“Directed by speculative architect Liam Young and written by fiction author Tim Maughan, In the Robot Skies is the world’s first narrative shot entirely through autonomous drones. In collaboration with the Embedded and Artificially intelligent Vision Lab in Belgium the film has evolved in relation to their experiments with specially developed camera drones each programmed with their own cinematic rules and behaviours. In this near future city drones form both agents of state surveillance but also become co-opted as the aerial vehicles through which two teens fall in love.”
Category Archives: Film & TV
Rambo III: Freedom Speech
We knew how Afghanistan was going to end way back in 2008. In this scene from Rambo III Richard Crenna warns the Russian commander how stupid it is to start a holy war in the middle east in the name of freedom.
And this from 2009. Matthew Hoh, a former marine saying Afghanistan is not worth U.S. lives.
“I feel that our strategies in Afghanistan are not pursing goals that are worthy of sacrificing our young men and women or spending the billions we’re doing there,” Hoh said. “I believe that the people we are fighting there are fighting us because we are occupying them — not for any ideological reasons, not because of any links to al Qaeda, not because of any fundamental hatred toward the West. The only reason they’re fighting us is because we are occupying them.”
Muscle Shoals Sound Studios
Barb and her sister are in Destin, FL this week and on the way down they stopped in Muscle Shoals, AL for a class reunion. Including a tour of the studio where the Rolling Stones recorded Wild Horses (and Brown Sugar) in December of 1969. The tour included the toilet where Keith Richards reportedly wrote Wild Horses, and an invoice for the recording sessions.
What does the yellow light mean?
Nobody Trailer
Action is my movie genre-of-choice and I’ve watched a bunch of them. But I’m not sure I’ve seen a better one than Nobody, staring Emmy winner Bob Odenkirk (Better Call Saul, The Post, Nebraska) as Hutch Mansell, “an underestimated and overlooked dad and husband, taking life’s indignities on the chin and never pushing back. A nobody.”
I watched most of this movie standing in front of my TV. Don’t recall doing that before. Hell, Christopher Lloyd has an action role in this movie and he rocks it. One more thing… I paid $20 to rent this film for 48 hours. Haven’t done that before but I’ll get my money’s worth when I watch it again tomorrow night. So much going on in the action scenes there was no way to catch it all.
And while I’m all hyperbolic, this movie might have the best soundtrack of any action movie I’ve seen and I’ve always thought Quintin Tarantino films owned that.
The Turning Point
Losing to China
Best drone video ever?
Wallets, billfolds and money-clips
When the nurse handed me my vaccination card she said, “Keep this in your wallet.” Hmm, where did I put my wallet? For the past year we’ve been paying for stuff online with a credit card.
I found my wallet and decided to do a little house cleaning. How much of this stuff do I really need to have with me every time I leave the house? I can pay for gas and groceries using my phone and ApplePay. And I’ve always kept some cash in a money clip. I see that some get by with their driver’s license and a credit/debit card in a phone case. Which got me wondering… do young folks still carry wallets?
“The difference between billfold and wallet is that a billfold is a small, folding sleeve or case designed to hold paper currency, as well as credit cards, pictures, etc while wallet is a small case, often flat and often made of leather, for keeping money (especially paper money), credit cards, etc.” (WikiDiff)
Forty years ago, when I started wearing suits to work, I carried a wallet in the inside pocket of my suit coat. (The one on the left in the photo below). When I hung up the suits for last time, I switched to a “billfold” (middle) and kept it in a pocket of my laptop case.
Along the way I kept looking for ways to lighten the load and tried some that didn’t fold at all. Just some pocket for credit cards and a magnetic money-clip. I’m giving that a try as I get back in the world.
I’ve long been fascinated by “fat wallets” and collected a few photos over the years. Each of the wallets pictured below were carried in the hip pocket. I would have dearly loved to got through the contents of each of these. What a story they could tell.
And no discussion of wallets would be complete without George Costanza’s exploding wallet. Another scene from the Wallet episode.
The Beatles: Get Back
Peter Jackson has released a “sneak peek” at his COVID-delayed documentary, The Beatles: Get Back. He stresses this is not a trailer or a sequence, rather a “montage” to give you a feel for “the spirit” of the film. Can’t imagine where or how he come up with 56 hours of “never before seen” footage of the band.
The Beatles hit the U.S. airwaves in February of 1964 (“I Want to Hold Your Hand”). I was a sophomore in high school and I won’t even try to tell you want a big deal this was. Nothing even close in the 50+ years since.
The Beatles broke up in 1969 so they provided the soundtrack for my high school and college years. I am really looking forward to this documentary. PS: It sure looks like they were having fun.