Essay by David Denby on the future of our predominant art form: the film. Via Arts & Letters Daily.
posted on Jan 11, 2007 - View this thread

Review on SF Site Here’s a question: what if the Wachowski brothers’ 1999 film The Matrix was not just an entertaining piece of sf-action-adventure hokum. What if, instead, it is all true? Imagine it as a message sent via the medium of the Matrix itself (Hollywood cinema) from someplace outside the Matrix, to wake us up to our human condition, to alert us all to the fact ‘that we are slaves’. If so, then we are not living the lives we thought we were living; we are instead inhabiting a virtual reality composed by oppressive machine-intelligences. What if this were literally true? How would it appear to us? Well, clearly, it would appear exactly as our lives presently appear to us. Unless we get ‘unplugged’, unless we become enlightened, we cannot see past the illusion that has been created for us. What should we do in this circumstance? Should we collaborate with the machines and not rock the boat? Or should we fight, free ourselves and eventually free everybody else? Clearly, says The Matrix Warrior, this latter. This is a book that proceeds from the assumption that the situation described in The Matrix is real, and tells you where to go from there.
posted on Apr 20, 2003 - View this thread

Freddy vs. Jason. Batman vs. Superman. It seems Hollywood is done mining lame cartoons for movie fodder and has moved on to pitting tired franchises against each other. What's next? Hercule Poirot vs. Indiana Jones? (Actually, that'd be good.) Personally, I'd like to see Bugs Bunny vs. Sauron. We know who'd win that battle. What movie battles would you like to see?
posted on Aug 5, 2002 - View this thread

Every wonder why most Hollywood movies completely stink? It's 'cuz all the decent writers get put through the wringer like this guy, and give up. He hasn't given up yet, and does seem to at least be getting a lot of free Evian at the production companies pitches at.
posted on Jul 18, 2002 - View this thread

Brando ill. The saddest, scariest part of this story is that he was just getting ready to film Scary Movie II when he got sick. Scary Movie II...and the Oscar for "Most Pathetic Former Genius" goes to....
posted on Apr 13, 2001 - View this thread