Thursday, February 04, 2010
Happy 2010 already
Don't know why I put off my first post of the year for so long, so I'm writing this on my phone to get it over with.
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Fact is, the future of feitclub.com is in doubt. Blogger has decided to end publishing via FTP, and since I use my own domain that's precisely how I put this blog together.
I want to continue writing and there are options on the table to migrate this project of mine to a new host or another publishing platform (Wordpress?), but nothing's going to be easy. It's fair to say I won't post much of anything here until I sort this out.
I'm trying to remain positive about this. I've wanted to overhaul the site for years as it's grown increasingly ugly by web standards. It was never pretty but it was, for a while, NOT hideous. Now it looks like less polished MySpace page. Ugh.
In the meantime, I'll continue to use Twitter and Facebook as usual. Notice that I've stopped the automated messages regarding feitclub.com. From now on, I'll just tweet about updates myself.
TTFN, I guess. Feit...out.
Labels: moblogging, site news
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Goodbye, Double-Oh Decade
Hey everybody, I just want to drop in here and say a few words before the year is up.
First off, the vacation is going great. I was nervous about the baby but it turns out he loves America and everyone in it. Strangers and family alike delight him, he is being spoiled with toys and clothes at every turn, and he is sleeping here like he never sleeps back home. Not necessarily at night, mind you, but a happy, well-rested baby is a hell of a lot easier to manage than a cranky, crying baby.
In professional writing news, Wired Game|Life has been posting best-of lists recently, several of which I got to vote for and contribute towards. While I recommend all of their fine work, readers looking specifically for my words should direct their attention to Top 5 PlayStation 3 Games of 2009, The 10 Best Videogames of 2009 and The 15 Most Influential Games of the Decade. I'm particularly proud of that last one because I got to write about two of my favorite games of the last ten years, both of which will be appearing in my love/hate 00s countdown.
Speaking of which, the countdown is on hold but not over. I haven't had much time to write on this trip, so I'll finish my thoughts about my favorite and most disappointing things of the past decade after it is complete.
In the meantime, enjoy this final day of the 00s. For those of you in Japan, the year is nearly finished, but here in the US we've got nearly an entire day to get through. Wherever you're at, have fun and I'll see you in 2010 (digitally speaking).
つづく...(Click here to read more)
First off, the vacation is going great. I was nervous about the baby but it turns out he loves America and everyone in it. Strangers and family alike delight him, he is being spoiled with toys and clothes at every turn, and he is sleeping here like he never sleeps back home. Not necessarily at night, mind you, but a happy, well-rested baby is a hell of a lot easier to manage than a cranky, crying baby.
In professional writing news, Wired Game|Life has been posting best-of lists recently, several of which I got to vote for and contribute towards. While I recommend all of their fine work, readers looking specifically for my words should direct their attention to Top 5 PlayStation 3 Games of 2009, The 10 Best Videogames of 2009 and The 15 Most Influential Games of the Decade. I'm particularly proud of that last one because I got to write about two of my favorite games of the last ten years, both of which will be appearing in my love/hate 00s countdown.
Speaking of which, the countdown is on hold but not over. I haven't had much time to write on this trip, so I'll finish my thoughts about my favorite and most disappointing things of the past decade after it is complete.
In the meantime, enjoy this final day of the 00s. For those of you in Japan, the year is nearly finished, but here in the US we've got nearly an entire day to get through. Wherever you're at, have fun and I'll see you in 2010 (digitally speaking).
Labels: family, number one son, site news, travel, video games, Wired, writing
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
En Vacances until 2010
By the time this post goes live, I'll be on my way to New York with my family in tow. Maybe Go will fall asleep on the plane and maybe he won't. Either way we will be spending the next two weeks in the United States.
I am, understandably, nervous about this trip. Even taking the airplanes out of the equation there's going to be a lot of traveling and I have no idea how Go will respond. Will he become jet lagged and sleep all day while keeping us up all night?
Ultimately it's up to me whether this trip is enjoyable or not. Go is going to do what he's going to do - it's out of my control. We're taking him to America so his grandparents and extended family can see him in person. It reminds me of last March when we took Mako's parents to New York. Their needs trumped ours, because they could not function without our assistance. Did I still enjoy myself? Hell yeah.
The key difference this time is that Mako's parents are, once provided with food and shelter, self-sufficient. We could bring them food and leave them in their hotel room for an evening. Go would not enjoy that.
So I don't know what to say. Am I excited? Of course? Am I nervous? Very much so. Am I scared? Nope. Worst case scenario, I go without sleep for two weeks while surrounded by friends and family. That beats spending another New Year's in Japan in front of the damned television, forced to watch an endless parade of celebrities sing and congratulate each other.
Also, I cannot predict my availability online. I'm bringing my netbook but I can't say how much time I'll be able/willing to sit in front of it. I hope to keep writing my list of my favorite and most disappointing things of the decade, as I'm only a third of the way finished.
So please forgive me if I miss out on Twitter or Facebook chatter. I'll see many of you in person soon. To everyone else, I'll catch you right here next year. FEIT...out
つづく...(Click here to read more)
I am, understandably, nervous about this trip. Even taking the airplanes out of the equation there's going to be a lot of traveling and I have no idea how Go will respond. Will he become jet lagged and sleep all day while keeping us up all night?
Ultimately it's up to me whether this trip is enjoyable or not. Go is going to do what he's going to do - it's out of my control. We're taking him to America so his grandparents and extended family can see him in person. It reminds me of last March when we took Mako's parents to New York. Their needs trumped ours, because they could not function without our assistance. Did I still enjoy myself? Hell yeah.
The key difference this time is that Mako's parents are, once provided with food and shelter, self-sufficient. We could bring them food and leave them in their hotel room for an evening. Go would not enjoy that.
So I don't know what to say. Am I excited? Of course? Am I nervous? Very much so. Am I scared? Nope. Worst case scenario, I go without sleep for two weeks while surrounded by friends and family. That beats spending another New Year's in Japan in front of the damned television, forced to watch an endless parade of celebrities sing and congratulate each other.
Also, I cannot predict my availability online. I'm bringing my netbook but I can't say how much time I'll be able/willing to sit in front of it. I hope to keep writing my list of my favorite and most disappointing things of the decade, as I'm only a third of the way finished.
So please forgive me if I miss out on Twitter or Facebook chatter. I'll see many of you in person soon. To everyone else, I'll catch you right here next year. FEIT...out
Labels: family, predicting the future, site news, travel
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
I Love the 00s: Three from Tarantino
Next on my list of my favorite things about the 00s is Quentin Tarantino. When the decade began he was MIA, curiously quiet after the lukewarm response to Jackie Brown (1997). Once he got back into the movie-making business, business was good. Very good.
His first film back from hiatus was Kill Bill (2003, 2004), an epic kung-fu/revenge picture that was forcibly split into two films by the studio. The end results made me wonder how Volumes 1 and 2 were ever part of the same picture, because the two films felt so very different.
Vol. 1 was a raucous splatterfest of swordfighting and rage, while Vol. 2 was a more restrained look at the characters left standing from Vol. 1. The final showdown between The Bride and Bill is emotional, not physical, and when she takes her revenge there is real sadness in the air.
One of the unsung triumphs of the movie(s) is the soundtrack. Cobbled together from other films and even a few television series, the music in Kill Bill is different than the pop-heavy mixes of Quentin Tarantino's earlier movies. Even though I couldn't recognize most of it, the use of instrumental music accentuated the film's numerous homages. When you hear Ennio Morricone, whether you can place its exact origin or not, you're going to think of spaghetti westerns.
It was three years before we saw another Tarantino movie, but it was worth the wait. Death Proof was the second half of the double-feature Grindhouse (2007), two films shown back to back with intentionally cheesy trailers preceeding each picture. I noted on my blog at the time that it was one of the best moviegoing experiences I've ever had - and that still stands. While the first film, Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror, was just as over the top as those trailers were, Death Proof opened quietly by focusing on four friends just hanging out. It's a slow burn, teasing the audience with glimpses of Stuntman Mike before eventually revealing that he's not just an over-the-hill stunt driver. The car chase at end of the film was one of the most exhilarating ones I've ever seen, right on par with classics like Bullitt and The French Connection. More so, perhaps, because those movies didn't have a woman strapped to the hood of the car during their chases.
Finally there's Inglorious Basterds (2009), a movie I've already written about several times since I saw it last month. I don't know if it's my favorite Tarantino film but it's certainly my favorite of the last ten years, as the opening conversation between the Colonel and that dairy farmer was so tense I almost couldn't stand it. That extended showdown of two men talking for I don't know how long was more tense than any clash in Kill Bill or crash in Death Proof.
I suppose it's selfish of me to wish that Quentin Tarantino could work faster. In the last ten years he made three films, while during that time we've had seven Coen Brothers movies, five Christopher Nolan movies and, ugh, five Michael Bay movies! Please, Quentin, don't rush things but don't leave us hanging for six years again. It's just cruel.
This represents Part 7 in a series of 25 posts about my favorite as well as the most disappointing entertainment properties/trends of the last ten years. To Be Continued!
つづく...(Click here to read more)
His first film back from hiatus was Kill Bill (2003, 2004), an epic kung-fu/revenge picture that was forcibly split into two films by the studio. The end results made me wonder how Volumes 1 and 2 were ever part of the same picture, because the two films felt so very different.
Vol. 1 was a raucous splatterfest of swordfighting and rage, while Vol. 2 was a more restrained look at the characters left standing from Vol. 1. The final showdown between The Bride and Bill is emotional, not physical, and when she takes her revenge there is real sadness in the air.
One of the unsung triumphs of the movie(s) is the soundtrack. Cobbled together from other films and even a few television series, the music in Kill Bill is different than the pop-heavy mixes of Quentin Tarantino's earlier movies. Even though I couldn't recognize most of it, the use of instrumental music accentuated the film's numerous homages. When you hear Ennio Morricone, whether you can place its exact origin or not, you're going to think of spaghetti westerns.
It was three years before we saw another Tarantino movie, but it was worth the wait. Death Proof was the second half of the double-feature Grindhouse (2007), two films shown back to back with intentionally cheesy trailers preceeding each picture. I noted on my blog at the time that it was one of the best moviegoing experiences I've ever had - and that still stands. While the first film, Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror, was just as over the top as those trailers were, Death Proof opened quietly by focusing on four friends just hanging out. It's a slow burn, teasing the audience with glimpses of Stuntman Mike before eventually revealing that he's not just an over-the-hill stunt driver. The car chase at end of the film was one of the most exhilarating ones I've ever seen, right on par with classics like Bullitt and The French Connection. More so, perhaps, because those movies didn't have a woman strapped to the hood of the car during their chases.
Finally there's Inglorious Basterds (2009), a movie I've already written about several times since I saw it last month. I don't know if it's my favorite Tarantino film but it's certainly my favorite of the last ten years, as the opening conversation between the Colonel and that dairy farmer was so tense I almost couldn't stand it. That extended showdown of two men talking for I don't know how long was more tense than any clash in Kill Bill or crash in Death Proof.
I suppose it's selfish of me to wish that Quentin Tarantino could work faster. In the last ten years he made three films, while during that time we've had seven Coen Brothers movies, five Christopher Nolan movies and, ugh, five Michael Bay movies! Please, Quentin, don't rush things but don't leave us hanging for six years again. It's just cruel.
This represents Part 7 in a series of 25 posts about my favorite as well as the most disappointing entertainment properties/trends of the last ten years. To Be Continued!
Labels: Grindhouse, I love the 00s, Inglorious Basterds, Kill Bill, movies, Quentin Tarantino
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Monday, December 21, 2009
I Love the 00s: Chuck Palahniuk
I wasn't much of a reader as a child, a bad habit that continued well into adulthood. Thankfully I've begun reading a lot more books this decade and at least part of the reason why is my fondness for one particular author: Chuck Palahniuk.
Like a lot of people, I first heard of Chuck's work when I saw the movie Fight Club (1999) which was based on his 1996 novel. I didn't actually get around to reading it until 2004 though, shortly after I saw him speak at my university. I thought the book was terrific, even if I felt the movie had a better ending. I later read Survivor (1999) which was, frankly, an even better tale about the lone survivor of a cult trying to assimilate into (but ultimately recognizing the absurdity of) our society.
But those are 90s books and this series of mine is about the 00s. Chuck may not churn out books at Stephen King's pace but he's been busy in the past ten years, presumably thanks to the tremendous publicity a Hollywood movie can bring.
The first book I read after Fight Club was actually the one Chuck came to UAlbany to promote, Haunted (2005). It's a short story collection bound by a creepy main story about a group of people who attend a secluded writer's workshop inside an old auditorium. The doors are locked and the windows are sealed under the assumption that cutting themselves off from the world will allow them to concentrate on their work, but the situation quickly deteriorates as they intentionally spoil their surroundings so that the ordeal can be more dramatic. I can't say I found all of the short stories to be engrossing but most of them were superb, as was the master story about the lengths to which humans will go to draw attention to themselves. For a book about writers I suspect he was also taking a shot at reality television in tha regard.
Other books written by Chuck that I enjoyed were Choke (2001), the story of a man who pretends to do just that so people can save him, Lullaby (2002), about a poem that can kill, and Snuff (2008), a cringe-inducing story set inside the waiting room for participants in a gang-bang. I can't say I really thought much of Rant (2007), for while it was well-written the science-fiction angle just never grabbed me. I have yet to read Diary (2003) or his latest work, Pygmy but I hope to pick one of them up when I'm next in the States.
It's not easy to explain what it is about Chuck's books that I find so fascinating, but I guess it's in the details. His books are packed with little factoids, such as the recipe for napalm in Fight Club. That one happens to be false as his publisher insisted that the real ingredients not be disclosed to the public, but he's always slipping in little things like that into his stories.
Furthermore, he routinely describes things that are positively disgusting and that I would never want to contemplate let alone witness, yet his stories draw me and make me feel closer to that grime than any other writer. While I read Snuff I could picture that room as if I was standing in it, so much so that I felt like I desperately needed a shower. And I defy anyone to read "Guts" in Haunted without laughing out loud or gagging, depending on your tolerance for awful stories about masturbation.
If you've never read his work, I'd recommend either of his 90s works above as a starting point, but I'm certainly a fan now and I look forward to more. Supposedly all of his books have been optioned for films at this point (I didn't see Choke) but as great as Fight Club was on-screen, I think his stories lose their urgency in the adaptation process once his writing style is removed. It's a contradiction: his books deliver such vivid descriptions that I can vizualize myself in them and I would love to see more of his creations in theaters, yet I am aware that any film version will ultimately be compromised because it will not be delivered in his distinctive prose.
I guess that's what books are for.
This represents Part 6 in a series of 25 posts about my favorite as well as the most disappointing entertainment properties/trends of the last ten years. To Be Continued!
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Like a lot of people, I first heard of Chuck's work when I saw the movie Fight Club (1999) which was based on his 1996 novel. I didn't actually get around to reading it until 2004 though, shortly after I saw him speak at my university. I thought the book was terrific, even if I felt the movie had a better ending. I later read Survivor (1999) which was, frankly, an even better tale about the lone survivor of a cult trying to assimilate into (but ultimately recognizing the absurdity of) our society.
But those are 90s books and this series of mine is about the 00s. Chuck may not churn out books at Stephen King's pace but he's been busy in the past ten years, presumably thanks to the tremendous publicity a Hollywood movie can bring.
The first book I read after Fight Club was actually the one Chuck came to UAlbany to promote, Haunted (2005). It's a short story collection bound by a creepy main story about a group of people who attend a secluded writer's workshop inside an old auditorium. The doors are locked and the windows are sealed under the assumption that cutting themselves off from the world will allow them to concentrate on their work, but the situation quickly deteriorates as they intentionally spoil their surroundings so that the ordeal can be more dramatic. I can't say I found all of the short stories to be engrossing but most of them were superb, as was the master story about the lengths to which humans will go to draw attention to themselves. For a book about writers I suspect he was also taking a shot at reality television in tha regard.
Other books written by Chuck that I enjoyed were Choke (2001), the story of a man who pretends to do just that so people can save him, Lullaby (2002), about a poem that can kill, and Snuff (2008), a cringe-inducing story set inside the waiting room for participants in a gang-bang. I can't say I really thought much of Rant (2007), for while it was well-written the science-fiction angle just never grabbed me. I have yet to read Diary (2003) or his latest work, Pygmy but I hope to pick one of them up when I'm next in the States.
It's not easy to explain what it is about Chuck's books that I find so fascinating, but I guess it's in the details. His books are packed with little factoids, such as the recipe for napalm in Fight Club. That one happens to be false as his publisher insisted that the real ingredients not be disclosed to the public, but he's always slipping in little things like that into his stories.
Furthermore, he routinely describes things that are positively disgusting and that I would never want to contemplate let alone witness, yet his stories draw me and make me feel closer to that grime than any other writer. While I read Snuff I could picture that room as if I was standing in it, so much so that I felt like I desperately needed a shower. And I defy anyone to read "Guts" in Haunted without laughing out loud or gagging, depending on your tolerance for awful stories about masturbation.
If you've never read his work, I'd recommend either of his 90s works above as a starting point, but I'm certainly a fan now and I look forward to more. Supposedly all of his books have been optioned for films at this point (I didn't see Choke) but as great as Fight Club was on-screen, I think his stories lose their urgency in the adaptation process once his writing style is removed. It's a contradiction: his books deliver such vivid descriptions that I can vizualize myself in them and I would love to see more of his creations in theaters, yet I am aware that any film version will ultimately be compromised because it will not be delivered in his distinctive prose.
I guess that's what books are for.
This represents Part 6 in a series of 25 posts about my favorite as well as the most disappointing entertainment properties/trends of the last ten years. To Be Continued!
Labels: books, Chuck Palahniuk, I love the 00s
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Thursday, December 17, 2009
DoFuss and the Wave
Can't believe I'll be in New York in less than a week. This trip is either going to be a nightmare or an extremely good time, and a lot of that is up to Go. Will he sleep on the plane? Will he adapt to the time shift? We'll all find out soon enough.
I was fortunate enough to be a guest on Alex's podcast The Dofuss Show again, although due to this being my third straight show he jokingly dubbed it "The DanFuss Show." I liked what we talked about but my voice sounds tired and I made a far too many pauses when I spoke. I don't know if it was the late hour or just nerves. Last time we did this I had just come home after a few drinks, so maybe I should make it a habit of loosening my lips with a spot o' booze in the future.
The show notes are on Alex's site this time, after we worked on them together using Google Wave. Have you heard about this thing? I got a random invite a few weeks back and let the service sit because I didn't know what to do with it. Now that I have friends on there as well as an entire community of Bitmob writers, I'm checking my waves daily to see what's going on.
In this case, Alex wrote the notes before we talked as an outline for our discussion. After we recorded I edited them, adding specific topics we brought up or articles we referenced. then put those into a wave that he and I could view. I added links to each item as needed while he was editing the show. When he was done, he looked at the notes and edited them to better reflect what made the final cut and what didn't. In the end, he was able to copy and paste the material from the wave, links and all, right onto his site. And unlike last time, the wave allowed us to collaborate and get the notes ready to be posted alongside the show. It's pretty cool.
Sure, I haven't seen anything in Google Wave that couldn't be done over e-mail, but the online nature of Wave makes collaborations like this a lot easier. Some of the stuff we're doing for Bitmob would be way too much of a hassle to attempt via e-mail, as dozens of different people are reading and responding in a single conversation would become an illegible mess of quoted text.
If you're on Google Wave, look me up. You can already guess what my username is. If you're wondering what it's like, you can ask me for an invite. Please note that you need a Google account to use Wave, but if you have Gmail that should count.
つづく...(Click here to read more)
I was fortunate enough to be a guest on Alex's podcast The Dofuss Show again, although due to this being my third straight show he jokingly dubbed it "The DanFuss Show." I liked what we talked about but my voice sounds tired and I made a far too many pauses when I spoke. I don't know if it was the late hour or just nerves. Last time we did this I had just come home after a few drinks, so maybe I should make it a habit of loosening my lips with a spot o' booze in the future.
The show notes are on Alex's site this time, after we worked on them together using Google Wave. Have you heard about this thing? I got a random invite a few weeks back and let the service sit because I didn't know what to do with it. Now that I have friends on there as well as an entire community of Bitmob writers, I'm checking my waves daily to see what's going on.
In this case, Alex wrote the notes before we talked as an outline for our discussion. After we recorded I edited them, adding specific topics we brought up or articles we referenced. then put those into a wave that he and I could view. I added links to each item as needed while he was editing the show. When he was done, he looked at the notes and edited them to better reflect what made the final cut and what didn't. In the end, he was able to copy and paste the material from the wave, links and all, right onto his site. And unlike last time, the wave allowed us to collaborate and get the notes ready to be posted alongside the show. It's pretty cool.
Sure, I haven't seen anything in Google Wave that couldn't be done over e-mail, but the online nature of Wave makes collaborations like this a lot easier. Some of the stuff we're doing for Bitmob would be way too much of a hassle to attempt via e-mail, as dozens of different people are reading and responding in a single conversation would become an illegible mess of quoted text.
If you're on Google Wave, look me up. You can already guess what my username is. If you're wondering what it's like, you can ask me for an invite. Please note that you need a Google account to use Wave, but if you have Gmail that should count.
Labels: Alex, Bitmob, friends, Google Wave, podcast, The DoFuss Show, writing
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
I Hate the 00s: Video Game Movies
No doubt, the last ten years have seen some wonderful movies come and go. You know one thing that all the great movies of the 00s have in common? They sure as hell weren't based on any video games! Yes, today's disappointment of the decade is the state of game-based movies: not only do they suck, they're getting worse.
I'm sure it's very, very hard to make a successful film from a critical or financial standpoint (to say nothing of both). One easy way to get people in the seats is to make a movie based on a known property. In the 1990s Hollywood dabbled in movies based on popular video games. The results were pretty abysmal; I'd argue that the only one of the bunch worth a damn is Mortal Kombat (1995) because it gets most of the characters right and they spend most of the film fighting each other. Then they tried to make a sequel and pissed away what little momentum the series had.
However, it takes time to get these things right. Movies and games are two very different mediums for storytelling, and the latter has only really begun to dabble in that department in the last twenty years or so. As games develop their narrative chops and, in this era of high-resolution graphics and performances from actual actors, crib more cinematic techniques as they go, movies and games should slowly converge, right?
Looking at the past ten years, the answer is a resounding "fuck no." Video game based movies seem to be the dumping ground for any and every cliched action script that only the hackiest of hacks can spit out. The process seems to be: [A] acquire rights to video game license [B] hire somebody to write a script based purely on the title of said game [C] release the resulting mess into theaters and watch it end up on DVD six weeks later. [D] Profit, I guess, because they keep doing this shit.
Look at Uwe Boll's first outing into game cinema, House of the Dead (2003). I'm hardly a fan of the original series of games, but I've played/seen them enough to know that they center around secret agents shooting zombies. Somehow the movie is about a group of teens who take a party boat to "Death Island" and wind up being attacked by the undead. Eventually there is one scene of shooting zombies and it's nothing but a long Matrix-inspired sequence of low-budget bullet time. Curiously, clips of the real game are actually edited into the movie, almost as a reminder as to what the story should be about, but isn't.
By all accounts, House of the Dead was a failure but Uwe Boll got to make another video game movie which managed to out-suck his first one. Alone in the Dark (2005) is the kind of film that routinely shows up on "worst movie ever made" lists and has been thoroughly mocked by the Agony Booth and The Nostalgia Critic, among others. Yet someone made their money back because Uwe Boll kept making movies, quickly cementing himself as a crap merchant dealing exclusively in video game properties. When video game companies license negotiate movie rights now, they demand a say in picking the director solely to avoid this guy (it's known as the "Uwe Boll Clause" and I'm sure they're only half-joking).
It wasn't just Uwe Boll though. Look at the Resident Evil trilogy of films which range from mediocre to OMG-awful yet a fourth film is on the way. Those games are extremely cinematic in their presentations, relying heavily on voice acting and camera angles from the beginning. It should have been an easy adaptation to make, but someone decided to gut the story and just turn it into another zombie movie and not a particularly good one. There's also a litany of forgettable movies based on fighting games like Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li, D.O.A. with more on the way. No, I won't mention them by name because they make my brain hurt.
The future of video game movies is bright, at least in comparison to what we've got now. The Prince of Persia movie seems to have a lot of money behind it and a decent leading man, but I'm not holding my breath. It's not like Jerry Bruckheimer hasn't disappointed in the past. Even if that movie fails, I hope someone eventually figures out that games have stories worth telling because a good video game movie would be spectacular. If a fan-made zero-budget short like Turbo can at least approximate the excitement of a fake video game, why can't a multi-million dollar production even come close to a real one?
This represents Part 5 in a series of 25 posts about my favorite as well as the most disappointing entertainment properties/trends of the last ten years. To Be Continued!
つづく...(Click here to read more)
I'm sure it's very, very hard to make a successful film from a critical or financial standpoint (to say nothing of both). One easy way to get people in the seats is to make a movie based on a known property. In the 1990s Hollywood dabbled in movies based on popular video games. The results were pretty abysmal; I'd argue that the only one of the bunch worth a damn is Mortal Kombat (1995) because it gets most of the characters right and they spend most of the film fighting each other. Then they tried to make a sequel and pissed away what little momentum the series had.
However, it takes time to get these things right. Movies and games are two very different mediums for storytelling, and the latter has only really begun to dabble in that department in the last twenty years or so. As games develop their narrative chops and, in this era of high-resolution graphics and performances from actual actors, crib more cinematic techniques as they go, movies and games should slowly converge, right?
Looking at the past ten years, the answer is a resounding "fuck no." Video game based movies seem to be the dumping ground for any and every cliched action script that only the hackiest of hacks can spit out. The process seems to be: [A] acquire rights to video game license [B] hire somebody to write a script based purely on the title of said game [C] release the resulting mess into theaters and watch it end up on DVD six weeks later. [D] Profit, I guess, because they keep doing this shit.
Look at Uwe Boll's first outing into game cinema, House of the Dead (2003). I'm hardly a fan of the original series of games, but I've played/seen them enough to know that they center around secret agents shooting zombies. Somehow the movie is about a group of teens who take a party boat to "Death Island" and wind up being attacked by the undead. Eventually there is one scene of shooting zombies and it's nothing but a long Matrix-inspired sequence of low-budget bullet time. Curiously, clips of the real game are actually edited into the movie, almost as a reminder as to what the story should be about, but isn't.
By all accounts, House of the Dead was a failure but Uwe Boll got to make another video game movie which managed to out-suck his first one. Alone in the Dark (2005) is the kind of film that routinely shows up on "worst movie ever made" lists and has been thoroughly mocked by the Agony Booth and The Nostalgia Critic, among others. Yet someone made their money back because Uwe Boll kept making movies, quickly cementing himself as a crap merchant dealing exclusively in video game properties. When video game companies license negotiate movie rights now, they demand a say in picking the director solely to avoid this guy (it's known as the "Uwe Boll Clause" and I'm sure they're only half-joking).
It wasn't just Uwe Boll though. Look at the Resident Evil trilogy of films which range from mediocre to OMG-awful yet a fourth film is on the way. Those games are extremely cinematic in their presentations, relying heavily on voice acting and camera angles from the beginning. It should have been an easy adaptation to make, but someone decided to gut the story and just turn it into another zombie movie and not a particularly good one. There's also a litany of forgettable movies based on fighting games like Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li, D.O.A. with more on the way. No, I won't mention them by name because they make my brain hurt.
The future of video game movies is bright, at least in comparison to what we've got now. The Prince of Persia movie seems to have a lot of money behind it and a decent leading man, but I'm not holding my breath. It's not like Jerry Bruckheimer hasn't disappointed in the past. Even if that movie fails, I hope someone eventually figures out that games have stories worth telling because a good video game movie would be spectacular. If a fan-made zero-budget short like Turbo can at least approximate the excitement of a fake video game, why can't a multi-million dollar production even come close to a real one?
This represents Part 5 in a series of 25 posts about my favorite as well as the most disappointing entertainment properties/trends of the last ten years. To Be Continued!
Labels: House of the Dead, I hate the 00s, movies, Resident Evil, Uwe Boll, video games
つづく...(Click here to read more)
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Listus Interruptus
Sorry to break the flow of this 00 retrospective, but I figured this would be of interest.
I've often communicated my enthusiasm for the PixelJunk brand of games on the PlayStation Network. Every since I bought a PS3 last year, I have found myself drawn towards their distinctive, addictive little games. When they finally released PixelJunk Shooter last week, their first completely original product of 2009, I was incredibly excited. I played through it as quickly as possible so I could write a review.
That review is on Bitmob right now, but after posting it last night I was stunned to see another writer had posted his own thoughts on the game and they were already splashed across the front page. It was an awkward moment for me, because while I was disappointed that someone else got the front-page treatment over me, I was really impressed by what he wrote. Bottom line: we both love the game, so you should consider buying it. Even though I've "finished" the game I've still got things to go back and collect.
Look for my list to continue very soon, although some year-end writing opportunities may cause additional delays. But hey, either way I'll be writing something, so be sure to stay tuned.
つづく...(Click here to read more)
I've often communicated my enthusiasm for the PixelJunk brand of games on the PlayStation Network. Every since I bought a PS3 last year, I have found myself drawn towards their distinctive, addictive little games. When they finally released PixelJunk Shooter last week, their first completely original product of 2009, I was incredibly excited. I played through it as quickly as possible so I could write a review.
That review is on Bitmob right now, but after posting it last night I was stunned to see another writer had posted his own thoughts on the game and they were already splashed across the front page. It was an awkward moment for me, because while I was disappointed that someone else got the front-page treatment over me, I was really impressed by what he wrote. Bottom line: we both love the game, so you should consider buying it. Even though I've "finished" the game I've still got things to go back and collect.
Look for my list to continue very soon, although some year-end writing opportunities may cause additional delays. But hey, either way I'll be writing something, so be sure to stay tuned.
Labels: Bitmob, PixelJunk, PS3, video games, writing
つづく...(Click here to read more)
