ilubmoney

filmsg
Members of this Singapore-based community are kicking it old-school when it comes to photos. Check out this haven of film photography for some beautiful examples of what a camera equipped with film can do.

imomus
What do you get when you take a Scottish artist and put him in Berlin with an LJ account? The Click Opera, that's what. Momus offers up a daily kulturkritik on whatever takes his fancy, from modern architecture to conceptual art.

onaleopard
Fans of novelist Catherynne M. Valente (aka yuki_onna) flock to this community to discuss the latest chapter in her online novel, The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making.

The original Wicker Man wasn't a particularly great movie, so it wasn't that much of a sacrifice for me - if you'll pardon the expression - when they remade it. Remakes, so far as I'm concerned, are for movies that were merely okay the first time around. The remakes rarely are actually better, but when you're remaking The Godfather or Casablanca, you really have no hope. When you're redoing The Hills Have Eyes or House of Wax, you're probably not going to make a masterpiece, but at least your chances of improving the original are far better.

But while watching Nicholas Cage dork his way through the new Wicker Man - which is so bad I can only watch it in five-minute increments - I'm amazed at everything they got wrong.

See, Wicker Man isn't a great film - it's got that stodgy pacing that most 1970s films do, it's quite full of itself, and the acting has Christopher Lee. I mean, I like Christopher Lee, but then again I really dig old Hammer films, which means you are in for a faceful of MAJESTIC ACTING and GRAND SWEEPING GESTURES and VERY ROLLED RS.

Yet why has the original Wicker Man endured? It's a bog-standard horror film, but it has two major twists you won't get in any other movie: the first is that the enemies are strictly pagan, and they're reasonably well-researched. There is a subgenre of people who will forgive any awfulness in a movie so long as the historical details are correct - sure, the plot holes may be so large they're threatening to swallow Cleveland, and the acting makes Pauly Shore look like a fucking Golden Globe winner, but did you see the trim on his helmet? It's completely 1466! You have to see this movie!

What this means is that the original Wicker Man has a lot of bardy music, culminating in an extended naked dance sequence intended to arouse your erotic spirits, but realistically sounds like some inbred SCA splinter faction's idea of a wild orgy. At first it's a nice change of pace from the usual STABBITY STABBITY violin-and-timpani zings of traditional horror soundtracks, but if your tolerance for fair-to-middling folk music is about ten minutes, like most of the population, by the end of the original Wicker Man you'll be needing some Slayer to wash out your earlobes.

And yet despite these flaws, the original Wicker Man works. Because the twist is very clear: these are pagans on their remote isle, and the investigating officer is very clearly an uptight Christian. He believes fiercely in one God, and he will not have sex before marriage, and his interactions with the people of the isle are colored by this. It makes for an intriguing tension.

Because the pagans actually seem to be having a good time.

Unlike most inbred cultists, the second major twist is that pagans have a lot of fine sex, and live among very pretty things, and they actually appear to be a fuck of a lot happier than poor Sergeant Neil Howie. After a while of watching Neil be outraged by everything that crosses his little twisted knickers, you're going, dude, lighten up, just have sex with the beautiful naked women and it'll be cool. Sure, they're a little creepy, but the same can be said of a lot of poly families - which leads to a fascinating thing where the traditional narrative tells you that you should be rooting for old uptight Sergeant Howie, but the people he meets seem to be the folks you'd rather hang out with if you had to choose.

And the amazing thing is that the new Wicker Man imported none of this.

In the new Wicker Man, the pagan cult? It's helmed by wimmens. Eeeevil wimmens. And the wimmens have the poor, bastardized menfolks in terrified bondage in their crazy feminist enclave, and nobody really looks that happy. Instead, everyone on the new Summerisle is imported directly from the Inbred Cultists Association, complete with gibbering old people, unshaven burly men, and cackling hags.

But more importantly, they've given Nicholas Cage a mission. Old Sergeant Howie was merely a dedicated detective following the trail of a missing girl - he didn't know her, but what was important was that justice was served. That gave him, at least, something you could respect. Nicholas Cage, on the other hand, is chasing OMG HIS DAUGHTER into the horrific depths of what would have happened to America if we had been foolish enough to pass the ERA and listened to Betty Friedan -

- and more importantly, Nickie-boy doesn't believe in anything. He's got no religion, no strong beliefs, just an urge to see his offspring. The original Wicker Man staged a showdown between Paganism and Christianity, but the new Wicker Man has a showdown between Paganism and agnosticism, which is inherently less interesting. Nicholas is fighting for the forces of genericism, or, perhaps, Darwinism. How many films have a man battling to save his offspring? About a zillion, right? In a way, it makes him more selfish because he doesn't give a fuck about anything on the island except that his genetic material might be recuperable. And without giving anything away, the fact that he has a daughter removes one of the most interesting twists of the original.

So now that you've neatly flensed away everything that set the old Wicker Man apart from other films, one has to ask the producers: why the hell did you make this movie? Because cultists on an island was such a crazy, unique idea that you just had to toy with it? Because the Wicker Man is so terrifying in and of itself?

No. I'll tell you why the original Wicker Man is scary: it's because near the end, there is an unmistakably chilling moment where you see Sergeant Howie's anguish and faith and fury going up against all of Summerisle. He's in more pain than any man has a right to be in, and the town? They are perfectly happy. In fact, they are ecstatic. And not culty-crazy ecstatic, but having the happy joy of simple people experiencing a fine day at the fair. His faith? His urges? They're gonna go away, and be buried, and the town is going to have a damn good year, and nothing that meant anything to him will survive.

That's horror, man. The old Wicker Man's tedious, but in the end it delivers that one shot - and that makes it all worthwhile. The new Wicker Man? Has Nicholas Cage screaming, "NOT THE BEES! NOT THE BEES!" in hysterical overacting. Underneath it is no conflict we haven't seen a thousand times before. As such, it is hollower than the Wicker Man itself.

So one of the latest DVDs to make the rounds on my porno site of choice is Spit Swappers ("It's more than spit, it's a lifestyle!"). It is, in its entirety, naked women spitting on each other, and on things, and then licking spit off of things. Certainly not to my tastes, but hey, there's a fetish for everybody.

What is cracking me up, however, is the reactions from the guys, who are all like, "Dude, covering a woman in spit is disgusting. Can't we go back to covering a woman in semen?" Because you know, that's totally different.

EUGH my laptop is fucking up again and I might have to get it repaired. Again! It mysteriously refuses to boot up and all I get is a Black Screen of Death. MADDENING. I will scream so hard if this means my data is erased because I spent like three whole days last week re-installing Guild Wars and WoW and all the patches and updates from scratch and I REALLY don't want to do it again.

I planned to spend all of tomorrow watching DVDs and baking brownies at home, but now I'll probably have to go look for a decent computer repair store. Nice.

God damn you, laptop. Seriously. God fucking damn you.

Poll #1432176 Best Thing Ever: Year 5 / Week 42
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Which of these is better?

Post of the Week ~ peterb. Keep the faith.

http://www.amazon.com/Indie-Game-Magazine-Issue-2/dp/B001V7RKMW/ref=sr_1_15/192-3979972-3026541?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1247740946&sr=8-15?ie=UTF8&tag=doctorx-20

funny

p.s. the writing in that magazine is not good so nobody consider buying it just cause it has my game on the cover

Relationships are, largely, a battle of wills. Even the good relationships involve a constant, subconscious battle where your habits rub against their habits - and though it may take decades for a victor to be declared, eventually someone wins out. After all, you can only argue so many times about which way the toothpaste tube should be squeezed from, or the default position of the toilet seat, or whether ketchup goes in the refrigerator or in the cupboard. Eventually, one partner stops fighting, and a sort of harmony is ushered in.

What can happen, amusingly enough, is the simultaneous breakdown, wherein the two of you are like partners in a hoedown trading places. Switch places, on ye go, where they end up, no one knows!

Case in point: The shoes.

Me? I came from a family where shoes got left anywhere. Tommy kicked his work shoes off at the end of the couch, Gramma left her sneakers by the stairs, and I leave my sneakers in the room where it first occurred to me to take them off. It's not uncommon to see me rushing about the house in my bare socks, yelling, "Dammit, now where did I leave those things?"

Gini, on the other hand, came from a house where shoes were, once removed, placed delicately in the closet. She doesn't have a whole lot of shoes (at least as far as the average woman is concerned - she still has about five more pairs than I do), but when they come off they are placed on the rack in her closet.

We have had many arguments about this. Many times we've had the ludicrous argument where I'm running around trying to remember where I left my shoes, and Gini says, "I put them in the closet," and I'll shriek, "Well, why the hell did you put them there?"

Thing is, we both broke down at the same time. Years of running amuck searching frantically for shoes has convinced me that yes, whenever possible, the closet should be where I put my shoes. And Gini, after years of seeing my slovenly freedom of just kicking off my shoes and then staying put in the comfy chair, has taken to dropping her heels wherever she sees fit.

Which is why we both feel incredibly stupid when I walk into her room to complain that she's left her shoes in the living room. We know, objectively, that one of us should have won and settled the matter. Instead, we've just switched sides.

fixed the bug in the save system, the game now auto-saves correctly!

i should do more than fix one bug a day though! need to start work on the game earlier on in the day

This one is my husband's:


Top tier has Fuji apple Bunny slices, baby carrots and some Garlic Texas toast. Bottom tier has a hot dog bunny hopping through a field of corn flowers (nibblets..heh) over a bed of romaine lettuce, ketchup in silicon mold and some Pringles.

And this one is mine:


All ingredients are the same, only my bento has a hot dog hippo showing off his pasta grill :D

(21:15:00) chikenatemydonut: How many storyline writers do you know?
(21:15:11) RinkuHero: hard to count
(21:15:16) RinkuHero: like, do you mean published writers
(21:15:21) RinkuHero: or should i include people who
(21:15:23) RinkuHero: have written fanfics
(21:15:28) chikenatemydonut: Uh
(21:15:33) chikenatemydonut: ...I.. don't know.

(21:16:02) chikenatemydonut: I'm looking for someone who could write a decent length (10-20 page) storyline to an idea
(21:16:07) chikenatemydonut: someone that can build upon a basic idea.
(21:16:13) RinkuHero: for what
(21:16:19) chikenatemydonut: A game I am making.
(21:16:23) RinkuHero: ah
(21:16:31) chikenatemydonut: It's a quad co-op survival game
(21:16:34) chikenatemydonut: [/l4d]
(21:16:59) chikenatemydonut: based on a nuclear explosion and caused a massive fallout
(21:17:43) chikenatemydonut: and the chinese government.

(21:18:25) chikenatemydonut: I have a good bit of the engine done
(21:18:31) chikenatemydonut: by a good bit I mean everything pretty much.
(21:18:35) RinkuHero: ah
(21:18:46) chikenatemydonut: I need a graphics designer and a storyline
(21:18:53) chikenatemydonut: i made my own menu, imo its badass
(21:19:56) chikenatemydonut: It needs somethign else though, but I cant put my finger on it

(21:23:19) RinkuHero: anyway, i'll ask if anyone is interested in writing the story on my livejournal, though
(21:23:24) RinkuHero: if you have a screenshot or something
(21:23:31) RinkuHero: that'd probably help its chances
(21:23:34) chikenatemydonut: The screenshots look terrible, they are all temp graphics.
(21:23:37) RinkuHero: ah
(21:23:44) chikenatemydonut: b/w circles and squares

if anyone is interested reply here. he's the author of this game: http://www.indiegames.com/blog/2007/03/gems.html

Hello Bento Challengers! It is my pleasure to be your new co-moderator :)

July 20th is National Hot Dog Day. I'm sure we all have at some point made the tried and true Octodog in our lunch, but there is so much more that can be done. If you would like some ideas, take a look at this website: Nippon Hot Dog Art

Super Kawaii :D

So let us all try something different from the chtulu dog this time around. I look forward to everyone's creativity.

Tag with "Hot Dogs."

I'm pleased (and thankful) to have foxymartini take the reigns on the bentochallenge community. She will start posting challenges and will help continue to keep our community functioning nicely. She has been a very active member of the community and will do an excellent job! I'm still here, in the background, as I gear up for a busy year.

I'm not sure if anyone else has ever posted something like this. I have always been frustrated at being limited to one banner image to encompass all the things that interest me. Because of this, when I was revamping my LJ the other day, I decided to see if I could get it to randomly display a banner on each page load from a select group of banners I had created.

I found a way and have put it into a five step process for anyone to use.

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Click for a Five Step Process to Random Banner Selection

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Examples of this code in action can be seen by reloading the pages on my LJ, kaylashay81. I currently have six different banners to rotate out on my LJ and I'm working on more.

〤 I saw Harry potter and the Half-Blood Prince and it was not bad! So here is what i thought of it, spoiler free. I particularly adored the scenes of Harry all hopped up on felix felicis. Seriously.


"Except for its... you know, pincers." *click click click*

Amazing. ♥ Gosh Danrad you are so tiny and endearing sometimes.

Also, the Death Eaters were badass, Bellatrix was awesome, and Helena Bonham Carter is a crazy, fierce bitch.

That being said though, I was pretty disappointed with the Harry/Ginny scenes. They had absolutely no chemistry and it was all very listless. It was kind of like watching Twilight all over again... only somehow worse, probably because I actually care about this series. The Ron/Lavender scenes were actually a lot more impressive than the Harry/Ginny ones, I think.

〤 Speaking of the shitfest that is Twilight, I found out the other day that one of my friends was really into Twilight, which is weird because I always thought she would be too mature and intelligent to be into stuff like that. It came up in a conversation and I was going on about how terrible it was and she was suddenly like "actually, I kind of love it...". Fghjkl. So awkward.

〤 I got this fabulous bracelet! It was a little expensive, but I love Pocahontas and Disney, so how could I say no. Savages, savages! ♥ Also lol I used to have the biggest crush on John Smith when I was little. He is my movie boyfriend.