From the mind of Paul Thomas Anderson…
In a world…
where the day’s catch from gambling is all that matters…
where hideous chuds have no problem landing smoking hot women…
comes a criminal with a score to settle…
Philip Baker Hall. Philip Seymour Hoffman. John C. Reilly. Samuel L. Jackson. Gwyneth Paltrow.
Haddo Eight!
Netflix
IMDB
Movie Club
The Google results on this site for this flick are not to my satisfaction, so it’s time to add to them. Enjoy.
[Ed. note: The Quarter to Three Movie Club is a monthly-ish event in which someone picks a movie for folks to watch — or re-watch, as the case may be — and then discuss. Then a magical random picking machine chooses the picker for the next movie from the participants in the discussion. We’ve been going strong — if by “strong”, you mean “off and on but never totally out” — for 33 movies and we show no sign of letting up. Join us for the Hard Eight discussion here and check here for the history of Qt3 movie club, along with your odds on the magical picking machine.]
If you’re into basketball (pictured), now is the time to sign up for Quarter to Three’s annual Madden league. If you’ve got a copy of Madden 11, you can check this thread for which teams are available. This epic thread for last year’s league explains this details. Good luck, and may the best man take home the cup this year!
Yesterday, I looked at the highest rated Little Big Planet level ever. Today, I’d like to get a look at the other end of the spectrum. However, there’s no option to sort lowest rated. And besides, wouldn’t some of the worst levels ever be simply unrated? What’s an easy way to just jump into something junky?
After the jump, I play the odds. Continue reading →
Among the list of usual suspects announced at a recent press event, Paradox Interactive revealed titles like Salem, Gettysburg: Armored Warfare, Dreamlor–. Wait, hold on. Back up. Isn’t armored warfare like, you know, tanks and stuff? I see what you did there, Paradox. What gives?
“Well, everyone knows General Lee lost at Gettysburg. What this game presupposes is, maybe they had kevlar crotch guards? Oh, and tanks and zeppelins.”
Gettysburg: Armored Warfare, which is a shooter/RTS hybrid, is one of several free-to-play games in development. Dig it:
* Salem — A free-to-play crafting MMORPG title set in a mythical version of New England.
* Gettysburg: Armored Warfare — A free-to-play FPS/ RTS hybrid. The game is set during an alternate version of the Civil War and includes tanks, zeppelins, a wide variety of firearms and much more.
* Hearts of Iron: The Card Game — A browser-based, free-to-play digital collectable card game based on the Hearts of Iron franchise.
* Dreamlords: Resurrection — A free-to-play Massively Multiplayer Online Real-Time Strategy (MMORTS) game.
Is it silly to be psyched about a Hearts of Iron CCG? I know it’s fashionable to think WWII is played out, but I love accessible new gameplay approaches like Petroglyph’s Panzer General on Xbox Live Arcade. When my opponent taps Hitler to keep his Panzer Division from retreating, I’m totally going to play my Atom Bomb card for ten points of damage. GG, Germany.
A couple on their honeymoon in China takes a wrong turn and gets chased by naked bald men coated in talcum power. Or “moon demons”, as the movie calls them. Of course, it’s moon demon-infested rural China, so there’s no cell phone service. However, Seventh Moon does something I’m seeing more often in horror movies. The cell phone without any reception becomes a source of light, as Amy Smart has discovered above. This is way better than a flashlight for a horror movie. The unfocused light from a cell phone illuminates the actor and it also makes for a more unsettling and unpredictable effect, because something scary could be just outside that soft sphere of light. Like, say, a moon demon!
Director Eduardo Sanchez makes the moon demons “scary” by lighting them poorly, shooting them out of focus, and jerking the camera around. Splice in footage of people running through the woods and, voila!, you’ve got a horror movie.
Sanchez got a lot of mileage out of people running through the woods when he made Blair Witch Project. But that running through the woods was given context with an eerie backstory, good actors, and masterful use of its unique twist (the “found footage” concept was novel back then). None of that is present here. Instead, we have a production that managed to get Amy Smart for a quick shoot in China and, uh, not much else.
For the better follow-up to Blair Witch Project, see a movie called The Objective by Sachez’s co-director, Daniel Myrick. It’s a flawed low budget horror movie, but it demonstrates that Myrick knows what made Blair Witch Project good and he’s capable of doing it again from a very different perspective.
A New York Times blog reports Russian television making a connection between the bombing at the Moscow Airport and Modern Warfare 2’s infamous “No Russian” mission (pictured).
Russia Today, a government-financed satellite channel, broadcast a report that mixed footage of the aftermath of the attack with gory scenes from a video game, “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2,” which allows players to take part in a terrorist attack on a Russian airport.
Russia Today’s report, which emphasized that the video game was made by Americans, included an interview with Walid Phares, a Fox News terrorism analyst, who suggested that terrorists might be using virtual games like this one to train for real attacks. “I think those who have been radicalized already — let’s suppose in this case jihadists, Al Qaeda or [some] other kind — they look at the games and say these games will serve them to train,” Mr. Phares said.
However, it looks like New York Times writer Robert Mackey knows his videogames.
The report asserts that the suicide bombing on Monday “mirrors” the video game’s scenario. In fact, the game dramatizes a commando raid on a Moscow airport that much more closely resembles the terrorist attacks in Mumbai in 2008.
You’re not an asshole, Mark. You’re just trying so hard to be.
I’m so charmed by this demo. I can’t help it. It brings to mind that friend who tries really really hard to be tough, especially to talk tough, but never quite gets there. He knows the words. He’s heard them all before. In movies probably. Or more likely he’s read them. But when he says them…not so much. It just doesn’t translate. It’s like he’s forcing little puzzle pieces together that clearly don’t fit. You like him so much, though, you let it slide. And eventually this becomes an endearing part of his personality.
This Xbox Bulletstorm demo is trying its darndest to be hardcore funny, but it’s such a dork. Dick-tits? Really? I should dismiss you out of hand, Bulletstorm. But I can’t. Because I think I love you, man. You’re just trying so hard with that pseudo-gruff pirate-voiced narrator. Grayson Hunt is the name? I’ll try not to giggle. Come over here so I can give you a noogy. What was that you wanted me to do? Bury my boot* in that freak’s poop passage? Poop passage? Did you really say that? Fine. You’re invited to the party Saturday night. You’re adorable.
Also, that leash thing. I like.
*pictured
