The Atheist's Nightmare

I defy you to watch this video without breaking into a goofy grin.

Music lover, that's me.

Chris Magyar (he formerly of Diary of a Tuber) has a podcast of his own, The Icrywolf Eclectic Music Podcast, which comes out pretty often in short bursts, sometimes just three songs and a bit of snappy patter. Sometimes he lets the computer choose at random from his iTunes library, and sometimes he lets guests choose the songs. I got to be one of those lucky guests just the other day, and the episode is available for download now. You just know I slipped a little bit of the old Bill Shatner in there for fun.

Download episode 32 of the Icrywolf podcast now.

Tom Hanks thanks Dan Striepeke

There's a fun little article in the New York Times this morning, written by Tom Hanks as a thank-you to his stalwart makeup artist, Daniel Striepeke. Striepeke's career, it turns out, is as impressive as Hanks'. How impressive? Try Planet of the Apes, The Sound of Music, The Magnificent Seven, and even a few Elvis movies. A sentimentally good read.

Fan review of "Gamera the Brave" at AICN

AICN scores another first: a fan review of the new Gamera movie (Gamera the Brave), which is being described as "E.T. meets Godzilla."

Through most of the film, we watch as Gamera is raised by an innocent little boy from a regular-sized turtle to the gargantuan fighting monster he becomes by the film's finale. It's more heartwarming than adrenaline producing. That said, there's still plenty of what you came for: monster-on-monster, man-in- suit, model-crushing action.

Read the full review of Gamera the Brave at AICN.

Geek alert! Godzilla and '50s sci-fi on Sci-Fi Channel and TCM

The Flick Filosopher, bless 'er, points out the embarrassment of riches on cable TV this week. Sci-Fi's playing a few Godzilla flicks (including Godzilla vs Gigan and Destroy All Monsters ) and TCM goes nuts on Thursday with movies like Forbidden Planet, It Came from Outer Space and The Quatermass Xperiment, just to name a few. Break out the Tivo remote, kids!

Get the low-down on all the geeky movies this week from the Flick Filosopher.

Ultraman Mebius: Postmaster for a day

If the Japanese postal service is anything like the US Postal Service, hiring a giant costumed superhero can only help.

"We're trying our best as we head toward privatization. Mebius has given us energy," said 58-year-old postmaster Yoshinori Suganuma after Ultraman's arrival.

Ultraman appeared at the post office at 9:30 a.m., and was handed a letter of request from Suganuma, before setting about his tasks in the postmaster's office.

While he appeared hesitant about using a pen -- something he normally doesn't do -- he managed to carry out his duties.

Read the full article at the Mainichi Daily News.

[via Kaiju Shakedown]

Improving the theater experience

Graham Roumieu has a few suggestions for improving the movie theater experience. It's a humor piece but it underscores the growing frustration with (and abandonment of) the movie theater experience among the moviegoing populace.

Since the fall of fascism there has been a steady decline in manners and attentiveness at public gatherings. Sick of ringing phones and people yammering or coughing too hard? Be sick no longer. Not only will there be more ushers patrolling the aisles, but they will be armed with tasers, batons and the legal authority to dispense corporal punishment to anyone who breaches the sound (i.e., silence) barrier.

Read "Improving the Theater Experience" at cbc.ca now.

Why HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are different

An article over at Engadget by Stephen Speicher reveals the real difference between the warring hi-def DVD formats. The answer might make you angry. Of course neither group of companies will give up their standard without a fight but in the end one of the two will be consigned to the same historical scrap heap as home Betamax and the Minidisc.

Save MGM Midnite Movies

DVD Drive-In has started a campaign to encourage Sony to continue the MGM Midnite Movie line of DVDs.

Over a year ago, DVD Drive-In started an online petition for Sony to continue MGM's Midnite Movies series after the studio purchased MGM's film library. We also suggested dozens of possible Midnite Movie candidates, and the petition has gathered over 4,100+ signatures to date. We are sad to report that none of the titles on the list are on Sony's current DVD schedule, and it looks like the Midnite Movies are still in serious trouble.

Click here to sign the petition, or click here for the Twitch entry on this subject, which includes a huge list of possible candidates for release which Sony has acquired from MGM.

Riya recognizes the faces in your photos

Riya allows you to tag a face in your photos and then search your other photos for the same face - once you've uploaded your photos to their server. Sounds pretty cool, but I don't see myself uploading all my photos to yet another service. This would be great as an additional feature to Flickr, but until that happens Flickr does me just fine, thanks.

Secret Wars Re-Enactment Society

From the geek-week.net video podcast.

Rethinking theaters

I don't think I've addressed the topic of the movie theater-going experience on this blog, at least not recently, but I've had conversations with many people over the last year about the recent decline in theater revenues and one of the companies I work for, Bside Entertainment deals in bringing small independent films to theaters. It's a topic that has been on my mind quite a bit lately, especially when I compare the theater experience at Austin's Alamo Drafthouse with the local Regal chains. The multiplex experience is so very broken, and the film blogosphere is abuzz with ideas about how to fix it.

Mark Glaser at PBS weighs in with his thoughts about the theater and the concept of the Long Tail.

What if each multiplex had its own theme for the movies it shows? One might be known for great dramas, another for comedies, another for horror flicks.

I'm not convinced that the content is as much the problem at multiplexes as the presentation and atmosphere – audiences that have become accustomed to talking to one another and on their cell phones during movies, terrible food, surly staff, and pre-show advertising – but I'd certainly be happy if theater owners started paying more attention to what it's like to be a moviegoer.

Got thoughts about the best and worst theaters you've been to recently? Leave them in the comments.

The Wrong Jon Stewart

Officials at a charter high school in Ogden, Utah, got the proverbial egg all over their faces after mistakenly believing they signed up Jon Stewart of the "The Daily Show" to host their annual gala.

Instead, they actually booked Jon A. Stewart, a 39-year-old former motivational speaker, businessmen [sic] and part-time professional wrestler from Deerfield.

Read the full article at the Chicago Sun-Times.

Pulgasari director Shin Sang-ok dies

From the Korea Times:

Shin Sang-ok a renonwned Korean movie director who lived a life just as dramatic as a movie died in a Seoul National University hospital on Tuesday night. He was 80.

...

During the 1970s, Shin became less active, while South Korea's cinema industry in general suffered under strict censorship and constant interference by dictatorial government. Most of the films he directed during the period ended up being flops. After running afoul of the repressive government in 1978, the then president Park Chung-hee closed Shin's studio.

The director and his wife were separately abducted to North Korea in 1978 while in Hong Kong to produce a film, by orders from the future North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, who wanted to establish a film industry for his country, according to the South Korean government at the time. The North Korean authorities have denied the kidnapping accusations, claiming that Shin came to the country willingly.

Shin later recounted that he enjoyed a close relationship with current North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, known as a movie buff, during his nine years in the North. Pyongyang provided him with a luxury villa built for the leader, a Mercedes Benz and US$3 million every year for his work, he said.

Shin directed seven films with Kim Jong-il acting as an executive producer. The best known of these films is Pulgasari, a giant-monster film similar to the Japanese Godzilla, which can be seen as a metaphor for the effects of unchecked capitalism. In 1986, Shin and his wife made a daring escape in Vienna, before eventually fleeing to the United States, seeking political asylum, until they returned to Seoul in 2002 for good.

While in the U.S., Shin worked under the pseudonym Simon Sheen, directing 3 Ninjas Knuckle Up and working as an executive producer for 3 Ninjas Kick Back and 3 Ninjas: High Noon at Mega Mountain, the latter starring Hulk Hogan. He also served on the jury for the Cannes Film Festival and for various Korean film festivals.

Read the full article at the Korea Times here.

Song in a Movie (more Snakes on a Plane news)

New Line is soliciting songs from the general public to be included in the movie Snakes on a Plane. The contest is being held via Tagworld, aka MySpace with better design. You must submit before April 12th and the Tagworld community will be allowed to vote on the songs beginning on April 19th.

Blockbuster considers "return to store" option for online renters

According to Hacking Netflix, Blockbuster is considering the addition of a "return to store" option for people who rent films through their online DVD service.

Upon return to the store, these online video rentals would be automatically cleared out from the “Shipped Movies” section in your BLOCKBUSTER Online Queue and the next movies in your Queue will be shipped to you. With this feature, your waiting time for the next movie would be reduced.

An interesting wrinkle, but hardly the kind of thing likely to drive people en masse from Netflix to Blockbuster, especially when you consider Netflix's far superior selection of titles.

Hanna-Barbera's Godzilla cartoon series on DVD

Sci-Fi Japan pointed me to the news today: if you're a Godzilla fan and you really want to hurt yourself, look no further than Classic Media's release of the 1970s animated television incarnation of the Big G, brought to you by the normally fine folks at Hanna-Barbera. Two discs will be released comprising the first eight episodes at a retail price of $12.98 each. A release in the month of June has been set.

Stomp Tokyo: Cult Movies Podcast Episode 20

Wherein we speak of the sci-fi movies we'd like to see made from books, the upcoming Blu-Ray/HD DVD format wars, and many other things. Guest nerd for this week is sci-fi author E. Mark "Skip" Mitchell.

Listen to episode 20 now.

Hell freezes over? Intel Macs dual-boot between OS X and Windows

To remarkably little fanfare (some of the Mac news sites I read haven't even published the news yet), Apple released a beta version (called "Boot Camp") of the next version of OS X – one that allows users with new Macs based on the Intel chip set to boot their computers either into OS X or Windows XP. This will be highly convenient in the future as there are a few specific tasks that I need to accomplish with Windows, but overall I'm not crying in my beer about the fact that I don't have a Macbook Pro. Especially since it has a dumb name like "Macbook Pro."

I kept checking the announcement article on Apple's site for signs that it might be an April Fool's hoax, but no such signs jumped out at me. I'm sure that, if that is the case, we'll know soon enough.

[Thanks to Scott for the early morning e-mail pointing this out.]

Netflix sues Blockbuster for patent infringement

I'm a big fan of the Netflix DVD rental service (I've been a member since 1999), but this business of suing over Internet patents seems a trifle silly. Some may claim that Netflix is simply guarding its territory in the manner now common (and expected) with web-based companies, but I'm going to need some extra convincing.

At any rate, the news is that Netflix is suing Blockbuster for infringing on its "rental queue" patents. Read the full story over at Hacking Netflix.

Chevy Tahoe contest backfires

Presumably hoping to piggyback on the success of "roll your own" trailer contests like the one held recently for Slither, Chevrolet announced a similar contest which asked the public to create their own commercials for the Chevy Tahoe. Surprise, surprise: the public used the chance to vent their feelings about the SUV explosion and global warming instead.

Check out some of the best of the satirical ads at C|Net.

[Thanks to Christina for pointing these out.]

Hong Kong Martial Arts Awards

Kaiju Shakedown (which is basically the blog Scott and I would be writing if we had a budget like Variety does) has a great wrapup of the HK Martial Arts Awards that took place last night. Funny stuff.

It's a known fact that if Simon Yam merely lays his hand on your child's head he can cure many diseases and increase your kid's IQ by up to 50 points. However, that doesn't change the fact that he was woefully underdressed last night, especially when sharing the stage with Yasuaki Kurata. The club jacket and t-shirt were all right, but the worn jeans with ripped knees and sneakers were not.

Simpsons Teaser Trailer now online

Well that took about 24 hours longer than I expected, but hey, here it is. (Looks like the teaser has been removed from YouTube. Try Apple's Quicktime trailers site instead.)