Monthly Archives: March 2014

Been quite the busy bee

Last weekend was Condor XXI, so now one of our local SF conventions is older enough to drink. I, of course, attended the convention as I have for quite a few years now.

Our guest of honor was steampunk author Gail Carriger. I’ve personally know Gail since before her fabulous writing career took off. I have thoroughly enjoyed watching her books sell lots of copes and gather up a fandom fairly unique in its nature. (She’s fond of saying her has the best fan I will not debate her wisodom here.)

Friday I was on no panels myself so I got to play around and be totally relaxed. I reconnected with a few friends I see mostly at conventions, and enjoyed the rarest of treats, sleeping in.

The secret masters of programming put me on all media panels this year, but since I ma huge media fan as well as a lit fan and aspiring author, I found not trouble with that.

We discussed the enduring popularity of Doctor Who, and I put forth the ideas that part of the popularity may rest on two aspects of the show. First, they are not tied to a particular kind of story. They can go dark one week, and silly comedic the next. This gives them a wide range of stories to tell and if you didn’t like what you saw this week, wait it will change. Second, the regenerations, first invented to replace an ailing actor, has created a unique possibility for the show. Each new actor playing the Doctor brings their own spin on it and so the Doctor slightly changes as the actors change. This allows the Doctor to always be a reflection of the times when it was produced, keep it fresh and connected to the audience.

On Sunday evening my sweetie-wife and I had dinner with Gail and her adorable boyfriend. It was a very pleasant time of good food, good company, and good conversation. The weekend was a rejuvenating experience for your humble host and improved my mood considerably.

I also finished the draft for my current novel in progress. I landed at 116,000 words and I have begun the process of cleaning up the copy before turning it over to afore mentioned sweetie-wife for her eagle eyed proofing.

In addition to all that I have been back working my overtime hours at the day job, and getting a submission ready for rejection at Writers of the Future. It has been a busy busy week, but a good one.

A writing and appearance update

My current WIP novel is nearing completion. I have started drafting the final chapter, having passed 111,000 words and I expect to land somewhere in the area of 115,000.

Then there will be polishing, and proofing. After that I will need beta readers to tell me how and how badly it sucks.

This weekend in San Diego is Condor 21, one of our local SF/Fantasy conventions. The Guest of Honor this year is the incomparable Gail Carriger a very talented writer of steampunk. (And a dear friend.)

I will be participating as a panelist, stop by and see our local wildlife. J

Here are the panels I will be on:

Saturday 11:00 AM – The Enduring Popularity of Dr Who.

Saturday 2:00 PM – Big Bang Theory: Love it or Hate it?

Saturday 5:00 PM – The Evolution of Zombies on Screen, and in literature and comics.

Sunday 10:00 AM – Buffy: 10 Years later.

Should be a fun weekend.

Sunday Night Movie: Marathon Man

In all honesty this is the late Saturday night/early Sunday morning movie, as I watched with a couple of friends during that period. Sunday night rolled around and I found myself, after MarathonMan_Poster_300dpi an early rise and a busy day, far too tired for a feature film.

Hailing from 1976, this is a wonderful film that if you have not seen it, you really should. It stars Dustin Hoffmann, Lawrence Olivier, and Roy Scheider. Scheider and Hoffman are brothers, though they are polar opposites. Scheider is a successful business man, with refined tastes and works in the global oil business, while Hoffmann is a graduate student pursuing his doctorate in history, wikth a side quest of proving his father innocent of charges thrown against him during the McCarthy era.

Everything I’ve told you about Scheider is what Hoffman’s character believes to be true and none of it is. This is really a story about family, about haunted pasts, and Nazi dentistry. It has one of the most chilling and terrifying torture scenes ever put to the screen, and it is done without blood and gore. After seeing this film the phrase ‘Is it safe’ will never have the same meaning for you again.

The Screenplay was written by William Goldman, based on his book, and it is stellar. Goldman is responsible for a number of truly terrific screenplays, including Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid, and The Princess Bride to name just two.

I can’t praise this film enough and I can’t talk too much if you have not seen it. The film has twists and turns, and I will not be one to spoil them for you.

The usefulness of a character study

In my writing I often employ a character study as a tool to help me out when I am stuck or confused about a character in one of my pieces. I try to dissect the motivations ad the perception of my character and from that I can usually see the event of the plot in a fresh way.

The thing is I will also turn this critical eye upon myself from time to time. All humans are composed of conflicting ideas, perception, beliefs, and morals. We like to believe that our values spring from a consistent worldview, held in a just and reasonable manner. In reality our views are a collection of odd bits picked up here and there like an indecisive shopper at the worlds largest swap-meet.

Know this I like to try to root out my inconsistencies and/or find the deeper values that are driving my surface reactions. In short do a character study on myself.

I have long maintained that I have libertarian political leanings. I do support the general principle that the government that governs best is the one that governs least. I do not like, nor do I approved of that state directing or attempting to direct the actions of individuals. I am passionate in the my support for the concept of equality, and try to live up to that lofty concept and not just pay it lip service.

Consequently for many years I registered and identified with the Republican Party in this country, the Party that pays the most verbal service to libertarian thought. But years ago I broke with them and more and more I have had a gut reaction that their view of libertinism and mine were somehow at odds. I could not simply walk off though, I need to know for my own sake what is at the root of the divergence. Why do I feel this way? Continue reading →

Sunday Night Movie: Reefer Madness: The Musical

After the horror that was 300: Rise of an Empire AKA Stereotypes Are Us, I wanted something light and fun and mirth-filled for my Sunday Night Movie. I almost wenmt with Reefer-Madness-The-Movie-Musical-reefer-madness-7417378-853-480 GalaxyQuest, a terribly fun movie, but at the last moment I committed to Reefer Madness: The Musical.

Now in the 1930’s there was a film made, Reefer Madness a hyperbole-filled exploitative movie about the terrors and dangers of the demon weed, marijuana. It passed into public domain, became a bit of a cult film for those with the spine to endure it. (It’s truly is a dreary, boring piece of propaganda.) Much later a playwriting teams took it and turned it into camp musical, keeping much of the dialogue and turning the delivery to take what had been lecture and transforming it into satire.

The stage play was later turned into a film for the pay-cable network, Showtime, and that is what I watched.

It starts Alan Cummings, truly a talented actor and singer, Kristen Bell of Veronica Mars fames, and Christian Campbell, who has been known to lament that his gravestone will note him as the actor who played “Jimmy Harper” the protagonist of this piece.

This is a hilarious bit of movie making. While I myself am not a user of the demon weed, hell I very rarely drink, I stand firmly against the stupid, expensive, and deadly drug-war our nation has engaged in. The movie is filled with wonderful performances, lively and sharp songs, all wrapped in unsubtle digs at the puritanical powers that would have us follow the unquestioning in this war.

If you like satire, if you like musicals, if you like camp, then this is a movie for you.

Movie Review: 300 II: Hellenic Boogaloo

So this morning, after losing the requisite hour of sleep the time regulatory gods, my sweetie-wife and I went to the local cinema to take in a movie. My sweetie-wife wanted to see 300: Rise of an Empire, the sequel to 300, a highly stylized retelling of the Spartan stand against the Persian Empire at Thermopylae. Now if you have seen 300, based on 300-rise-of-an-empire-poster1 Frank Miller’s graphic novel, then you know it wildly took liberties with the history and the culture of the Spartans. 300: The Rise of an Empire is true to the Hollywood tradition of a sequel being less intelligent and less well made of a film that the one it is following.

In this movie the physical are more at odds with reality, the characters as even more two-dimensional, and the story is much thinner. This is truly a film that should be shown to aspiring writing, both screenplay and prose, as an example of what not to do.

I had forgotten my watch at home so I am unable to tell you when the story starts, as the movie is front loaded with what looks to be at first a prologue, but turns out to be long tedious minutes of exposition. I am not taking about 3 or 5 minutes, I am talking about 10, 20 maybe more. When the story does start, it often stalls again for more exposition. At one point they literally give you a flashback to the opening of the movie as though you may have forgotten what happened a mere 60 minutes earlier.

This movie also is a prime example of everything that is wrong with digital effect as they are used today. While digital artists can create anything that can be visualized, that does not mean that everything that can be visualized should be created. In this film there are many shots of ships at sea, moving up and over large waves, throwing spray, and the characters aboard these vessels at standing stock still. Often these are not, or at least do not appear to be, digital doubles for the actors, but rather the actors standing in from of a green screen, lacking any realistic motion at all. In one battle the seas are so heavy that vast waves more than thirty feet high loom and present themselves as oceanic hills. Of course in reality ships if the era would be in serious danger of foundering during a storm like that, but in this movie they maneuver and attack with ease.

There is the now standard, falling damage doesn’t apply, digital stunt work, and the impossible animals. (Seriously the lend-lease with Mordor and Persia must still be in effect because the Persian war elephant or more like Oliphants, looming larger an than real land animal.)

My sweetie-wife noted that several times throughout the presentation I suppressed laughter. I assure it was not due to the filmmakers intent to impart humor. In fact this is a fairly humorless movie, and that studious effort to be meaningful and utterly failing is one of the many sources of mirth.

This movie is MST3K ready, right out of the box.

Political Rant Ahead – You are warned.

invasion bullshit

This particularly idiotic piece of tripe has been floating around on facebook and has been shared by people who really ought to know better. Clearly the crux of the idea is that there is no difference between US military interventions and Russian ones.

But even if you set aside the moronic call for equivalence this thing is still one of the most rock stupid things I have seen on facebook and mind you that take a level of stupid not usually seen outside of a Michael Bay movie.

So, 22 invasions in 20 years for an average of 1.1 invasion per year. That’s some busy armies, but of course these yokels can’t even do basic arithmetic. 20 years ago was 1994, yup we’re all well into the 21^st century now. Below is the list of invasions given to support the idiocy.

(1) Grenada (1983-1984), (2) Bolivia (1986; ), (3) Virgin Islands (1989), (4) Liberia (1990; 1997; 2003), (5) Saudi Arabia (1990-1991), (6) Kuwait (1991), (7) Somalia (1992-1994; 2006), (8) Bosnia (1993-), (9) Zaire (Congo) (1996-1997), (10) Albania (1997), (11) Sudan (1998), (12) Afghanistan (1998; 2001-), (13) Yemen (2000; 2002-), (14) Macedonia (2001), (15) Colombia (2002-), (16) Pakistan (2005-), (17) Syria (2008; 2011-), (18) Uganda (2011), (18) Mali (2013), (19) Niger (2013), (20) Yugoslavia (1919; 1946; 1992-1994; 1999), (21) Iraq (1958; 1963; 1990-1991; 1990-2003; 1998; 2003-2011) (22) Angola (1976-1992)

Now let’s strike out everything that is before 1994.

Wow we’re already down to 12, just because the people who made the meme can not count. Then there is the concept that any US force on foreign soil constitute an ‘invasion.’ That itself is a horrible twisting of the language, by that metric they missed the US Invasion of Great Briton in 1942. Also included here are not simply military invasion but joint policing actions done in concert and with the cooperation of the host government. Again ignoring if these action are wise or foolish, I pretty think a core concept to ‘invade’ is being opposed by local government. So let’s strike out those where we partnered with the regional government.

Let’s also cross off where there has been principally air power used. Invade does mean attack; the two are not synonyms. I would argue invade means a ground effort to control territory.

As you can see the list grows thin. This listing also also conflates the purposes for invasion. The Balkan campaign, whether waged well or badly, was in response to genocide.

Yes we invaded Afghanistan after they refused to surrender the murderous criminals who killed thousands of civilians in an act of terrorism.

Iraq? A stupid, war of offensive we had no business starting that I never supported. It was a colossal blunder and forever stained how nation’s honor. More than anything else that act lead to my decision to turn against the GOP.

Also let us not forget that the international community pretty much flipped out over the invasion of Iraq. It was not sanctioned by the United Nations, it was condemned by foe and ally alike, and it created diplomatic rifts that still have not been healed. So the very premise, along with the facts, of this pice of garbage is wrong,

That said, I am saddened that people with smarts enough to read could fall for this poorly constructed, one sided, incompetent propaganda. If you shared this on your wall you have really lost points for pointing at anyone else and calling them ignorant,

Movie review Cockneys vs Zombies

No Sunday Night Movie this week, too tired to make it through any film and I watched part of Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.

So instead I have a mini review for you of a film I watched view Netflix streaming Saturday afternoon with a couple of friends and my sweetie-wife; Cockneys vs Zombies.

You have to pity someone wanting to making a zombie film these days. The vein was never very thick and it has been throughly mined. We have seen Zombie at Night, at Dawn, in the cockneys-vs-zombies-poster Day, Nazi Zombies, fast zombies, indestructible zombies, Zombies on a boat, zombies on a plane, Zombies on an island, Zombies in Spain pretending it was the Uk, rom-com zombies, Romeo and Juliet zombies, Sex-slave zombies, and pet zombies, so it’s getting pretty hard to find a new angle on the genre.

This film builds its humor on when the lower class, and stereotypical seen as criminal, London east-enders, Cockneys face the Zombie a apocalypse. The plot is barebones, a group of cockney youths are pulling a bank robbery to have the funds to keep their grand dad and his pals in the east-end when the pensioner home is demolished. Thanks to greedy and archeologically ignorant construction workers, the zombie plague is loosed on modern London, specifically the east-end. Both the youths and the pensioners fight the zombies, as the the crisis worsens.

Like Shawn of the Dead this si player for laughs, but more regional that rom-com. It is bloody and it is graphic as one should expect from a zombie film, but it is funny and touching, and has more than a touch of satire.

I recommend it.

Despite the Rain, a pleasant day

The rain showers moving through the area nixed our plans, but the sweetie-wife and I still had a nice, relaxed and pleasant day.

A few games of Dominion played on line.

A nice lunch out at Oggi’s Pizza and Brewery.

A little shopping.

And an evening home with episode 10 of season three Game of Thrones.

Tomorrow back to the grind and the waiting to see what transpires from my interview.

Damn you Marvel Studios

Thanks to the Guardian of The Galaxy trailer,
this song has been stuck in my head.

Robert Mitchell Evans

Literary Saboteur