Posts Tagged ‘ Movie ’
There are many impressive dance groups out there, all deserving of recognition, but not too many videos have had as much impact as the ‘Tron Dance’ from The Wrecking Orchestra. This video isn’t the newest, but I felt the need to throw it up simply because every time I run into it on the web, I just can’t help remember how excited I was the first time I saw it. Check the method below.
During a work trip to Florida, I got to stay in house with a movie theater in it, and out of all the movies I chose to watch during my stay, ‘Finding Nemo’ was one of the first on the list. Who knew that only two weeks after, Disney and Pixar would announce that the film is getting a sequel. Finding Dory will arrive in US cinemas on November 25th, 2015, and (as you may have guessed) will follow the adventures of Dory, the helpful if somewhat absent-minded Blue Tang from the original movie.
The film will take place roughly a year after the events of the first film. Many favourites will return, including Marlin, Nemo and the Tank Gang, among others. Other details are scarce right now, but the film will take place partly along the California coastline.
Ellen DeGeneres seems pretty ecstatic about reprising her role as a forgetful fish. “I have waited for this day for a long, long, long, long, long, long time,” said DeGeneres. “I’m not mad it took this long. I know the people at Pixar were busy creating ‘Toy Story 16.’ But the time they took was worth it. The script is fantastic. And it has everything I loved about the first one: It’s got a lot of heart, it’s really funny, and the best part is—it’s got a lot more Dory.”
And the director of Finding Nemo, Andrew Stanton, will also be returning to oversee the sequel. “There is no Dory without Ellen,” he said. “She won the hearts of moviegoers all over the world—not to mention our team here at Pixar. One thing we couldn’t stop thinking about was why she was all alone in the ocean on the day she met Marlin. In ‘Finding Dory,’ she will be reunited with her loved ones, learning a few things about the meaning of family along the way.”
This sense of combining a proud concept history with twenty first century design continued in Holden’s latest concept. Released in Australia in 2005, the Efijy looks like what Batman would drive if he was trying to blend into a fifties Chicago Gangster movie. No surprise, it is indeed a tribute to a fifties Holden model, the FJ, and was born in the minds of the company’s design team as long ago as 1988. Boasting a V8 engine with Rootes supercharger, the Efijy packs a whopping 644 horsepower. An even cooler touch: it rides on an air suspension system that lowers the car automatically when it’s stopped. In fact the touches like that explain the success of all Holden’s concept cars: they make you smile, and draw breath in wonder at the same time.
Most of us know Dora the Explorer as the bilingual Nick Jr. children’s cartoon that’s slowly infecting our nation’s youth with bleeding heart liberalism and tolerance, but did you know that Dora is also a badass action hero with a hot, shirtless (and, in this case, grownup) sidekick named Diego? Well, she is — Dora has gone live-action and she’s here to f*ck sh*t up.
Check out Busta Rhymes Feat. J-Doe in “Movie” official music video. As well as the bottom video, the behind the scenes look at it. This song is from his album, “Year Of The Dragon”.
Oktapodi is a 2007 French computer-animated short film that originated as a Graduate Student Project from Gobelins L’Ecole de L’Image. It won a gambit of awards from film festivals all over the world, and even though it’s not the newest piece of work out, it’s still pretty dope.
Mondo, the collectible art boutique arm of Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, has announced their second Batman print for Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises. The limited edition variant of this print from world-renowned artist Olly Moss was available at Mondo’s Comic-Con booth.
When it comes to movies that are based on history, nobody can bend the hell out of history itself like Q. Tarantino. After “Inglorious Bastards” (Where the Americans kill Hitler in the end), I knew that if he ever did another history based film, it’d be more about the action than historical correctness. A few days ago my good friend told me about Will Smith playing his movies safe, and passing on the movie Django Unchained. I had never heard of the movie before, but when I found out that it was Quentin Tarantino’s take on an action movie based around slavery, I KNEW I had to check that out.
Former dentist, Dr. King Schultz, buys the freedom of a slave, Django, and trains him with the intent to make him his deputy bounty hunter. Instead, he is led to the site of Django’s wife who is under the hands of Calvin Candie, a ruthless plantation owner.
Halo 4 and the Master Chief got its gameplay debut yesterday during Microsoft’s E3 2012 conference with a colossal gameplay trailer using both live action and also Xbox 360 in-game footage.
Originally thought to be the flagship game for the potentially upcoming Xbox 720, the now Xbox 360-bound trailer shed light on both what the Halo 4 single player campaign would look like and also showcased both the new-look Covenant and ancient foes the Forerunners.
The trailer also shed light on the Halo 4 plot revealing that the Master Chief would not be the only human stranded on the Forerunner planet, he will be joined by the surviving crew members of the UNSC Infinity, a titanic exploration vessel that has been pulled onto the planets surface.
Appearing for the first time are the Forerunners, previously mentioned but never-before-seen creators of the Halos and the Ark. Combining both technology and organic life they bring with them an entirely new arsenal of weapons that will sit alongside the classic Halo Battle Rifle.
Finally the trailer was able to expand further on the relationship between the Master Chief and Cortana, the ancient AI that he both protects and relies on for help.
While little is known about her, Cortana’s back story was touched on by Halo Reach and looks to be expanded upon by Halo 4 with the Artificial Intelligence having to face the prospect of mortality.
Microsoft have revealed that the Halo 4 release date is 6th November and will be exclusively available for Xbox 360 with both the standard version and a Limited Edition available.
Ice-T takes us on an intimate journey into the heart and soul of hip-hop with the legends of rap music. This performance documentary goes beyond the stardom and the bling, to explore what goes on inside the minds, and erupts from the lips, of the grandmasters of rap. Recognized as the godfather of Gangsta rap, Ice-T is granted unparalleled access to the personal lives of the masters of this artform that he credits for saving his life. Interspersed with the performer’s insightful, touching, and often funny revelations are classic raps, freestyle rhymes, and never before heard acappellas straight from the mouths of the creators. What emerges is a better understanding of, and a tribute to, an original American art form that brought poetry to a new generation.
Emirates has unveiled the world’s widest seat-back television screens, to be installed on its new aircraft. The new 12.1-inch screen is the largest economy class seatback system in the world, Emirates says, complete with high-definition displays — another first for the Dubai-based carrier. New screens are also being installed in premium classes, Emirates said May 31, including a 27-inch widescreen in First Class and 20-inch screen in Business Class. Emirates, which is competing with rival Etihad to build a hub-based model from its location in the Arabian Gulf, has long been recognized for the money it pours into in-flight entertainment, winning world’s best entertainment from airline ratings website Skytrax for the last seven years.
The new upgrade, due to be installed on all new Boeing 777s in the fleet and on the carrier’s A380 aircraft (pictured below) from next year, is likely to further consolidate this position. A new computer system, developed by Emirates and Panasonic, will drive the screens, offering over 300 movies, thousands of music tracks and television programs. The new system has been based on a consumer tablet, Emirates says, with the aim of allowing passengers to ‘swipe’ and ‘scroll’ to access functionality and communications features such as SMS and email access. A tie-up with skating brand Quiksilver will also see new entertainment offered for children, including a branded travel journal, wallet and playing cards.
A rare 1932 cover illustration of “Tintin in America” by Herge, the artist who dreamed up the boy reporter, on Saturday fetched a record $1.6 million at an auction in Paris. “The work has been sold at 1,338,509.20 euros, costs included, by a person who wishes to remain anonymous,” a spokesman for the auctioneers, Artcurial, told AFP. The previous owner, another Tintin collector, had bought it for 764,218 euros in 2008, which had until today stood as the record price in this domain. Belgian comic book artist Herge painted the Indian ink and gouache colour cover for the first edition of the book, which first appeared in 1934. One of only five such works of cover art remaining by Herge, it shows the young adventurer dressed as a cowboy sitting on a rock, his dog Snowy at his side, as three Indians, two wielding axes, creep up behind him.
Last year, film director Steven Spielberg released a 3D film, “Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn” and is already planning a sequel.
Daddy Warbucks, the rumors are true: Jay-Z will be overseeing music for a remake of the musical Annie and will contribute original tracks. That’s according to British actress Emma Thompson, who is writing the film, as she confirmed — along with Jay-Z’s involvement — to BBC and the U.K. Press Association. The movie is being produced by Will Smith and will star his daughter, hair-whipping Jay-Z signee and noted Odd Future fan Willow Smith.
“I think it’s a very good combination,” Thompson told the BBC. She added that film’s management was hoping to choose a director as early as this week. Thompson is pumped about the project, according to the Press Association, which quotes her as saying: “I’m writing a modern version of Annie for Willow to play, which I’m so excited about because Jay-Z is going to do the music — oh my God I’m so modern. So I am very thrilled about that.”
The movie will take place in present-day New York and will include new songs, according to Thompson’s interview with the BBC. Some of the old songs won’t make the cut, but Thompson eases any concerns that the new Annie will leave out the old standby “Tomorrow” — “that’s in, weirdly,” she’s quoted as saying. Filming reportedly starts early next year, and Thompson confirms that Willow Smith will play the title role, adding, “That’s if she doesn’t get too tall.” So we know Willow won’t be doing any “Got Milk?” ads in the coming months.
Jay-Z sampled a song from Annie for the hit single “Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem),” from his 1998 album Vol. 2… Hard Knock Life. The film project comes as he’s been particularly busy: flying to France for Kanye West’s Cruel Summer film premiere, raking in BET Awards nominations, fending off Guinness World Record challenges, and, oh yeah, tapping Pearl Jam to headline his own Made in America music festival. He also recently endorsed Barack Obama’s support for same-sex marriage, while his wife Beyoncé, will perform tonight for the first since giving birth to their daughter Blue Ivy Carter in January.
Will Smith separately confirmed the Annie project and Thompson’s role in an interview with Good Morning America this week. “Emma Thompson wrote the script for Annie,” Smith said. “She is fantastic.” Thompson co-stars with Smith in the new movie Men in Black 3, though the two met during the making of 2007 film I Am Legend.
The sun’ll come out … whenever the Fresh Prince tells us it’s coming out.
Minimal posters are very trendy, and Alejandro de Antonio has produced an excellent set of minimal movie posters in this vein. He has an uncanny ability to capture the essence of a popular movie and represent it via a simplistic, but elegant illustration. His designs showcase how strong the brand is behind the movies, as we instantly connect with the represented protagonists.
Academy Award winning director Martin Scorsese has announced he will produce Silver Ghost, a film that chronicles the lives of the names behind the formation of Rolls-Royce. Silver Ghost will tell the story of motoring pioneer Lord John Douglas-Scott Montagu, his wife Cis and his secret love affair with his secretary and mistress, Eleanor Velasco Thornton. It also will detail Montagu’s connection and friendships with Rolls-Royce founders Charles Rolls and Henry Royce and British artist and sculptor Charles Sykes. Thornton was the inspiration for the iconic Spirit of Ecstasy mascot, designed by Sykes, that to this day adorns all Rolls-Royce cars. “When I read the story of ‘Silver Ghost’, I was mesmerised,” Scorsese said. “I immediately thought this is a picture that has to be made. I didn’t hesitate for a moment.” The script has been penned by Kiera Knightley’s mum, Sharman Macdonald and Christian Bale is rumored to be in line to take a starring role in the film as Lord Montagu.
Today I saw some work from Steve Payne, who created the ‘Replaceface’ series, where Steve took digital copies of George Dawe’s paintings of Russian generals and added celebrities faces to the portrait using Photoshop. So as always, enjoy & live inspired.
Click the pic to watch the trailer.
A name is everything when it comes to entertainment, but some names can be quite misleading. When I saw the all black poster with nothing but the words ‘Gangster Squad’ on it, I assumed it was probably some flick with a bunch of rappers and starring the Tupac hologram. But after hearing from an editor who worked on the movie about what it was really about, I was more than intrigued. Click the pic to check this awesome trailer about a gangster true story.
Los Angeles, 1949. Ruthless, Brooklyn-born mob king Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn) runs the show in this town, reaping the ill-gotten gains from the drugs, the guns, the prostitutes and–if he has his way–every wire bet placed west of Chicago. And he does it all with the protection of not only his own paid goons, but also the police and the politicians who are under his control. It’s enough to intimidate even the bravest, street-hardened cop…except, perhaps, for the small, secret crew of LAPD outsiders led by Sgt. John O’Mara (Josh Brolin) and Jerry Wooters (Ryan Gosling), who come together to try to tear Cohen’s world apart. “Gangster Squad” is a colorful retelling of events surrounding the LAPD’s efforts to take back their nascent city from one of the most dangerous mafia bosses of all time.
“Considering how long this has been in development, and the number of similar projects that have fallen by the wayside including a mooted Paul Greengrass directed biopic, and a fictional road trip style movie, we figured the Andre 3000 starring Jimi Hendrix movie was not going to happen. Hell, even as far back as 2008 the actor/rapper himself said, “The funny thing with the biopics [is their uncertainty], I mean, it’s the same thing with ‘Hendrix.’ It’s kinda like, until you are on set doing it you can’t say what’s going on, because everybody wants to do the movie, but there are so many things that go into a biopic.” Well, it looks like the movie is actually going ahead.
Titled “All Is By My Side,” the film is gearing up start lensing in three weeks in Ireland, with a six week production schedule mapped out. John Ridley, the writer behind “Three Kings,” “U-Turn” and the forthcoming “Twelve Years A Slave” has penned the script and will be directing as well, making his sophomore feature effort following 1997′s “Cold Around The Heart.” The film will essentially cover Hendrix’s breakthrough period from 1966 to 1967, when he was discovered in a New York club by Linda Keith, a model and girlfriend of Keith Richards at the time, who introduced him to The Rolling Stones’ manager Andrew Loog Oldham and producer Seymour Stein (who both declined to work with him), and eventually to manager/producer Chas Chandler who helped launch his career. He went to London, recorded Are You Experienced? and the rest, as they say, is history.
No word yet on the rest of the cast, but last summer, Hayley Atwell revealed she was eyeing a role but nothing has been heard since. The big question here is if the film will have rights to the songs, licensing of which tends to be expensive and difficult to come by. But we presume if cameras are set to be rolling, some kind of approval on the film has come down from the musicians’s estate, Experience Hendrix. Either way, we’re curious as hell to see how all this winds up turning out. Are You Experienced? is a fairly defining moment in rock ‘n roll history, and Hendrix is one of the titans, so let’s hope it gets the treatment it deserves.”
Being surrounded by graphic designers on a daily basis gives me a better perspective of just how unique a craft it is. But for the layman, learning about graphic design can be a little less easy. A video my assistant found seems to perfectly sum everything up. Thank you to Robertcrosscountry for putting his school project up online.
Instagram rocketed to 30 million iOS users in 18 months and was named iPhone app of the year in 2011. It is one of the best apps for taking and sharing photos from the iPhone. Its square images and assorted image filters let anyone make retro, techno and pretty pictures out of mundane shots of their kids, pets, food. Instagram’s Android version, released last week, got millions of downloads immediately. But $1 billion, if true, is still a crazy number. Instagram doesn’t make any money. Nor did it say it was focusing on revenue. It is still chasing big users. Kevin Systrom, Instagram’s CEO, wrote this to calm down his users in response to the deal. An excerpt:
It’s important to be clear that Instagram is not going away. We’ll be working with Facebook to evolve Instagram and build the network. We’ll continue to add new features to the product and find new ways to create a better mobile photos experience.
It’s not clear what the Facebook deal means for the Series B funding round that may have closed last week, led by Sequoia Capital, Thrive, Benchmark and Greylock at a reported $500 million valuation. But the fact that Facebook would pay 2x what the company was supposedly worth within a week’s time suggests this is a defensive move. Facebook has the money (almost $4 billion in cash on hand as of December 2011), and certainly isn’t desperate for more users, most if not all of whom are already on Facebook (which greatly influences the price-per-new-active-user Facebook is paying. See crude math below.)
Fred Wilson has said that Facebook is really about photos and this only underscores that. The mobile-social photo sector is still amorphously led but if anyone is harmed by this deal it is Yahoo. Facebook is really going after its Flickr property here, to put the nail further in Yahoo’s coffin. (To its discredit, Yahoo hasn’t done anything with Flickr lately). Zuckerberg is playing chess, making a defining move in how it stands in the photo space. It’s like what Google did with YouTube.
One problem this will solve for Instagram’s 30-something million users is that sharing an Instagram photo on Facebook from your phone pretty much sucks right now. Here comes the much needed integration: bigger photos, more detailed info about the filters, etc. Right now all you get when you post an Instagram photo on Facebook from your phone is a small link and a thumbnail image. A better integration will stimulate more sharing through Instagram.
But a $1 billion for 30 million users that pay nothing for the service? Sounds crazy but consider this: Instagram is getting bought for $33 per user. Facebook is supposedly trading with a market cap of close to $100 billion and has 850 million users, giving it a value of $117 per user. So it looks like a decent bit of funny-money arbitrage, using well-endowed Facebook shares to acquire users and solidify hold of a strategic asset at a lower valuation. We don’t yet know how much of the deal is in cash vs. stock, so this calculation could be less favorable sounding but it still makes sense with Facebook currency.
Here’s a video Forbes editor Michael Noer did with Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom for our 30 Under 30 special. According to Wired’s Mike Isaac, Systrom netted $400 million from the sale.
Sci-Fi films with monstrous budgets are a dime a dozen now a days, but seem to lack whatever quality it is that captivates moviegoers. Flicks like John Carter or Wrath Of The Titans all seemed good in theory, and for the amount of money they cost, should have been great, but failed to deliver to audiences. It takes a unique, interesting, and well delivered story to make a science fiction movie stand above the rest now a days, and Rian Johnson’s “Looper” smells like it has all the right ingredients. Starring Jason Gordon Levitt, and Bruce Willis, the move seems like a welcomed departure from the generic movie scripts that are coming to the screen this year. Aside from ‘The Avengers’ and ‘The Dark Knight Rises’, ‘Looper’ is one of the films I’m looking forward to the most this year. Check the official synopsis below, and look out for a trailer coming in the next week or so.
Time travel will be invented, but it will be illegal and only available on the black market. When the mob wants to get rid of someone, they send their target 30 years into the past, where a “looper”—a hired gun, like Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt)—is waiting to mop up. Joe is getting rich and life is good. . . until the day the mob decides to “close the loop,” sending back Joe’s future self (Bruce Willis) for assassination. The film is written and directed by Rian Johnson and also stars Emily Blunt, Paul Dano, and Jeff Daniels. Ram Bergman and James D. Stern produce.
Comic books have been a staple in pop-culture for generations. Some of the more iconic super heroes have even become idolized by celebrities and fans alike. Shaq has an obsession with Superman, (and eve I’ve been consumed by the character of Tony Stark as well) but no matter who makes a fuss about their favorite heroes, the artwork that brought those heroes to life is what solidifies them in our minds. Check out 30 examples of the greatest comic book to be published.
For a new film festival in Thailand called Film on the Rocks Yao Noi, an outdoor cinema was constructed in the most unlikely of places: right on top of the water. The amazing venue is called the Archipelago Cinema and is tucked away inside a bay surrounded by towering island rocks and lush jungle plants.
For the final night of the Film Festival earlier this month, guests were taken by boat to savor a final screening on this floating cinema designed by Beijing-based architect Ole Scheeren.
The Archipelago Cinema consisted of a floating screen, cradled between two towering rocks, and a separate raft-like auditorium. The cinema was crafted out of recycled materials, and its modular construction allows for flexibility and future reuse.
The Festival, which took place from 9th- 12th March 2012, is set to become an annual meeting place for art and film.
And festival or not, this is for sure one of the coolest destinations I’ve seen in a long, long time.
Unique content is relatively hard to find now a days in films. Be it short films, feature length, or independent, ideas just tend to be regurgitated every so often. But the film Pixels by Patrick Jean is something that just struck me as wildly original. Witness the invasion of New York City by all manner of digital creatures below.
Click to pic to see more.
Total Recall has been a cult classic film for quite some time… I would venture to say “for generations” but that’s not the case. The original ‘Total Recall’ only came out in 1990, which begs the question as to why the powers that be felt the need to re-make it. The visual effects revolutions that have taken place between the 1933 “King Kong” movie and the the one released in 2005 are massive, but that’s not really an excuse in the way of “Total Recall”. However, before someone brings up the point that the Spiderman franchise didn’t even wait for a 6th grader to graduate high school before they re-booted Mr. Parker, lets just remember that there was nothing wrong with T.R. In Arnold Schwarzenegger’s version, the plot circles around a virtual vacation on Mars and the implications of things being too real in virtual reality, but you can read the official synopsis of the 2012 version below.
Total Recall is an action thriller about reality and memory, inspired anew by the famous short story “We Can Remember It For You Wholesale” by Philip K. Dick. Welcome to Rekall, the company that can turn your dreams into real memories. For a factory worker named Douglas Quaid (Colin Farrell), even though he’s got a beautiful wife (Kate Beckinsale) who he loves, the mind-trip sounds like the perfect vacation from his frustrating life – real memories of life as a super-spy might be just what he needs. But when the procedure goes horribly wrong, Quaid becomes a hunted man. Finding himself on the run from the police – controlled by Chancellor Cohaagen (Bryan Cranston), the leader of the free world – Quaid teams up with a rebel fighter (Jessica Biel) to find the head of the underground resistance (Bill Nighy) and stop Cohaagen. The line between fantasy and reality gets blurred and the fate of his world hangs in the balance as Quaid discovers his true identity, his true love, and his true fate.
