If you are looking for plot lines that are somewhat cohesive and make sense then go catch a summer drama. If you want to escape from the summer heat to see some stellar robot-on-robot violence and flawless CG then this is the place to kill 2.5 hours. The robots in the sequel play a larger role due to a larger budget so there are about 5x as many of them of varying shapes and sizes, which is cool. Apply the same equation to the explosions in the first movie and you can see why regardless of logic we have an epic blockbuster on our hands.
Be prepared for countless slow motion action sequences and frame by frame walking against dramatic backdrops/lighting. Does the fact this made squillions of dollars in ticket sales make a statement on today’s society and collective intelligence? Unfortunately Yes, but the best review I have read was via i09 (highly recommend reading after watching) which argues that this film is misread and is in fact a profound artistic cinematic statement, not dissimilar to the European dadaism (why make sense?) movement.
What is it about musicians named Elvis that makes them act out in fashion-centric ways? Crazy hair, intentionally mismatched socks….I guess everyone must find their visual signature nowadays; beats facepaint and sweatbands/wristbands.
Christopher Baker is an interactive artist that specializes in installation art. His latest piece, Murmurs is examines the rise of micro-messaging technologies such as Twitter and Facebook’s status update. One might describe these messages as a kind of digital small talk.
So what makes this compelling? According to the artist, it’s the emotional nature of the content itself, not necessarily the structure of the message:
What the vast majority of users fail to understand is that these fleeting thoughts are accumulated, archived and digitally-indexed by corporations. While the future of these archives remains to be seen, the sheer volume of publicly accessible personal — often emotional — expression should give us pause.
http://www.vimeo.com/4464887
This installation consists of 30 thermal printers that continuously monitor Twitter for new messages containing variations on common emotional utterances. Messages containing hundreds of variations on words such as argh, meh, grrrr, oooo, ewww, and hmph, are printed as an endless waterfall of text accumulating in tangled piles below. Via Cpluv.
Looks like the OEMs in China and Taiwan have learned how to get small speaker driver prices low and to keep them there while shopping them around to accessory manufacturers. Case in point is Nixon’s latest offering, their in-ear headphones that are strikingly basic in appearance, have a nice cloth cable jacket (similar to these JBLs that I use daily) and are available in four products, carefully platformed and offered in a variety of different colors. From a basic 8mm model for $40 to an iphone capable edition for $90 they look good enough that I wouldn’t care all that much about performance. When it comes to headphones in general smaller players are increasingly throwing their hats into the ring with differentiated styles and colors so choice abounds. If you have the ca$h to spend these days, that is.
Fashion brand Diesel’s Creative Team, headed by Director Wilbert Das, has collaborated with lighting brand Foscarini and furniture brand Moroso to create the Diesel Home Collection of furniture and lighting, called Successful Living. Whereas this is sure to be a limited edition low production run of products it doesn’t mean they aren’t testing the waters to do something similar to brands that offer not only clothing, but in the case of Ralph Lauren include: Furniture, Lighting, Wallpaper, Crystal, Bedding, Towels, Tableware, Textiles, and Paint. As a yardstick to how elastic their brand can be this is a fitting push in another direction, most likely due to seeing the promising margins they already see on accessories like sunglasses.
The partnerships have resulted in over five families of products across the two categories; both partners cater to the mid/high-end interiors market and were solid fits. Above is just one of the family of products produced from a collaboration between lighting manufacturer Foscarini and Diesel. I have to say I am impressed with the results considering Diesel carries clothing both too expensive and trendy for my taste. Sure, I have some smallish issues with their approach to proportion but the articulation and edgy approach to creating their own visual vocabulary here is a nice change of pace. I’m surprised there aren’t wild textures stamped on the metal components and ugly as hell textile patterns on the lamp shades so I think this is a ‘win’ for sure.
The Moroso tables are a bit busy for my taste (making them a better fit than the lighting elements with regards to the partnership) but definitely evoke that ‘why didn’t anyone else think of this first’ response that good product design often elicits. The progressive uber-landscape footprint coupled with the throwback Eames-esque wire legs is a nice pairing. The edgy table in question’s glass is overlaid with a printout of a simple x-ray of a d.j. table. The best part is the graphical tie-in with their killer holographic projections featured in their ‘Liquid Space’ 2008 runway show…..
Via Ifitshipitshere.
Why can't you share your bed?..... It's what the whole world should do.
Sadly, this is the case (until we find the island that he, Elvis, Biggie, and Tupac are living on) and the late night jokes are writing themselves. Whereas one can’t argue his talent and effect on music I think mainstream media has been predictably hasty in judging him as a somewhat of a recently departed saint. I think the story is tragic to say the least because no one around him could save him from himself.
He succeeded in many remarkable ways, not only from a performance and career standpoint but also in distancing himself from reality. Seeing early Jackson 5 footage frames things in a tragic light to say the least since he died looking nothing like nature intended. It seems that a few events in his life provided catch-all excuses for his behavior; abuse from his showbiz father, having his hair set on fire during a Pepsi commercial which he was no doubt paid ridiculous amounts to do, falling off a stage.
I should hope that the amount of sympathy for these factors does not overshadow the fact that he was still responsible for his own actions and addictions. That did seem to be the case over this weekend’s press coverage. The upside to all the attention highlights a few things I never knew such as: The Moonwalk debuted live during the Motown 25 award show, Billie Jean was a musical Jackie Robinson moment, and Martin Scorsese directed Bad. Who knew MTV was so racist back in the day, or that Scorsese at one point really needed the money desperately enough to do a music video?
MJ had planned for one last tour in hopes to make enough ca$h to live ‘comfortably’ for the rest of his life and it looks like whoever insured these events is ruined, so at least a fitting financial legacy is in place. On a final note during a few shows I was watching over the weekend providing ‘coverage’ a commercial came on featuring a Beatles song. At least this raping and pillaging of one of the greatest music catalogs in existence will stop. Oh wait, didn’t he sell half of that to Sony in 1995 to help pay legal fees ? He will be missed…..but mostly by rabid delusional fans.
I had to share this since I just got out of a five hour meeting where this seemed to be the prevailing attitude. See ya next week…
It’s such a solid summer when it comes to both sci-fi and beer this year. I have to make direct mention of this because both Transformers 2 and my favorite Sam Adams Seasonal (White Ale) sounds like a delicious combination. I don’t care how lowly the movie was rated because if you are looking for plot I suggest avoiding movie versions of friggin’ cartoons because I am sure G.I. Joe is going to be a 21st century Hamlet in rocket boots.
Genius reporting. I have no idea why these producers and anchors haven’t broken into a major media market yet either….
Think nothing is worse than being diagnosed with tendonitis at a job where you happen to be typing/mousing 8-10 hours a day? How about showing up to work wearing a wrist guard identical to the one above on one arm the day after Michael Jackson died. ‘Nope, this isn’t paying homage to the self-proclaimed king of pop–it’s just tendonitis.‘ If I could only moonwalk away from conversations…