I had the good luck to meet Ian a couple of times.....my ex knew him from her wilder youth....a nicer more genuine bloke Ive never met in the rock world. Sharp as a scalpel and dry wit like Ive never seen. Not a chip on his shoulder about the fame...just a common bloke who made good. One of those blokes who even though you meet only once or twice the news of his death hits you.
This one slipped under the radar so thanks for the heads up.
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
I had the good luck to meet Ian a couple of times.....my ex knew him from her wilder youth....a nicer more genuine bloke Ive never met in the rock world. Sharp as a scalpel and dry wit like Ive never seen. Not a chip on his shoulder about the fame...just a common bloke who made good. One of those blokes who even though you meet only once or twice the news of his death hits you.
This one slipped under the radar so thanks for the heads up.
Quite often the way mate. I've met a fair number and behind the media hype and stage image most are just ordinary guys and gals. Some ride it out but as you know many cannot handle the fame and fortune
I've been lucky enough to know (in their early days I might say) Syd Barrett, Dave Berry, Mick Jagger, Peter Frampton (flat mate), Gene Vincent and Cilla Black
RICHARD OF LOXLEY
It’s none of my business what people say and think of me. I am what I am and do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. It makes life so much easier.
Gene Vincent? Gene!!!!!
Syd Barrett?
Peter "Do You Feel Like I Doooooooo" Frampton?
Richard....you are my hero!
Anyways, setting the serious fanboy adulation aside....on to a quick review
LEWIS BLACK - IN GOD WE RUST
Lewis is, IMHO, one of the funniest American comics doing the rounds at the moment. His persona...that of a WTF??? frustrated old guy in a world apparently gone crazy is hilarious, and hs biting satire and commentary always hits the mark and has me rollng around with laughter. In this latest live special he has a swing at the usual round of social and political issues, as well as his increasing inability to cope with modern household appliences and devices. Its proper laugh out loud stuff, and well worth a download if, like me, you are a fan of all things Americana and n need of giving your mirth muscles and chuckle cheeks a stretch.
Also worth droppng are his earlier shows RED BLACK AND BLUE and BLACK ON BROADWAY.
Out and about in lovely hi quality low size HDTV rips.
As an example of Lewis' style here is his now famous takedown of Glenn Beck on John Stewarts Daily Show.
and heres Lewis on Creationism
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
In the aftermath of the attack Lord Oishi gives a trusted retainer the misson of reporting their deeds to the Lords family, and all the families of the 47. 16 years later the retainer completes his mission, and returns to Kyoto for the 17th memorial services. Whlst there he spots hs friend Mazogo who was supposed to have run away in fear the night before the attack. Mazogo has in fact been on a mission for Lord Oishi too, except his was more sensitive - he was protecting the Lords only child, and for 16 years has borne the shame of being branded a coward. Now she has come of age he needs to find a good husband and so complete his mission.
Its very long and pretty plot dense as the drama swirls between three plot threads, and as each get more entangled the whole story comes out. Theres not a lot of action n terms of swordplay, but its a delight to watch all the same, and reminds me of AME ARAGU (AFTER THE RAINS) or THE HIDDEN BLADE.
Anyway, if you are a fan of samurai drama its well worth a watch.
EXCELLENT
No motorbikes in Nippon then
RICHARD OF LOXLEY
It’s none of my business what people say and think of me. I am what I am and do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. It makes life so much easier.
glad you liked it mate....I love jidae (samurai history) flicks and have a large collection should you ever wish to meet up and bring your computer along....I will bring the hard drive or a thumb drive with them on.
Good news.... the guy who recently remade 13 ASSASSINS has convinced the studios in Japan that samurai flms make big bucks and sell internatonally, so this year there are a stack due to come out. Takeshi Miike, the guy who made 13 Assassins, has two new ones due for release, both based on classic 1960s B&W jidae films.
I love Japanese and S Korean cinema as they make their films the old way with a lot of time spent on charactersation and developing the plot, and the detailed and rich sets and costumes just add the cherries to the cake. My two hot reccs are AME ARAGU (After the Rains) and WHEN THE LAST SWORD IS DRAWN, both of which could easly stand side by side with the great Kurosawa classic 7 SAMURAI.
Now for the bad news.
After the US govt went after Megaupload and shut them down a lot of file hosting companies cacked their pants and started shutting out file exchanges. That resulted in the two asian cinema sites I got most of my asian films from closing down as well as their posts were all now useless. So, from now on there will be less asian cinema flms avalable and reviewed till I fnd a reliable source of new releases. There are a few promising new sites, but the majority of their posts are hi def files that are over the 2Gig level, and I dont bother with those types of files as they are sodding pointless unless you stick em on a DVD and watch them on a good TV.
Give t time and the sites will recover.
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
Its a good week for chuckle muscles over at Sandman's Castle. I never knew that John Cleese did standup, but as he explains during this show he never wanted to....its becuase he has to pay his ex $20 thanks to teh clownshoes law in California. So, John spends a good part of the show ripping hs ex to shreds using that ascerbic and hilarious tool he has employed during his long career, biting wit and satire. Along the way John talks about his life and career, turnng every event into a Faultyesque scalpel job of comedy.
Its great laugh out loud watching, and had me in tears in places. He is a master of his art, and this is like watching Basil Faulty in full flow for a hour and a bit.
Available in lovely dvdrip format at veehd.
Pure comedy gold.
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
GHOST RIDER: SPIRIT OF VENGANCE is out in HDRIP copies BUT its cropped, so Im guessng that the croppng wll have also cropped off the subtitled bits of Russian audio translation. Duuuuurrr......
Up to you whether you drop it....Id wait for the BDRIP and DVDRIP to come out in a week or so.
Also....whereas the first was around a healthy 2hrs this sequel follows the current Hollydud trend and is a pathetic "drunk jock on a kegger" length and barely scrapes in at 1hr20m when the lengthy start and end credits are removed. I therefore dont feel one ounce of gult at recommending piracy as a way of telling studios to go screw themselves with a rotating pineapple.
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
second alert..... SHERLOCK HOLMES: GAME OF SHADOWS is outa nd about in DVDRIP formats at the usual suspect sites we all know and love. Looks excellent.
Also over at VeeHD a scad load of great documentaries are being posted. A must watch in my book is the one at http://veehd.com/video/4722961_National ... vilization concerning the recent discoveries at Gobleke Tepe in Turkey. The temples and monoliths beng found there have literally turned archaeological knowledge on its head and are truly amazing....complex and beautifully carved temple complexes dating from 11500 BC.....thats around 7000 years before the Egyptian pyramids were built and at a time when until now we thought that mankind were nomadc hunter gatherers.
Its truly mindblowing stuff, and a great fact filled documentary.....which makes the hjacking of the finds and its groundbreaking importance by those f ing rearded clowns on the so called History Channel's puke inducing clownshow Ancient Aliens all the more disgusting. Maybe the History Channel can follow up by sending that equally disgustingly cretinous spam faced skin waste Brad Meltzer and his three "Decoded" goofball stooges over there and they can link it to some alien Illuminati conspiracy to turn us all into NWO drones. Seriously....can someone in the US do the rest of the reasonng world a favour and firebomb their bloody head office during a producers conference?
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
Another couple of documentaries that you have almost no chance at all of seeing on the telly anytime, mainly due to the content, but come highly recommended are two that take a first hand look at the Cambodian genocides under Pol Pot and the Khymer Rouge. I found both on one streaming video site so its time to give em a review.
First up we have ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE. In this documentary the Cambodian journalist Thet Sambath sets out to collate his ten year research into the KR regime and set it down as some sort of historical testament to those years. The documentary is groundbreaking as Thet is the only man to have got Nuon Chea aka Brother No2 to talk on film. Thet's mission s to try to undertand how the KR came to power, and once there comitted the genocde that took his father, mother and sister. He intervews a series of KR cadres, and gets them to admit on camera to the crimes they comitted, often in hideously graphic detail. Its a heart rending trip made all the more surreal by the calm way the cadres speak about what happened, I suppose safe in the knowledge they will never be held accountable for what they did. The film also goes into the background of the way it was made, all the more pertnant given recent reports that Thet is now in direct danger for making it. Seems Uncle Hun didnt like it. Its won multiple international awards, and is a must see for anyone with an interest in the history of the KR.
Then we focus down on one partcular aspect of the KR death camp system in the documentary S21: THE KHMER ROUGE DEATH MACHINE which documents the activites of the "processng camp" at Tuol Sleng, a primary school the KR turned into their own version of hell on earth. Tuol Sleng was the main processing camp that all enemies of the regime from the central area went through on their inevitable journey to Chuong Ek (the Killing Field) and now serves as the Genocide Museum. Ive been there and its a horiffic experience that stays burned onto your memory for life. Only 5 men survived the camp, and the documentary sets out through intervews of them and the kids the regime used to run the place to document for history what went on there. Like ENEMIES it has won a scad of internatonal awards, and is essential viewing for anyone with an interest in Cambodia and its sad history.
Welcome to tonights Sandman's Cinematic Kitchen, and we are going to be making a little dish for those harumphing teen pain in the arses you have upstairs.
Take one cup of dystopian futuristic gun fu action flick EQUILIBRIUM and slice and dice into little shreds. Now spice that with a wee whiff of BLADE RUNNER and slowly stir in a teaspoon or ten of RUNNING MAN. Now take that mix and chuck into the patent Hollydud washing machine with a great big fat whopping sackfull of the Japanese kids as gladators splatter flick BATTLE ROYALE. Set onto rinsewash, spin dry, and spit the whole PC tissue thin mess out and serve to a salivatng audience of panty wetters with no appreciation of how a good flick is made and no apparent awareness of pre 2000 Hollydud cinema or Japanese film. Add a cash it in Twilight flavoured sequel franchise cherry on top. Flog the whole steaming carcass and hype like crazy till the cash tills explode.
Equilibrium had intellgence, style and great gun fu in spadefulls. Battle Royale had all the over the top Japanorama freakshow fun o the fair served as tempura. Blade Runner and Running Man are classics. THIS however is just a great big steaming pile of poodle poo that only a teen who wees their pants every time Justin Bieber squeeks could ever enjoy. Personally I found slamming my john thomas into a filing cabinet till my eyes bled more entertaining.
Doing the rounds like a bad dose of crabs in a reasonably watchable TS copy. The only reason I would recc this is to rob the swine who made it of every penny in the forlorn hope they do not make the other two in the franchise.
Fat chance.....
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
This is pretty much you standard "survival chase" flick which uses an alien invasion as opposed to zombies as its driver, along with the usual suspect cast of "disposable teens" who run, hide and occasionally get killed off. But there are a couple of nteresting twisties that make this flick a bit more interesting.
First up the aliens are mostly "invisible" as they hide behnd phase walls that make them all but invsble except for in electrical fields. You only get to see the actual aliens at the end "boss level" section of the film. And they dont turn the victims into splattery goo....they suck out all the electrcity and minerals, reducng victims into a cloud of cat litter like ash. Second, its set in Moscow so has a unique Eastern European twist and the sets are thus more interesting. Fans of Russian cinema will recognise the Russian cast from films like 9th Company and Day Watch.
Its a good action chase flick and well worth a watch if you want a dose of bubblegum and popcorn for your eyeballs, and the effects are done really well. Yes it fits the chase flick cliches all the way, but at least the makers tried to add a new flavour to the genre....and the CGI effects are cool.
Out and about in DVDRIP formats all over the place. Gets two cheers for effort
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
Well, today is IRON SKY theatrical release day ... in Finland anyway. Will be released in the UK later in the month so copies should appear sometme around then...well worth keeping an eye out for IMHO. Space Nazis, campy comedy and apparently excellent CGI effects....
then if Space Nazis aren't your cup o tea then how about Zombie Nazis? After spending four long years in a legal battle over distribution rights and the producer chucking a tedddy bear and locking the final cut reels in a vault somewhere in deepest Finland (seriously) WAR OF THE DEAD is finally going to be released in late May....and thanks to his messing about its now going straight to DVD so copies will be all over the net come the end of May...which hopefully will teach the silly Finnish prat a lesson. Trailer looks good....fingers crossed....
aaaaaaaaaand finally non Finnish made Zombie Nazi flick 4th REICH starring Sean Pertwee starts shooting in the UK in May and is on target for a 2013 release date along with Zombie Nazi flick sequel OUTPOST 2. As both are Anglo/American productions hopefully they will stick on schedule and not end up AWOL in some safe in the snowy back of beyond for years on end.
For you Tommy Atkins zee var is never over!!!! Mwaaa ha ha hah ha.
"Science flew men to the moon. Religion flew men into buildings."
