Aug
2009

Paul McCartney

categories: Music

I wrote up this really great post about the concert and every that happened, but Vox is a bitch and ate the damn thing when I accidentally clicked on a picture I had inserted. 

The concert was good but now I’m not in a mood to write about it again.  I had fun. There you go.

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As you can see from the next post I decided to write about the concert again.  While it’s not exactly what I wrote before, I think it gets the same points across.  I decided to just write, and not try to remember everything I had previously written.  I’m glad I did. 

*smile*

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Jul
2009

Ice Song

categories: Books
icesong.jpg

Ice Song by Kirsten Imani Kasai is the most recent book I’ve finished reading.  I was drawn in by the cover at my local Barnes and Noble, and intrigued by the description on the back of the book.  I put it back on the shelft and sent myself a text so that I might remember to add it to my book wishlist for later.  Dan bought the book he had found and we headed back out to the car, where he then pulled a book out of his bag and handed it to me.  Somehow he had managed to buy me Ice Song, right under my nose with me not being any the wiser.  I loved it!  And I got to read a new book that looked really interesting.  And it was.

Ice Song follows the story of a woman named Sorykah (such a pretty name) and her travails to recover her kidnapped children.  She is unique though, because she is a Trader, someone who can switch genders.  This presents it’s own advantages and disadvantages as she travels in search of the man known as the Collector who has taken her twin babies.  Throughout her journey Sorykah and her alter-ego Soryk, meet all manner of people/creatures who have been affected by something simply known as The Change.  Mixed in with the overall plot there are twines of friendship, romance, lust, passion, jealousy, faith, and simple survival.

The world created is vivid and the characters bring the book to life.  Sometimes I feel it’s hard to find a book or a story that feels new to me, and this one stood out.  The myraid of characters were things my imagination found new and wondrous.  Their stories were all different, and usually touched with sadness.  I felt for all of them, only in different ways. Some characters I did not like at all, some I grew to understand more as their story unfolded and my opinions of them changed.  Some of the characters themselves grew and tried to be better than what they were before.  I find characters who can change, or characters who cause my opinon of them to change to be the most engaging.

Fans of fantasy should definitely check this out.  It’s not the kind of story I am typically drawn to, but it was a good read, and a very enjoyable story.  I was caught up in the life of Soryk/Sorykah, as well as the other characters involved in their epic quest to rescue the babies.

four-star

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Jul
2009

Repo!

categories: Movies
repo.jpgRepo! The Genetic Opera

 

Okay, it’s been a while since I’ve seen this actually, but I didn’t get around to writing about it and decided I wanted to do it now.  Repo! The Genetic Opera is a story about a Repo man and his daughter, and what they go through in a futuristic world where organs are harvested so that any ill can be cured.

It is definitely a movie off of the beaten track, and it’s weird and quirky nature is why I like it.  I was intrigued by the idea of it being a musical and an out there sci-fi/horror-eqsue movie.  It also stars Anthony Stewart Head (Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer), which was easily enough of a reason for me to give it a try.

Overall I felt that it was a well done movie and it had several plotlines that worked together to forward the major plot and unwind the story.  The singing was also well done, and worked into the movie’s natural dialogue quite well, although some of it did bother me.  There were parts where the dialogue and singing mixed and that was a little offputting.  It just didn’t flow very well to me.

This is a very weird movie, and not one to just watch on a whim.  Or maybe it’s exactly that.  Dan and I had a hard time trying to find a night to watch this, because we just weren’t in the mood for something we knew was going to be weird and kind of wacky.  So we simply picked a night and decided that we were watching it and that was that.  I think with this kind of movie you either do like Dan and I did or you simply grab it and go for it.  It’s not a movie to wait around for the “right mood”  because I don’t think it exists.

If you like quirky offbeat musicals that also have lots of blood and guts, and organs in it, I say go for it!

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Jun
2009

Resident Evil: Extinction

categories: Movies

I like the first two Resident Evil movies quite a bit.  I really like Milla Jovovich as an actress.  I really wish I hadn’t bothered watching this movie.  Such a disappointment.  Anyhow, I took some notes as I was watching, and I’ll share them with you now.

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I was confused by the beginning of the movie.  I couldn’t figure out why they were replaying the first movie.  Then I thought that it was probably a dream sequence.  And there there was a pit of dead Milla Jovovich’s and a bunch of zombies.  Nice. 

Hicks and zombie dogs.  Nice.

The zombies eating people is just a little gratuitous in this movie.  Bleh.

And now Alice has telekinesis.  And little Red Queen doesn’t look nearly as cool anymore. She’s way too sweet looking.  The red holograph was a lot better.

And now it’s the birds.  If you can’t tell I’m not overly impressed so far. 

Is there an actual plot in here somewhere?

Milla is a superwoman.  Wheee!  She has awesome mind power abilities.  Un-huh.  Yeah.  Right.

Of course there were zombies in Vegas…..and they’re still fighting them….and still fighting them.

*sigh*  I didn’t think this movie would be this bad.

He has tentacles.  Why the hell does he have tentacles?

And now Milla/Alice is on the hunt for the big bad.

Great – Mutant Zombie is all mind-powerful too. 

I’m still wondering, where’s the plot?

And Alice #2 saves the day!  Or at least saves Alice #1.  Although #2 is probably really like #50 or something since there’s a bunch of them in a ditch.

Wheee!  A whole army of Milla-Alice’s!  That makes perfect sense for the end of this movie.

I’m glad I netflixed this and didn’t buy it based on my liking the first two movies.

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So those were my thoughts as I watched the movie. I didn’t pay a whole lot of attention to it, as I was also playing Eggbreaker on Facebook.  I think Eggbreaker was more interesting.  I think I’ll just pretend this one doesn’t exist. 

None of the new characters were very well done. Actually none of the characters were very well done. None of them had a purpose, there was no real story in there except that they had to avoid zombies.  That was it. And they didn’t do it very well. 

They could have taken the new abilities that Alice had and explained them better, then used them to better advantage. Some of the stuff there was kind of cool, like her shorting out the circuit in the satellite. Very far fetched, but kind of neat.  Only they just threw these abilities out there and didn’t really do anything with them.  They just wanted to make her look cool I guess.  It didn’t add to the story, there was no reason why she suddenly had mind powers.  The only time they actually worked was when she shielded Carlos from the fire.  Otherwise they were pointless.  And after she woke up and dropped her bike and all the rocks she had this look on her face like it had happened before.  The audience should have been in on that.  If it wasn’t a surprise to her then it should have been introduced to us that way. 

I think there might have been some potential to this movie if they had explored Alice’s character better, maybe showed us some of what she did out there on her own, and if they had developed a better villain.  This movie was a mashup of zombies, gore, death, and superpowers that just didn’t work. 

*sigh*  I am disappointed.  Don’t bother with this one, especially if you like the first two.  And to leave you with a really bad pun – this movie needs to be extinct.  

Go ahead and groan.  *laugh*

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Jun
2009

Primer

categories: Movies
I watched Primer not too long ago, and overall I enjoyed it.  It’s an odd take on the ability to time travel.  The story is very well told, and comes across very realistic.  The basic gist is that two guys build a device that allows them to manipulate time, or travel through time.

While interesting, I also found the movie to be confusing.  Some of the dialogue is very technical and I had a hard time following the story line that was driven by that dialogue.  By the end of the movie I did understand what had happened, and how events had played out. 

Primer is a quiet movie, there’s not a lot of action or over the top scenes.  It’s very simple and straightforward, which I found to be a good way to tell the story.  I would say this is a more intellectual movie as you really need to pay attention to keep up with the story (something I didn’t exactly do while watching).

I believe watching it a second time might be interesting because I know the story.  That would allow me to pay more attention to the characters and the details of the science used in the movie.  Perhaps I’ll add it back to my Netflix sometime in the future and see how a second viewing goes. 

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