Movie Appreciation

I was reading about the first movie "Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory" by the Lumiere brothers at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auguste_and_Louis_Lumi%C3%A8re

One of the early movies they took was of Loie Fuller mentioned here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loie_Fuller

Loie Fuller had dance routines that were like rythmic gymnastics before their time. She would weave the air with the fabric of her clothes. She also developed psychodelic stage lighting for which she held patents on. I wonder if her innovations led to today's modern rock concert lighting? I am sure she synchronized her movement to music but sadly, they only had silent film back then. Her flowing clothes have a hypnotic effect and she was the subject of many other artists trying to capture the essence of air and movement. Her dance was not so well recieved in the USA but she was quite popular in France were she spent the rest of her life.

"It's all part of my rock 'n' roll fantasy
It's all part of my rock 'n' roll dream."

Bad Company "Rock 'N' Roll Fantasy"

Just finished reading the shooting script for pulp fiction. Here's a website with hundreds of movie scripts: http://www.dailyscript.com/movie.html I like to play a movie in my head as I read the script and spot the differences.

It's also a lot of fun to mentally work out how shots were set up, how it was edited together, and what tricks were used. I like trivia, directors commentaries, behind the scenes and the making of features. I even have a shelf of books dedicated to all the different aspects of filmmaking.

Is it just me or has it gotten awfully quiet? (Hope I didn't scare you)

The DeVille

tronicmale@yahoo.com

www.SyncMovies.com (when it's working)

Share your thoughts, click here to join The Arkive: http://www.synchronicityarkive.com/referral/77777b6f

In the 1986 movie "Back to School" Rodney Dangerfield's rich character hires the actual Kurt Vonnegut to write a term paper about one of Kurt Vonnegut books. After reading it, the class professor tells Rodney something like, "You don't know the first thing about Kurt Vonnegut!"

Kurt was an American who was captured by the Germans in World War II. He was kept in a slaughter house by the Germans. The funny thing about Germans is they don't like noise, so they built the walls of the slaughter house very thick. When the Allies bombed the town/city Kurt was imprissoned, the only people who survived in the bomb feild were some American prisoners, including Kurt, in the "Slaughterhaus Funf(5)". Kurt noticed that this made the Germans angry that they were the only survivors in this bombed town. Psychologists say survival of this magnitude profoundly metamophasizes people to become very active in life. His book "Slaughter House 5" is based on his real life event. His books are widely admired.

Kurt Vonnegut died Thursday April 12, 2007 at age 84.

I've stopped going to theatres, but A Scanner Darkly was on my list to see from when it was in theatres. ASD is based on the Philip K. Dick book of the same name. PKD wrote a lot, generally categorized as sci-fi, and I've been a fan of his writing for a while now. His books were the basis for a lot of movies (Blade Runner, Total Recall, Scanners, Minority Report, and a couple other, mostly B-movies). ASD is arguably the most "true to the book", as well as perfectly capturing the mood.

It's also rotoscoped, which in a nutshell means it's animated, but the animation was done over actual live footage. ASD stars Keanu Reeves, Winnona Ryder, Woody Harrelson, Robert Downey Jr., and Rory Cochrane, and all of them are completely recognizable in the movie.

What I liked best about the movie (and the book) was its increasing relevance to today's society. The main themes in the book revolve around surveillance, corporate greed, governmental corruption, drug use, and paranoia. With the recent news that the US govt is already heavily involved in spying on its own citizens, either for the war on "terror" or the war on "drugs", this movie becomes even more relevant.

It's definitely not for everyone. PKD's writing has been criticized as being more than a bit schizophrenic, and ASD has a high "weirdness" quotient, when compared to standard Hollywood fare. But I personally thought it was well-worth seeing, and definitely worth repeat viewing even. The animated look might even make for a good synch... the visuals in the movie are pretty wild. Not a kids flick (mature themes obviously, plus some nudity), but it doesn't baby you at all, and unlike most Hollywood films, doesn't assume you're a moron (always a plus, in my book).

If you check it out, I'd be curious what you think...

peace,
--mj
arkiver

The Magic Theatre
for madmen only
Price of admittance your mind
Not for everybody.

Jack, the Pumpkin King, is rejected by those he trys to please with his presents. The Christmas world goes as far as to blast Jack out of the sky. They tried to destroy him and his gifts.

Jack felt that Christmas was beyond his grasp. He could not understand the magic behind the gifts. But without realizing it, he had a deeper undertanding of Christmas. That was forgiveness.

Despite being blasted out of the sky, Jack rescues Santa and worries if Santa has enough time to set things right. He even gives Santa back his hat. If somebody else had been blasted out of the sky while trying to deliver gifts, they would have let Santa perish by the boogie man's hand. And definately not given back Santa's hat.

Santa, in return, give Holloweentown some snow to enjoy. As awry as Holloweentown was, they had ment well. And Jack had the true meaning of Christmas all along.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Love,
Karl

Had some vouchers my work gave me to use up so got these 3 films today;

*I think Constantine has lots of potential as theres great imagery and action etc all the way through and the universal theme of good vs evil etc.

*V for Vendetta im not so sure about although its quite stylised and does have some action in it so it could work with something maybe.

*Ive never seen Superman Returns but once i have i will be trying 'The Soft Bulletin' with it because of the song 'Waitin' For A Superman'...

Anyone got any Synchs or Synch ideas for them?

I just saw Mel Gibson's "Apocalypto" and I thought it was great. A wonderful synch waiting to happen. Possibly another "Dark Side" synch? There's an eclipse and everything! Has anyone else seen this movie? Highly recommended.

*bang* I'm dead.

This movie is about the battle of musicians represented by warriors. Who will control the next generation audience? I enjoyed the simplicity of this B-movie and recommend it. I imagine the movie could be synched to a musical artist who varies their style. Or you could just watch a good movie.

Check out the link and you'll be there in a wink

http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue83/screen.html

I went to see "Saving Private Ryan" thinking it would be a drama of people walking through grass fields (like the movie trailers on the telly). I was not prepaired for the following blood bath and almost walked out of the movie theater in despair durring the first 15 minutes.

Then there was the time I went to see "Ran" in 1985 or 86. Whoa! There are rivers of blood in this epic tale. King Lear is based on this eastern tale, not vice versa. I recommend the 3 hour "Ran" and it would be a great angst movie for synching. It is subtitled in english. Here is some movie info: http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1800354625/info

And here is a "Ran" reveiw:
http://www.culturevulture.net/Movies2/Ran.htm

I am still in shock...

Stay to the very end of the credits of X-men III. There is more movie there.

I have been waiting for a current movie based on the book "I am Legend" and now it is in the works.

We had Vincent Price as "The Last Man on Earth" in the 1960's.

Charlton Heston as "The Omega Man" in the 1970's (watch out for the nudity folks).

And now, at long last, we have...

http://www.cinecon.com/news.php?id=0604262

Mr. Paik charged, "Television has attacked us for a life time. Now we strike back!"

He passed away at age 74 but he will remain vibrant in our memories.

Here is a link to some of the visionary artist Mr. Paik's work.

http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/02.29.96/paik-9609.html

I was watching the movie "Crash" and felt that the movie needed soothing music to ease the constant plot tension. I felt that a great alternative sound track would be Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons" to calm my nerves.

I could not bring myself to watch the movie again. It was good, the acting beleiveable, sometimes the plot was forced, but my emotional chemistry was too reved up by the movie and I could not stand it again. So I have to search my limited movie library for something to match Vivaldi to.

I know. "The Dark Crystal"!

hi people ,
just thought id drop a couple of lines in here to tell you of an e-mail i recently recived... here it is ...

I'm a Wall Street Journal reporter working on a story about backmasking with digital music and saw your website. I'm wondering if I could talk to you about how you found the songs with backward messages and your other thoughts on backward music. My contact info is below.

Thanks.

Staff Reporter
The Wall Street Journal
200 Liberty Street, 10th floor
New York, NY 10281
212-416-4457

prety neat huh! wall street journal is prety big, and im quite looking forward to working on this article !!!

anyways...

take care of yourselves... and each other .... !!!

I synch to movies I tape off the Television. I do not have alot of money to buy stuff. The trouble is:

1. Commercial Breaks
2. Movie Editing to increase commercial time
a. deleting scenes
b. time compression
3. There is no way on earth the synch can be duplicated by other artists.

I am too embarrassed to even mention what i have tried using tapes from TV.

The good points:

1. Feeling out a match before investing money.
2. TV is free and there is so much to choose from.

Has anyone else seen this movie? It's kind of weird, but might have some appeal to folks that hang here and are more comfortable with "out there" flicks. I caught it on HBO, and thought it was kinda funny, not the best movie ever but I enjoyed it. The model it used to present the story was pretty funny...

peace,
--mj
arkiver

The Magic Theatre
for madmen only
Price of admittance your mind
Not for everybody.

I think the first Movie Theater Movie was shown Dec 28, 1895 in France. It was a documentary showing people leaving a work factory at quiting time.

Thomas Edison was working on the single veiwer movie projector at the time.

Eventually a piano player was added to the theater with a book of "Fakes" music to play perscribed moods, emotions, and motions.

Constantine would be a cool movie to sync to i think - great imagery

I was watching "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and kept feeling like I recognized Grandpa Joe. Then it hit me. Grandpa Joe is one of the lead characters in "Waking Ned Devine".

"Waking Ned Devine" is a good easy movie. My wife and I laughed alot with the jokes they play. I think I look alot like Grandpa Joe. He is a good looker, ay.

Follow the link, you will be there in a wink

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0166396/

"Christmas on Mars" by the Flaming Lips. I wonder if they will match the movie to already existing music or they wrote music with the movie in mind? I wonder if they will be brave enough to use other artists music too like Michael Jacksons' "Thriller"? Follow the link wink

http://www.flaminglips.com/content/film/

I was listening to a beatles song and remembered that their "The Beatles' Yellow Submarine" was synched to music.

There seemed to be two animator teams. One very creative team to animate the main story. Another unimaginitive dolt to animate the song sequences.

For instance, Synching "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" the chose dancing women, a dancing lady with stars covering her nipples, and a horse, all which change colors (why a horse?). They can do ANYTHING with animation. Yet no rocking horse people or flowers increadibly high. No psychodelia. Yet the scenery before and after the synch sequence was fantastic and bizzarre.

They also had many fantastic song to chooe=se from and they chose these? The Beatles have better songs.

I was sadly disappointed considering I have fond memories of it from when it was released in the theaters. Times change.

I did see precursers to the "Fantastic Planet" in the main animation. Strange landscape and bizzarro beasts. Great sound effects.

I did like the No Where Man and his phrases like, "causing the causation of causality".

And the Beatles saying there is only one way to exit. And that is to go out singing. Rock on!

I was a big fan of Gumby and Pokey cartoons. I always dreamed of doing my own stop action cartoon with my clay set. Stop action hit the big time with "Rudolf the Red Nose Raindeer" and I was blow away by the "Mad Monster Party" in the theaters. I used to recognize all the personnas used for the monsters.

Back in the 80's and early 90's I saw stop action making a comebback in short animation festivals. I remeber one from Germany oddly reminiscent of "The Nighmare Before Christmas". There were 4 or 5 stick men stuck on a floating square platform. Jack from "TNBC" looked looked like these figures. long tall and thin. These figures discovered a box on their platform in the sky but they had to cooperate to balance the platform to get to the box. Notice how long the cooperation lasted and the balance was tipped. It was very clever. I wish I remember which year and festival it was from.

I should start synching to "The Nighmare Before Christmas" since it is so cool. Or maybe even the "Mad Monster Party".