Firelight

In my continued blog-warfare based battle to get little cp to give her last MTC post, here is the recent spoof that SNL did of a certain movie. Take that!

p.s. Taylor Swift's opening monologue was pretty funny too.

Red Harvest

2009 is the 80th anniversary year of the first publishing of the book "Red Harvest". This was author Dashiell Hammett's first novel and arguably one of the most influential works of American literature of the 20th century. Hammett was also the author of such books as "The Maltese Falcon", which gave rise to the character of Sam Spade the hard-boiled private eye - sometimes confused with his contemporary Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe character, which is understandable because they were both played by Humphrey Bogart ("The Big Sleep" is also considered a seminal work of American 20th century fiction). Anyway, Red Harvest started the gangster novel genre and blurred the lines of mystery and detective/crime fiction. While employing Western elements, he painted his characters in shades of grey, which contrasted sharply with the stereotypical white hat/black hat western mentality. And it was the originator of the pervasive "man with no name" antihero archetype and the plot device of the hero playing both sides to achieve his ends (and coming out victorious, but a little the worse for wear). This book gave rise to many influential movies including Akira Kurosawa's "Yojimbo", Sergio' Leone's "Fistful of Dollars", and the 1996 Prohibition era period film "Last Man Standing" (to which Kurosawa contributed his writing talents).

Name related ramblin's:
Red Harvest is also a decent Norwegian heavy/industrial metal band. And it's the title of the second album by the alternative metal band Bloodsimple (who clearly read the book because "blood simple" is a quote from the last line). I like them, they're vaguely Metallica-y and Godsmack-ish. "Blood Simple" is also the title of the neo-noir crime thriller that was the Coen brothers' directorial debut. The term describes the addled mindset in which people find themselves after periods of prolonged immersion in violent situations. The film is lesser known but it did make Bravo's list of film's 100 scariest moments.

Six degrees of Bruce Campbell:
Did you know Joel Coen also worked as an editor on Evil Dead? It's true. He also worked on Spies Like Us (1985) with James Daughton who was in Animal House with Kevin Bacon! Hahaha! Bacon number of 2! Click here for the Bacon Oracle, which can be used to connect anyone to anyone in the movies. It's default setting is Kevin Bacon but I think I'm going to start connecting people to Bruce Campbell just because mentioning Evil Dead just now reminded me of him (in fact I may make this into a sub-section called Six degrees of Bruce Campbell...there I did it). Let's see... Dashiell Hammett wrote The Maltese Falcon, which was made into a movie starring Humphrey Bogart who was in Deadline - U.S.A. (1952) with Dabbs Greer who was in Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat (1990) with Bruce Campbell! Booyah!

Chickens! Cultural Moment: Evil Dead The Musical

Weee! So much belated birthday fun thanks to my awesome bro LP (all it took was a whirlwind weekend drive to Calgary. FYI Drumheller had the cheapest gas by far). The story of Evil Dead: The Musical was actually a combo of the 3 Evil Dead movies with some poetic license. For example, many of the characters from "Evil Dead II" are missing and "Army of Darkness" was relegated to a few quotes (like the "boom stick" monologue) and a statement at the end. Also, Ash's hand gets bitten by the demon moose head instead of evil Linda and that's why it turns evil. Anyway, especially amusing in the play were all the inside jokes making reference to Bruce Campbell, Sam Raimi, or horror movie standard plot devices. The show is put on by Ground Zero Theatre and Hit & Myth Productions at the Playhouse at Vertigo Theatre Centre in Calgary (which I had never been to before) and it is the first Canadian EDtM show outside of Toronto.

The fist half of the show basically covers the first movie (Evil Dead) in which our main characters Ash (sole survivor who, as such, loses all loved ones and his own hand to evil forces and is covered in blood repeatedly), Scotty (Ash's friend, man slut, coward), Linda (Ash's love interest and fellow S-Mart employee come evil demon), Shelly (ho that Scotty picked up in a bar), and Cheryl (Ash's sister, accosted by trees while following mother's advice to always investigate scary nigh-time forest noises alone with out waking the others) head to a cabin in the woods for some romance and relaxation (1 - Cabin in the Woods, Housewares Employee). They find a recording in the basement which turns out to be translations of the "Necronomicon" by the ill-fated Professor Knowby. [Side note: This was actually called the "Naturon Demonto" in the first movie and renamed "Necronomicon Ex-Mortis" in the sequels. Both are translated to mean "book of the Dead".] They then inadvertently bring on their own personal zombie laden gore-fest by playing the recording and all of the main characters proceed to by horribly killed except for Ash (2 - Look Who's Evil Now, What the F^%# Was That?, Join Us). Now the first movie ends around here with Ash destroying the book but with a cliffhanger of a demon coming out of the forest to get him.

Fun facts about Evil Dead:
The film was shot over a period of 1.5 years with an operating budget of $375,000 (even though it went on to be one of the highest grossing horror movies of all time). Not surprising then that the inconsistencies within the film are both rampant and glaring (imdb has a big list of them), but I think that adds to the humour. It was non-union so a lot of the actors used stage names to avoid penalties from the screen actors guild. Bruce Campbell was basically the only actor who stuck with the project to the end and was available for re-shoots so Sam Raimi resorted to using "Fake Shemps" for replacements. Although it featured a lot of slapstick, the movie was before its time in gore level (and also featured an infamous "tree rape" scene that garnered it wide disapproval), which got it banned in several countries including the UK (and an X rating before that). Although Quebec rated it 13+, go figure.

In the second half of the play we got mostly Evil Dead II plot stuff but they basically culled the characters down to Annie and Ed (archaeologists) and Jake (reliable). Features a lot of people running out of the cabin and coming back dead and Ash gets his chainsaw hand (3 - I'm Not A Killer, Bit Part Demon, All the Men in My Life Get Killed by Candarian Demons). Annie explains how to summon/kill all the demons then gets demonized herself (4 - Ode to an Accidental Stabbing, Do the Necronomicon, It's Time). Finally Ash kills everyone and all the demons spray blood on the people in the "splatter zone" and we find Ash back a S-Mart telling of his adventures (5 - Blew That B@#%* Away). The review "play enjoyed by all" speaks for itself.











Fun Facts about Evil Dead 2:
Goofs continue to be rampantly hilarious. Did you know that you can see the clawed Freddy Krueger glove at various points during the movie? They did that because the Nancy character in Wes Craven's "A Nightmare on Elm Street" can be seen watching Evil Dead while trying to stay awake near the end of the movie. Which was in reference to the torn 1977 "The Hills Have Eyes" (also by Wes Craven) poster visible in the cellar in Evil Dead. Oh movie types and their inside references.

History of the Necronomicon:
Made up by horror writer H.P.Lovecraft and included in several of his short stories. Lovecraft also wrote a fictional "History of the Necronomicon" story. Pop culture references include "Evil Dead" (duh!) and the Simpsons (of course) in which Bob Dole reads a snippet at the Republican party meeting in the first 2 minutes of Season13Episode7 (Brawl in the Family). Also the crux of a low budget movie called Necronomicon (1993).

1307

I love the spoof advertisements of posters for the Broadway mainstays Les Miserables, Hairspray, and Mama Mia! that were done up for the Toronto incarnation of the musical (click to embiggen):










Original "Evil Dead" (1981) Movie Trailer

Original "Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn" (1987) Movie Trailer

Original "Army of Darkness" (1992) Movie Trailer

p.s. I don't know how many of you watched the cartoon Reboot but they did an homage to Evil Dead 2 and the Evil Dead series of games (and there's also a Michael Jackson reference in there - RIP). The various games actually added significantly to the storyline. And speaking of games did you know that Bruce Campbell does the voice over instructions for the Spider Man movie games? Funny times.
p.p.s. FYI a movie version of the musical is in negotiations. Also, an Evil Dead 4 movie is in the works with Sam Raimi in the process of writing the script.

It's no ordinary rabbit!

The monster that guards the entrance to the cave of Kyre Banorg (wherein, carved in mystic runes upon the very living rock, the last words of Ulfin Bedweer of Regett proclaim the last resting place of the Holy Grail). A creature so foul, so cruel that no man yet has fought with it and lived!

"So, brave knights, if you do doubt your courage or your strength, come no further, for death awaits you all with nasty big pointy teeth." - Tim the Enchanter

If these walls could talk...

From Off the Mark comics.

Twilight Buns

The always enjoyable 30-Second Bunnies Theatre Troupe has given little cp the gift of Twilight Buns. Bunny/Edward lovers everywhere rejoice!

p.s. You may remember the Bunnies from this post or this one.

Simpsons Movie and Spiderpig

You may remember the Simpsons movie from such posts as this one and this one. Well, turns out I liked it enough to actually purchase the DVD! The main menu is sweet, if you watch for a bit spider-pig swings across the screen. There are a few Easter Eggs as well (lingo for Moms: Easter Egg = hidden extra on a DVD):

1. Colin:
Main>>Special Features>>Deleted Scenes>>highlight "Deleted Scenes" (press UP arrow then ENTER)
2. Russ Cargill:
Main>>Special Features>>Special Stuff>>highlight "Special Stuff" (press UP arrow then ENTER)
3. Mutant Squirrel:
Main>>Special Features>>A Lot of Trailers>>highlight "A Lot of Trailers"( press UP arrow then ENTER)
4.Turn it up!
Main>>Language Selection>>highlight "Audio" (press UP and LEFT then ENTER)

p.s. Spiderpig a rip-off of Spider-Ham? You decide...










p.p.s. other super pigs include:

For little cp who is sicky

and cute too (comic from Strange Brew).

Also, here is the walk off scene from Zoolander in Spanish just for you:

If movies had cell phones

I especially like the Romeo&Juliet one! This is why all of my suggestions for what people should do during movies would make crappy movies.

p.s. This video is from the college humour people. They're pretty funny (I like the metaphor free radio video).

This week in history

FYI The song she sings, "Anything Goes" from the Broadway musical of the same name, debuted on Broadway in 1934. So it checks out.
p.s. Thanks to D for being a nerd and posting this which led me to the promo poster.

Death Panda

Death Panda is part of the Japanese metal scene described in the sweet documentary Global Metal by Scot McFadyen and Sam Dunn. The sequel to his first metal documentary Metal: A Headbanger's Journey (which I haven't seen yet but I expect some people to have some sort of metal movie night soon). I was quite pleased with the film! Very interesting to get different viewpoints on metal music and how it is affecting and being affected by different cultures that are new to it. I especially liked the Israel based metal band called Orphaned Land. Also, it made me really proud of Sepultura and their forward thinking ways.

Anywho, one of the stand out funny things was Japan's take on some aspects of metal music (namely visual kei) and there was a clip of a cartoon called Death Panda.

According to this blog:

"The Death Panda is a shock manga by artist Waita Uziga about a giant demonic panda bear from hell. A more cutesy guitar playing anime character called Death Panda (loosely based on the manga) was created and aired as one of the segments of TV Tokyo Channel 12’s wacky TV show "Takeyama sensei?!"

The video clips show an angry guitar playing and singing panda who laments man’s extermination of animal species around the world. The speed metal theme was created by (ex-Megadeth guitarist and now Tokyo resident) Marty Friedman and was sung by members of the popular all girl idol group AKB48."

You know, sometimes things just make you go "What the heck!?" but are awesome.

p.s. If anyone knows the translation let me know (I wouldn't want a repeat of the Polish fiasco).

Flying Pants

For little cp because she loved the books so much, The Sisterhood of the Flying Pants:






















and some other things that shouldn't have wings but do. Enjoy!

Saskatchewan (1954)

Wow look at that propaganda! Its got everything! Mounties wearing dress uniforms all the time, intolerantly stereotypical depictions of native people, helpless women folk wearing off the shoulder dresses whilst crossing the plains in a wagon. I don't even know where to start with this! Wait, yes I do...why is Saskatchewan in the Rockies? Bah!Update: Here is a link to an article in the Globe and Mail about this and a few other similar misrepresentations of Canadian geography and history. Neat.

A Chickens! Educational Sidebar: NOT 10,000BC

Terror birds (Family: Phorusrhacidae): Giant, flightless carnivorous birds, which stood up to 10 feet high, lived in the Americas (mostly South America) during the Cenozoic. Anything even close to resembling it in the old world died out millions of years ago. It had been previously thought to have existed as recently as 10,000BC in South America but the most recent fossil has been re-dated to around 2 million years ago.

Woolly Mammoths and Mastodons: Mastodons were native to both Eurasia and North America but died out in Eurasia approximately three million years ago and were browsers not grazers like the mammoths. The woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius aka tundra mammoth) was found in North America, Northern Eurasia, and Siberia. They evolved from the steppe mammoth (M.trogontherii) which was 15ft at the shoulder and lived in Northern Eurasia but it was replaced by tundra mammoth about 250,000 years ago. Most mammoth species were no more than 10ft tall at the shoulder max (that's 2 ft taller than my ceiling) and had much smaller ears than modern elephants (closer to 30cm long compared to 6 feet). They began disappearing with the other Pleistocene megafauna about 12,000 years ago, with the last dwelling on islands in the Arctic until as late as 3,000 to 4,000 years ago. They did not (and could not) live in any warm locations such as Africa (besides the long fur, mammoths had a 8cm think layer of blubber beneath their thick skin), although there is some evidence that suggests that Egyptians may have known about them. Also, while the tradition of training elephants may go back some 4 000 years in the Hindu valley, there is no evidence to suggest the taming of elephants or the use of elephants for labour in any way before this time (let alone mammoths!).

Sabre-toothed cats: The most popular sabre-toothed cat was Smilodon (aka the sabre toothed tigre; no close relation to actual tigers). It stood about as tall as a modern lion (but was about twice as heavy, around 400kg) and lived in the Americas.
The lesser known Homotherium (aka scimitar cat) lived in Eurasia, Africa, and the Americas but only survived in the old world until about 30,000 years ago. It was the size of a modern lion and had relatively short upper canines compared to Smilodon. The giant sabre-toothed cat depicted in the movie was at least 2 to 3 times larger than anything that ever existed in real life. Just like this:

Animal Domestication - Horses: As early as 30,000 years ago we see depictions of horses and horse hunting in Paleolithic rock art. In 10,000BC horses were still being hunted for food and in the process of going extinct in the western hemisphere (though there is evidence to suggest that some of the North American horse species migrated to Siberia before this time). The horse may have been domesticated in central Asia as early as 4000BC (around the same time the wheel was invented. Yes, I know the "wheel" existed earlier than that but that was for pottery not transportation), but these may have been merely "tamed" wild horses; the earliest evidence of bit wear dates to around 3500-3000BC; chariots and other material evidence clearly indicate the horse was definitely fully domesticated by 2500 - 2000BC and in common employment throughout Eurasia. Anatomically modern horses (Equus caballus) are a product of selective breeding by humans.

Animal Domestication - Sheep: Sheep were one of the earliest agricultural animals to be domesticated (along with goats), perhaps as early as 9000 years ago (even as early as 10 to 11,000 according to some, soon after agriculture, but that is still only 9000BC at the earliest) in SW Asia. But woolly sheep weren't being selected for until several thousand years later.

Plant domestication: Occurred independently in several major centers around the world. It occurred in the Fertile Crescent region of the Middle East as early as 9000BC. Here we have grains and some legumes like wheat (einkorn and emmer), barley, pea, lentils. Around 8000BC, we see the domestication of Mesoamerican/South American plants like corn, squash, tomato, lima beans, white potato, sweet potato, chili peppers, peanuts, guava, and avocado. These species don't make their way to the old world until the 1500's. So, to sum up, while arguably a case could possibly be made for horticultural cultivation of some transitional domesticate crops in some regions of the Middle East as early as 10,000BC (though there really isn't any evidence for this), these crops would not have included New World domesticates like corn or chili peppers.

Metallurgy: While small amounts of soft natural metals like deposits of gold may have been cold hammered and/or used as decoration as early as the late Paleolithic period (40,000BC), the technology of metallurgy began around 3500 B.C. in the Bronze Age.

Monumental Architecture: The earliest Neolithic townsites date to around 8000BC, actual monumental architecture (except for megaliths) doesn't clearly show up for at least a few thousand years after that.

p.s. Visit some of the other blogs in my blogging community for more angry rantings about 10,000BC here and here.
p.p.s. Another rider to this. I guess the movie isn't so bad because my Mom didn't have to worry about anyone in it, everyone got theirs in the end. In my disapproval of the movie I failed to give extra points for its Mom-friendliness. Let that be a lesson to me. Also, in further defense of the movie, the only thing that actually didn't ever exist were the giant sabre-toothed tigers (of course even though the other things existed, they didn't exist in the same times or places and definitely not in the Old Wold in 10,000BC).

The Amazing Screw On Head

The Amazing Screw On Head was a comic book done by Mike Mignola who some dorks out there may know as the creator of Hellboy. There was only one issue published by Dark Horse Comics in 2002. The comic followed a robot head with interchangeable bodies who works for Abraham Lincoln fighting the evil Emperor Zombie. An animated version of the comic was made and screened online by the Sci-Fi Channel in 2006 (Bryan Fuller exec-produced). Among other things it includes Paul Giamatti as the Amazing Screw On Head, David Hyde Pierce as Emperor Zombie and Molly Shannon as Patience, his vampire lover (zombies AND vampires - nice). Zany zombie-related animated comedy. Good stuff. Bet you didn't know that that's how the Homestead Act came about did you. Ha!

p.s. This artist that was indirectly linked to Dr.McNinja did a drawing of Emperor Zombie and posted it on her blog here; she used to have a series of pictures on there that I really liked featuring a devil character but they aren't on the interweb anymore (although I think one of them is under the art tab here).