BBC NEWS Scotland Low-flying bomber disperses mob
Can we have these to deal with the local neds?
Please?
Sunday, March 19, 2006
Saturday, March 18, 2006
"South Park" battle over Scientology heats up - Yahoo! News UK
"South Park" battle over Scientology heats up - Yahoo! News UK
A storm in a teacup or a symptom of the increase in religious fundamentalism and intolerance?
It seems to me that Isaac Hayes was happy enough to lampoon religion as long as it wasn't his religion which was the butt of the joke.
Did TC use his influence to get the show pulled? I don't know and I'm tempted to say I don't care, but that would be a bad attitude to take to this isue. Why? Because, if true, it is another example of a network censoring their output die to pressure froma minority and that is becomong a big problem.
Other religions - especially minority ones for whom such a stushie can give world-wide exposure - have seen the influence over the media that Islam has gained through the intolerance and threats and they want the same 'respect'. That favourite phrase of the politician, the slippery slope is particularly apt here and the appeasement of Islamic fundamentalists was the top of it. We've come a long way from the days of the Inquisition. Religious fanatics want to see us return to it and we mustn't let it happen.
A storm in a teacup or a symptom of the increase in religious fundamentalism and intolerance?
It seems to me that Isaac Hayes was happy enough to lampoon religion as long as it wasn't his religion which was the butt of the joke.
Did TC use his influence to get the show pulled? I don't know and I'm tempted to say I don't care, but that would be a bad attitude to take to this isue. Why? Because, if true, it is another example of a network censoring their output die to pressure froma minority and that is becomong a big problem.
Other religions - especially minority ones for whom such a stushie can give world-wide exposure - have seen the influence over the media that Islam has gained through the intolerance and threats and they want the same 'respect'. That favourite phrase of the politician, the slippery slope is particularly apt here and the appeasement of Islamic fundamentalists was the top of it. We've come a long way from the days of the Inquisition. Religious fanatics want to see us return to it and we mustn't let it happen.
Thursday, March 16, 2006
Theaters may ask to jam cell phones - Yahoo! News
Theaters may ask to jam cell phones - Yahoo! News
And about time, too if you ask me. Though I do recall a previous attempt to do this being blocked over concerns of the jammers interfering with the operation of pacemakers. Maybe they've found a way around that.
Maybe the faulty ticker brigade are just going to have to take one for the team and stick to DVDs.
And about time, too if you ask me. Though I do recall a previous attempt to do this being blocked over concerns of the jammers interfering with the operation of pacemakers. Maybe they've found a way around that.
Maybe the faulty ticker brigade are just going to have to take one for the team and stick to DVDs.
Wednesday, March 15, 2006
Review V for Vendetta
Review: V for Vendetta
I find myself in disagreement with Jonathan Ross more and more often these days. I used t find that our tastes pretty much coincided on films. Much more so that I did with his predecessor, Barry Norman. So when he was so viciously scathing about this film I very nearly decided not to bother going to the press screening.
How glad I was that I decided to make up my own mind.
I found this to be a thoroughly enjoyable couple of hours. It has more depth than the average comic-book story and its ambiguous politics and morals appeal to me much more than the usual squeaky-clean superhero flick. The action scenes are generally well-paced and appropriate to the piece and have not succumbed to the temptation of going overboard just because it can be done. Since I’d heard that Alan Moore had his name removed from the credits I even went off and read his graphic novel before I wrote the review. I don’t really see what his problem is with it.
Unless it’s that, in some ways, the film’s better…?
Not wildly or completely better, you understand, but there are distinct improvements in plotting, tension and just being able to follow who’s who. Because of the way a large part of the film-going audience are presumed to be by studios (i.e. stupid) it has a clearer villain and a more satisfying dénouement. The bad guys are badder and the good not quite so grey. I don’t think anything was gained in the GN by having the police inspector take drugs and end up a tramp. I thought Evey taking on the mask was good in the GN, but probably better not done in the film as it would probably have seemed more clichéd there. I was offended by the awful attempt at representing a Scots accent and more-so by having all the tramps in the GN being given one.
The acting is excellent, especially from the estimable Mr Weaving who not only carries off being masked throughout the entire film, but shows a surprising subtlety and breadth of emotion whilst being deprived of all the tools actors mostly rely upon. Like C-3PO and Darth Vader’s masks before it, V’s mask with its fixed expression is a masterpiece of the sculptor’s art. The mind wants to see more, so the bland expression can be interpreted in many ways by the viewer’s imagination, but this in no way detracts from what the actor has added to it.
There are, however, some problems.
I’m afraid that Natalie Portman’s accent is a little weird for someone who has supposedly never left London. Seems to veer into Australian rather frequently, and Stephen Rea lets his Irish brogue drift in from time-to-time as well. Now, they do make a comment about his mother being Irish, but the point is that it’s his mother who was. Not him, and he wasn’t brought up there. Of course, due to the American influence on the film there is no comprehension of the difference between British and the nationalities which make up the discrete groups who comprise it. Hence all the references, apart from that one about Rea’s mother, to the relationship between England and the other nations of the United Kingdom have been excised. This leads to that awful use of ‘England’ when ‘Britain’ is meant and vice-versa.
Whilst the fights are good and V is shown to be thoroughly skilled, but not super-powered, there are a few problems. Especially in the seeming ability of bladed weapons to penetrate anti-stab vests. I don’t know why the police bother to wear them in this film as it seems even a thrown knife will cut through them as easily as a cotton t-shirt.
Steven Fry’s character is an excellent invention, drawing comparisons to those who helped the targets of the Nazis to hide during WWII and showing that even in such an oppressive police state with deeply intrusive powers (just like Tony & his cronies seem to want in real life) people will still try to do good things. One does rather wonder, though, how he got his seditious programme made and transmitted. John Hurt is, as always masterful and it I extremely weird for anyone who enjoyed his performance in 1984 to see him playing a very Big Brother-ish character.
Neither this film with its pat ending or the Graphic Novel with its ambiguous finale are perfect. Both serve the tale well for their particular medium, though and V for Vendetta is a more than acceptable way to pass a little time. If either can provoke some debate or even a doubt in some minds about the current use of the politics of fear and our government’s erosion of civil liberties even better, for both do so without the liberal partisanship of the likes of The Road to Guantanamo.
PS Why is it that trailer-editors are so keen to give away the end of a film? If you watch any trailer for this film you will realise very quickly that you have seen V’s objective reached before you got into the cinema. Moving this objective gave the film a more concrete objective than that of the GN and leaving it to Miss Portman’s character to decide what to do is a better story choice than in the original but any tension about whether or not she’ll do it is ruined by the trailer which delights in showing the target explode. Alright, it’s not really in too much doubt because we all want the satisfying bang and the whole film builds up to it, but there are other explosions in the film, other equally dramatic shots, so why not use them instead of giving the game away?
I find myself in disagreement with Jonathan Ross more and more often these days. I used t find that our tastes pretty much coincided on films. Much more so that I did with his predecessor, Barry Norman. So when he was so viciously scathing about this film I very nearly decided not to bother going to the press screening.
How glad I was that I decided to make up my own mind.
I found this to be a thoroughly enjoyable couple of hours. It has more depth than the average comic-book story and its ambiguous politics and morals appeal to me much more than the usual squeaky-clean superhero flick. The action scenes are generally well-paced and appropriate to the piece and have not succumbed to the temptation of going overboard just because it can be done. Since I’d heard that Alan Moore had his name removed from the credits I even went off and read his graphic novel before I wrote the review. I don’t really see what his problem is with it.
Unless it’s that, in some ways, the film’s better…?
Not wildly or completely better, you understand, but there are distinct improvements in plotting, tension and just being able to follow who’s who. Because of the way a large part of the film-going audience are presumed to be by studios (i.e. stupid) it has a clearer villain and a more satisfying dénouement. The bad guys are badder and the good not quite so grey. I don’t think anything was gained in the GN by having the police inspector take drugs and end up a tramp. I thought Evey taking on the mask was good in the GN, but probably better not done in the film as it would probably have seemed more clichéd there. I was offended by the awful attempt at representing a Scots accent and more-so by having all the tramps in the GN being given one.
The acting is excellent, especially from the estimable Mr Weaving who not only carries off being masked throughout the entire film, but shows a surprising subtlety and breadth of emotion whilst being deprived of all the tools actors mostly rely upon. Like C-3PO and Darth Vader’s masks before it, V’s mask with its fixed expression is a masterpiece of the sculptor’s art. The mind wants to see more, so the bland expression can be interpreted in many ways by the viewer’s imagination, but this in no way detracts from what the actor has added to it.
There are, however, some problems.
I’m afraid that Natalie Portman’s accent is a little weird for someone who has supposedly never left London. Seems to veer into Australian rather frequently, and Stephen Rea lets his Irish brogue drift in from time-to-time as well. Now, they do make a comment about his mother being Irish, but the point is that it’s his mother who was. Not him, and he wasn’t brought up there. Of course, due to the American influence on the film there is no comprehension of the difference between British and the nationalities which make up the discrete groups who comprise it. Hence all the references, apart from that one about Rea’s mother, to the relationship between England and the other nations of the United Kingdom have been excised. This leads to that awful use of ‘England’ when ‘Britain’ is meant and vice-versa.
Whilst the fights are good and V is shown to be thoroughly skilled, but not super-powered, there are a few problems. Especially in the seeming ability of bladed weapons to penetrate anti-stab vests. I don’t know why the police bother to wear them in this film as it seems even a thrown knife will cut through them as easily as a cotton t-shirt.
Steven Fry’s character is an excellent invention, drawing comparisons to those who helped the targets of the Nazis to hide during WWII and showing that even in such an oppressive police state with deeply intrusive powers (just like Tony & his cronies seem to want in real life) people will still try to do good things. One does rather wonder, though, how he got his seditious programme made and transmitted. John Hurt is, as always masterful and it I extremely weird for anyone who enjoyed his performance in 1984 to see him playing a very Big Brother-ish character.
Neither this film with its pat ending or the Graphic Novel with its ambiguous finale are perfect. Both serve the tale well for their particular medium, though and V for Vendetta is a more than acceptable way to pass a little time. If either can provoke some debate or even a doubt in some minds about the current use of the politics of fear and our government’s erosion of civil liberties even better, for both do so without the liberal partisanship of the likes of The Road to Guantanamo.
PS Why is it that trailer-editors are so keen to give away the end of a film? If you watch any trailer for this film you will realise very quickly that you have seen V’s objective reached before you got into the cinema. Moving this objective gave the film a more concrete objective than that of the GN and leaving it to Miss Portman’s character to decide what to do is a better story choice than in the original but any tension about whether or not she’ll do it is ruined by the trailer which delights in showing the target explode. Alright, it’s not really in too much doubt because we all want the satisfying bang and the whole film builds up to it, but there are other explosions in the film, other equally dramatic shots, so why not use them instead of giving the game away?
Who Wants HD/Digital?
Who Wants HD & Digital TV?
. I could hardly be called a Luddite as I truly love my gadgets (Except when they all seem to conspire to screw up my life, that is), so to find myself actually being against advances is something of a novelty for me.
Last night’s Gadget Show on Channel Five really got me thinking about the so-called digital revolution. I mean, who really wants it? You see, they did a group test of some HD-ready tellies and the best comment that the presenters could come up with when talking about the winner was that they ‘…could live with…’ its picture. Hardly a glowing recommendation, really. It seems that, although only plasma and LCD screens are going to be HD-TV compatible neither is actually up to the job.
As for the programming we’re going to get do we actually want it? Yes, it’s nice to have access to sport if you’re into it, or movies on demand. I could possibly be persuaded to watch the Sci-Fi channel, but experience has shown that more channels simply generate more crap. And cheap crap at that. I have this pet theory that, as society has become more insular, many have switched to soaps as being their actual contact with other people. As we have progressively less contact with our neighbours and our families many of us adopt the soaps as a sort of surrogate. They’re who we gossip about, worry about and relate to, to the extent that many viewers seem to be unable to distinguish actors from characters. The stories some of my friends tell about having to deal with idiots who take them to task about their character’s behaviour are legion, and many of them are in ways and at times which most decent people wouldn’t even think of doing to their real families! So there’s no advantage to us in that, really. Plus, previously what kept many of us in conversation were shared events on TV. Look at how many tuned in to Dallas to see JR get shot and ho big an event that was. There’s nothing – and I include the execrable Big Brother in this –that compares. Telly was, believe it or not, one of the few remaining social glues in Western society. Multi-channel TV viewing patterns make the likes of that impossible already. Why would we want even more?
Speaking of digital, the analogue switch-off is being forced on us with no apparent consultation, at huge cost and is, in the UK being extensively funded by the TV licence. It doesn’t even work particularly well yet and the signal coverage is pants with no extra transmitters being planned. So, again; why? Who really wants all these things?
They’re even putting TV onto phones now. Or beginning to. I think that once they start pursuing people for a TV Licence for their phone that route will be killed stone dead. Who in their right mind is going to pay for another licence – because your home licence doesn’t seem to cover you – just to watch slowly-loaded clips on a 2” screen?
. I could hardly be called a Luddite as I truly love my gadgets (Except when they all seem to conspire to screw up my life, that is), so to find myself actually being against advances is something of a novelty for me.
Last night’s Gadget Show on Channel Five really got me thinking about the so-called digital revolution. I mean, who really wants it? You see, they did a group test of some HD-ready tellies and the best comment that the presenters could come up with when talking about the winner was that they ‘…could live with…’ its picture. Hardly a glowing recommendation, really. It seems that, although only plasma and LCD screens are going to be HD-TV compatible neither is actually up to the job.
As for the programming we’re going to get do we actually want it? Yes, it’s nice to have access to sport if you’re into it, or movies on demand. I could possibly be persuaded to watch the Sci-Fi channel, but experience has shown that more channels simply generate more crap. And cheap crap at that. I have this pet theory that, as society has become more insular, many have switched to soaps as being their actual contact with other people. As we have progressively less contact with our neighbours and our families many of us adopt the soaps as a sort of surrogate. They’re who we gossip about, worry about and relate to, to the extent that many viewers seem to be unable to distinguish actors from characters. The stories some of my friends tell about having to deal with idiots who take them to task about their character’s behaviour are legion, and many of them are in ways and at times which most decent people wouldn’t even think of doing to their real families! So there’s no advantage to us in that, really. Plus, previously what kept many of us in conversation were shared events on TV. Look at how many tuned in to Dallas to see JR get shot and ho big an event that was. There’s nothing – and I include the execrable Big Brother in this –that compares. Telly was, believe it or not, one of the few remaining social glues in Western society. Multi-channel TV viewing patterns make the likes of that impossible already. Why would we want even more?
Speaking of digital, the analogue switch-off is being forced on us with no apparent consultation, at huge cost and is, in the UK being extensively funded by the TV licence. It doesn’t even work particularly well yet and the signal coverage is pants with no extra transmitters being planned. So, again; why? Who really wants all these things?
They’re even putting TV onto phones now. Or beginning to. I think that once they start pursuing people for a TV Licence for their phone that route will be killed stone dead. Who in their right mind is going to pay for another licence – because your home licence doesn’t seem to cover you – just to watch slowly-loaded clips on a 2” screen?
Seeking Ancient Thrills
Seeking Ancient Thrills
As I was watching this evening’s programme about ‘shocking art’ I was struck by how much it seemed that some of the participants were clearly tuning into some ancient way of testing and challenging themselves. Especially those who were involved in the ‘suspension’ parts of the show.
Clearly there were those who were expressing a fetish for pain and this was really the way that Channel Four has been advertising the programme. A heavy focus on the more fetishistic aspects and the shock aspects in the advertising for the show clearly seem to be attempting to appeal to the prurient tastes of the audience.
Yet I was left thinking about those who were basically following ancient tribal rites about pain and self-testing, those rites of passage which seem barbaric and pointless to most of us seem to be stimulating a growing section of the modern, western populace. Are we so devoid of ways to challenge and confront ourselves that we are looking into our primitive past for ways to do so? In an increasingly nannying state we have seen the rise of so-called extreme sports and generally silly practices like bungee jumping. Base-jumping, free-running and so on all seem to me to be expressions of a need to challenge ourselves and our environment and that so many of these activities are at least frowned upon makes them all the more thrilling to their participants.
I’m doing some fight directing later in the week for a major TV series. The ‘fight’ is, as they are in many UK dramas, so brief and minor as to be a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it affair. In fact, I think my presence for it is almost entirely pointless and is costing the production money just to shut up insurers. Insurance and risk-assessment is making everyday life almost impossible. I have to do a risk assessment for pulling someone around and having them flinch back and pretend to hit their head on a wall and by the time I’ve worked out every possible – but extremely unlikely – eventuality and made the actors aware of them, I’ll have them so scared that they’ll likely be very awkward when it comes time to perform the action. In this state they’ll be more rather than less likely to have an accident and will respond to minor pain stimuli in a more extreme way than they would otherwise, because they’re anticipating it and will therefore subconsciously add to any minor impact they feel. All of which adds to the difficulty of my job, their job and all the crew’s jobs because it will be more difficult to get anything done quickly. And all because of insurance. Not that I should complain; if the insurers weren’t like this I’d get a lot less work, though what I would get would be more interesting.
Glasgow Libraries are introducing free wireless connection to the ‘net at all libraries. So far only three are capable of it and I tried to use one last week. I couldn’t because the council’s health & safety bods had been around and had covered up all the power sockets because they were worried about people plugging in untested electrical equipment. Seems we just might blow up the whole library or something. Now apart from the fact that the tests an item would be subjected to to be cleared by this body for use are the same ones that the manufacturers use before they leave the plant is one thing, but do they really think that there is any way on this earth that people will send off the power supplies for their computers to be tested by the council before they can be used? Of course they won’t, so a great initiative will be strangled at birth by a foolish interpretation of a regulation.
There are already ‘organisations’ in America pressuring for legislation to ‘protect’ people from using their own bodies in this way. For ‘protect’ read ‘prevent’ and you’ll get what’s really on their mind. It’s that whole thing of not understanding it, so it must be bad, so we’d better ban it. I don’t feel the need to hang myself from a meat hook to make myself feel alive. I think that the people cutting themselves in front of audiences and calling it ‘art’ are self-deluding, pretentious and essentially un-talented. But it’s their choice to do so and the choice of their audience to chose to view it and to take from it what they will. It is not the place of the government, the council or some right-wing prude hiding behind protecting children to impose their views on them.
Human beings need challenge. We need to find a way to make us feel alive and if regressing to some ritual from our tribal past does that for some of us then who are the rest of us to say it’s wrong?
As I was watching this evening’s programme about ‘shocking art’ I was struck by how much it seemed that some of the participants were clearly tuning into some ancient way of testing and challenging themselves. Especially those who were involved in the ‘suspension’ parts of the show.
Clearly there were those who were expressing a fetish for pain and this was really the way that Channel Four has been advertising the programme. A heavy focus on the more fetishistic aspects and the shock aspects in the advertising for the show clearly seem to be attempting to appeal to the prurient tastes of the audience.
Yet I was left thinking about those who were basically following ancient tribal rites about pain and self-testing, those rites of passage which seem barbaric and pointless to most of us seem to be stimulating a growing section of the modern, western populace. Are we so devoid of ways to challenge and confront ourselves that we are looking into our primitive past for ways to do so? In an increasingly nannying state we have seen the rise of so-called extreme sports and generally silly practices like bungee jumping. Base-jumping, free-running and so on all seem to me to be expressions of a need to challenge ourselves and our environment and that so many of these activities are at least frowned upon makes them all the more thrilling to their participants.
I’m doing some fight directing later in the week for a major TV series. The ‘fight’ is, as they are in many UK dramas, so brief and minor as to be a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it affair. In fact, I think my presence for it is almost entirely pointless and is costing the production money just to shut up insurers. Insurance and risk-assessment is making everyday life almost impossible. I have to do a risk assessment for pulling someone around and having them flinch back and pretend to hit their head on a wall and by the time I’ve worked out every possible – but extremely unlikely – eventuality and made the actors aware of them, I’ll have them so scared that they’ll likely be very awkward when it comes time to perform the action. In this state they’ll be more rather than less likely to have an accident and will respond to minor pain stimuli in a more extreme way than they would otherwise, because they’re anticipating it and will therefore subconsciously add to any minor impact they feel. All of which adds to the difficulty of my job, their job and all the crew’s jobs because it will be more difficult to get anything done quickly. And all because of insurance. Not that I should complain; if the insurers weren’t like this I’d get a lot less work, though what I would get would be more interesting.
Glasgow Libraries are introducing free wireless connection to the ‘net at all libraries. So far only three are capable of it and I tried to use one last week. I couldn’t because the council’s health & safety bods had been around and had covered up all the power sockets because they were worried about people plugging in untested electrical equipment. Seems we just might blow up the whole library or something. Now apart from the fact that the tests an item would be subjected to to be cleared by this body for use are the same ones that the manufacturers use before they leave the plant is one thing, but do they really think that there is any way on this earth that people will send off the power supplies for their computers to be tested by the council before they can be used? Of course they won’t, so a great initiative will be strangled at birth by a foolish interpretation of a regulation.
There are already ‘organisations’ in America pressuring for legislation to ‘protect’ people from using their own bodies in this way. For ‘protect’ read ‘prevent’ and you’ll get what’s really on their mind. It’s that whole thing of not understanding it, so it must be bad, so we’d better ban it. I don’t feel the need to hang myself from a meat hook to make myself feel alive. I think that the people cutting themselves in front of audiences and calling it ‘art’ are self-deluding, pretentious and essentially un-talented. But it’s their choice to do so and the choice of their audience to chose to view it and to take from it what they will. It is not the place of the government, the council or some right-wing prude hiding behind protecting children to impose their views on them.
Human beings need challenge. We need to find a way to make us feel alive and if regressing to some ritual from our tribal past does that for some of us then who are the rest of us to say it’s wrong?
Monday, March 13, 2006
If It Were You or I
If It Were You or I We’d be Arrested
Sir Ian Blair is fast becoming as big a joke as Dubya. He certainly seems to make about as many gaffes.
Problem is that this guy’s in charge of the Metropolitan Police. From his cack-handed response to the shooting of Mr Menezes, through to the outrageously insensitive comments about the murders of Jessica Simpson and Holly Wells (not to mention the inept and inadequate apology for it) he’s given us all much to ponder. Not least about how someone so apparently self-seeking and incompetent managed to get the job in the first place.
He’s recently been caught out recording conversations with the Lord Advocate and others. Now, apart from the level of mistrust and paranoia that shows which is worrying enough in someone holding his position and would seem to indicate that he holds the Lord Advocate to be on a par with terrorists. After all, it’s to catch terrorists that he wants the right to tap our phones with impunity and without a warrant. If he’s already doing bugging his political masters, then it seems likely that he’ll have no compunction doing so to the rest of us.
Correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t secretly recording a telephone conversation a criminal offence? My answering machine can do it, but in the manual it quite clearly states that you are required to inform the other person that you are doing so and it beeps every 15 seconds to remind them that it is being done. Now that Sir Ian has been caught doing so and has admitted it publicly, shouldn’t he be getting charged?
Sir Ian Blair is fast becoming as big a joke as Dubya. He certainly seems to make about as many gaffes.
Problem is that this guy’s in charge of the Metropolitan Police. From his cack-handed response to the shooting of Mr Menezes, through to the outrageously insensitive comments about the murders of Jessica Simpson and Holly Wells (not to mention the inept and inadequate apology for it) he’s given us all much to ponder. Not least about how someone so apparently self-seeking and incompetent managed to get the job in the first place.
He’s recently been caught out recording conversations with the Lord Advocate and others. Now, apart from the level of mistrust and paranoia that shows which is worrying enough in someone holding his position and would seem to indicate that he holds the Lord Advocate to be on a par with terrorists. After all, it’s to catch terrorists that he wants the right to tap our phones with impunity and without a warrant. If he’s already doing bugging his political masters, then it seems likely that he’ll have no compunction doing so to the rest of us.
Correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t secretly recording a telephone conversation a criminal offence? My answering machine can do it, but in the manual it quite clearly states that you are required to inform the other person that you are doing so and it beeps every 15 seconds to remind them that it is being done. Now that Sir Ian has been caught doing so and has admitted it publicly, shouldn’t he be getting charged?
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