.."It would be my pleasure to structure the announcement of this resignation and the ensuing transition in conjunction with you so that your administration and the cause of justice are served optimally.
I have handwritten this letter so its confidentiality can be maintained until the appropriate arrangements mentioned above can be made." ( John Ashcroft as reported by AP)
Let's get this straight:
The Attorney General of the United States needs to hand write his letter of resignation so it won't be compromised in transmission to the President of the United States ??
Isn't that just a little bit scary?
Like the original poster, I too was offended by this obvious attempt to falsify evidence.
I much prefer the authentic blue-ish and lavender-ish tints I remember of Mars from the last time I was there.
"...I can forgive a blooper or two, but I don't really think intentionally moving scenes in such a haphazard way can be forgiven."
Excuse me? Have you ever worked on a movie?
Give these guys a break for crying out loud!
> Shouldn't the individual movie houses that produce the
> movies have the right to decide how their films get
> distributed, and furthermore,
What you are advocating is a Charlie Chaplin-style Communism!
There are no "individual" movie "houses" !
Um, your argument for the switch to x86 is to increase Apple's CPU supplier options...by one? So Apple can be the tiny tail that wags the Intel/AMD dogs?
It seems to me that from Apple's viewpoint,
a) x86 is effectively monolithic, in that it is designed to serve a Windows-centric market, regardless of what you can run on it, and,
b) x86 offers Apple no hardware differentiation or integration hooks at all.
This isn't a strategy, it's just a way of surrendering.
After all, even if Apple goes all-970, Motorola still has a vested interest in providing CPUs for Apple. All that switching to x86 would accomplish for Apple is to trade two devils it knows for two it doesn't know.
I find the quality of today's VOD too low for my 10- meter teleWall.
There's nothing like kicking back and watching a 3D holo-cast of a live sporting event (I am a New York GyroBall Giants fan myself) or a pristinely encoded HDDVD of the latest RealityFiction blockbuster, preferably while knocking back an ice-cold glass of nutriPhetamine.
Maybe our children will know a world where quality VOD is obtainable (perhaps over the millions of kM of still-dark fibre in our streets) but I doubt we will see this in our lifetimes!
Steven Soderbergh was the Executive Producer on NAQOYQATSI. The film had not been begun when Soderbergh stepped in to back the project. He is very much responsible for its coming into existence: the film had existed only on paper - for 11 years - before his involvement.
Miramax acquired the film (while it was in production) in the summer of 2001 and is releasing it in October of this year.
Joe Beirne,
Producer of NAQOYQATSI
The only two possible explanations I can think of, , are:
1) Dennis Miller once infamously referred to KOYAANISQATSI during a NFL post-show commentary, I think in 2000. This was cited by several media critics as evidence of Miller's superb game-day preparation.
2) Someone at Netflix knew that Godfrey Reggio, is a huge Shaquille O'Neil fan...which oddly enough, he is!
Joe Beirne
Producer, NAQOYQATSI
The DVD produced by MGM of both KOYAANISQATSI and POWAQQATSI are letterboxed to the originally envisioned 1: 1.85 theatrical projection ratio.
At the time the films were shot there was thought to be no viable market for letterboxed films on video (the biggest TVs were 27" and there was only a glimmer of some future HDTV widescreen home video format). The goal of the MGM release was to produce an affordably priced version of these films that had so long been out of circulation. Consequently, the decision was taken to make a 1.85 (theatrical) version, as only one version could be realistically be done for this DVD. You are not "missing" any part of the image on these DVDs any more than the original film audience was "missing" anything when they saw the film projected at Radio City Music Hall in 1983. The director and the DPs simply "protected" the area above and below the theatrical frameline for use on TV. The 4x3 version is perfectly valid, but it does not reflect the director's original intent any more than the other does.
It is ironic that these DVDs have been criticized by cinephiles for this reason: the standard practice has of course been to wantonly "pan and scan" widescreen films for video release. Blockbuster for instance has only _very_ recently allowed distributors to sell any letter-boxed theatrical aspect ratio versions of feature films through their stores, citing the number of consumers complaining about the black band on the bottom and top of the screen!
Joe Beirne
Producer, NAQOYQATSI
The reason we used 30fps (actually approx. 60 fields per second) was that it was sort-of the "least common multiple" of the many native frame rates of the material we were reviewing for potential use while editing the film. 80% of the film was acquired footage, from stock libraries, news archives, etc and NTSC was the most practical starting point. When the show was almost finished we re-constructed it at 24 progressive frames per second, first as video (in an Avid Symphony system), then as 2K data to feed a laser film recorder.
The 20% of the film we did shoot was shot on 35mm film, mostly at very high frame rates (150 fps and up).
I imagine that the DVD will be mastered from a HDTV transfer we made of the original film output negative. It hasn't been done yet.
Slashdot Mirror
Like the original poster, I too was offended by this obvious attempt to falsify evidence. I much prefer the authentic blue-ish and lavender-ish tints I remember of Mars from the last time I was there.
"...I can forgive a blooper or two, but I don't really think intentionally moving scenes in such a haphazard way can be forgiven."
Excuse me? Have you ever worked on a movie?
Give these guys a break for crying out loud!
> Shouldn't the individual movie houses that produce the > movies have the right to decide how their films get > distributed, and furthermore, What you are advocating is a Charlie Chaplin-style Communism! There are no "individual" movie "houses" !
Um, your argument for the switch to x86 is to increase Apple's CPU supplier options ...by one?
So Apple can be the tiny tail that wags the Intel/AMD dogs?
It seems to me that from Apple's viewpoint,
a) x86 is effectively monolithic, in that it is designed to serve a Windows-centric market, regardless of what you can run on it, and,
b) x86 offers Apple no hardware differentiation or integration hooks at all.
This isn't a strategy, it's just a way of surrendering.
After all, even if Apple goes all-970, Motorola still has a vested interest in providing CPUs for Apple. All that switching to x86 would accomplish for Apple is to trade two devils it knows for two it doesn't know.
At massive cost, by the way.
I find the quality of today's VOD too low for my 10- meter teleWall. There's nothing like kicking back and watching a 3D holo-cast of a live sporting event (I am a New York GyroBall Giants fan myself) or a pristinely encoded HDDVD of the latest RealityFiction blockbuster, preferably while knocking back an ice-cold glass of nutriPhetamine. Maybe our children will know a world where quality VOD is obtainable (perhaps over the millions of kM of still-dark fibre in our streets) but I doubt we will see this in our lifetimes!
Steven Soderbergh was the Executive Producer on NAQOYQATSI. The film had not been begun when Soderbergh stepped in to back the project. He is very much responsible for its coming into existence: the film had existed only on paper - for 11 years - before his involvement. Miramax acquired the film (while it was in production) in the summer of 2001 and is releasing it in October of this year. Joe Beirne, Producer of NAQOYQATSI
The only two possible explanations I can think of, , are: 1) Dennis Miller once infamously referred to KOYAANISQATSI during a NFL post-show commentary, I think in 2000. This was cited by several media critics as evidence of Miller's superb game-day preparation. 2) Someone at Netflix knew that Godfrey Reggio, is a huge Shaquille O'Neil fan ...which oddly enough, he is!
Joe Beirne
Producer, NAQOYQATSI
The DVD produced by MGM of both KOYAANISQATSI and POWAQQATSI are letterboxed to the originally envisioned 1: 1.85 theatrical projection ratio. At the time the films were shot there was thought to be no viable market for letterboxed films on video (the biggest TVs were 27" and there was only a glimmer of some future HDTV widescreen home video format). The goal of the MGM release was to produce an affordably priced version of these films that had so long been out of circulation. Consequently, the decision was taken to make a 1.85 (theatrical) version, as only one version could be realistically be done for this DVD. You are not "missing" any part of the image on these DVDs any more than the original film audience was "missing" anything when they saw the film projected at Radio City Music Hall in 1983. The director and the DPs simply "protected" the area above and below the theatrical frameline for use on TV. The 4x3 version is perfectly valid, but it does not reflect the director's original intent any more than the other does. It is ironic that these DVDs have been criticized by cinephiles for this reason: the standard practice has of course been to wantonly "pan and scan" widescreen films for video release. Blockbuster for instance has only _very_ recently allowed distributors to sell any letter-boxed theatrical aspect ratio versions of feature films through their stores, citing the number of consumers complaining about the black band on the bottom and top of the screen! Joe Beirne Producer, NAQOYQATSI
The reason we used 30fps (actually approx. 60 fields per second) was that it was sort-of the "least common multiple" of the many native frame rates of the material we were reviewing for potential use while editing the film. 80% of the film was acquired footage, from stock libraries, news archives, etc and NTSC was the most practical starting point. When the show was almost finished we re-constructed it at 24 progressive frames per second, first as video (in an Avid Symphony system), then as 2K data to feed a laser film recorder.
The 20% of the film we did shoot was shot on 35mm film, mostly at very high frame rates (150 fps and up).
I imagine that the DVD will be mastered from a HDTV transfer we made of the original film output negative. It hasn't been done yet.
Joe Beirne,
Producer of NAQOYQATSI