Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Books / Film / Politics A Brief Thought About Twilight
Posted by Mark Asch on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 4:57 PM
- The author, in a recent photograph.
On a possibly related note, I've barely been out of college longer than I was in it and the Beloit Mindset List is already making me feel old.
Anyway.
Music / News Will.i.am, Crime-Fighting Super Agent, Uses His iPad to Recover Stolen Property!
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 4:31 PM
He went all Ethan Hunt on them thieves, used the tracking device in the brand new iPad they stole to figure out where the loot was being kept, called the cops, and has already gotten nearly all his goods back. LAPD is reportedly on the thief's heels, expecting to make an arrest soon, but, spoiler alert, it was totally fellow Pea apl.de.ap. (HipHopWired, TMZ)
Media Inflict an Oil Spill on Any Website You Want with Instant Oil Spill
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 4:02 PM
- Oh no, not our pristine website! Damn you BP!
A new, better than the last, web app has the BP oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico spilling all over any website you please. Just go to Instant Oil Spill enter whatever URL you (dis)like—ours for instance—and watch the devastation unfold before your very eyes. (Oil-coated fish, turtles and birds not included.) (NOTCOT)
Film Watch a Short Animation of Alfred Hitchcock Explaining How a McGuffin Works
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 3:34 PM
The interview audio is old news (very old news that a nerdier film nerd may be able to cite and date for us in the comments... is it from the Truffaut interview?), but Isaac Niemand's clever visuals do a great deal to help illustrate the simple yet often elusive concept of the McGuffin. My favorite film class example was always the Maltese Falcon in The Maltese Falcon, but obviously Hitch's work is full of 'em. (DesignYouTrust)
Film Play the 8-Bit Video Game Version of Twilight: Eclipse
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 3:01 PM
In this hilarious old school video game-style version of the latest film in the Twilight saga by The Station, you control Bella, and have to choose between Jake and Edward. However, be warned: if you try to set her up with Jake, as would be best for her, or do anything really that doesn't follow the plot of the film, Victoria invariably shows up and kills you with a lightning bolt attack. Good luck, young Twihards. (TheDailyWhat)
Media How to Make Money Off Free Magazines
Posted by Mark Asch on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 2:32 PM
- Yes Darling But Is It Advertorial?
In possibly related news, the venerable Chicago Reader is currently reporting on the firing of its longtime editor.
Art / Special Events Win Tickets to the New Museum's Private Party for Brion Gysin's Dream Machine
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 2:02 PM
Last week our friends at the New Museum were giving away a deluxe membership worth 400 smackers (which, congrats to Kris Keyser of Chatham, NJ) and this week the rules are basically the same, but the prize is different. Just send an email with your name and address and the subject "PARTY" to membership@newmuseum.org and you'll be entered to win two tickets to the NuMu's upcoming private party for the opening of Brion Gysin: Dream Machine on the evening of July 13. What's this Dream Machine, you ask? I'll let the late Mr. Gysin explain:
Politics Profiles in Cowardice: Marty Golden
Posted by Henry Stewart on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 1:37 PM
Marty Golden has become gun-toting criminals' newest hero!
Agree with the state senator from Bay Ridge or not (and we certainly do not), nobody's happy about his cowardly abstention from a hard vote. Criticism has been mounting—including handed-out fliers like the one above—from right and left since Golden missed a vote two weeks ago on "microstamping" that would have "require[d] semiautomatic handguns made and sold in New York to have unique identifying information on spent shells," Bay Ridge Interpol explains.
Golden stepped out of the chamber to take a phone call, standing in the hallway while he was called upon to vote. The bill failed, and now criminals can go back to shooting Golden's old cop-colleagues with anonymity!
Film Contraband Cinema: What Makes a Political Film?
Posted by Cullen Gallagher on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 1:05 PM
The range, depth, and diversity of the program—to say nothing of its intelligence and excellence—can be attributed to its collectivist mentality (itself a political statement on the art and bureaucracy of curating). Bringing together several organizations and individuals, the series is being presented by Red Channels and the Brecht Forum, and was collectively curated by Jake Perlin, Matt Peterson, Kazembe Balagun, Valeria Mogilevich, Rebecca Cleman, and James Spooner. Together, they pose the question, “What makes a political film?” To help answer this question, and to discuss the process of collaborative curating as well as some of the gems from the program, I recently sat down with two of the series’ presenters: Matt Peterson from Red Channels and Kazembe Balagun from The Brecht Forum.
Politics The Definitive List of Asshole Subway Behavior
Posted by Jonny Diamond on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 12:39 PM
In what seems like an attempt to forestall said paralyzing rage, the good people at DesignBlahg have distilled the object essence of subway douchery into eight must-have items for eight kinds of subway douchebags. Highlights include "A giant fucking backpack," a "BOB Revolution Duallie Stroller," and, of course, a "Gigantic bucket of chicken from KFC." We salute you, DesignBlahg.
Film Eclipse, And The Twilight of Sexual Progress
Posted by Benjamin Sutton and Henry Stewart on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 12:01 PM
HENRY:
Ben, if I hadn’t had to check my phone at the door, I’d have been texting you all through Eclipse. Mostly, “OMG!” Because, wow, there were a lot of OMG! moments in there, no? If I had to guess, I’d say Stephanie Meyer wasn’t a day over 14 when she wrote this installment in her quite profitable tetrology (soon to be a cinematic pentology). And even that’s a little generous. This movie doesn’t just feel like it’s for tweens, Ben—it feels like it’s by tweens!
News Bay Ridge Facebook Group To Call Out Illegals-Hiring Businesses
Posted by Henry Stewart on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 11:32 AM
- Duh sezzames stingk!
Furthermore, "This group allows U.S. citizens"—but not illegal immigrants!!—"to see the business's who employ Undocumented & Illegal Immigrants in Bay Ridge and allows them to decide if they would like to spend they're money at these establishments with the knowledge that these business's are breaking American Tax & Labor laws and being overall unpatriotic."
That's not as bad as it might sound.
Film Summerscreen: Seven Days from Now
Posted by Mark Asch on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 10:55 AM
This is just a friendly reminder that Summerscreen, the L's and Williamsburg's annual outdoor film series, returns to McCarren across from Turkey's Nest (home of enormous frozen margaritas to go!) in exactly a week's time, next Wednesday, July 7th, for all your outdoor summer movie needs. As well as all your outdoor after-work-before-dark live music needs, and all your local food and drink needs—we'll have beer from Sixpoint, along with food from Pizza Moto, Asia Dogs, People's Pops, San Loco, and more from the Brooklyn Flea.
So please do keep up with Summerscreen updates on Facebook, and join us next Wednesday for John Cusack's proto-emo boomboxa love, and subsequently for a movie David Bowie definitely has no memory of; a movie pretty much everybody from middle school remembers every second of; Johnny Depp unto death; giant bugs from the bastard son of Bruckheimer and Brecht; and extreme sports with the late Patrick Swayze and the great Kathryn Bigelow.
News Sweet Beautiful Relief...
Posted by Jonny Diamond on Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 10:28 AM
- The offices of The L Magazine, on a nice day.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
News See People Making That Face on New Tumblr Pictures of Peple Making This Face
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 4:31 PM
You sort of pull your eye sockets downwards, tug your mouth wide and, if you're sufficiently dexterous, push your nose up, piggy-like, and voila, you're just like the folks on Pictures of People Making This Face, an odd and frankly rather impolite new single-serving Tumblr blog. Although I suppose anyone's liable to be a little short-tempered and prone to face-making in this type of weather. (TheDailyWhat)
TV You May Remember Troy McLure from One of his 100+ Credits in this Simpsons Charticle
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 3:57 PM
Where do you remember Troy McLure from? Was it from "The Unbearable Moistness of Sweating"? What about "Cut It Out: The Wacky Adventures of Jack the Ripper"? Could it be from "Driving Mr. T"? Or did you see him in "Trucks"? Whatever it was, it's somewhere in a massive new charticle some bored fan made of every single "Hi, I'm Troy McLure, you may remember me from..." moment on The Simpsons. Click here for the full version. (RIP Phil Hartman) (NextRound)
Music Strangely None Of My Co-Workers Seems to Have Posted This Video of Janelle Monae Covering "Let's Go Crazy" at the BET Awards Yet
Posted by Mark Asch on Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 3:28 PM
This is still relatively new and noteworthy, right? She wears her hair really high and dances side-to-side in saddle shoes as per usual; Prince, in the audience, smiles faintly and nods, once, in approval. It's fun:
Film La Captive: Proust for the People
Posted by Nicolas Rapold on Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 2:59 PM
Lost in those first heady postmillennial days was this superb, transfixing take on Proustean drift, temporal, sensual, sexual. It screens tonight as part of FIAF’s series for Sylvie Testud, whose seemingly shifting features and subliminal currents of emotion are on display. Gorgeously streamlined and fluid compared to Raoul Ruiz’s magic-lantern show, Time Regained, one year earlier and perhaps too fresh in critics' minds, it’s shot by Manoel de Oliveira’s DP Sabine Lancelin. Akerman herself has expressed regret that the film did not receive American distribution, which makes little sense for one of the decade’s top films, so let’s make it up to her.
Film Surreal Short Film "The Bench" Shows How Most of Us Feel Right Now
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 2:26 PM
Are you unbearably warm, uncomfortably sweaty, incapable of moving from where you're sitting at this very moment, and seeing strange things like a cowboy dog sporting a rainbow-colored sweater and shooting it out with a laser-eyed furball? Then you're kind of like the sleepy protagonist in Kitty Crowther and Bruno SalAmone's "The Bench (Le banc)," the perfect little hand-drawn short for a sweltering day such as this one. (NOTCOT)
Art Not In My Palace! Louvre Curator Slams Upcoming Murakami Show at Versailles
Posted by Benjamin Sutton on Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 1:49 PM
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