movies

tags: The Magic Behind Harry Potter 6, interview, celebrity gossip, funny, streaming video This is a streaming video of the new Harry Potter movie: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. This Special contains cast interviews and exclusive footage of the new movie. [Part 1/5 -- the remainder of the parts will be posted tomorrow] [10:12]
The theme from the animated (1986) Transformers film.I had promised myself that I would not blog about Transformers 2. I knew it was going to be awful, but against my better judgment I went anyway. (Given that MST3K was one of my favorite shows, I figured I could at least have some fun riffing on it.) Now that I have seen it, though, I must break my promise. Military fetishism, incomprehensible action sequences, sexism, racism, and gaping plot holes pervade big budget summer action movies (i.e. anything by Michael Bay, Roland Emmerich, &c.), but there was one scene in particular that…
Unfortunately, I saw this coming, although I had thought that it might be a few more months. Farrah Fawcett has lost her three year battle with anal cancer: Farrah Fawcett, an actress and television star whose good looks and signature flowing hairstyle influenced a generation of women and bewitched a generation of men, beginning with a celebrated pinup poster, died Thursday morning in Santa Monica, Calif. She was 62 and lived in West Los Angeles. Her death, at St. John's Health Center, was caused by anal cancer, which she had been battling since 2006, said her spokesman, Paul Bloch. To an…
The Telegraph has just released the trailer for the forthcoming film adaptation of the book Annie's Box, which focuses on Charles Darwin's personal struggle with science and religion. It is called Creation; What do you think? [Hat-tip to Michael Barton for sending this along.]
I've noticed that a hilariously literal-minded parody of that 1980s chestnut "Total Eclipse of the Heart" by Bonnie Tyler has been making the rounds in the blogsophere. I was suitably amused, but I also found this new tidbit amusing. I haven't seen the latest Terminator movie yet, but I've been a big fan of the Terminator movies since the very first one back in 1984. I even kind of liked Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. At least, it wasn't as bad as I had feared, and parts of it were pretty entertaining. However, what the Terminator movies have always lacked is one thing. That's right: A…
tags: religion, atheism, godlessness, Keep Porno Out of Day Care Centers!, humor, funny, satire, edward current, streaming video This video reveals Hollywood's latest assault on our culture; stripping preschoolers of their innocence and filling them with unchaste ideas. [4:15]
tags: movies, film, Star Trek prequel, satire, humor, funny, The Onion, streaming video I'm not sure I want to see the new Star Trek film. Based on this video report, long time fans of the Star Trek franchise say JJ Abrams' enjoyable, engaging prequal betrays what Star Trek is all about. [2:22]
Tomorrow Angels and Demons comes to theaters across the country. One in a long series of movies that profits from the idea that underneath our regular, ordinary world, there are powerful forces controlling the scenes. I understand the appeal of these movies, it's an entertaining concept. A fictional conspiracy engages your intellect, creates a mystery, makes you think about the world and who is in control. But we have to remember when we see these films that these are works of fiction for entertainment. The Illuminati are not real, this sadly ludicrous belief still persists for some…
I like the way some people think, Clive Davis, for instance. Remember how, two or three weeks ago, I speculated about who would play arch-Holocaust denier David Irving in a movie that's been optioned based on his libel suit against Holocaust historian Professor Deborah Lipstadt? Well, Clive Davis has a better idea: Cinematical suggests Emma Thompson should portray Lipstadt. As for the other lead role, I'm tempted to go for Denzel Washington, just to give the world's most famous Holocaust denier another reason to go to court. Heh. I'd love to see that. Of course, if we want to match viewpoints…
tags: film, movies, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, streaming video This video shows the West Wales site where two Hollywood blockbusters will be filmed this summer. Harry Potter and Robin Hood will both be filmed in Freshwater West in Pembrokeshire. [2:05] Filming for for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is already underway. Roads will be closed in Pembrokeshire, as building for Shell Cottage begins. Shell Cottage plays a prominent part in JK Rowling's final book. Originally located on a little cliff in Cornwall, Harry, Ron and Hermione take shelter in Shell Cottage whilst on the…
I never really liked the many incarnations of Star Trek on television. I remember the episode of the Next Generation where the crew was devolving, but that's about it. That's why I was a little unsure of whether I would enjoy the big screen reboot of the franchise. After just seeing it, though, I have to say I was very impressed. The film really fulfilled the potential the series carried while honoring the source material. There are a few other science fiction extravaganzas I plan on seeing this summer (i.e. Terminator: Salvation and Transformers 2), but it is going to be hard to beat Star…
I just learned yesterday from a link a friend sent me and from Professor Deborah Lipstadt's blog that the team of producers who made The Soloist have optioned the movie rights to Professor Lipstadt's book History on Trial: My Day in Court With a Holocaust Denier, which is the story of the libel suit brought against her by Holocaust denier David Irving in the U.K., a lawsuit that Irving ultimately lost big time. This is excellent news. Having read her book, as well as Richard Evans' account of the trial, Lying About Hitler: History, Holocaust, and the David Irving Trial, I had always thought…
After writing about a new low of pseudoscience published in that repository of all things antivaccine and quackery, The Huffington Post (do you even have to ask?), on Tuesday, I had hoped--really hoped--that I could ignore HuffPo for a while. After all, there's only so much stupid that even Orac can tolerate before his logic circuits start shorting out and he has to shut down a while so that his self-repair circuits can undo the damage. Besides, I sometimes think that the twit who created HuffPo, Arianna Huffington, likes the attention that pseudoscience turds dropped onto her blog by…
Today's free book is "Hollywood Science: Movies, Science, and the End of the World" by Sydney Perkowitz. (If you click over the Amazon page linked above, you'll see a review by scibling Brian Switek of Laelaps.) Remember: To claim the book, be the first commenter to earnestly affirm that you will read and review the book in less than 6 months. Then send me your snail mail address via my science (dot) woman account on google's mail service.
...but sadly, it's not. Jenny McCarthy has struck again. Yesterday, given the release of Jenny McCarthy's new book espousing antivaccinationism and autism quackery and the attendant media blitz the antivaccine movement has organized to promote it, I predicted that a wave of stupid is about to fall upon our great nation. Well, the stupid has landed. And how. An interview with Jenny has just been published on the TIME Magazine website in which she "surpasses" herself. In fact, so dense is the stupid emanating from what passes for a "brain" in that empty head of hers that words fail me.…
The American Scientist is the magazine of the scientific society, Sigma Xi. You can get it on the news stand, and that's where I bought the latest issue (March-April, 2009). One of the articles is by historian of engineering, Henry Petroski, and it's about the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. The bridge was a product of Depression infrastructure funding but instead of being an investment in the future it only lasted four months. It is famous because its spectacular collapse was caught on film (below the jump) and for many years was shown in thousands of undergraduate calculus and elementary physics…
If the 1960s film, The Graduate, were to be made today (Graduate, II: The Stimulus), the iconic scene at the party where a friend of the family takes Dustin Hoffman aside and whispers in his ear, "I have only one word for you, Plastics") would be transmogrified into, "I have only three words for you, Health Information Technology." HIT, and its love child with the recently passed stimulus package, the Electronic Medical Record, have all the characteristics of a good idea destined to go bad. One of my vivid memories from my early career was being shown a new kind of quiet printer, called an…
tags: ornithology, claymation, film, black comedy, streaming video People have always been conflicted about pursuing knowledge, and this short claymation film captures some of that emotion in this black comedy [4:41]
Back in December, I pointed out a Norwegian movie that the Hitler Zombie definitely approves of: Dead Snow (or Død Snø in Norwegian). After all, how can you go wrong with Nazi zombies in a remote, snow bound area in Norway attacking the usual bunch of hapless but beautiful young people? I don't know about you, but that's all I ask for in a movie, even if I have to read subtitles or put up with dubbing. Good news, fans of Nazi zombies! After a successful run at Sundance, Død Snø has a U.S. distribution deal: U.S. rights to Tommy Wirkola's "Dead Snow" have been acquired by IFC Films.…
I hate to see this. I really do. I really hate it to see people who think they're doing a good thing, who think they're raising money for a worthy charity, totally clueless that what they are doing is supporting the rankest pseudoscience and quackery. Here's an example from my hometown of Detroit. It's a story about a woman who's going to raise money for what she thinks is autism awareness and research at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit this coming week: When it comes to dressing for the North American International Auto Show Charity Preview, attendee Val McFarland is…