The Popular Arts Post: Film, Poetry, Roleplaying, Music and Literature

[tcpip]

Went to IMAX for the first time last week to see "300". As the thread on RPG.net suggestsit really isn't good at all (my summary is probably on the last page). Also recently saw The Notorious Bettie Page. Visually cute, it included some excellent thematic considerations and then utterly failed to elaborate on them.

Unitarian service last Sunday was poetry, readings and folk music. As is my norm, I selected Unitarian poets and authors, specifically, Horatio Alger, Ambrose Bierce, ee cummings, and Kurt Vonnegut Jnr.

Easter Sunday was spent, as per last year, playing GURPS Bunnies & Burrows. The Fellowship of Talor journeys in the eleventh scene for HeroQuest. Have managed to convince imajica_lj to run Call of Cthulhu in the near future.

Went a bit nuts on the weekend buying music: Johnny Cash, Velvet Underground, Hawkwind, Gang of Four, Devo, China Crisis, Eels, Elysium. No one can claim I don't have a variety of tastes. Have made a start on the small moutain of books sent to me by Ticonderoga; a seven-part space opera by Kevin J. Anderson. Also should mention that my review of Blackbeard: The real pirate of the Caribbean is available in the latest issue.

Cocktail party for Friday night is shaping up very nicely indeed.

Comments

[discordia13.livejournal.com]

I'm with rodshark. I saw 300 last night, and it certainly wasn't a bad movie - it was what it was - a comic book adaption that faithfully reproduced the art using actors. Something that i'm finding increasingly cool these days.

It was fun to watch for the same reason The Matrix was fun to watch. The acting was just as wooden. The SFX were as good (albeit not groundbreaking). The plot was just as thin.

Certainly if you try to treat it as a historically accurate epic, it's going to fall short. Even the director admits that.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

The director is way off the mark; 90% of the events are accurate? No way. If one was to do an event-by-event study of the film (and even weighted according to screentime) it would be well below the 90% claim - probably below 50%.

As for the Matrix the acting was better (marginally), there was slightly more plot and character development and, perhaps most importantly, the theme was well executed.

This said, neither were particularly great films.

NB: Snyder is apparently going to do a film of Watchment. *fingers crossed*

[discordia13.livejournal.com]

Well you know what they say about statistics...

It should be no real surprise though to anyone though, we have arguably not Miller's best work (and I'm not a fan of Varley's art either), plus Snyder - a guy who likes the pretty but wouldn't know plot if it took to his leg with a machete.

Its a graphic novel on the big screen. More fun than reading it though (I had a bowl of wedges and lots of popcorn). I'll probably buy the DVD, but I wouldn't go so far as seeing it again in the cinema.

I don't hold high hopes for Watchmen.

[tcpip.livejournal.com]

I don't hold high hopes for Watchmen.

One could be justly scared of it being ruined.

It's such a huge piece of work - and all that backstory in the clippings between the comic strips.

There's two - or three - films in Watchmen.... If he pulls it off it'll be genius. But anything else will be a crying shame.