What is the AniMatrix? A direct-to-video release of 9 animated shorts (comic book style, pure CGI, etc) by 7 directors looks at possible visions of the world pre-Matrix. Looks like it could be an interesting collection.
posted by mathowie
on Sep 5, 2002 -
27 comments
Remember the movie Magnolia? One of the themes running through the movie was of amazing coincidences and chance.
This story of a people getting hit by trains near San Francisco this week mentions one such coincidence. A man was hit by a train, and on that very train was the chairman of a "nonprofit group whose goal is to reduce the number of train-related collisions, deaths and injuries." The additional fact that this safety group leader was enroute to give a speech on grade-crossing safety makes it approach urban legend status, but it did indeed happen.
posted by mathowie
on Jul 15, 2000 -
5 comments
Clerks: The Animated Series is coming to ABC in May (here's
a preview in quicktime format). How far will ABC let slacking, smoking, cursing vandals go? Are they gunning for SouthPark? I can't imagine a watered-down version of Clerks being very funny at all, the whole point of Clerks the movie was the absurdity of the dialogue and jokes. Don't get me wrong, I used to be an über Kevin Smith fan, but I just can't imagine enjoying a kid-friendly version of the New Jersey universe.
posted by mathowie
on Mar 7, 2000 -
9 comments
Much in the spirit of the
ASCII Star Wars site, Neale over at
wetlog has unveiled an short
ASCII version of American Beauty (when is the academy going to finally recognize the brilliant work of ASCII illustrators everywhere?). He's also running
a contest for players of
The Sims. I've been thinking about getting this game since I first saw it, but Neale's contest is enough to push me over the edge and actually buy it. I'd like to try getting my Sims to perform either
Magnolia or
The Ice Storm.
posted by mathowie
on Mar 1, 2000 -
1 comment
MovieFone (or 777film.com, or AOL/Moviefone if you want to be official) has long been my favorite place to look up movie showtimes, but lately I've been running into problems. The biggest one is this: if you search for movies by theater, then hit "more" a couple times, it reaches a limit of about 12 theaters. Here in LA, that limit corresponds to a 4-5 mile radius. The theater I want to look up movie times at is maybe 7-8 miles away, but no where in the interface is a real "search." It's all just lists and lists. Eventually, I found a list of local theaters (covering about a 20 mile radius) in the theater codes section, but it's not a real search engine, so looking up times at out of town theaters requires you to know the zip code of the place you're going to. I know they're trying to simplify their site by taking out a search engine, but what about the people that know exactly what they want? I use moviefone on the web because using it on a telephone requires you to navigate convoluted menu systems, but they've transferred the phone experience to the web quite well.
posted by mathowie
on Jan 16, 2000 -
2 comments
Jon Katz' new book to be made into a movie? Now this just boggles the mind. I've read
Geeks, and it was an interesting story (to fellow geeks), but I just can't imagine this as a movie. It's non-fiction, so there's little, if any drama happening in any single scene. The screenwriters are going to have a field day with this. I predict that the movie may contain the general points as frames of reference, but everything else will be made up.
posted by mathowie
on Jan 14, 2000 -
0 comments
(probably my last post about Magnolia) There were a few 'easter eggs' in Magnolia worth mentioning. What may be the
first non-555 phone number in a movie was mentioned, but I can't remember it, if anyone tracks it down, please post. There was the 1-877-TAME-HER number that was mentioned on every ad done by Tom Cruise's character. You can call it and hear a special message. If you don't feel like leaving your computer, you can use
dialpad.com to make the call. Also, at the end credits of the gameshow, they flash a URL,
wdkk.com, which maps to the Magnolia website. At one point, a audience member of the quiz show has a sign that says 'Exodus 8:2' which
I looked up, and it reads 'And if thou shalt REFUSE to let [them] go, behold I will smite all thy borders with frogs'. Usually when I see a movie, I don't pick up on these things, I guess Magnolia really was
that good.
posted by mathowie
on Jan 10, 2000 -
3 comments
I just saw
Magnolia, and went looking for interviews with P.T. Anderson, the writer-director.
I found one on a fan site, with a bunch of great insider stuff, but I wouldn't suggest reading it unless you've seen Magnolia. Too many spoilers.
posted by mathowie
on Jan 9, 2000 -
0 comments
I can't wait for the new version of Shaft to come out. It should be pretty cool. Richard Roundtree played a pretty good badass in the original, but other than that it was pretty comical. Rent it and listen to the lame dialouge the writers came up with.
posted by mathowie
on Sep 21, 1999 -
0 comments
The first rule of
fight club is... you do not talk about the fight club. Second rule of Fight Club is you do
NOT TALK ABOUT FIGHT CLUB. God I hope that movie doesn't suck. And I love walking around the office repeating the two rules of fight club. Do it, your co-workers will love you for it.
posted by mathowie
on Sep 9, 1999 -
0 comments
From the
You Learn Something New Everyday file: I had no idea there was such a huge move industry in Bombay, India, known worldwide as
Bollywood. I need to get out more, I'm becoming quite the ugly american lately...
posted by mathowie
on Aug 16, 1999 -
0 comments
