Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes) is awakened by his tutor, Doctor Cornelius (Vincent Grass), who warns that his aunt and regent uncle Miraz (Sergio Castellitto) have a new son. In the absence of a son, Caspian was safe as Miraz's heir, but the son secures Miraz's succession as king – if Caspian is eliminated. Cornelius gives Caspian a package, to use only in greatest need. Caspian flees into a forest, pursued by Miraz's guards. He eludes them, only to encounter two dwarves and a talking animal, who have him at a disadvantage. He opens the emergency package, and blows the horn within. The guards follow the noise, and capture a dwarf, while Caspian is taken away by the animal and the other dwarf.

Meanwhile, the four Pevensie children – Peter (William Moseley), Susan (Anna Popplewell), Edmund (Skandar Keynes), and Lucy (Georgie Henley) – are in the London Underground. A wall opens, summoning them through a tunnel onto a sunny beach. They frolic, thrilled to be back in the world of Narnia. Soon, however, they discover that the ruins overlooking the beach are their once-grand palace, and centuries have passed since they ruled there. Back in London, only a year had passed. (And in the actors' real world, three years have passed.)

Soon, Caspian has convinced most of the Narnians – beings his people had long thought merely legendary – that he's not like the other humans, who had hunted Narnians to extreme scarcity. And before long, he and the Narnians encounter the Pevensie children, by then well-equipped to answer the summons of the magical horn.

But the job of restoring peace between Caspian's people and the Narnians will be difficult. The Narnians are outnumbered, and Aslan doesn't seem to be available to help them.

Andrew Adamson returned to direct. He was also one of the three-part writing team, with Christopher Markus & Stephen McFeely, adapting from the C S Lewis novel Prince Caspian. My memory of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was somewhat stale, but my memory of Prince Caspian was even worse; the story was almost entirely unfamiliar to me. Thus I can't adequately compare it with the book except with help.

Looking at the film's story on its own merits, I think it's very good. The most conspicuous element of Christian allegory is absent in this film, although faith is present as a theme. The Pevensie children show a credible reaction to the centuries changes in the world of Narnia during their single London-year. Through much of the story, there are a couple of plot lines – the Pevensie side and the Caspian side at the beginning, and a different split later – and the story switches between the plot lines at points that strengthen both sides. The villains' motivations are comprehensible and credible.

Adamson did a very good job on the directing too. He had his special effect people pushing the limits of what they could do, but mostly avoided effects that weren't quite ready. (Credit for the effects themselves goes to the effects crews, but the choice of whether to use an effect is the director's.) The battle scenes emphasized comprehensibility over fog-of-war, which was appropriate to the story. The drama and within and between scenes worked, and felt smoothly paced.

William Moseley, Anna Popplewell, Skandar Keynes, Georgie Henley, and Ben Barnes were all very good. (However, all except Henley look quite a bit older than the characters they portray.) Sergio Castellitto was good, if occasionally exaggerated. Peter Dinklage was excellent: my favorite performance. Liam Neeson and Eddie Izzard did excellent voice work. Other performances were solid, but not individually memorable.

The effects have improved a great deal since the first film. The effects were more ambitious, the River God was spectacular, the centaurs were remarkably credible, and the miniatures were wonderful. I saw no compositing problems (an occasional weakness of the first film). The digitally multiplied armies looked realistic. The one effect I thought could have used improvement involved pit traps; the edges didn't look quite right. Overall, the effects were excellent.

The score didn't make much impression on me. The songs over the credits seemed like a shaky fit for the film.

With very good writing, directing, and acting, plus wonderful effects, I rate the film very good. I gave the first film the same rating, but I give this one the edge.

Rating: The film's US rating of "PG" is reasonable, although I think it pushes the limits. There's a great deal of violence, quite a bit of death, but almost no blood. The closest thing to sex is a small amount of kissing. Language is mild.

Screening: Friday, 6:30 pm, Seattle suburb (Lincoln Square Cinema).
Audience: About 14 people, 120 seats (advertised capacity).

Snacks: None; we were stuffed from a large late lunch at an Italian restaurant in the same building.

Ads:

• The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor - The third Mummy movie features Jet Li and Brendan Fraser; directed by Rob Cohen.
• Hancock - Will Smith play a slacker superhero with a sloppy attitude about collateral damage. I had heard of the film, but had no idea it was a comedy.
• City of Ember - The generators that power the post-apocalyptic underground city of Ember are failing, and two children have to find a way to escape. Stars Bill Murray. (Looking it up, I see it's based on a 2003 novel – surprisingly recent. I also see that it's directed by Gil Kenan, who I met at the premiere of Monster House. That makes me much more enthusiastic about the film than this ad did.)
• Wall•E - Pixar is finally showing some detail about its next film. Wall•E is a robot who has been alone for 700 years. In that time he has developed a personality – and has become lonely. That changes when something new arrives in the world. It looks wonderful, but most of us had already expected that, because it's Pixar.

Tags: film, review

Tuesday

On Tuesday we went to see Continental, a Film without Guns at a SIFF press screening. In the "Snacks" line of the review, I mention "scalding-hot tea". That's because of a painful incident along the way. We had tea in travel mugs, to drink along the way. I didn't have mine safely secured, and during a mildly abrupt maneuver I lost my grip on it. The mug landed on my lap, spilling quite a bit of very hot tea on me.

Fortunately, it wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. The lid was on the mug, so it only spilled through the sipping hole. The worst of the spill splashed on me above the belt. The portion that spilled on my pants cooled as it soaked through, just enough to avoid a sensitive skin disaster.

I ended up with a burn on my stomach, but it wasn't too serious. Burn cream reduced the pain quite a bit. It's still red today, but it doesn't hurt anymore.

Wednesday

On Wednesday, we went to another press screening, The Red Awn. After the film, we went to Ballard to a grocery store that specializes in Scandinavian food and novelties. I listened to NPR in the car while she shopped for it. My wife bought lots of goodies and a few decorations. She took pictures to show off the purchases on her journal, and said I could share them too.

When we got home, we saw a cute squirrel on our deck. I took a bunch of pictures with my wife's compact camera. See below for both the squirrel and the shopping pictures.

Thursday

Today, my wife and I both got haircuts. She went to a place in downtown Seattle and got a trim and a highlight; it looked really nice. Afterwards she went shopping. Later in the day, I went to the Seattle hair shop where sroit has her day job. She did a very good job. We talked about her book, online communities, and a little about SIFF. It was fun meeting in person again. My wife had arrived there about the same time I did, and read a book while I got the haircut.

This was the the first time this year that the weather was really warm. There's an ice cream shop next to sroit's shop, so we gave it a try. The ice cream was good, but nothing special. What was special was the waffle cones: they were made right there, by hand. They were delicious.

Later, we stopped at a travel book and map store and browsed for a while. I got couple of books and my wife got a nice travel bag, bit smaller than a typical laptop bag. We had dinner at an Indian restaurant; it was delicious. Since we had eaten dessert first we were really full when we finished dinner.

( Click through for the pictures from yesterday. )

Tags: food

Song Hai (Yao Anlian) returns to his rural home town, after five years in the city, and learns that his wife is dead and he has also been declared dead. His 17-year-old son Yongtao (Lu Yukai) had reported him dead because he resented his long absence. His kinsman (Huang Lu) is also angry about Song Hai's long absence, but forgives him, and signs the papers declaring him not dead. The kinsman owns a red combine, and needs people to help with the harvest work. He asks Song Hai and Yongtao to work with him.

Kinsman (I can't find any source that shows his name) doesn't own much property of his own, so he takes his combine on the road, taking payments from other farmers to harvest their wheat. Although competition with other harvester owners and other occasional problem complicate the work, their biggest challenge is the lingering friction between Song Hai and Yongtao.

Along the road, they meet two women, both seeking rides to their rural home towns. The younger one is twentyish, pretty, and plagued by annoying calls on her cell phone. The elder is thirty-something, and hesitant to talk about her background. The young woman and Yongtao are immediately attracted to each other. Song Hai tries to get the elder woman to talk about her background.

Will Song Hai and Yongtao reconcile? What will become of Yongtao and the young woman? Who's calling her all the time? What's the elder woman's story? And what's a red awn?

I can answer the last question without a spoiler. An awn is a hair-like bristle on a plant, and according to this review, "Awn" is the harvester's brand name. The translated title would be a great double meaning, referring to both the combine and the wheat it harvests, except for one problem: "awn" is a really obscure English word, and "Awn" is an obscure brand name in the English-speaking world.

Cai Shangjun directed the film, and co-wrote it with Gu Xiaobai and Feng Rui. The story is mostly a simple family drama, between Song Hai and Yongtao, but the wounds between them run deep, so there's room for plenty of drama, particularly since the son is an angry teen. The secondary stories broaden the story. The writing is good.

Cai is best known to SIFF audiences as the writer of Shower (Xizao), which I saw soon after its SIFF 2000 appearance (but didn't review). This is his feature debut as a director. He makes good use of awkward pauses in conversation to convey emotions. The characters are distinct individuals from the start. The rural scenery looks beautiful, while the occasional urban scenes show prosperity but loss of individuality. His directing isn't fancy, but it is good.

Yao Anlian is very good as the father; he shows the wear of years in the city, away from his family, and his sadness and frustration at the difficulty of reconnecting with his son. Lu Yukai is excellent as the angry teen. Huang Lu is good as the kinsman, a less challenging part. The young woman is good and the elder woman is very good. The smaller parts were well-performed.

I enjoyed the film, and appreciated the occasional surprises that turned up in the story. The directing was competent and the acting was effective too. I rate the film good overall.

I see on the film's SIFF 2008 page that director Cai is scheduled to appear at both screenings during the main festival. That hadn't been announced the other day in the press screeningannouncement. If anyone attends the director appearance, it would be interesting to know whether the director is aware how obscure the translated title is.

Languages: Chinese with English subtitles. During a several-minute stretch in the middle of the film, the subtitles lag several sentences behind the conversation. It's not because they try to fully transcribe rapid-fire conversation and get behind. It just looks like a blunder in the application of the subtitles to about one reel of the print. That part is confusing at times, but a lot of the meaning can be inferred from context.

Rating: I don't think the film has a US rating, but it looks like it would be a "PG-13". The violence is mild, the sex is milder, and there's no nudity. There is some strong language, but it isn't too frequent.

Screening: Wednesday, 2 pm, Seattle Center (SIFF Cinema).
Audience: About 80 people, 381 seats (advertised capacity). It was a press screening, also open to SIFF pass-holders.

Snacks: Travel mugs of tea from home.

Ads: None at all; just an in-person announcement by a SIFF volunteer.

SIFF Statistics: 4 films seen (4 features). One event (the opening preview).

Tags: film, review, siff 2008

Three beautiful women (Vanessa Ferlito, Sydney Tamiia Poitier, and Jordan Ladd) drive around in a Texas town. They don't know it, but a stalker is following them: Stuntman Mike (Kurt Russell). They all end up in the same bar, where they meet Pam (Rose McGowan), an acquaintance of the three women. Stuntman Mike convinces Pam that she'd like him to drive her home. They leave in his car, and the other three leave with a fourth woman (Monica Staggs) in their car.

Since the next three paragraphs include progressively stronger SPOILERS, I'll use small text to make them easier to skip without reading.

Soon, Stuntman Mike reveals his dirty secret to Pam: although his "death-proof" car is absolutely safe for him, it's not at all safe for her. He drives wildly, bouncing her around in the unsafe passenger seat, until she's battered unconscious. Then he finds the other women and smashes into their car; he's the sole survivor.

Later, he finds Zoë Bell (as herself), Abernathy (Rosario Dawson), Kim (Tracie Thoms), and Lee (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) at a Tennessee convenience store. Zoë has them go to see a muscle car she wants to drive; it's for sale and her pretense is that she wants to test-drive it before buying. Not only that, she wants to try out a wild stunt she calls "Ship's Mast". They leave Lee behind as collateral to convince the seller they won't steal his car.

Stuntman Mike follows them, and attacks them with his death-proof car, while Zoë is playing Ship's Mast. But Kim and Zoë are stunt-women, so they're not easy victims like the five in Texas. After an extended road battle, both cars skid to a stop, and the women turn tables on him. Who will win the battle in the end? (Even in small print, I'm not telling.)

Quentin Tarantino wrote and directed this film, which was originally released as Grindhouse in combination with Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror and a number of trailers to nonexistent films. The intention of the project was to make a pair of "B" movies, in a combination of homage and spoof of genuine 1970s grindhouse "B" movies. This film is a much better movie in most respects. One weakness is in the spoof aspect: although it borrows a lot from exploitation films (including some typical flaws), its execution is a bit too good for the joke to work. On the other hand, I didn't think the joke was very funny anyway (as I wrote in my Planet Terror review), so I don't see this film's failure to be bad enough for the spoof to work as a serious shortcoming.

The is almost good on the plot side; there are some plot holes, but I'm never sure whether they're mistakes or intentional as part of the exploitation film joke. But the idea of a spree-killer who uses a stunt car as his murder weapon is very clever, and the premise is well executed. The biggest dramatic fault is the encounter with the first group of women; foreshadowing undermines the emotional strength of the scene's outcome.

The dialogue side of the writing is very good, particularly among the second set of women. Although fans of exploitation movies might regard the talk scenes as a bothersome interruption of the action, I found it more interesting. Better still, parts of the main action segment were spiced up with the sharp dialogue, so fans of the dialogue and fans of the action could have fun at the same time. Overall, I rate the writing good.

The directing is a mix. The bar scene is good, but nothing special. The action scene that follows has a shaky stretch, with a spectacular (though somewhat repetitive) conclusion, and a great moment of comic relief. The non-action scenes with the second group of women are very good. The final action sequence is excellent.

Kurt Russell was excellent; his changes in tone were tough to get right, but he pulled it off. In the first group of women, only Rose McGowan was memorable; she was good if her intention was spoof, but fair if she was supposed to be taken seriously. The others were collectively good, but not individually noteworthy. In the second group of women, Zoë Bell was rather stiff, even though she was playing a version of herself; I rate her performance almost-good. Rosario Dawson and Tracie Thoms were very good; Thoms deserves extra credit because her performance elevates Bell's work. Mary Elizabeth Winstead was excellent if her intention was spoof, but fair if she was trying to play serious.

The stunt work was excellent – much too good for the exploitation movie premise. The other technical work was very good – again a bit too good. The music was good, and unobtrusive.

After seeing Planet Terror, I expected not to like this movie. But the solid directing, spectacular stunt work, and mostly-good acting aren't dragged down by bad writing. The main fault is that it tried to have it both ways on the exploitation movie spoof premise; it was in many respects too good to play as a spoof, but still had enough holes that it wasn't clearly trying to be more than a spoof. That makes it feel like less than the sum of its parts, but I still rate it good.

I chose to watch the film in the first place because my wife and I met McGowan's aunt at the SIFF preview the other night. It's odd that although I liked this movie much better than Planet Terror, I thought McGowan did better work in the lesser movie.

Credits: The first point about the credits is that there's one brief, final scene after the big names in the credits, but before the long-list credits begin.

The credits didn't follow the style of genuine exploitation movies very well. Rather than being a couple of screens full of names, including a lot of duplications of people doing several jobs, this one had a credit scroll that went on and on. But since it's much better than the movies it spoofs, I don't think that's a problem.

Rating: The film's US rating of "R" is reasonable, based on the violence. There's a lot of foul language, and some talk about sex, but no actual sex or nudity. The violence is reason enough for the "R" on its own.

Screening: Monday morning, finished Wednesday morning, at home (Starz! on demand cable television).
Audience: One.

Snacks: Decaf tea.

Ads: I didn't pay attention to the Starz! self-promotions. This version didn't include the fake trailers.

Tags: film, review

My wife and I skipped the April 30 press screening of Baghead. We didn't feel like a 10 am show, and the movie's premise didn't appeal much to either of us.

However, we sat near Peter at today's screening of Continental, a Film without Guns caught the Baghead screening. He didn't immediately recall the title, but mentioned that it was done by the Duplass brothers, who previously made The Puffy Chair (which I still need to see; my wife said was very funny). That was enough for us to figure it out.

Anyway, he had a mini-review of Baghead. The essence of it was, "don't miss the first minute of Baghead, but the rest of it isn't much good."

So, we'll try to see if it works out to catch the first minute, then slip out in time to see something more interesting.

It's quite possible that the movie is good in terms of its genre, but neither my wife nor I are into it. I should have asked Peter whether it was something fans of the genre would like, but I didn't think of it at the time.

(I don't remember Peter's last name; I'm not even sure I've ever asked. But he's someone we've seen frequently at SIFF events in recent years.)

Tags: film, review, siff 2008

An unnamed man (uncredited) dozes on a bus. When he awakens, the bus is empty, and stopped in a forest. He gets out of the bus, notices something, and wanders away from it. His wife Lucette (Marie-Ginette Guay) reports him missing, but the police can't do anything because there's no evidence of foul play. She's torn between searching for him and pining for his return and dismissing him as gone forever and trying to forget him. During a moment of trying to forget him, she goes to a ballroom to dance the Continental. (That's a source of the title, but the director mentions other meanings on the film's official site.)

Louis (Réal Bossé) gets a job selling insurance, but the work is away from home, and he lives in a hotel, and frequently overhears the couple in the next room having sex. He misses his family. Chantal (Fanny Mallette) works at the hotel's front desk, and befriends him during his stay.

Marcel (Gilbert Sicotte) seeks dental care, and learns that he needs expensive treatment, or else lose his teeth and wear dentures. He runs a secondhand store and also does repairs, and can't afford the treatment. But he wants to keep his teeth, and begs his ex-wife for help with the money.

Will Lucette find her husband? Can Louis resolve the conflict between job and family? Will Chantal figure out what she's looking for, and will she find it? Can Marcel get the money he needs to for the dental work?

Stéphane LaFleur wrote and directed the film, his feature debut. The story cuts between brief incidents in each of the four main characters' lives. The incidents are often enigmatic; we don't always know what is important about the scenes. They're also darkly funny – but very deadpan; the characters don't set the humor. This is a strange story, but it's strange in a good way. The dialogue is cleverly minimalist; I never felt like the subtitles were falling behind the spoken words. The writing is good, sometimes very good.

The directing is excellent. Every shot uses a fixed camera (although some scenes cut between camera angles), always with a sense of formality to the scene composition. The fixed camera adds drama to at least one scene. (The one I have in mind has three characters drinking liquor; to say more would be a spoiler.) The fixed camera also seems to be a joke reference to the frequent use of wobbly hand-held camera work and frenetic editing in other films.

Marie-Ginette Guay is very good, and has the advantage of the most emotional scenes. Gilbert Sicotte is good, particularly in a scene where he agrees to do some repair work. Fanny Mallette is very good. Réal Bossé was good, particularly in a job interview scene. In a smaller role, Marie Brassard was very good as "Diane", another guest at the hotel.

The sets were simple, in a way that worked well with the formal composition of the shots.

The film's deadpan humor and offbeat style won't work for everyone, but my wife and I both enjoyed it a lot. The good writing, excellent directing, and solid acting add up to a very good film.

Languages: French with English subtitles, and a small amount of English with French subtitles.

Rating: The film's US rating of "R" is apparently based on language, but I don't recall the vocabulary being particularly harsh.

Screening: Tuesday, 2 pm, Seattle Center (SIFF Cinema).
Audience: About 70 people, 381 seats (advertised capacity). It was a press screening, also open to SIFF pass-holders.

Snacks: Travel mugs of scalding-hot tea from home.

Ads: None at all; just an in-person announcement by a SIFF volunteer.

SIFF Statistics: 3 films seen (3 features). One event (the opening preview). We met a few more people we've seen at previous years of SIFF.

Tags: film, review, siff 2008

We knew restaurants would be packed yesterday, and we didn't really care for giant crowds and waiters getting nervous if we didn't finish dinner and clear the tables fast enough. Additionally, my grandmother is hard of hearing, and doesn't deal well with noisy restaurants. So, the family plan was to defer Mother's Day by one day. Since it's different in every country anyway, we figured there's no reason we had to celebrate it on the customary day anyway.

So, this afternoon my wife and I went to my parents' place. There we piled into their van with them and my brother, and rode together to my grandmother's place. We picked up her, and went to a nice fish restaurant near where she lives.

My dad had a nice, sentimental card for his mother. My brother and I had funny cards for my mother. My wife picked it out the one "from me"; she loves shopping for cards. She also gave my mother a small gift, a little zipper pouch with some small things in it, such as a hand lotion she likes.

My wife and grandmother ordered trout; my wife had the same thing a couple of weeks ago (same restaurant, different location) and enjoyed it so much she was excited to have it again. My father and brother ordered tempura prawns; my brother also ordered a clam appetizer and shared it with those who like clams. My mother had crab cakes, her favorite fish-restaurant food. I had steelhead, which was yummy. Everyone was pretty full, so none of us ordered dessert.

After dinner, we returned my grandmother to her place, and went back to my parents' place as a group, then my wife and I went home. It was a fun evening.

Tags: family, food

When we arrived today, the long-haired guy was on one of the aerobics machines, watching History Channel. While we were doing our warm-up, the woman who started a few weeks ago came in, also to do aerobics; she had to wait briefly for us to finish. We hadn't seen either of them since last month.

My work-out included a lot of lat pull-downs; "M" said I hadn't done them in a while. Even so, my shoulders aren't very stiff. Other than that, it was pretty much a mix of upper body, core body, and legs. I had one new exercise, using a new tool. It was two Velcro anklets with heavy elastic bands between them. I stretched out on my side on a mat, and stretched my legs apart, first on one side, then on the other side. Muscles along my hips ache from that one.

The other two clients were both gone when we came out to do more aerobics. I bumped the treadmill up another notch to 4.8 and managed to keep it up for about 7½ minutes, then slowed it down to a fast walk, for a total of about 15 minutes. My wife worked hard on the elliptical machine too. We watched a History Channel show about ships, from ancient times to clipper ships; I think it was going to cover steamships too, but we didn't stick around for that.

Afterwards, we went home, had a little food, and I took a nap. This evening we're going out with my parents and grandmother for Mother's Day; we skipped the customary day (yesterday in the US) to avoid the crowds.

Tags: exercise

The patriarch of two sets of sons dies. His three elder sons, Son (Michael Shannon), Kid (Barlow Jacobs), and Boy (Douglas Ligon), resent him. He was such a drunk that he couldn't even think of proper names for them, and he abandoned them and their mother Nicole (Natalie Canerday). Son has a wife, a son, a ramshackle house, a decent job at a fish farm, and a back that's pock-marked with buckshot scars that are the topic of much speculation. Kid lives in a tent in Son's yard. Boy lives in an old van with a flaky radio.

The dead father was good to his second family, Cleaman (Michael Abbott, Junior), Mark (Travis Smith), Stephen (Lynsee Provence), and John (David Rhodes). After abandoning his first family, he had cleaned himself up, found religion, and become a good father.

The second family hold a funeral for the father. Town gossip "Shampoo" (G Alan Wilkins) tells the elder brothers about the funeral, and they go to attend it too. Son impulsively shows his resentment, and offends the second family. After the funeral, hot-headed Mark retaliates, provoking a fist-fight. Shampoo is always ready to provide information to escalate the feud.

Tragedy seems inevitable. But how bad will it get?

First-time writer-director Jeff Nichols shows an instinct for the "show, don't tell" philosophy. None of the film's characters talk much, except maybe Shampoo. Instead, they communicate through their actions and body language. The story of escalating violence between the two branches of the family is simple, but it has some surprise. (Beware spoilers.)

The characters are distinctive, particularly on the elder side: Son is intelligent, but fond of gambling and somewhat short on common sense, and troubled by resentment for his father. Boy is dim, but good-hearted, and coaches youth basketball. Kid is a hothead, and fiercely loyal to his brothers. Cleaman is a family man, and becomes a surrogate father to teens Stephen and John; Mark is a hothead. Shampoo is a slacker who plays at being the friend of both sets of brothers, but he's always ready with information that can make a bad situation worse.

Nichols has a feel for the setting, England Arkansas, about 30 miles southeast of his Little Rock birthplace. He understands the small-town poor people, and doesn't look down on them. On the face of it, the pace seems slow, but that same pace builds suspense. Rushing through the events would deflate the suspense, so the restraint works. The writing is good; the directing is excellent.

Michael Shannon is very good; his performance makes me curious to watch for him in his fairly long list of small-role credits. Douglas Ligon is excellent; one wouldn't guess that this was his first acting role. Barlow Jacobs is good in his first film role. G Alan Wilkins is very good as the gossip who pretends to be doing favors, but isn't. Michael Abbott Junior, previously a stage actor and Elvis impersonator, is very good. First-time actors Lynnsee Provence, David Rhodes, and Travis Smith are all very good, and disappear into their characters. The other acting performances are also good.

The cinematography, by Adam Stone, is very good. It shows both the poverty of the people in the area and the often-bleak natural beauty of the rural landscape. Music is good, and fits the mood.

The directing and the performances by Ligon and Shannon are the highlight of the film, which I rate very good overall.

The film screened at SIFF 2007, but we missed it. It won the New American Cinema jury award at SIFF, and has picked up a few other awards too.

Rating: The film's US rating of "PG-13" is reasonable. There are moments of strong violence, some harsh language (bordering on "R"), and the revenge theme.

Screening: Sunday, 7 pm, Seattle inner neighborhood (Northwest Film Forum).
Audience: About 14 people, 120 seats (advertised capacity).

Snacks: Mushroom polenta (me), ham and cheese panini (my wife), and brew-pub brews.

Ads (in progress when we arrived):
    Alice Neel - A documentary about an artist.

Tags: film, review, siff 2007

Among the wreckage found after the Space Shuttle Columbia broke up during re-entry was a 340 megabyte 2½-inch disk drive. It was found in a dry lake bed, its non-metallic parts melted or burned away, its controller chips melted, most of its metal parts dented and battered, and its disk platters caked with dirt and burned plastic. A data-recovery company managed to clean the disk platters, install them into a functional drive, and recover most of the data on the drive, and all of the data related to the experimental results that were recorded on the drive.

"Shuttle Columbia's hard drive data recovered from crash site" — Brian Fonseca, Computer World.

In addition to the article about the data-recovery, there are some interesting pictures.

This NASA article, "The Physics of Whipped Cream", describes the experiment, in accessible language.

This AP article, "Data from Columbia disk drives survived the shuttle accident", has another take on the data recovery.

The data can be considered another memorial to the seven crew: Rick D Husband, William C McCool, Michael P Anderson, Ilan Ramon, Kalpana Chawla, David M Brown, and Laurel Clark.

Tags: science

Saturday Night Live was so mean tonight – and very funny.

I am a sore loser.
My supporters are racist.
I have no ethical standards.

Opening: Message from Hillary Clinton

It's funny because it's true. More accurately, it's true enough that the satire works. I would really be surprised to see her putting in a full-hearted effort to help Obama win the general election. Although most of her supporters are not racists, her appeal to racists was pretty shameless. The ethical standards statement is also close enough for satire; fairly or not, a lot of ethical charges have been made against her.

It's nice to see that the show is still funny without Tina Fey.

Tags: humor, television