I know this has been posted on a few sites already but I loved this so much I just had to show it off here. THIS, finally, is the future I was promised by the seminal Tomorrow’s World in the early 80’s (But still no flying cars…bah!):
I love the bits when the guy kicks it and when it starts slipping on the ice - just watching those robotic legs kick and struggle in exactly the way an organic beastie would…blows my tiny little mind.
As a added treat, have a look at what those brain boffins in Japan are have created in their quest to build robots in the human mould…
Is anyone else as creeped out by smiley plastic Einstein as I am?
In the battle for Web Standards, the Acid test has swiftly become one of the [many] benchmarks by which a browser is judged. Acid 2 featured a smiley face that would only render correctly if the browser supported the standards used in it’s construction 100%. Opera was the first to pass this, followed not terribly long afterwards by Firefox. Only very recently has Internet Explorer joined the party: the first beta of version 8 now passes:
A smooth animation should play of boxes filling in left-to-right, each of a different colour, and a score will count up depending on how far the browser gets, up to a maximum of 100 - the pic below is what it should look like when complete:
Opera’s latest snapshot build (9815):
Opera are sticklers for Web Standards and usually are the front-runners when it comes to these things; they recently took Microsoft to court over their refusal to abide by standards the rest of the web wanted to propagate. However, a new front-runner has emerged…
Firefox (3.0b5pre):
Opera has long been my browser of choice but at the moment I am highly impressed with Firefox. Not only have browsing speeds picked up considerably, and scrolling of pages improved dramatically, but at this exact time it is proving to be more stable than the Opera snapshots. They’ve even managed to fit in a few nifty ideas that Opera doesn’t have: I’m in love with the new single-click add-bookmark functionality in the Address Box, for instance. I’m so impressed, in fact, I even wondered briefly if I shouldn’t rethink my loyalty to Opera! I even wrote this article in Firefox…But before the FF fanboys get excited, there are more than a few things I’d miss about Opera; I just need to wait until the 9.5 final is released, methinks.
Oh yeah, almost forgot one. So how does Internet Explorer 8 beta 1 fare (In the default Standards Mode)?
Bless. It’s like the fat kid who was always made to run races by his gym teacher. Everyone gives a special round of applause when he finally crosses the line panting, wheezing and red-faced.
While the Acid Test is not by any means a definitive statement of which browser performs best on the web, it is certainly fun watching them all compete to pass it!
As a life-long fan of Science Fiction in all her forms, and as an appreciator of Fine Art and Desktop Wallpapers generally, it is my proudest pleasure to introduce the wider world to a site, and an artist, whose works are stunning in the power and grace of their Vision.
Not only is it a cracking display of imagination and talent in artist Gary Tonge’s chosen medium but the web-site itself qualifies as one of the most beautiful implementations of Flash coding I have ever had the pleasure to browse.
Please take some time to look around, but be warned the site will open Pop-ups if you try to open the larger versions of the Artworks.
The following are cropped samples of some of his work:
**SPOILER** CONTAINS PICS OF ACTUAL [TOY] MONSTER!
As a follow-up piece to my Cloverfiled film review, I thought I’d share these pics that surfaced on Digg.com not too long ago of the actual monster. In the film he’s kept mostly hidden from the audience by a variety of tricks; dust-clouds, darkness, ‘unsteady’ camera-work and poor lighting, to name but a few. But now, Hasbro, toymakers of giant-robot-to-vehicle fame have revealed their forthcoming model, presented here in bright, clear, plastic-o-vision. Behold!
Erm, yeeees. Remember back when I was talking about shoddy design? What is with those arms, guy? I bet the monsters on Monster Island routinely wet themselves laughing at those things…and they’re not exactly supermodel standard themselves! Even Gamera can hold his head up high when ol’ ‘Orang-utan’ Cloverfield is around!
Go on, I dare you to take that seriously. Yeah, okay, he’s about 200ft tall in ‘real ‘life, but rather than screaming and running I’d likely be giving him my best Paddington Bear Hard Stare trying to work out how we’re supposed to believe that evolution has gifted the beast such ungainly forelimbs. Heck, even random radioactively-generated mutations aren’t enough of an explanation for those! I begin to grok his extreme camera-shyness…
Ah, this is looking better. That’s a mean-lookin’ lump o’ flesh and teeth you got there, Mr Cloverfield. And that tongue is sure to impress the lady monsters. Respect is due. Oh, but I forget that those enlarged headbumps actually throb, don’t they? Like paper-bags being blown into prior to bursting. Well, I suppose the toy won’t bother replicating that feature so you might get away with it.
After what seems like years of viral marketing and frenzied babble on Internet discussion boards, I finally got a chance to go and see Cloverfield, the once-mysterious-film-without-a-name by creator/producer J.J Abrahms, one of the guiding minds behind deflating TV sensation Lost. Flanked by ample companionship in the form of Debs, Leigh, Daisy and Laura, I took my seat in Aberdeen’s Vue cinema with a tremulous anticipation building in my stomach: even without paying attention to the specifics the amount of sheer noise generated on the Internet over this production had itself become reason enough for me to want to see the film, almost as if some devious marketer was hoping that would happen…
Happily, I knew very little about the film; there was supposed to be a monster - hard to unlearn that kind of detail once you’ve laid eyes upon it - and featured lots of hand-held cam footage, but that was about it. For preference I like to know very little about a film before I go and see it: I tend to enjoy the films more when I’m surprised by what they contain. Which, by the way, might not be the case if you read any more of this. There are some minor spoilers ahead, but I feel safe revealing them because you’re either reading this as you’ve exhausted everything else printed online about the film, or you’ve just been to see it and want to find someone who agrees/disagrees with your own opinions. You’re forgiven, I do that too.
After the usual preamble of adverts and trailers (nice to see Hellboy 2 but pimping the new Star Trekeleven months prior to release smacked somewhat of desperation) and one warning about strobe effects for the epileptics (”Great: I haven’t had a good twitch in ages!”) the film finally began to play…
The conceit presented here is that the entire film is one 85 minute record scraped from the memory of a digital camera recovered from the devastated regions of New York after some kind of extreme incident, or so some official-looking text duly informed us. I don’t recall being granted security clearance for such naked access to material evidence of this kind - any real evidence of ‘monsters’ would surely be locked in the same vast warehouse of secrets as Indiana Jones‘ Ark of the Covenant - but, overall, I’m glad I got to see this. Having said that, though, the first 20 minutes were a real chore and very nearly prompted my first ever premature exit of a cinema screening.
Rob Harrison, gleaming paragon of youthful, successful handsomeness (designer stubble and designer teeth perfectly matching his designer suit), has secured a promotion as Vice-President of something or other, and is leaving his squadrons of equally well to-do friends behind for a life in Japan. A party is thrown in his honour by his brother’s girlfriend, Lilly, while the brother, Jason, enters into the affair half-heartedly, dumping his unwanted camera-man duties on uncomplicated, slower-witted ‘friend’, Hud. Hud then wanders around the throng of revellers, securing testimonials for Rob to enjoy when he leaves, and thus becomes our shaky, hand-held window into this world. Complications arise when Beth, Rob’s love-interest, appears at the party with another fella at her side and the party spins predictably into a swirling morass of rumour, angst and gossip, Hud effectively morphing into a triple-whammy of investigator, instigator and central gossip node.
Yes, okay, we need to have characters that we can hook ourselves onto to lead us through the events and crises to come, otherwise we may as well be watching a series of YouTube clips stitched randomly together, but good grief why these characters? Hud is amiable enough in his own way, but you get the sense from everyone else that he is tolerated, rather than genuinely liked. But among the rest of the cast there is precious little to actually like. Jason comes across as a spoilt juvenile, Rob acts like a more self-confident version of the same, Hud’s own object of desire, Marlene (Mar-lay-nuh), comes across as a precious, self-absorbed cow; only Lilly shows any decent character traits from the outset. And as for Beth, well, she’s…inoffensive, conforming to a disturbing trend in young American leading ladies of Hollywood efforts of late, being as bland and unremarkable as sheets of lined A4: more a template than an actual 3-dimensional character. I appreciate when films strive for realism, but if there had been just one or two more likeable characters among the throng, or even introduced later, I might not have been rooting so firmly for the monster(s).
Perhaps I’m just biased: I detest these sorts of parties in real life. Vacuous people drinking and gossiping, all empty smiles and shiny clothing, with no meaningful interaction to speak of. So, it was with considerable relief - akin to a really satisfying, pressure-releasing visit to the lavatory - that the first ‘incident’ occurred, and shook the film out of the nail-scrapingly tedious Dawson’s Creek/OC nightmare it was stuck in: an apparent earthquake booming throughout the city, briefly darkening night-time Manhattan.
Having suitably un-nerved the on-screen characters, events move rapidly from here on (as does the camera POV). A building across Central Park explodes. Lady Liberty’s head crash-lands, torn and gashed, in the street outside Rob’s apartment building. Another building collapses, with something enormous glimpsed moving briefly through the dust-clouds, strange booms thudding through the ground, and even stranger roars filling the night sky.
THIS is what I paid my ticket-money for - chaos and people screaming! I love disaster movies. I’d spend a lifetime exploring ruined cities given half a chance and Cloverfield’s creators have obviously spent considerable time watching 9/11 footage for inspiration. So much so that it is almost perverse that none of the on-screen characters are heard making the same comparison. Still, it was watchable then and, visually at least, has lost none of its potency.
What flows from this point onwards is a roller-coaster ride of terror, scares, and emotion, and lots of camera lurching as the gigantic and inordinately camera-shy Cloverfield monster rampages around the city, tearing chunks out of buildings, tossing vehicles and stomping on soldiers in the traditional monster idiom (although its spawning of ceiling-crawling, Alsatian-sized beasties is a fresh wrinkle, enabling the writers to maintain the tension when the big ugly is occupied elsewhere). Rob, Jason, Lilly, Marlene and Hud attempt to leave Mahattan island, only to watch as Jason, and the bridge they are crossing, are swiftly annihilated (Shame, they’ll really miss that bridge…). Then, spurred by an emergency call from the departed Beth (she left early after an argument with Rob) Rob drags the party of four back into the city in order to save his token pretty. My hero.
I remained unconcerned for the human cast for the rest of the movie, even cheering when one of the two girls gets bitten, bleeds from one eye and promptly explodes (Spoiler Warning: try not to look at the picture abov…oh bollocks). And despite warming to Hud, and laughing at some of his unintentionally humourous commentary, I still clapped with glee when he…well, best not to give that one away, hmm?
Oh, and I have one word for all helicopter pilots to keep in mind when ferrying civilians from monster-infested zones:- ALTITUDE!
We left as the credits were rolling, and took ourselves off to a nearby drinking emporium, all four women complaining of quite alarming nausea. I was perfectly fine, hardened by decades of first-person shooters (Both Alien versus Predator games made your Alien character run along walls and on ceilings; great fun!), and tried not to lord it over them too much because it made buying the first round that much cheaper (soft-drinks all round, heh). But I did wonder if perhaps the film should be warning people about more than a few paltry strobe-lights…
So. Cloverfield. A good film, all in all, as soon as you get past the first 20 minutes, don’t root for the humans, and don’t mind never getting a clear full-body look at the monster (From what little they showed I suspect this might have been a wise move: shoddy design is a real suspension-of-disbelief killer). Cleverly shot, if you can ignore the obvious artifice behind it, and a rollicking, heart-stopping ride just short enough to avoid invalidating itself.
