The biggest problem with France is...

in
The top search query in France in May 2003, according to Google Zeitgeist, was "nice people."
Things must truly be bad if one must turn to a search engine to...
Oh, I'm going to bite my tongue because I'm heading over to France in a few weeks for the Tour de France, and I'll need some of those nice people to push my fat butt up the Alps. Maybe they'll think my red, white, and blue bike and helmet represent the French flag.

Special f/x flix = hard-core porn

in
The widespread disappointment over The Matrix: Reloaded reminded me of David Foster Wallace's essay F/X Porn. It argues that Hollywood special effects blockbusters are no different from hard-core porn, each special effects-heavy scene being the equivalent of the porn scenes while all the other stuff is just filler. He also posits a law he calls the Inverse Cost and Quality Law:
The larger a movie's budget is, the shittier that movie is going to be.

More was at work in the downfall of The Matrix: Reloaded (TMR), however. Wallace's law rests on the premise that a huge studio will only commit hundreds of millions of dollars to a movie if it's guaranteed to succeeed. Thus the movie "must thus adhere to certain reliable formulae that have been shown by precedent to maximally ensure a runaway hit." Some of TMR fits this idea--the elaborate fight sequences, the love story. But based on what I've read about the very private Wachowski brothers, I don't think they'd acquiesce to studio pressure to alter their story. The plot of the TMR also seems fairly non-commercial, as convoluted and philosophical as it is (though respected critics such as Stanley Kauffman refer to the Matrix movies as "aggrandized juvenilia" and "adolescent fodder"). Frankly, Warner Brothers approved the construction an entire stretch of freeway just to shoot the car chase scene, creating huge budget overruns. Sure sounds like the Wachowski brothers had carte blanche.
And what of the Lord of the Rings trilogy? It was undoubtedly Peter Jackson's largest budget to date, by a long stretch. Despite being known primarily to movie buffs, Jackson received approval to spend $300 million to shoot all three movies in one year. That was a huge risk for New Line considering that if the first movie was a bust, they'd be on the hook for the other two. Yet all I've read indicates Jackson had significant creative control, and the first two movies have been wonderful, IMO. Perhaps they don't have the charm of earlier low-budget Jackson flicks like Dead Alive or Forgotten Silver or Meet the Feebles, but they're not low quality, to use the jargon of Wallace's law. Jackson obviously adapted the story from source material, and the popularity of that source novel reduced the risk to the studio to some degree, but in LOTR: TTT Jackson and his wife made several large plot adjustments, and overall IMO they created a story that's much more emotionally charged than the book.
But Wallace's law generally holds true. Studios are notoriously conservative which is why we're seeing so much interest in franchises (new chapters are in the works for all of the following: Harry Potter, LOTR, Matrix, Spiderman, X-Men, James Bond, Terminator, Mission Impossible, Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park, Alien, Blade, XXX) and sequels (e.g. MIB II, Meet the Fockers, Legally Blond 2: Red, White, and Blond, Shanghai Knights). The hope is that familiarity with characters and plotlines minimizes marketing costs by bringing in a built-in audience. So read the darn essay. It's dead on about the merits of Terminator versus T2. If nothing, Wallace is a funny writer and astute commentator on pop culture. [1] Until you do, I'm going to pass on The Matrix: Reloaded and reload The Matrix instead.
[1] If adding footnotes to blog entries were simpler, I'd use them as frequently as Wallace does. Instead I resort to way too many parentheticals. My mind just can't think linearly for more than one or two thoughts at a time. I want a muffin.

LCD versus Plasma TVs

in
Among my wealthy early adopter friends, plasma TVs are all the rage. Everyone wants one, everyone has an itchy trigger finger. But what about LCDs? Should they wait until larger LCDs are manufactured at attractive price points (all signs are that monstrous LCDs are on the way)? Here's some background reading on the topic for those of you fortunate to have enough disposable income and household purchase decision-making power to contemplate the addition:
Article 1
Article 2
Personally, I can't envision a plasma TV being my primary TV right now, and they're too expensive as a second TV. Also, in home theater, size matters--watching a movie on a 42" plasma TV only works for me in smaller rooms. But hung on a wall in a bedroom? Smoooooth. Some high quality 32" to 42" models are available for the price of a really nice computer ($3500) so this is the year I expect quite a few of these toys being mounted by drooling boys in homes across America. Me, I'm going to wait on these new LCDs. Hopefully in a year or two prices will drop enough to justify my love.

The demise of the complete game

in
Joe Sheehan writes a good article about why it's silly to diminish today's pitchers for not throwing as many complete games as yesterday's pitching stars like Bob Gibson and Juan Marichal.
It reminded me of the Cubs' series against the Blue Jays, where their hitters were taking a ton of pitches. Prior threw 100+ pitches just to get through 5 2/3 innings, and the Cubs' bullpen got a lot of work. Against a patient team like that, throwing strike one is really key. In Pedro Martinez's last start against the White Sox, he was strike one to just about every hitter. The White Sox were taking lots of pitches b/c they knew he was in only his second start back off of the DL and was on a pitch limit. Pedro was more than happy to take advantage of the situation. A hitter down 0-1 in the count is much less dangerous. Of course, the White Sox strategy ultimately paid off when Pedro got pulled and the Red Sox bullpen blew the win for him again. Still, if Pedro was healthy, he would have been tough to beat. It's like starting every at-bat down a strike automatically.
The problem is that many managers and starting pitchers feel like they've failed if they don't work deep into the game, and that can encourage abuse. Dusty Baker and Kerry Wood seem particularly susceptible to that old-school machismo. Let's hope it doesn't backfire. The Cubs have a good bullpen--no reason to leave them sitting.

Me Tatonka

in
I attended the 2003 Tatonka Wing Eating Contest tonight, as a judge. Tatonka is a monthly gathering at the Wing Dome in the U-District. Andy, a New Yorker, started the monthly buffalo wing and beer fest in the early days of Amazon. I hadn't been in quite some time, but I do eat wings cleaner than anyone I know and felt an obligation to lend my critical eye to ensure a fair competition.
I happened to have my new Minolta F300 digital camera handy so I snapped some photos during the event. It was a good chance to try and learn how to use the camera, and as you can tell I didn't quite figure everything out so a few shots are out of focus.
When I got home, I popped the SD Memory card in a USB reader and plugged it into my Powerbook, and a few minutes later, all the photos appeared in iPhoto (Apple's i-apps are the Microsoft Office of fun). Why not learn to use iPhoto as well? I fiddled around with iPhoto for an hour or two trying to touch up the photos, to add some comments and titles, and to export them into a web page. For the most part it was intuitive, but the degree of image size control in the export function isn't as precise as that in Adobe ImageReady (part of Photoshop), so the large-sized photos turned out very large, still. Each ranges anywhere from 150K to 200K in size. Sorry about that. I'll go in and shrink them with Photoshop or ImageReady when I have some more free time.
Perhaps, however, the bloated images are appropriate. After all, this is an event in which 1,341.5 buffalo wings were consumed in less than ninety minutes. Some contestants gained nearly 10 pounds in weight during the evening. Inspired by the evening's gluttony, I wrote a short wing-eating contest haiku:
Man leaves the Wing Dome.
"Completed the wing contest!"
Dies of heart attack.

Or, appropriating one of my favorite spam haikus:
Jassy sees doctor.
"I eat wings monthly," he says.
Angioplasty.

Wal-Mart vs. Netflix, Round 1

in
I got my first two Wal-Mart movies yesterday in the mail. They shipped on Thursday the 12th, and arrived on Monday the 16th. That's three business days. Not good when you compare it to the reigning heavy weight champion, wearing the red trunks...
Netflix received a movie back from me on Monday the 16th and sent me an e-mail letting me know to expect the movie on Wednesday the 18th. I got it today, just one day later. Most of the movies they ship to me arrive in one business day, the remainder take two days. Advantage Netflix.
As for the website and packaging, Wal-Mart hasn't tried to do anything fancy to outdo Netflix. Their mailers are almost exactly the same. Smart move since technological innovation isn't their game. Wal-Mart's core competency is pricing its competition into submission. Ruthless.
I shipped one of the Wal-Mart movies back to them today. Let's see what their "mail back receive new movie in return" cycle time turns out to be.

Ginger, AOL, Apple

in
Good, quick read (excerpt from the book Code Name Ginger) about an early meeting between Dean Kamen and team and Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, and John Doerr concerning the Segway.
Another entertaining read about the two big sales icons from early AOL, Colburn and Berlow, before the fall from grace.
A not revolutionary but concise summary of the Apple business model from Tim O'Reilly (he describes them as a cultural, not technological, innovator).

Movie and food club

in
Book clubs seem to be really popular, at least among women I know. Though I still suspect they're just excuses for women to get together and gossip, the concept is appealing. Scheduling regular events (music lessons, pub nights, annual themed parties) is a good thing in an age when everyone's so busy that time can evaporate. However, I just can't let other people dictate my reading choices.
As an alternative, though, I've decided to start a movie/gourmet club. Once a month, we'll gather and watch a movie while eating food that shares some common theme. Perhaps it's French film noir night and we'll watch Le Samourai while swallowing escargots, smoking cigarettes, and sitting around, mute and stern, like Alain Delon. Or watching Wong Kar Wai's Chungking Express while eating canned tuna and chef salads, like the Tony Leung character. Foodie movies like Big Night and Eat, Drink, Man, Woman are perhaps too literal, but rules are unimportant. We can make it up as we go.
Hopefully they're movies that most of the people haven't heard of or seen yet. In this day and age, it's easy to get your hands on movies that used to be difficult to obtain. A video store like Scarecrow, an online site like Yes Asia or HKFlix, and even Amazon's sister companies in the UK and France and Japan make it easy to get your hands on international movies long before they're picked up for North American distribution. Bend it Like Beckham, Le Cercle Rouge, Double Vision, this Hayao Miyazaki Studio Ghibli Collection, 28 Days Later, Versus, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Six (Willow as crazy psycho dark queen witch) are just a few of the intriguing titles available right now on DVD to movie fans worldwide though they're not currently being issued on DVD by a North American video distributor. Want to find out what movies are coming out of Hollywood next? Check out these movies which have been stolen (read: picked up) by various Hollywood producers and studios for shameless repurposing and copying with big-name movie stars in the near future: Shall We Dance (to star Richard Gere and Jennifer Lopez...yuck), Dark Water (after the box office success of The Ring, every Asian ghost story is going to be optioned, and this gem from the creator of The Ring was snatched up by Bill Mechanic's Pandemonium), The Eye (which itself copied quite a few American suspense flicks, such as...oh, go see it for yourself; Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner did, and they bought the remake rights), Infernal Affairs (picked up by Brad Grey and Brad Pitt...the original was solid but could use some editing, so perhaps a remake will pick up on that). In some cases it means you'll need a region-free DVD player, but no real movie fan should be without one anyway considering how cheap and plentiful they are.
I'm getting sidetracked. What do you need to do to join up? Have a healthy (unhealthy?) love for movies and movie history. You know who you are. Be willing to show up once a month. Be willing to cook something up (or buy it from a restaurant) about once a year. It's probably helpful though not required to live in Seattle, because otherwise you'll have to watch the movies by yourself or listen to them via speakerphone. I know some people like this and I'm going to recruit them now.

Buy, Cell, Hold

in
Some things never change--Japan and Hong Kong always get the coolest electronic toys before the rest of the world. This 505i cameraphone (Quicktime movie) from Sony Ericsson looks sweet.
One phenomenon I can't understand is the popularity of downloadable ring tones. It's over a $1 billion business worldwide! Supposedly it's a way to distinguish yourself from the masses. I agree that it distinguishes people. It says, "I am a dork."

How do you like dem apples?

in
Sang and I went to a cajun restaurant called La Louisiana last night after a softball doubleheader, and there was a party of five waiting in line ahead of us. One of the guys, tall, middle-aged, with a thick, dark beard, was in a tizzy.
"What is the name of that artist? How can I not remember? He's so famous, everyone knows him. Oh god, come on, help me out here John. He does the stuff with boxes? Whitney Museum? Oh god this is so embarrassing. Come on, guys." The other people in his group, a man and three women, looked at him like he was crazy and shrugged their shoulders. The way he spoke--effete, pompous--annoyed me. However, art is not an area I am an expert in, so I bit my tongue.
Sang went off to the bathroom. No one came to take our names or to seat us. We stood in that cramped entryway while this man continued to harangue us. I thought back to a lonely dinner I had while in South America, in the Argentine city of Puerto Madryn. I knew no one, and I had run out of books to read, so to entertain myself, I reread the same issue of The New Yorker (I think it was this year's anniversary issue) which I had already read twice during my two weeks in South America. One of the best articles just happened to be a profile of the works of...
"Joseph Cornell," I said.
He looked at me as if disappointed. "Yeah, that's right."
He shut up after that, and after a long period of silence we got seated. I wish I had kept that issue of The New Yorker.

Right on ya, mate

in
The most enjoyable aspects of Finding Nemo, for me, were the Australian references. The Aussie accents and personalities, the animated shots of Sydney, the depictions of marine life on the reef...they brought my sabbatical back to the front of my mind. The animators seemed to be striving for realism, and after a dozen or so scuba dives, I can attest to the realism of several details. Anything underwater appears less colorful than it does above water (because water absorbs lots of blue light, if I recall correctly). The Pixar folks nailed that. As you descend, or as day turns to night, everything under water loses its color, and several shots in the movie illustrated that effect. The young turtle who gives Marlin and Dory the pep talk before they get ejected from the current? "Alright, everyone, you're going to have a great jump today." That was every extreme sport operator I met in New Zealand.
The little cleaning shrimp (I saw a few while scuba diving)? He was hilarious, too.
"No cleaning!"
"I am so ashamed."

Potpourri

in
No subject at all, just a random tour of stuff and thoughts...
Lots of people ask me what hosting service I use for my website. Frankly, web hosting is a commodity. I use Hostway, but Laughing Squid looks like a good deal, too. I used to host my site on my desktop, but then it crapped out on me.
Don't Blog: Headlines from the Future
June 20 will be a big movie day for me here in Seattle. The Hulk opens that day, as does Le Cercle Rouge in a one week stint at the Varsity. Also, the acclaimed documentary Winged Migration visits the not-deserving-of-acclaim Egyptian Theatre.
Kicksology is a cool site that reviews basketball sneakers. Shoe fit is so personal that you can't really buy a shoe based on a review, but some of the info is objective and useful, and the pics are sweet. The Nike Air Ultraposite is one of the coolest looking basketball shoes ever. Unfortunately Nikes are made for people with perfect feet--narrow, with perfect arches. I have wide, flat feet. The last pair of Nike basketball shoes that fit me were the Nike Air Jordan VIII's, in black and concord. I still have that pair even though the treads have worn down so much they're useless on a court. They have sentimental value. They were the last time I could wear the same shoes as Jordan, and they're the first pair of expensive basketball shoes my mom bought me. She didn't even know if I played basketball that well, and they cost $100 back then, a fortune to spend on a short, non-athletic kid like me. But every now and then she could tell when I really wanted something, and she'd splurge for me, no questions asked. Those were great shoes, and if I ever find another pair for sale at a decent price I'm picking up another pair. Those were better than any hoops shoes I've worn in recent years.
Charles Pierce on Sammy Sosa and cork, in Slate.
Interview with Bill James about Moneyball, also in Slate.
Busted! I saw this news clip in IMDb:
Before re-releasing their 1989 short Knick Knack and attaching it to their release of Finding Nemo, Disney and Pixar virtually eliminated the breasts of two female characters, a mermaid and a plastic bunny, USA Today observed today (Wednesday). "In the original, the girls have breasts the size of large grapefruit," animation fan Raymond Tucker of Greensboro, N.C. told the newspaper. "In the new version, the breasts just aren't there." Animation historian Jerry Beck added: "These films need to be treated like classic films, not kids' fodder."
My first thought? I think Raymond Tucker is more than an animation fan. Second thought? I've got to go home and confirm this! Knick Knack is included in the deluxe collector's edition laserdisc boxset of Toy Story. I fired it up just now, and lo and behold...the breasts are indeed massive in the original! That is so cool. Anyone who wishes to come by and confirm this for themselves is welcome. By the way, laserdiscs are totally cool and retro now, the same way LPs are cooler than CDs. Laserdisc collector box sets are the ultimate in cool, with their huge packaging and lovely cover art. Until they issue DVDs of the Star Wars Episodes IV through VI, the deluxe laserdisc box set of that trilogy is the only way to experience them in your own home with Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound.
Exactitudes.
The perfect gift for your graphic designer friend.
Not feeling creative? Stuck? Try Brian Eno's Oblique Strategies. Here are lots of links to online versions.
Some kind Photoshop users throughout the web have chipped in some interior design suggestions for the embattled Martha Stewart in case she ends up in the slammer.
Einstein: "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."

Wal-Mart vs. Netflix

in
Wal-Mart announced final pricing for their Netflix competitor DVD rental-thru-the-mail service, and it's cheaper than their beta pricing and cheaper than Netflix. Wal-Mart's pricing:
$15.54 for 2 DVDs out at a time, unlimited rentals
$18.76 a month for 3 DVDs out at a time, unlimited rentals
$21.94 for 4 DVDs out at a time, unlimited rentals
(Who came up with these random prices, anyway? Obviously not a marketer--no one will remember these figures)
Compare this with Netflix pricing:
$13.95, customers can get four rentals a month
$19.95 a month for three movies out at a time, unlimited rentals
$29.99 for five DVDs out at a time, unlimited rentals
$39.99 for eight movies out at a time, unlimited rentals
I'm a long-time Netflix customer, and I'll admit that the Wal-Mart pricing is tempting, despite the fact that they are the evil empire. Forget all of the 3+ movies out at a time deals. The one that's really intriguing is the Wal-Mart offer for 2 DVDs out a time for $15.54 a month, with unlimited rentals. Netflix used to have a comparable service, at $14.95 per month for 2 DVDs out at a time, unlimited rentals. Unfortunately, I canceled that service when I went on sabbatical, and by the time I returned they had nixed it. Why? Because no normal person needs to have 3 rental DVDs at home at a time. If you finish one movie, you can mail it back and get another back in the span of 3 to 4 days, and if you can't keep yourself occupied on that model with 2 DVDs at a time, you are a total loser and need a job. Netflix probably realized that most people would realize this and switch to the $14.95 plan, depriving them of $5 a month in subscription.
Now they have to acknowledge it again.
The negatives on Wal-Mart/advantages for Netflix:

  1. Their selection of movies is not as good as that of Netflix, not that Netflix's selection is the end-all be-all. For example, I have Devil's Playground on my Netflix rental list, but Wal-Mart's search engine didn't return it (that could be an issue with their search engine, though; see my next point.

  2. Their website is buggy. The search engine often doesn't work--I tried searching for Barbershop off of the page for Frida, and the movie Barbershop didn't come up despite being featured on their homepage.

  3. The switching costs from Netflix involve porting some 81 titles from my Netflix rental queue over to Wal-Mart, and my free time is precious. Someday hopefully we'll be able to port our DVD rental wishlists from one company to another using a web service, driving the switching costs towards zero, but for now it's a hassle.

  4. Fourth, Wal-Mart is evil and I don't want them to have more of my money (okay, maybe they aren't, but most things I've read about them suggest hints of darkness, and they also sued my employer a few years back which wasn't very endearing).

  5. When Netflix expanded their distribution network, transit times for DVDs through the mail improved dramatically. When I drop a movie in the mail, it gets to Netflix in two business days, and Netflix then promises to get a movie back to me in three business days but usually delivers in one or two. That speedy turnaround has really changed the financial equation in Netflix's favor as compared to renting from Scarecrow Video, which costs me a minimum of 30 minutes round trip if traffic is clear. In these days of high gas prices, and because I watch quite a few movies each month and hate driving anywhere, DVD rental through the mail is an obvious winner.


Some people might see the built-up ratings and recommendations of current Netflix customers as another switching cost. Personally, I've rated over a hundred movies in Netflix and don't find their recommendations useful at all. Maybe I've just seen too many movies. I get most of my recommendations from reading, Amazon, and friends and use Netflix for fulfillment (that always sounds funny, though to say I use them for physical fulfillment would sound even worse).
What to do, then? I'm not canceling my Netflix subscription, but I signed up for a Wal-Mart 30 day trial today. If their service is solid, perhaps I'll switch. Every dollar counts, a truth which Wal-Mart has built an empire on. Hopefully Netflix will match the Wal-Mart 2 DVD at a time program, if not exactly in price, then at least close. Netflix doesn't have the financial clout to compete with Wal-Mart in a price war, but enough of their customers will stay loyal to them if they show good faith in competing (some consumers will do the right thing if they feel that companies or artists are trying to meet them halfway; it's the reason I bought about 20 songs off of the Apple Music store yesterday even though I could find all of them quite easily using Kazaa). At the very least, this should spur Netflix to think more creatively about how to improve their website and service--it's been fairly stagnant for a long time.
Footnote: Greencine is a DVD rental site that stocks more esoteric movies than Netflix or Wal-Mart. It's the only site that rents Battle Royale or Eraserhead, it has a huge selection of Asian and anime titles (want to see Infernal Affairs, which I just saw at SIFF? Greencine has it already), and its selection generally puts its more well-capitalized competitors to shame. They're as close an analogue to Scarecrow Video through the mail as I've found. I might switch over to them, though $21.95 a month means a lot of pressure to get through at least 1 movie a week to feel like you're getting your money's worth. They seriously need some software help as well. The site layout and search engine are poor. From a selection standpoint, however, they rock, making them a viable option for true movie buffs.