is terrible. Reel went bust and became a front for buy.com. Buy offered less impressive prices, but it was still sometimes better than shopping in the "real" world. That fell through, or something, and now Reel is a front for 800.com. It's not even worth the time to look.
DVDexpress is even worse. Like most of the rest of express.com, they just sort of stopped shipping product for a good long while as they figured out their financial situations, then reopened their store some time later-- with the kind of prices you'd expect to pay at Suncoast.
These days, if I'm looking to buy a new DVD, I'll most likely drive to Best Buy. They're not always the cheapest sticker price, but shipping isn't a factor, and except in particularly rare cases, this means the final cost is less. I've found that the websites attached to retail stores-- bestbuy.com, circuitcity.com, and so on-- always sync their prices with their real-world counterparts, so they're only useful if you're wondering how much you're going to pay when you get to the store.
The only beacon of hope? I'm in love with deepdiscountdvd.com. They have some screwy prices at first glance, sometimes even a buck, buck and a half more than the other sites, but this is because they also offer "free shipping:" you're going to pay exactly what you see. The site is particularly nice when it comes to, surprise surprise, pre-orders. My hope is that they don't sell out to one of the larger online retailers, because then shopping online would become exactly what we're all afraid of for the net: it'd be nothing more than a counterpart to a small assortment of large real-world corporations.
I really miss the old days, when those of us willing to brave online shopping were treated to unreal deals just because the sites needed to get attention. This is what ate the sites alive, I'm sure, but damn if I don't love the idea of getting cheaper movies because of some sucker venture capitalist.
And don't even get me started on shopping for books online.
The article is pushing the limits of journalistic credibility to points I'd not ever expected to encounter on a website I respect.
I'm growing increasingly weary of Jon Katz. It used to be that I just had difficulty following his trains of thought, and I attributed it to a lack of focus on my part. But when I actually sit down and try to concentrate on what he's written, I realize that it's both lazy and contradictory.
This article is like so many of his others: it makes broad, sweeping statements phrased in such a way as to imply that there is no room for argument; that the ideas Katz presents are not to be questioned, that they are merely given. It feels like the article is merely an outline of what could be a decent paper. But it would have to be filled in with real research and facts, rather than, you know, kind of a feeling, sorta.
It bugs me that he states that the iMac has not reached the mainstream, without acknowledging that Time Magazine is about as mainstream as it gets. He even points out that Grandma likes playing with the iMac-- how can a computer reach a broader audience than that segment of the population who have the least experience with and the most apprehension about computers?*
(*Look. I just made a statement based on nothing more than an idea that maybe sounds about right-ish, because it fits the point I want to make. It's JUST THAT EASY.)
It sounds like Katz is coming up with his conclusion, then trying to bend the facts to support it, rather than more appropriate opposite.
I'm not trolling, damnit. I'm just grouchy.
I never actually shelled out the cash to play the game, so I may be off-base, but I did read all the articles in the gaming magazines hailing it as the second coming. So here goes.
I never expected Majestic to "work" just because I wouldn't have thought anybody would really be able to suspend disbelief enough to enjoy the hassle.
If I had somebody calling me in a panic, I would be less concerned about whether or not, you know, they were going to die or something, than I would be about how many of my cellphone minutes it was using up.
It's like playing the "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" PC game. It's not real, you're not winning any money, and so you're subjecting yourself to Regis for nothing.
I always got the impression that EA got the idea for Majestic from "The Game," the Fincher movie with Micheal Douglas from '97 or so. The difference, though, was that Douglas had no idea what was a part of the game or not, and there was the distinct feeling that he could lose anything at any time, including his life and his fortune.
I didn't have frightened phone calls in the middle of the night before, so I think it'd be pretty obvious where they were coming from as soon as I signed up for the game. There would be too many logistic, liability, and cost issues for EA to do anything physical whatsoever with Majestic, and the only fortune I could legally lose is the $240 a year it would cost to play in what is essentially an underwhelming RPG.
It's nice to see that not all games out there these days are fragfests, but Majestic was pretty much a misguided novelty from the start. A footnote or interesting sidebar in the history books at best.
Well, the article's been Slashdotted, but this isn't particularly new news, so there's probably not any need.
There was an article in Wired awhile back about the contractor Microsoft was using to actually build the Xbox units. It had almost nothing to do with the console itself and more about the phenomenon of third-party electronics manufacturers, but if memory serves everything I'm about to spew forth is from there. (I think the Register has gone over it a bit, too.)
Of course Microsoft wants to take over your living room. How much money out there is spent on, say, DVD players, stereo components, video game consoles, and all the rest combined every day? It's a gold mine.
And I'm sure MS was thinking of this when they came up with the cute little name, too: Xbox? As in the variable X? Not just a cool-sounding letter?
COME ON, PEOPLE! It's a CONSPIRACY!
Moving on. It's kind of a shame for the game players, though. I admire Nintendo's philosophy when it comes to designing new systems: it's designed for games, not for running your home entertainment system. The more broad you get in your objectives, the less you're going to be able to specialize. You've gotta give and take when you're designing, and when you need to get both DVD functionality and game playing in one box, you're not going to be able to really push the hell out of the design of one aspect-- passable functionality is probably good enough. Note the apparently inferior quality of the PS2's DVD playback. This is the reason the GameCube doesn't house a DVD player (as well as the added benefit of the difficulty in duplicating a proprietary disc, but see the talk on Panasonic's "Q" from earlier today for that): Nintendo knows its place.
If Microsoft manages to get everything I want in a system for a reasonable price, I'll probably buy it-- I won't discriminate just because it's MS. I doubt they'll ever be able to capture all of the quality in one box that you'd find in seperate components, and so my five hundred FutureBucks are probably secure for now.
I'm more curious about the little yellow squares that seem to be appearing at the upper left of the story headlines.
It's new, and from a purely aesthetic standpoint, it's hideous and distracting. It sticks out like... well, not a green thumb, because a green thumb would fit in. A yellow thumb then.
Why are they there, anybody? I don't think I'm trolling, I'm just curious. The problem is that if they serve a function, then I'll probably have to live with seeing them to use them; if they don't, and they're purely for looks, then they're probably not something one can turn off.
Man. This just goes to show you how picky a person can be over something they get for free.
It's a bit absurd to be replying to this, as there's no accounting for personal taste, but something about it got under my skin.
A favorite is just that-- a personal taste. I'm fully aware of everyone from the Lumiere brothers onward, I just happen to enjoy watching films made during my lifetime more. They're what I've been watching since I was a kid. I'm not unwilling to see anything else, but if I'm spending a night on my couch, I tend to look to that with which I'm most comfortable.
If you're looking for more additions to your list of directors, by the way, I'm fond of Renoir, particularly his "Rules of the Game"-- you may not have heard of it, as they probably didn't mentioned "Grand Illusion" first in whatever matchbook filmschool from which you're listing off all your favorite directors-- but it's not something I can sit down and watch particularly often. "Say Anything" or "Bottle Rocket," on the other hand, are films more aligned with the sensibilities of my time, and as such I can get more out of them.
There's more reason to watch a movie than to learn the intricacies of shot composition in Italian neo-realism. How about enjoyment?
As a poster on Slashdot, you are both immensely disappointing and confoundingly dense. I don't know how you could take any statement that claims that its maker knows everything, particularly considering the well-informed and well-reasoned context, as anything other than a touch of humor.
Alright, you've got me on the defensive here. Allow me to explain.
It was probably an error in my writing to follow a statement about my fondness for "smart dumb comedy" with the admission that I laughed a few times at "Scary Movie." This probably suggested that I considered "Scary Movie" a good example of a smart movie-- if so, well, allow me to correct myself here and now.
I remember Marlon Wayans fondly from "Scary Movie," mostly because I have a friend or two that has made pot-related humor amusing to me in some small way, and I tend to laugh at small touches more than the outright jokes. If his comedy isn't your thing, and you don't buy that Marlon Wayans could ever do quality work, check out "Requiem for a Dream."
But I will stick to my fondness for smart dumb movies. In trying to think of examples off the top of my head, I'm coming up with "Wayne's World," although that's probably just a hold-over from my youth and I haven't watched it in awhile, and "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure," which features exceedingly dumb characters in a subtly clever script set within a conventionally moronic genre, the surfer-dude-buddy-flick.
My favorite comedy is "Rushmore." My favorite directors, in no particular order, are David Fincher, Wes Anderson, Cameron Crowe, and a few other relatively low-key types. As I said, my tastes aren't necessarily sophisticated, but I'd like to think they run towards quality.
So believe me. As I said way at the beginning of my first post, I'm a film student, so I know everything.
Alright people, understand the following disclaimers:
1. I am a student and my major is film, and as such I think I know everything.
2. I actually like some teen movies for what they are-- "Election," most notably, but I didn't think "The Faculty" was that bad, either.
3. I have no problem with Jon Katz, prior to this review.
Here we go then.
I saw this movie last night, as the concept amused me and a friend offered to pay. I regret it immensely.
My tastes are not what I'd call extraordinarily sophisticated; I can be amused by dumb comedy, so long as it's *smart* dumb comedy, if you catch my drift. "Scary Movie" got a few laughs out of me.
"Not Another Teen Movie" did not.
Every bit of humor is obvious and cliched. There is no wit whatsoever to this-- it seems that the makers of the movie are responsible for this heap not because they would want to pander to and work at the level of 12-year-olds, but because that's the best they can do.
It's not enough to say that an adolescent boy could have written this thing. It's more like an adolescent boy could have written it the night before it was due.
Katz gets one thing right: plot is almost non-existant. Unfortunately, without plot, we would need some other cohesive element to this the movie together-- characters, say. But there's so many characters crammed in here, haphazardly and without rhyme or reason, that the whole thing becomes difficult to follow. I've seen just about everything the movies spoofs, so I recognized the "archetypes" of the characters, but each was so bland and unfunny (although I'll admit the token black guy was vaguely amusing at one point) as to completely blend into the next.
I was worried going in that I would have seen all the jokes already in the previews. This was a mistake. I should have wanted to see more of the jokes in the previews, so that I would have known enough to save myself the 82 minutes it took to suffer through this abomination.
Save yourself from it, boys and girls. Go see "Vanilla Sky" instead. It may mess with your head, but at least you'll be thinking about something other than the eight bucks you just lost on your way out of the theater.
As we all know, the P4 is designed to take advantage of high memory bandwidth-- which is why the 845 chipset (or whatever) that used SDRAM was such a flop.
When the P4 was first introduced, Intel claimed that it was designed specifically for RDRAM. If this is true-- and I suppose it doesn't have to be-- then is it possible that the new DDR stuff will actually perform below RDRAM systems? Is the only advantage going to be price?
I'm not really a tech guy, so this is an honest question. I'm not a Rambus fan-- I've got a PIII with the 820 chipset, and I'm not particularly fond of it-- but could it be that the company that everybody hates is actually the better way to go in this case?
Of course, everybody around here is going to be be gushing over DDR over Rambus-- if they choose Intel over AMD, which doesn't seem likely-- but it seems that Intel is either stepping backwards or conflicting with their past words.