Over on /Film they've discovered that Eagle Eye Co-writers are working on a sequel to Blade Runner. Can you imagine that? Whilst it sounds cool, and it'd be nice to see more Blade Runner, would it be right to make a sequel? Most remakes of old films seem to turn out bad, and I don't just mean "oh, it's not as good as I remember it"-type bad but astonishingly bad. I can name three films that say a sequel shouldn't be made:
Alien vs. Predator
Alien vs. Predator 2
The Phantom Menace
Is that enough proof that a sequel shouldn't be made? I thought so.
I hadn't heard of this film before I saw it in my "Recommended" list on Amazon, so I thought I'd give it a try. "The Place Promised in Our Early Days" is a film about three best friends who during their last summer together make a promise to go to the Hokkaido tower - a towering structure that they've always seen in the distance, and have wanted to visit it. At first I found it hard to decide what time period the film is set in, but towards the end there are signs that it is set during the 1990's (albeit an alternative timeline). In this alternate world, Japan has been split into a North and a South, with the North being controlled by the Union.
In the South, Hiroki Fujisawa and Takuya Shirakawa are two friends currently in their last year of middle school. It starts on the last day before spring break and introduces the characters by having Kana, a friend of Sayuri, confess her feelings for Takuya which he does not feel for her in return. We soon find out that secretly, both of them have feelings for Sayuri. Hiroki stays behind for archery practice, and Sayuri does for violin practice. When the two meet on the train platform for their journey home they get to know each other and become friends. As she leaves the train though she comments that she'd had a dream that they would meet on the train like they did - an omen of what's to come. This whole section of the film seemed a bit like "The Wonder Years" due to the voice-over that was looking back at their times then. During the spring break they work for Mr Okabe who runs a factory that specialises in the manufacturer of missiles, so that they can pay for parts they need to finish rebuilding the crashed drone they found (that they've named the Bella Ciela). During the last term, Sayuri goes with them to see the plane and they make a promise that they'll fly their plane to tower. Whilst watching them work, Sayuri has a dream that foretells the tower exploding. This is the last time they were all together before the events that take place 3 years later.
During that last summer at middle school Sayuri had mysteriously disappeared, Hiroki and Takuya had abandoned the work on the plane, and the two friends had more or less stopped speaking. We then learn that Takuya has been successful and is not only at High school, but is working with the NSA researching parallel universes at the Hokkaido tower. The function of the tower is to transfer matter surrounding the tower between different parallel worlds but only has limited functionality. The cause of this as we soon learn is that when Sayuri went missing she had fallen into a coma and had been "sleeping" for the past 3 years. Although she is unconcious, her mind is another reality where the world has been devastated by a war between the North and South.
Mr. Okabe who was the former employer of the boys later turns out to be the leader of the Uilta Liberation Front that wants to destroy the Hokkaido tower in an attempt to reunify North and South Japan as one (occasional I did wonder if they were talking about Korea since the Americans were there interfering) and he reveals his plans to Takuya. Meanwhile, the past 3 years haven't been as kind to Hiroki - his dreams have been plagued by visions of Sayuri which has led to him being continuously depressed and never knowing what to do. This cycle of depression is broken when a letter from Sayuri finally reaches him (it was written before she fell into a coma) and it sets him off looking for her. His search leads him to a hospital where she'd not long been moved from, and briefly they speak to each other in a dream. The place where Sayuri's comatose body has been moved to though is the facility that Takuya works in.
By this point I did find myself starting to lose interest in this 90 minute film, but I'll attribute that to me being tired at the time. The ending is actually not that bad an ending, Takuya and Hiroki after a brief fight decide the best course of action is to work together to rescue Sayuri and to bring her mind back to her body by flying her in the Bella Ciela. Around this time we learn that the United States want to declare war on the Union due to the Union wanting to use the twoer as a weapon to replace the world with that of a parallel universe (the only thing stopping this is Sayuri's dreams). Due to Takuya being injured, and there being only 2 seats, Hiroki and Sayuri fly the Bella Ciela to the "promised place" which makes Sayuri wake from her coma. As this causes the weapon to activate, Hiroki fires a missile that destroys the tower.
My best friends and I thought about only two things that summer - flying, and falling... in love; and when you're in love you make promises.
It's not your typical action-packed anime movie, it's more of a "heart-felt" tale of friends as they grow apart, but to ultimately be reunited (whilst their country also happens to be on the brink of war all this time). If you enjoyed any of Makoto Shinkai's other award winning work, you're bound to also enjoy this one as it is a continuation of his style, and an improvement in terms of the quality of animation. I think based on this it will be interesting to see what work Makoto come's up with in the future, especially as this one won quite a large number of awards.
There are two versions of this on DVD, the standard one disc version and the collector's three disc editon. The standard edition and the first disc of the collector's edition both feature the full 90 minute film, 3 interviews, and some trailers. The second disc from the collector's edition has a number of storyboards to cover the entire film, an interview with Makoto Shinkai, and an animated gallery of his work. The third disc is only a CD-ROM and contains images and sheet music. There is also a book of storyboards included in the collector's edition. Unless you're a big fan of Makoto Shinkai or the film I probably wouldn't recommend bothering with the collector's edition as it doesn't feel anything special.
I've been in two minds whether or not to try Mirror's Edge when it comes out - it just feels too much like one of those games that is only there to show off a concept. Ages ago Red Faction did this for demonstrating modifiable terrain, Doom 3 did it to sell it's engine, and Mirror's Edge seems to do this with the idea of "free-running". If they release a demo I think I'll give it a go, otherwise I'll wait until I hear reviews of it. Anyway, below is a trailer for it that shows the origin story.
The new Google Phone that utilises their Android technology has apparently been in development for over 3 years by Google, T-Mobile, and HTC. The first thing that impresses me here is that Google got HTC to build their handsets - I've always been a fan of HTC's devices running Windows Mobile as they do look simply great. One big difference between the iPhone and the HTC G1 is that Google aren't putting the same restrictions on application development that Apple is doing with their AppStore. Whether this sets a precedent that Apple will eventually follow in the footsteps of I don't know but it is always a hope.
Rather than a virtual keyboard like the iPhone it has a small keypad for typing with - I'm not sure what the practicality of this is going to be like - personally I'm not too keen on tiny keyboards as they feel clumsy. The 3.2-inch LCD touch-sensitive screen (running at 320 x 480 HVGA) provides easy access to Gmail, YouTube, Google Talk and Calendar. Apparently it is also integrated well with Google Maps, but there is no mention of how well it works with Google Docs and Spreadsheets.
For network access it has a 3.5G and Wi-Fi which it will switch between depending on what is available meaning your able to collect emails pretty much anywhere - though saying that I'm sure I could find somewhere that neither connection would work at all (for example I'm sure it won't work in the middle of the Nazca desert - which is a good point actually, if anyone is interested you can actually get a mobile phone reception from Machu Picchu surprisingly).
I do question the default interface, take a look at it and tell me what you'd do to read text messages, or even send them for that matter. It's okay being able to email and all these other great features such as performing Google searches - but where are the features that make a phone a phone? It has of course got a call and a hang-up button at the bottom of the phone, and there's the "Dialer" application which I assume contains the contacts list. Though how you use SMS on it I've got no idea.
According to reddwarf.co.uk, Robert Llewellyn (aka Kryten) has said they're making 4 specials - two of which will be proper episodes.
Doug Naylor will be masterminding the four half-hour instalments, and the regular cast will all be reprising their iconic roles. They are being made by GNP for UKTV's free-to-air channel, Dave
And a few more details:
"It's very new news to me - I really only fully heard the details yesterday," Robert told comedian/host Michael McIntyre. "We're doing four new shows with the original cast. Two of them are going to be, like, proper episodes of Red Dwarf. One of them is so exciting I've been asked not to say anything about that because other people will steal the idea - and it is a great idea, quite challenging for us as performers. And the other one is a kind of behind-the-scenes-y... the truth. There's been so many rumours and gossip about Red Dwarf, about whether there's going to be a movie and whether we all get on, all those things... The downside for me, which is just dawning on me now, is I've got to do the 'rubber' thing again, which I haven't done for ten years."
It's unbelievable to think that a prequel for "I am Legend" has been confirmed - what more is there to see? During the film we saw flashbacks to Robert Neville's (Will Smith) life as people were dying, so all we're going to see is more of that with some extra tidbits of information. Seems pointless to me.
Another surprising announcement in the movie world is that Johnny Depp is going to play Tonto in a remake of The Lone Ranger, will play Mad Hatter in Tim Burton's animated version of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, and will return as Captain Jack Sparrow for Pirates of the Caribbean 4.
Adobe have today unveiled their latest version of the creative suite of products, named CS4. They'll be releasing this as at least 6 different collections:
Design Standard
Design Premium
Web Standard
Web Premium
Production Premium
Master Collection
The Master Collection will feature all their CS4 products, and will consist of:
InDesign CS4
Photoshop CS4 Extended
Illustrator CS4
Acrobat 9 Pro
Flash CS4 Professional
Dreamweaver CS4
Fireworks CS4
Contribute CS4
After Effects CS4
Adobe Premiere Pro CS4
Soundbooth CS4
Adobe OnLocation CS4
Encore CS4
Adobe Bridge CS4
Adobe Device Central CS4
Dynamic Link
Version Cue CS4
Let's start off by looking at Dreamweaver as some people still insist on using it. The first of the new features is the code hinting for Ajax and JavaScript frameworks - this means when you're writing JavaScript using jQuery or one of the other supported frameworks it will provide a dropdown list to help auto-complete function names as you're typing and show the syntax for the function you're trying to use. There is also the new "Related Files and Code Navigator" and a few other minor changes to the UI but nothing special really. Dreamweaver now supports AIR and Subversion, as well as helping you with CSS best practices.
Photoshop CS4 Extended has changed quite a bit since CS3. It now sports "revolutionary 3D painting and composition" with it's new ray-tracing engine and support for common 3D formats. Another new feature is the "content aware scaling" - this is a way of stretching an image without it stretching everything within in. It's a hard feature to explain, but once you see it in action you'll understand what I mean.
Flash CS4 is another application to go through major changes. One of the changes is 3D animation for 2D objects (which I suppose means the 2D object is actually 3D) with various translation and rotation tools. Another amazing new feature is the Bones tool which offers a great way to get linked models to interact correctly. It is now also possible to add XMP metadata to SWF files for better accessibility and I guess to also aid Googlebot in indexing your SWF files. There is now support for Adobe AIR and H.264 as well.
On the video side of the creativity suite, After Effects CS4 can import 3D objects from Photoshop, a new cartoon effect for making video instantly look cell-shaded, author video for mobile devices, and finally supports XMP metadata. Premiere Pro CS4 adds supports for new tapeless formats such as AVCHD, P2, XDCAM EX, and XDCAM HD without the need for transcoding the video. Another great new addition is the support for burning to Blu-ray discs, and 50GB dual-layer Blu-ray discs. This same enhancement has also made it's way into Encore CS4.
After recently being reintroduced to Japanimation I started to look to see what there was that was worth watching. One of these is an old(ish) movie that's been out in Japan for a long time but is only just making it's way over to the UK in a couple of months. This film is called "The Girl Who Leapt Through Time" - the title alone is enough to spark interest, and if that isn't enough then here is a trailer for it:
Sir Tim Berners-Lee, as most people know, is credited with the invention of the World Wide Web as we know it. As a way of moving forward with the Internet he has launched a foundation that aims to promote a web that is free and open, and to expand the Web's capabilities and robustness. The World Wide Web Foundation has already had $5 million put into it by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. The aim is to launch this new organisation next year so that it can focus on three areas:
Web Science and Research
Web Technology and Practice
Web for Society
As an outcome, the group hopes to be able to anticipate and ensure the web's future through the study of how it currently works, and to research the issues it currently has that impacts the users. It is hoped that they can make the web more stable and secure, and bring this information to the masses so that people can be trained to think this way through University and College courses on Web Science.
With it being headed by Tim Berners-Lee, and the W3C CEO Steve Bratt, how can it fail? I hope it manages to succeed in improving the web as although it is usable to the majority at the minute it's like a piece of artwork - there are always ways it can be improved and I think the only way this is going to happen is if people stop and think about it, they need to be innovative, yet also mindful of how users actually want to use the 'net and what they use it for.
Anyone born in the 80's is likely to remember "The Mysterious Cities of Gold" a true classic that has finally been released as a boxset on DVD in the UK (Region 2). After the 20 or so years since it first aired, does it still stand up to modern television? Time to find out...
Before we look at the DVD it's important to remember a little about what made the series so great during the 1980's. It was an animated series by DiC Entertainment and Studio Pierrot first released in Japan as "Taiyo no Ko Estueban" (roughly translated as Esteban, Child of the Sun) and had a mix of actual historic facts and science fiction. A good portion of the series is set in Peru and the surrounding areas - having been there myself it's nice to see these places in an animation and actually know the places that the characters are talking about and travelling through.
What’s more, The Mysterious Cities Of Gold holds up incredibly well. The animation may look a little dated, but it harks back to a time in the 1980s when ambitious programmes such as these were filling the childrens’ TV schedules. And this was the best of the lot. With a darkness and edge that you simply wouldn’t expect, it’s a gripping tale, expertly told. Further icing the cake, the DVD set that The Mysterious Cities Of Gold arrives on is nothing short of majestic, bursting with interesting features and a real care and attention that befits the programme itself. Which goes to make this collection something really very special indeed, not only bringing back a genuine classic from the archives, but doing it with a style that others would do well to match. Brilliant. --Simon Brew
The story follows the adventures of Esteban, a young Spanish boy who was orphaned when he was very little, Zia (an Incan girl), and Tao, the last survivor of the empire of Hiva. The story starts in 1532 with Esteban listening in on the tales of sailor's adventures until he is called for to help bring out the sun - making the sun shine when he wants it to is something that happens throughout the series but is never explained. Shortly afterwards he joins Mendoza, Pedro, and Sancho aboard Gomez's ship that is taking Zia, an abducted Incan girl, back to the Americas in search of fortunes and the mysterious cities of gold (though Esteban believes his father may still be alive and goes in search of him). Mendoza joins the crew as a navigator and it is revealed that it was Mendoza that saved Esteban many years before and has half the other half of Esteban's amulet - one that Esteban's father gave him just before disappearing beneath the waves during a great storm. Over the course of the next few episodes we see the journey from Spain to South America (specifically Peru) during which time Esteban becomes friends with Zia. Eventually Esteban and Zia get split up on the rest and meet Tao, the last descendant of the people of Hiva on what is evidentally the Galapagos Islands - the proof of this is the wildlife that they see such as the giant tortoises and the approximate location we know them to be in. For the next 30 or so episodes we see them travelling across South America discovering things like the Golden Condor, a flying machine made of gold. They reach sites such as Machu Picchu, which of course at the time would have been a working city as was depected here - but was referred to as the city above the clouds. Eventually they come across the Olmecs, and ancient civilisation that were deformed from radiation by the war between the builders of the seven cities. They plan to use the power source of the cities of gold for their own ends, but when the city of gold is found their plans are foiled and the city destroyed. They then part ways with the trio flying off in the Condor in search of the other cities. It's an entertaining story, but I don't want to cover it in great detail due to the shear size of it (it spans 39 episodes).
The dialogue isn't amazing, though the majority of the voices aren't too annoying. One annoyance is the number of times you can count Zia shouting "Esteban!" - there's too many times this happens to easily count! One thing most people will remember about this series though is it's memorable theme tune. As a special feature this theme tune is available with words for Karaoke. The rest of the music has an Andean feel to it, and some of the incidental music such as the piece for the Golden Condor is good to listen to.
In terms of animation it isn't as detailed as you would see today, but it is very symbollic of the style of children's Anime that was about at the time. On the 6 DVDs in the boxset there are the original documentaries that featured after every episode, deleted scenes, production documentary, biographies of cast and crew, original storyboards, a 32 page booklet, a double sided poster, and 6 postcards.
All I can really conclude with is that if you enjoyed this series before, then you're bound to enjoy it on DVD too!
Today Apple have announced a few updates to their product line-up. As of today user's can download iTunes 8 which has the new Genius Playlists feature. The Genius Playlists is a way of creating a playlist based on a similar songs to the one you're currently listening too - quite cool, especially if you have a large library of songs. A similar feature is the Genius Sidebar - this picks songs from the iTunes store that are similar to music you already own. Quite an interesting idea for both of these, but the latter is one that to some degree has been a feature of Amazon for a long time. Other changes include the addition of a grid view, High Definition TV shows, improved accessibility, and a new Visualiser.
The next announcement from Apple is the change to the iPod nano. First point it now comes in a wide range of colours! Their website has it showing in White, Black, Purple, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, Red and Pink. Another change is that it now has a Genius feature for creating playlists, and rotating the iPod rotates the screen! One questionable feature is that if you shake your iPod it shuffles your songs. So what if you're jogging or cycling with it? You're going to be reshuffling every few seconds! There is also a new iPod Touch out with these features (of course!) in 8Gb, 16Gb, and 32Gb flavours.
It is so close now to the date when The Force Unleashed, the latest Star Wars game, is due to hit the shelves. A number of online retailers are offering various exclusives if you pre-order the game from them.
HMV, are offering an exclusive Stormtrooper Commander figure if you pre-order with them. If you pre-order with Play.com they're offering an exclusive General Rahm Cota costume to use in-game, and similarly Game are offering bonus in-game content in the form of extra abilities. I think there's a good chance that eventually the bonus in-game content will be made available as DLC, though the same can't be said about the exclusive figure.
Needless to say, I've cancelled my pre-order with Play.com and have chosen to go for the HMV exclusive!!
As the title says, the new Star Wars Clone Wars series starts on Cartoon Network in October. Whilst you wait for it to start they have a trailer for the new series, it does look better than the film that was released a few weeks ago.
The first ever Command and Conquer game I played was Red Alert. It was great fun and I played it for hours on end. As many of you know, Red Alert 3 should be out by Christmas /Hanukkah, but what you might not know is that as a promotional piece to advertise the new game they're giving away the original on their site.
Let me start off by saying what my one problem with the UK release of this DVD was - the theme tune hadn't been translated into English for the English track so to understand it you have to turn the subtitles on and then turn them off again when the story starts. Obviously not a big problem, and may prefer to hear the opening sequence it in Japanese anyway.
The story is set in 300 years into the future when the face of the planet has been changed by trees that were genetically engineered to grow in harsh environments. Due to the impatient nature of one of the scientists the experiment (which was taking place on the moon) goes out of control and eventually splits the moon in two - sending seeds to the Earth. On the Earth however this got out of control and quickly overgrew cities and destroyed civilization. The main protagonist of the story is Agito, a young boy who lives in Neutral City - a place that exists between the forest and the military city of Ragna. Him and his friend, Cain, are racing from the top of the city down to the water provided by the forest, but careful not to disturb the druids that protect the forest. They are caught and Agito dives underwater where he discovers a building from the old days and discovers a girl in stasis, Toola.
In fear, the forest empties the water from the pool, flooding the building Agito and Toola are in and they narrowly escape and get back to Neutral City. It is then that we learn that there was another person awake from stasis years ago who eventually decided to leave Neutral City and go to to Ragna. This other, Shunack by this time has learnt of Toola's existence and believes her to be the key to restoring the world to it's former "glory". Agito explains to Toola the history of their city and how his father Agashi was one of the ones who helped build the city after being "enhanced" by the forests power. Those who are enhanced have their hair colour changed to silver from the effects of this power. When Agito takes Toola to see Agashi we learn more of the effects of this enhancement - over time someone who is enhanced slowly becomes part of the forest. Agashi is practically a tree when Toola see's him and is at first a little afraid of this. When he tells her that she must decide whether to let go of the old world or leave, she runs off upset and comes across Shunack who is waiting for her.
Agito sees Shunack is going to take Toola away and tries to stop him, but Toola goes willingly in hope that she can make a difference and get the Earth back to the "way it was meant to be". Toola and Shunack head back to Ragna by train - this bit has an interesting change in animation style. It seems whenever we see an external shot of the technology, rather than it being hand-drawn it looks more like CGI. Agito then returns to his father to tell him the news, but is told that he will soon become one with the forest and it is up to Agito to make his own decisions. Now that his father, the wise mentor, is ready to pass on Agito decides to become enhanced by the forests power (much to the dismay of Minka) like his father was. He travels down to the forest and asks for the power to be able to go after Toola and stop the destruction of the forest. They grant this power and almost immediately is the first trial of his new powers as he stops some Ragna war machines from attacking the forest. So, begins the "hero's journey".
After getting his new powers, Agito runs as fast as he can to Ragna in an attempt to save Toola. When he gets there he sees Toola, now dressed in the same clothes as the other people of Ragna which is symbolic of the "shapeshifter" archetype whom changes sides. They're all there waiting for Agito at the "train station" ready to spring what is obviously a trap. Despite his new powers, Agito is subdued with knockout gas and awakes in manacles with Toola and Shunack watching over him. Shunack, as a typical villain does, tells Agito their plans to leave Ragna and use Toola's Raban (kind of like a PDA worn as a necklace) to activate Estoc, the device that will change the world. They leave using this peculiar train like vehicle that is basically two trains on separate rails with a big engine that pulls them both. Agito uses his newfound plant powers to break free (changing his right arm into a plant kind of like Swamp Thing) and chases after the train. In an attempt to kill Atigo, Shunack orders the other train to be released and then fires on it with a rocket.
Whether we join the forest or fade to dust, our future depends on you now -- Agashi to Agito
When Agito recovers, Yolda (the leader of Neutral City) helps him and explains that Agito should concentrate on "the seed within" him to return his arm to normal otherwise he may not be able to change back to human form. At Estoc, Shunack shows his true colours by turning on the military of Ragna and declaring that the weapon is for him alone to use and then leads Toola into the complex. When Toola inserts her Raban into the dias inside Estoc it turns out that it is inside a volcano that has been turned into a huge weapon capable of wiping out all life on Earth, thereby creating a kind of "reset". Meanwhilst the Raban military prepare to attack the traitorous Shunack as the mountains separates from the ground and sprouts huge metal legs and starts walking towards the forest. This part I had a bit of problem with as I don't believe it's technically possible for a volcano to be moved with technology no matter how advanced yet still have it active. I ignored this though as it's supposed to be a cross between science fiction and fantasy anyway. We learn at this point that Estoc was built by Toola's father as a fail-safe for the people in stasis to return the planet to "normal" in the event of the trees getting out of control. Not only this but we learn it was her father that headed the project that created the trees, and it was Shunack's fault the experiment got out of control with his over eagerness to excel and prove his work successful.
Atigo manages to get on board and faces off against Shunack. The two fight and eventually Atigo sacrifices himself to give Toola a chance to remove her Raban from Estoc to stop the process of it destroying the forest. In his sacrifice he becomes a great tree and traps Shunack inside of it. Toola realises the importance of the forest and removes her Raban - almost immediately the mountain starts a self destruct that threatens to kill anyone who's still inside. Instead of trying to escape Toola climbs back up to the tree that was Atigo and cries at the side of it. At this point we see what I presume is a scene on the "spirit plane" - Atigo see's his father, and a redeemed Shunack and they say his time to join the forest has not come yet, he must teach others of the importance of the forest and that the forest can give birth to humans. Atigo then falls from a "pod" on the tree and escapes with Toola.
The animation style is very good, and many of the shots of the characters and the long shots of the places contain a lot of detail making it visually pleasing with well designed set pieces. The character development is also pretty good though doesn't delve deep enough into the history of Toola, nor the druids. It would have been nice to learn more about the druids and dryads to see just what relationship they have with the forest, and more of what the world was like before the devastation. The opening theme and the music throughout is quite good, although the opening theme is by far the best music in the film. Unlike some anime, the voices are well dubbed for the western audiences.
There isn't really any extra features on the first disc other than some trailers, but on the second disc there is a "Making of" documentary that is quite good and goes into a reasonable amount of detail.
To conclude, following the "hero's journey" type of story gives the story some edge and is enjoyable to watch whilst also being visually pleasing. Although there are better films out there (many of which this one has borrowed from) it is a recommended viewing for any Anime fans.
I am a web developer working for a company that specialises in websites for government and enterprise clients. On my own personal website I publish articles on Web development, web design, and other topics such as tweaking the performance of games and movie reviews.
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