The Inherent Instability Of Euphemisms
Often it is required of a storyteller to say less in order to say more. Steven Spielberg had to censor the most gruesome parts of the holocaust in order to make a movie that was actually watchable, and his intuition was arguably right. The movie ended up being a hit, exposing millions upon millions of people to the the holocaust. But it wasn't the horror. It was a watered down version, made so people would not be too upset watching it. The reality of the situation was so much worse that Spielberg didn't even think a movie showing the actual truth was possible. Nobody would be brave or masochistic enough, he thought, to actually see it. A similar story happened to Dunkirk, another World War II movie, this time by Christopher Nolan, who deliberately avoided the worst aspects of a war film to make a film which the audience could watch without taking their eyes from the screen, and as a result, a film that is arguably scarier because of that. Nolan's masterful management of tension is so good that the movie doesn't need violence and blood to be visceral. And yet, to some extent the movie is a watered down version of what war supposed to be. And some argue it is a lesser film because of it.
Forcing Cashless
This article will be strangely related to something I had experienced just recently. And quite frankly somewhat related to the Moria's Race project. I will talk about means, or in this particular case, a mean, that governments sometimes use to push people into doing what the governments like people to do.
The Creator
Gareth Edwards is a type of writer / director that I can relate to. I remember watching the Star Wars movie that he directed Rogue One back when it came out and feeling like I know what this guy is doing. Like I myself want to be that guy. Back in 2016 ( when Rogue One came out ) I still didn't quite give up the Wrong Hate project and what he showed was the stuff that I was aiming for.
The Vast Of Night
It's so weird to be watching The Vast Of Night almost right after No One Will Save You. One movie has no dialogue, while the other is just dialogue. To be honest, it might seem very strange to make a film so dialogue heavy, if we didn't have people like Quentin Tarantino who shows time and time again that movies with a lot of dialogue can work fantastically.
Is Agenda Bad For Discussion
The studio was full of people and the host was mentally preparing for the cameras to go live. The cameras started rolling which filled the room with tension. And the producers behind the cameras started counting the count-down. The host touched his tie in a nervous manner, to make sure that it sits nicely. The countdown went - "5 - 4 - 3 - ..." - from that point on, the producers counted only with their fingers, to avoid accidentally being heard counting on the broadcast itself. They showed 2, then 1 and then pointed to the host, which meant that it's the time to start.
J.U.M.P Limited
Imagine a platformer where you can't jump as much as you'd like. You can jump, of course. What platformer doesn't let you jump? But this time you can jump only limited amount of times. Therefor - Jump Limited.
What Lies Beneath
Have you ever wondered what would Alfred Hitchcock do in the age of CGI and VFX? What kind of strange insane shorts he would come up with? Well Robert Zemeckis set out for himself a challenge to find out. He is notorious for using visual effects creatively. A lot of people might be familiar with the mirror shot he did in the film Contact. So something like trying to make a Hitchcockian thriller of the 21st century was just about the right kind of thing for Zemeckis.
CGI vs AI
I showed my movie Moria's Race in a gas station once. A woman came by, saw it and asked me "Is it AI?". I obviously cringed. Because it wasn't AI, it was CGI. And there is a difference. Well technically there was one AI tool that was used. The open-image-denoise denoiser that comes preinstalled with Blender. But it's not really AI. Or is it?
SimpliSafe Is Far From Safe
Once in a while, while watching a video on Invidious ( a proxy site allowing to watch YouTube videos in freedom ) I come across a very interesting advertising. SimpliSafe. A collection of home appliances that make security of the home supposedly simpler. And therefor makes your home safer.
I'm Not Even Human Soundtrack
I'm Not Even Human ( a film that I made in 2018 ) has an original score written by me. This original score is also the first time I used MIDI to compose music instead of playing it on the electric piano. The first song "Explosion" was originally composed and recorded using the piano, but the sound quality of the piano was nowhere near where I wanted it to be for the movie. So for the first time I touched MIDI and redone the song in MIDI, which sounded great. So I made all of the original score for the movie in MIDI apart from 3 songs. The Bill's Into was recorded with live guitar. Abstraktation was improvised on the piano. And the final Bonus Track was recorded the same way as my album The Pentas.
Sinking In The Fire
Sinking In The Fire is an old movie project of mine that I was trying to make when I was about 14-15 years old. It's a story about a girl who meets an alien boy. And they go on an adventure together.
Wrong Hate
Wrong Hate is a movie project that I was trying to do when I was 16-17 years old. The story revolves around a future war where huge building-size robots fight to death. But unlike similar movies where the focus of the action is on the robots. In this film, the focus is on the family that is trying to survive the mayhem.
Chocolate
Asian cinema is different from American cinema. When in America filmmakers are often armed with enormous budgets, Asian cinema is trying to survive with what it has while still delivering the same, if not more, entertainment value. It's not that hard when dealing with dramas. There most of the time the story is about a few people in few locations, talking and crying with one another. Which is not expensive. But it's an entirely different challenge when you are trying to compete within the action-film market.
Addons For SuperTuxKart
There is this game called SuperTuxKart that I didn't develop. But which is among the best Free Software games out there. And they have a way to make and publish addons. This is a list of addons that I made for SuperTuxKart.
Speed Racer
This had to be done finally! One of the biggest inspirations for Moria's Race, one of my favorite childhood movies, one of the best action films ever and perhaps one of the most colorful films: Speed Racer by the Wachowskis.
Overworked And Underpaid
We all heard by now that the situation in Hollywood is not very good at the moment. A lot of Visual Effects artists are overworked and underpaid resulting in some atrocious CGI like in The Flash 2023. Studios even considering replacing those overworked and underpaid VFX artists with AI technology. Because it can make better images and complain less about its conditions at work.
Moses 40 Years For This Kind of Trip Is Too Much
In 2014 Ridley Scott made a very controversial, seems to be - religious movie - called "Exodus: Gods and Kings" about the life of Moses and his subsequent adventure of saving the Jewish people from slavery in Egypt. Religious people were mad about the movie, since it tried to show a plausible, realistic way the entire thing could happen. It didn't show God, for example, simply appearing in front of Moses as a burning bush. There was a burning bush and there was God. But before Moses saw those he got hit in the head very severely. So you have a possible explanation for why he saw God in the first place.
Debunking A Critique of Free Software by Anonymous
An Ultimate Hacker by the name of Troler sent me an interesting article written by some anonymous writer and published subsequently by Jake Bauer. I already debunked a few anti-free-software and anti-Stallman articles before. But most of them were from either complete imbeciles or corporate imbeciles. This time it seems like the article, which is titled "A Critique of Free Software" is written by a Free Software enthusiast. And by a person that is genuinely interested in the success of Freedom. He criticizes some aspects of the Free Software Foundation that he believes are detrimental to its stated goals. And believes that the goal is not what they tell it is.
The Nightmare Of Paying Online
Cryptocurrency should have been the savior of the world from over-reaching control of governments and banks. But while on paper it could have worked. The reality is way worse. There was a store next to where I live that until a few years ago advertised that they can be paid with Bitcoin. The notice is now removed, probably due to the bursting of the crypto bubble, which lead to a rapid decrease of value of many cryptocurrencies.
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