movies
mikethemadbiologist | December 26, 2007From the archives comes this post about movie critic Roger Ebert and the email he sent me.
A little while back, Roger Ebert wrote a column assailing Imax theaters for pulling movies that were about the origin of life, the origin of the universe, and evolution. I suggested that we should send him email and thank him for supporting science. Well, I did just that, and in my email In Box today was a reply from Ebert. Pretty damn cool.To sum up, he says that he's received a lot of ('countless') emails from creationists who use ridiculous arguments. The criticism he's received the most is what he (…
oracknows | December 22, 2007Here's one of my all time favorite David Bowie tunes, truly an underrated gem from his career. (Too bad the movie it came from was only so-so.) This performance is from June 2000:
Why? Because Christmas is coming and I felt like it. Enjoy!
grrlscientist | December 14, 2007Everyone is talking about The Golden Compass -- a movie that I had no idea was being made or released or even premiered this past weekend -- a movie that is based on a series of books that I've never read and have only vaguely heard about. But my readers have fixed that literary oversight for me because you have sent the entire "His Dark Materials" trilogy to me, and I plan to start reading it as soon as I get a couple book reviews finished in the next few days. (Oh, I also plan to see the movie as soon as I've finished reading the first book). But a quick look around the internet has yielded…
purepedantry | December 12, 2007I guess I suspected that Golden Compass might not be good, but I went to see it last night if for no other reason than to see why thousands of people would attempt to boycott it on Facebook. The Catholic League is also organizing a boycott. I haven't read the books that this movie was based on, but apparently the primary objection to the film was from Christian groups to the atheist imagery in the books. The author of the books, Philip Pullman, has also enunciated his desire to create a sort of anti-C.S. Lewis, secular trilogy.
Listen, maybe the books are substantially better, but if this…
oracknows | October 31, 2007...we need a little something as night approaches.
I know just the thing: Brain-eating zombies.
Given that this is the blog that conceived of the misbegotten literary (if you can call it that) device known as the Hitler Zombie, how could I not post a clip involving an actual cinematic brain-eating zombie on Halloween? (Warning: In the interest of full disclosure, this clip contains a brief and pretty well obscured topless shot and a couple of uses of the F-word.)
Intelligent talking zombies who understand how to use pulleys. Now that's scary! Yes, this was a clip from one of my favorite…
revere | October 22, 2007I like movies but I'm not a film buff. I have no reason why I find cinema's most famous scream interesting. But I do:
In case you haven't had enough, here's a Wilhelm scream compilation:
Just because.
oracknows | October 20, 2007I can't say I saw this one coming, but it turns out that Albus Dumbledore is gay:
Harry Potter author JK Rowling has revealed that one of her characters, Hogwarts school headmaster Albus Dumbledore, is gay.
She made her revelation to a packed house in New York's Carnegie Hall on Friday, as part of her US book tour.
She took audience questions and was asked if Dumbledore found "true love".
"Dumbledore is gay," she said, adding he was smitten with rival Gellert Grindelwald, who he beat in a battle between good and bad wizards long ago.
The audience gasped, then applauded. "I would have told you…
oracknows | October 13, 2007
Will Smith is the last man on earth. The movie is directed by Ridley Scott. The last take on this story (Richard Matheson's post-apocalyptic I Am Legend), The Omega Man, is one of my all time favorite science fiction movies. (Yes, I know it didn't follow the story that closely, but it stood on its own.)
'Nuff said.
oracknows | October 10, 2007One of the most important responsibilities of health care workers and hospitals is to protect the privacy of the patients for whom they care. Unfortunately, in the case of George Clooney's recent hospitalization for injuries sustained in a motorcycle crash, a consequence of electronic medical records was revealed when dozens of employees, some of whom apparently leaked the information to the press, accessed Clooney's medical records. Of course, these employees didn't seem to realize that EMRs allow the tracking and identification of anyone who logs on to the system. Anyone who logs on leaves…
mikethemadbiologist | September 2, 2007Last week, I saw the movie Lucky Number Slevin. I thought it was a great movie, and lent to friends, who agreed that it was really well done.
The odd thing about the movie is that I had never even heard of it, and others had also never heard of it or had vague recollections of it (and hadn't seen it in theaters). So I ask you, the readers, why did this very good movie get virtually no exposure (and I'm assuming viewers in theaters)?
Also, go rent the movie. It's quite good.
oracknows | August 23, 2007You know, even though I know he's been a Republican talker for a long time, that he worked for the Nixon administration as a speechwriter and lawyer, I've always kind of liked Ben Stein. My wife and I used to like to watch Win Ben Stein's Money, and he was quite amusing as the principal in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. He's always come across as a pleasant doofus, even though I know that image appears to be carefully calculated one.
Now I learn that he's the narrator and a driving force behind a pro-"intelligent design" movie called Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, which is due to be released…
oracknows | August 12, 2007While trying to avoid working on my grant yesterday, I was idly flipping channels. I had planned on killing a few minutes while psyching myself up to go back into the Bat Cave that is my office, ignoring a gloriously perfect sunny day with temperatures in the low 80s, to do battle with the grant application again, when I came across it: The greatest movie ever made!
The movie is called Fiend Without a Face, a low budget science fiction/horror movie from the 1950s.
It's awesome, and I'll tell you why. The monsters are disembodied brains. Yes, this is (mostly) a medical blog, and talking about…
purepedantry | July 30, 2007I saw the Simpsons Movie, twice in fact, which should indicate to you how good I found it to be. Two favorite lines. This one from the trailer:
The other one was where Tom Hanks is trying to sell the US on a new Grand Canyon in a commercial. He says: "If you are going to trust a government, why not this one?"
Priceless.
purepedantry | July 10, 2007Go to the Simpsons movie site and make your own.
Here's mine.
Hat-tip: Omni Brain.
oracknows | July 7, 2007Time to take a break from science and medicine again.
The Rambo movies happen to be a guilty pleasure of mine. Little did I know that there was a Turkish knockoff of the character:
I particularly love the rocket launchers in this one. Their "action" has to be seen to be believed.
oracknows | June 11, 2007After having been pointed yesterday to a video of an old Betty Boop short that strongly suggests that Boop may have been a homeopath, I couldn't resist clicking on the links to a couple of other old Betty Boop cartoons. One of them reminded me of just how different our culture was 72 years ago when this cartoon was released. What's astonishing to me, from the vantage of 2007, is the casual racism, done without a care in the world that it would offend anyone and done with the grossest racial stereotypes played for cheap laughs:
We can be grateful that such stereotypes are no longer…
oracknows | June 10, 2007While reading through a mailing list I belong to, I came across a link that demonstrates that alternative medicine has been ingrained in popular culture since at least the 1920's and 1930's. Indeed, I never realized that that icon of flappers, Betty Boop, practiced homeopathy. Don't believe me? Well, here's incontrovertible evidence in the form of a short called Betty Boop, M.D. released in 1932 and perhaps the most bizarre Boop short I've ever seen (particularly the last shot, which makes me wonder if acid had actually been invented six years before it was supposedly discovered). Basically,…
oracknows | May 16, 2007As a fan of Iggy Pop, I was appalled to read this:
Former "The Lord of the Rings" star Elijah Wood will play Iggy Pop in The Passenger, a biopic of the legendary rocker, reports Variety. Ted Hope's This Is That Productions and Traction Media are executive producing.
The movie, which follows Pop's early years with his band the Stooges, will be directed by Nick Gomez (Drowning Mona) from a script by Eric Schmid.
The $6 million-$8 million "Passenger" is set to film in next six months and is scheduled for delivery by midsummer 2008.
Pop has "given his blessing" to the project but will not take…
mikethemadbiologist | May 14, 2007By way of Oliver Willis, I stumbled across these outtakes from the movie Flock of Dodos. I will never stop being amazed by the disingenuousness of the ID movement: