Showing all posts tagged: entertainment

Australian high school drama Heartbreak High returns for third series

13 November 2024

The third — and it seems, final — series of Heartbreak High, in the second inception of the gritty Australian high-school TV drama, is on the way. Set at the fictional Hartley High, in Sydney, Heartbreak High originally screened between 1994 and 1999.

A rebooted version of the show debuted in 2022. Series one of the reboot was well received all around, and garnered a one-hundred percent Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer rating. Series two, while popular with audiences, did not however do so well critically.

The original nineties show was considered ground-breaking (read: in your face), and as I wrote before, Heartbreak High made my high-school days seem like a non-event…

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Star Bores: A Few Cope, as fourth Star Wars trilogy announced

11 November 2024

For years I was excited by the prospect of a Star Wars sequel trilogy. This, long before what became episodes seven through nine, were even announced. I used to burn the midnight oil reading fan-written Star Wars EU plots and stories, that were published on various Star Wars forums and wikis.

But all three films, when they were eventually released, were underwhelming. The Last Jedi, the only one I remotely liked, seemed to be hated by just about everyone else. But I think the Disney produced sequel trilogy, made after series creator George Lucas had sold Disney the franchise, was hamstrung by the expectations of EU storylines, some of which were decades old by that stage.

Of course, the EU stories were not canon, or official, and differed considerably — to say the least — from Lucas’ vision of a third trilogy. Nonetheless, they prominently featured many of the Star Wars characters we knew and loved, as they struggled to build the New Republic. When the first sequel trilogy film, The Force Awakens (the very title was a portent of things to come…) arrived, we all expected to see the old gang back together again. Luke, Leia, Han Solo, Chewbecca, R2D2, C3PO, plus other hangers-on, who’d joined in as the original trilogy progressed.

Instead we had a confusing array of new characters, Han Solo wearing the same bloody clothes from twenty-years earlier, and director J.J. Abrams, borrowing heavily from Episode Four, A New Hope. I thought to myself: I have a bad feeling about this. Abrams that is, having seen him in action in the re-booted Star Trek films. I knew it was over there the moment Star Trek villain Khan (re)entered the frame in Star Trek into Darkness.

Now a fourth trilogy is apparently in the works. Where this story goes, or who exactly is involved, remains to be seen at this stage. Naturally the Star Wars name will get people along to the cinema to see whatever eventuates, but I wonder what interest this new trilogy will have to early Star Wars fans.

Despite the cameo appearances by the likes of Luke, Leia, Han Solo, et el, episodes seven to nine, did not feel like Star Wars stories. They were a galaxy removed from the earlier instalments, and the magic of the Lucas made films, present even in the prequel trilogy, was nowhere to be found.

But we can live in hope. Dare I say: new hope. After all, Disney has access to some great writing talent, perhaps something amazing is on the way. Until then, may the fourth trilogy be with you…

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Great movie title drops are like clever cameo appearances

8 November 2024

Title Drops, by Germany based data visualisation designer and developer Dominikus Baur, analyses the number of times a movie’s title is mentioned during the story.

It’s something that’s not always possible though. I’m looking at 2001: A Space Odyssey, as an example. Although if you can think of a way it could, somehow, happen, let me know. Time-travel classic Back to the Future, however, is, I think, the gold-standard when it comes to title drops.

I’m not sure movies named for a main character, Barbie for instance, really count. It’s surely a given their name will come into the conversation sooner or later. But something like: “next Saturday night, we’re sending you back to the future“, is self-referential in both a smart, and funny, way.

One thing that seems apparent form the data here is that title drops are becoming more frequent.

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Playing Tetris may ease post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms

24 September 2024

Sara E. Teller, writing for Legal Reader:

The research, published in BMC Medicine, focuses on the use of video games, particularly the well-known Tetris game that has been around for decades, to help reduce intrusive memories, a core and sometimes debilitating symptom of the condition.

Invented in 1984 by Alexey Pajitnov, Tetris is a straightforward yet fun, video game. Anything that can help PTSD survivors, in any way, has to be a good thing.

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A short film shot on the iPhone 15 Pro Max, with no lens, filter, or AI

3 September 2024

Well, I’m sure pretty no AI is involved.

What’s really incredible about this three minute video, made by Faruk Korkmaz, is that it was filmed entirely by a device, a smartphone, many of us carry in our pockets.

The narration is fitting also. It comes from a speech given by Canadian-American actor and comedian Jim Carrey, for the 2014 graduating class at Maharishi International University. This excerpt seems somehow as relevant today as it was ten years ago:

So many of us choose our path out of fear disguised as practicality. What we really want seems impossibly out of reach and ridiculous to expect. So we never dare to ask the universe for it. I’m saying I’m the proof that you can ask the universe for it.

Talking of short films shot on iPhones, take another look at Float, made by Aundre Larrow, about three years ago.

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Oasis regroup, this is not the second coming we were waiting for

30 August 2024

Backbeat, the word is on the street, Oasis, the old nineties Britpop act — that was, in the words of co-founder Noel Gallagher — bigger than the Beatles, is set to play a series of reunion concerts. Honestly, I was more excited when in 2011, the Stone Roses, an even older act, announced they were* getting the band back together after an acrimonious falling out, fifteen years earlier.

This despite the fact I knew next to nothing about them. The Roses were, somehow, possessed of an alluring enigma, which made their reformation all the more intriguing. I can’t say the same for Oasis though, and nor can Ben Coady, writing for The Sydney Morning Herald:

Cool Britannia is over and Britpop is over, lads. In hindsight the Oasis v Blur battle was never a fair fight. Blur’s mid-90 albums stand the test of time — Oasis’ releases are stasis, stuck in amber like a mammoth’s turd.

Aye, spoken a like true Gallagher. I did see Noasis, an Australian based Oasis tribute/satire band perform locally once. They were good. But I won’t be amongst those waiting with baited breath to see Oasis when they take to the stage again.

* the Stone Roses had disbanded again as of 2019.

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Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, return for Devil Wears Prada sequel

12 July 2024

Well, this will be something. A sequel is in the works for The Devil Wears Prada. By the time it is released, assuming production starts sooner rather than later, the follow-up will pick-up almost twenty-years after events of the original film. That’s a long time in the fashion world.

So far, Meryl Streep — as Miranda Priestly — and Emily Blunt — as Emily Charlton — have indicated interest in reprising their roles, but Anne Hathaway remains unsure about returning as Andy Sachs. An early outline of the storyline suggests Priestly will face off against a now successful Charlton.

We can only wait to see how Sachs fits into that dynamic, should Hathaway decide to be involved.

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The Tetris font, fun and games with typography

28 June 2024

Is there a version of Tetris that requires the player to try and spell words with the Tetris pieces, as they fall from the sky? If there is, I’ve not heard of it. But, that’s not saying much, as I don’t know a whole lot about gaming.

Anyway, Tetris Font, developed by Erik Demaine and Martin Demaine, may not be quite such a game, but you can still have fun typing in a word or name, and watching it take shape with the Tetris pieces.

There goes the morning…

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A book about ferns: the truth of the three-hour Gilligan’s Island cruise

24 June 2024

Gilligan’s Island was a slapstick American TV series that ran from 1964 to 1967. Despite its popularity, the show was cancelled shortly before filming of a fourth series commenced. I first saw reruns of Gilligan’s quite some time later. A number of movies, featuring most of the original cast, were made between 1978 and 1982. For all its goofiness, and ludicrously fanciful storyline, the show’s appeal has not waned, since production ceased over forty years ago.

Much of the allure lay in the way a group of mismatched passengers and crew were forced to get along after being marooned on an unchartered island, somewhere in the vicinity of the Hawaiian Islands. Among them were the wealthy and the working class, the chic and the collegiate. Most of the laughs were generated by the titular character, Gilligan, the well-meaning though bungling first mate, of the shipwrecked charter vessel, that all had been aboard.

But the premise of Gilligan’s Island, about seven people setting off on what was meant to be three-hour cruise, has been a constant source of speculation. And conspiracy theories. For instance, why was the millionaire, Thurston Howell III, carrying a briefcase full of cash? Further, why did he board the charter vessel with dozens of suitcases of clothing? And what of the professor? Why on earth was he on a fun cruise with a cache of scientific paraphernalia?

I wrote about this topic in 2008, after reading an in-depth exposé by Gilligan’s fan, and writer, Adam-Troy Castro, published on the no longer online SFF Net website. I’m glad I posted a number of excerpts from Castro’s article, in my piece, as they may be all that’s left of the original article.

But, long story short, no one aboard the S.S. Minnow, the shipwrecked charter boat, was out on any three-hour cruise. Howell wanted to cross into international waters, and make a big drug buy. That explains the cash he was carrying. The professor meanwhile, had brought analysis equipment with him, so he could check the contraband was the real deal. Everyone else on the Minnow had their not so wholesome reasons for being there.

Although my post is sixteen-years old, it still comes up in search engines results, which says a lot about the enduring popularity of Gilligan’s Island, together with the intrigue of the show’s peculiar premise. And then the other day, during my weekly login to Facebook (FB), an article about the professor, posted on the Classic Stars FB page, popped up in my feed. If you’re a fan, it’s well worth a read (and I don’t think you need to be a FB member), but this is possibly the most salient sentence:

The Professor’s backstory identifies him as Roy Hinkley (though his actual name is rarely mentioned during the series), a high-school science teacher who was born in Cleveland, Ohio. His principal expertise was as a botanist, whose purpose in joining the ill-fated voyage that stranded the castaways was to write a book to be titled “Fun With Ferns”.

So there we have it. The professor was not on board the charter vessel so he could test the authenticity of goods Howell was allegedly buying, somewhere on the open sea. The great big mystery can finally be laid to rest. The professor was there researching a book about ferns. Plants, not illicit drugs. Nor was anyone else, therefore, up to no good.

Maybe.

How though does going on a three-hour cruise, where nary a fern is to be seen, with an excess of laboratory equipment no less, help in the writing of such a book? Oh no: we’re by no means anywhere near getting to the bottom of what was really happening on this “three-hour cruise”…

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Can you use Vison Pro in a group or social setting?

14 June 2024

Or when snuggled up on the sofa, say watching a movie, with your better half?

I feel isolated when watching media, and it’s also much harder to snack and get cozy.

This is a point — raised by Hacker News/Y Combinator member archagon — and is not something I’d thought of, in regards to the whole process of using mixed-reality headsets. Since I don’t do this — use devices like Vision Pro — all that often, I wouldn’t know what this sort of experience might be like.

But maybe I’d put the headset aside, at such a time.

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