Hard News by Russell Brown

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Hard News: Looking for Monsters

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  • Craig Ranapia,

    Thanks for watching the show

    Thank you Mr Keith for being one of the creators of a documentary that didn't make me dumber at the end that I was at the beginning. I know they're out there, but TVNZ and Three seem determined to pretend otherwise. :)

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • insider outsider,

    My wife was upset when she saw on the posters that the chief nasty woman didn't have a monkey...

    nz • Since May 2007 • 142 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    Hi Hamish,

    Thanks for watching the show - like to make the point that there are no actors and no re-enactments anywhere in the series and I make the point - I hope - that there is NO substitute for standing in front of a work of art and having your own conversation with it. My big bitch about that is that the institutions that care for our culture do their best to get in the way.

    I've really enjoyed you talking about this in the interviews. It's a bugbear of mine too.

    For collectors of film trivia - I hope you spotted the Willhelm scream in episode one?

    No! I'll have to watch again and listen out.

    For the mystified

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    Finn, thx 4 da warn-off. Got a look at it after dling 20MB of Quicktime updates and 20 mins installing, crashing Firefox again, finally IE shows it, but only in a little strip, no maximize button. I'm wondering if this movie is a metaphor for the huge rage that people feel against 'The Apple'?

    I feel bad for you. QuickTime on Windows seems a bit of a pain. QuickTime on the Mac is life itself.

    Even WMV is on the Mac is good now. the Flip4Mac components play WMV movies with the QT plugin, meaning you can save stuff you're not supposed to be able to save.

    I'll have to try it out though. I installed a PR-blagged copy of Vista on my iMac on Sunday. Leo's games run beautifully (= iMac deprivation for Dad after 6pm).

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • insider outsider,

    Don

    I'm just an amateur - Graeme will better advise you. I have not heard of them being 'banned' but the way the rules are written does seem to make it all a bit silly and you have to wonder exactly what they are trying to achieve, given the complete lack of evidence of any effect needing remedying.

    nz • Since May 2007 • 142 posts Report Reply

  • Don Christie,

    Just been looking for the "free speech coalition" mentioned on Radio NZ.

    Thanks to wikipedia I see this organisation is rather broader minded than I first suspected.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Speech_Coalition

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 1645 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    I feel bad for you. QuickTime on Windows seems a bit of a pain.

    It's an oxymoron. I love the way the only menu options are greyed out, because they're for paying customers. If the uncrippled product wasn't so crap maybe I would pay.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Graeme Edgeler,

    Don - I go through the explanation at this comment. Banned is only a little too dramatic. Most candidates will merely require advance written approval of their answer...

    Of course, in looking at how outraged we should be over this, let's remember too that no-one will face charges over this even if it stays written this way - the police will rightly tell people people to stop wasting their time. It's still better if it's fixed of course.

    Wellington, New Zealand • Since Nov 2006 • 3215 posts Report Reply

  • Don Christie,

    you have to wonder exactly what they are trying to achieve, given the complete lack of evidence of any effect needing remedying.

    "They" are trying to achieve transparency in democracy.

    What makes it difficult in this day and age is that there are so many means of communication and these are changing so quickly that you end up with a dogs breakfast trying to make reasonably encompassing legislation.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 1645 posts Report Reply

  • Don Christie,

    Graeme

    Thanks, I missed your response. I agree the anomalies should be fixed. Just because legislation won't be enforced is not a reason for letting it slip through.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 1645 posts Report Reply

  • JP Hansen,

    I love the way the only menu options are greyed out, because they're for paying customers. If the uncrippled product wasn't so crap maybe I would pay.

    What pissed me off is that when I upgraded to the latest Quicktime (bundled with iTunes), my old QuickTime Pro is gone, and now I have to pay again to upgrade the latest version into Pro.

    Yes, I was given fair warning that I would lose the Pro features on upgrade, it was the nagging by iTunes that finally made me give in. Still annoyed by it. It's not like the QT 6.x to 7.x (or whatever it was) is any great leap forward either, at least as far as I can tell.

    Russell, your post was the first I'd heard of Cloverfield. Looks pretty cool, I usually wait for the DVD for any blockbusters I wish to see, but this one I might just head to the theatre for. Only about 8 weeks away too!

    Waitakere • Since Nov 2006 • 206 posts Report Reply

  • KevinHicks,

    Sorry to hijack but remember the protest tomorrow midday Wellington.

    Lindsay reminded me that white ribbon day is coming up on the 25th to protest violence against women (very worthy).

    It gave me an idea - not only wear a gag on the protest tomorrow, wear a black ribbon for the death of democracy as well.

    Auckland • Since Sep 2007 • 67 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    when I upgraded to the latest Quicktime (bundled with iTunes), my old QuickTime Pro is gone, and now I have to pay again to upgrade the latest version into Pro.

    That sucks. I'm not even sure I want to pay to see the movie. I'm sure I don't want to pay to see the trailer. There's a sneaky suspicion that I'll be seeing more than my fill of this one's trailers.

    Ooo forgot more recent NY destruction scenarios:
    -Giant ape loose
    -Terrorists blow up stuff as cover to rob bank

    Am I missing any? Gangs, vice girls and P destroy NY?

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Jackie Clark,

    I've seen reproductions of Jackson Pollock's Blue Poles hundreds of times, but standing before the physical object in the NGA is over-whelming.

    I'm afraid that I lived in London for three years, and only went in the National Art Gallery once - I went in the front door, almost fainted with the emotion of being in the same building as so many of the paintings I knew as an Art History major, and had to leave forthwith. The Tate I could handle (I stood for hours in front of the Ucello), the Cortauld Collection was wonderful ( hold your hand just centimetres away from a Rembrandt and tell me you don't feel the love), but the NAG was just too, too much.

    Mt Eden, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 3136 posts Report Reply

  • Russell Brown,

    What pissed me off is that when I upgraded to the latest Quicktime (bundled with iTunes), my old QuickTime Pro is gone, and now I have to pay again to upgrade the latest version into Pro.

    Yes, I was given fair warning that I would lose the Pro features on upgrade, it was the nagging by iTunes that finally made me give in. Still annoyed by it. It's not like the QT 6.x to 7.x (or whatever it was) is any great leap forward either, at least as far as I can tell.

    Maybe it's a Mac thing again, but 7.x was a big jump from the 6.x line (that began in 2002). It was released alongside Mac OS X 10.4 and supported a bunch of the new APIs that are a key MacOS characteristic: Core Audio, Core Image, etc, and had the first mainstream H.264 codec. I upgraded in early 2005 and have kept my Pro registration since then, through three big OS upgrades. That's okay.

    But I would say that. QuickTime these days is really an OS layer, so when you install it in Windows, you're really installing a chunk of MacOS X in Windows. Bound to end in tears.

    Russell, your post was the first I'd heard of Cloverfield. Looks pretty cool, I usually wait for the DVD for any blockbusters I wish to see, but this one I might just head to the theatre for. Only about 8 weeks away too!

    I like the look of it because there's actually a rationale for the crazy handycam style. It picks up a modern fact of media life: that all disasters are now televised because so many of us carry some form of camera. So you can convincing tell a story with footage that might even be shot by the actors themselves.

    Plus, it has a monster.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 22850 posts Report Reply

  • Deborah,

    My wife was upset when she saw on the posters that the chief nasty woman didn't have a monkey...

    What do you mean - no monkey?!!! When I heard that Nicole Kidman was to be Mrs Coulter, I thought that it was casting perfection, because she really does put me in mind of a golden monkey. Her perfect daemon.

    I of course, prefer a somewhat febrile looking cat....

    My eldest daughter read Northern Lights, a.k.a. The Golden Compass, and the atheism passed right over her head, just like the religion in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

    New Lynn • Since Nov 2006 • 1447 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    Plus, it has a monster.

    who tears the head off the statue of liberty and uses it as a baseball! Beats just knocking it over or freezing it. Although surely Ghostbusters takes the biscuit for biggest misuse of the SOL, covering it in happy slime and using it to smash into a building, which brings me to:

    -Ghosts take over NY. 3 times I think.
    -Robots sing into a cellphone camera about killing the humans (set in NY). Or were they Australians? Who cares?

    Anything to come?

    But I would say that. QuickTime these days is really an OS layer, so when you install it in Windows, you're really installing a chunk of MacOS X in Windows. Bound to end in tears.

    Don't worry man, I can assure you that any codec upgrade on Windows involves tears. That's why I prefer software with the codecs built in, in a shocking reversal to all the wonderful trends of the last 10 years.

    Indeed, it seems to me that the entire paradigm of software sharing libraries is totally flawed. Whatever minuscule and totally unimportant gain there is in library disk space and supposed instant access to improvements across different software is totally overshadowed by the instability introduced by the different pieces of software requiring different versions of the libraries due to having been developed at different times and possibly not kept up to date. I dread every single Windows Update, because it always kills something.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Daniel Barnes,

    Well the Bill seems to have thrown the Libz' Lindsay Perigo into tizz. He's calling for the immediate violent overthrow of the Labour government:

    "...the time for mere marches is past...It is the right and duty of New Zealand citizens to throw off this government, which has long evinced a desire—nay, a compulsion—to subjugate us to absolute despotism. We should not wait for the 2008 election...New Zealanders must now ask themselves if they are a free people—and if so, are they prepared to act accordingly? Which is to say, are they prepared forcibly to evict all tyranny-mongers from their positions of power?"

    http://www.solopassion.com/node/3723#comment-43157

    Publicity stunt? Cry for attention? Fortunately I think the powers that be realise there is not much chance of anyone at all following La Perigo into armed conflict...;-)

    Auckland NZ • Since Aug 2007 • 20 posts Report Reply

  • Watson,

    A quick look at The Golden Compass trailer on apple.com reveals what looks suspiciously like a golden monkey...

    AK • Since Nov 2007 • 8 posts Report Reply

  • Deborah,

    A quick look at The Golden Compass trailer on apple.com reveals what looks suspiciously like a golden monkey...

    Deo gratias!

    New Lynn • Since Nov 2006 • 1447 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    Publicity stunt? Cry for attention? Fortunately I think the powers that be realise there is not much chance of anyone at all following La Perigo into armed conflict...;-)

    LOL, surely he's taking the piss? I mean naming your movement SOLO. I wonder if Linz plays Han Solo in his dream revolution, meaning the guy who bails off in the fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy with his big hairy mate? Or is it more of a hand solo? I can just hear him yelling "You're all clear kid, now let's blow this thing and go home".

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Craig Ranapia,

    Fortunately I think the powers that be realise there is not much chance of anyone at all following La Perigo into armed conflict...;-)

    Personally, I'd rather the more subtle satisfaction of handing Labour a thorough spanking at the ballot box. Not as melodramatic as your own private Les Miz, but I'm sure the weeping, wailing and rending of garments from the usual suspects will be sweet music all the same.

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • BenWilson,

    If there was a 'spank Labour' option I'd vote for it. Following Perigo sounds like the 'spank Monkey' option.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 10657 posts Report Reply

  • Idiot Savant,

    Don't you think the sight of an Elder God trashing the Statue of Liberty would perk 'em up no end?

    Well, it would perk me up, at least until it ate my brain.

    (And I am looking forward to The Golden Compass, though there's very little religious content in the first book at all).

    Palmerston North • Since Nov 2006 • 1717 posts Report Reply

  • Idiot Savant,

    "...the time for mere marches is past...It is the right and duty of New Zealand citizens to throw off this government, which has long evinced a desire—nay, a compulsion—to subjugate us to absolute despotism. We should not wait for the 2008 election...New Zealanders must now ask themselves if they are a free people—and if so, are they prepared to act accordingly? Which is to say, are they prepared forcibly to evict all tyranny-mongers from their positions of power?"

    Given his views on the Urewera 17, that seems just a tad hypocritical.

    Calling for armed rebellion only seems to be a problem if you are brown, green, or red.

    Palmerston North • Since Nov 2006 • 1717 posts Report Reply

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