Tagged: literature

MOVIE REVIEW: Harry Potter and the Profit of Cash

MOVIE REVIEW: Harry Potter and the Profit of Cash

I just came out of a screening of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, the fifth installment of the series, and before I go spouting off my likes and dislikes, I wanted to forewarn anybody reading this review that my expertise is vastly limited in the world of J.K Rowling. While I’ve never read the books, and it’s not due to a disliking or laziness, I just find the concept of visual storytelling much more effective than having me conjure up images from the deep and dark recesses of my imagination.

With that said, I want readers to understand that I’m reviewing this film as just that, a film, and not so much a visual appendage of the book. So please keep the hate mail that starts off with “You ignorant twit…” to a minimum.

Now that that is out of the way, I loved the film. It had all of the visual aspects and plot maturity that the previous films were leading up to, and I know we are only going upwards from here. The last film left us with the big reveal of nose-less Ralph Fiennes as our quintessential baddie Lord Voldemort, and Harry taking his first step of many into adulthood. There lies my biggest problem with the film, but we’ll take it slow, as per usual.

Putting our best foot forward, the visual effects never cease to amaze me in each of these films. Each director (in this case, BBC veteran David Yates) has brought a different look and feel to the film they were charged with, and gave the film an entirely fresh feel, without diverting too far from the original text. In this film, we get more special effects than any of its previous predecessors. Between CG’d giants, to CG’d fireworks, even to Ralph Fiennes CG’d lack of a nose, there is certainly more computer graphics in this film than you can wave a stick at. Though through all of this, not once was I taken out of the mythos by a lack of belief, all thanks to the superior visual effects.

By far my favorite aspect of the film to talk about, and probably the one that will get me in the most trouble, is the undertone used throughout the first and second act. That undertone being the same thing that has fueled some of the most important science fiction and fantasy films of our era, and probably before that. This message of course is essentially “Damn the Man!”

(more…)

F&SF News & Links

F&SF News & Links

  • News
  • July 10, 2007

Colleen Mondor has a long essay about mysterious houses in various genres. (That picture, by the way, is the very first result for "mysterious houses," though they don’t look terribly mysterious to me.)

SF Signal thinks about who the next Grand Masters of the Science Fiction Writers of America should be.

Cracked lists the seven lamest Transformers of all time. Oh, yeah…as if being a giant killer robot who can turn into something else isn’t pretty damn cool no matter what… [via Extra Life]

The UK SF Book News Network reports on the launch of Galaxiki – a wiki-editable virtual galaxy intended to become a gigantic collaborative writing project.

(more…)

Now – Classics from the UK

Now – Classics from the UK

Remember how last Sunday I was lamenting the lack of comics based on classical literature by, say, "Virginia Woolf or a Bronte or two?"  Well, via Down the Tubes comes news of a new UK-based company starting up to tackle even more classic literature in a graphic format.

Classical Comics hopes to have its first titles up and running by next year, and lookie here (at right), Jane Eyre will be one of them!  (Not only that, but it will be adapted by Amy Cozine — great to see more women writers turning to comics!)

CC’s first adaptation, of Shakespeare’s Henry V, should be out this October.  Forbidden Planet International  has some sample pages.  Also planned are adaptations of Macb— er, The Scottish Play, as well as Dickens’ Great Expectations.  Which definitely describes my hopes for this company.  The more ways we can reintroduce cool books by dead writers to new readers, the more we can immortalize their wonderful prose.

Pocketful of Kryptonite

Pocketful of Kryptonite

  • News
  • April 25, 2007

Via Slashdot, "A mineralogist at London’s Natural History Museum was contracted to help identify an unknown mineral found in a Serbian mine. While he initially thought the miners had discovered a unique compound, after its crystal structure was analyzed and identified the researcher was shocked to find the material already referenced in literature.  Fictional literature."

"Towards the end of my research, says Dr. Chris Stanley, "I searched the web using the mineral’s chemical formula — sodium lithium boron silicate hydroxide — and was amazed to discover that same scientific name, written on a case of rock containing kryptonite stolen by Lex Luther from a museum in the film Superman Returns.

"The new mineral does not contain fluorine (which it does in the film) and is white rather than green but, in all other respects, the chemistry matches that for the rock containing kryptonite."

Now we know what museum Superboy is referencing in the panel at right.

Artwork copyright DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

GLENN HAUMAN: Literature of ethics, revisited

  • News
  • March 18, 2007

I’ve been kicking around these ideas around for a while but never codified them until Jim Henley wrote his famous blogposts and essay on the Literature of Ideas. Henley’s thesis boils down to “If science fiction is the literature of ideas, the superhero story is the literature of ethics. Or say, rather, it should be.”

Now for the backstory. This isn’t verbatim, but as I know and at least briefly worked with all the people here, I suspect it’s pretty close.

In the early 1970’s, the late great Julius Schwartz took over editorial duties on the Superman comics line from Mort Weisinger. Julie hired Dennis O’Neil to write the series, and O’Neil knocked Superman’s power levels down to about the level of his earliest appearances — no heat vision, no x-ray vision, no super-breath, no flying through space unaided, and so on. O’Neil was quoted saying that the reason for the change was that he found it difficult and/or uninteresting “to write about a character who could destroy distant galaxies by listening hard.”

O’Neil’s tenure on Superman lasted for about a year, and then the reins were handed over to Elliot S. Maggin. Elliot bumped Superman’s power levels back up to where they were, and approached writing Superman this way: if you have a character who can do anything, the only story avenues left to you are ethical ones. But in this area, there’s a lot of ground: “What was Superman’s relationship to his charges, the people of the Earth? To the authoritative functionaries of the rest of the Universe like the Guardians and, by extension, those who might be considered deities? What were the limits of Superman’s responsibilities? Were there differences between the real limits of his responsibilities and his perception of those responsibilities? What role did his heritage, both on Earth and among the stars, play in the determination of his actions? What long-term effects were coming about as a result of his intercession?”

(more…)

The reading generation

The reading generation

  • News
  • March 12, 2007

According to this article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, teenagers are reading more now than they have in decades.  Not only that, but they’re "buying books in quantities we’ve never seen before," says Booklist magazine’s Michael Cart, who also notes that "publishers are courting young adults in ways we haven’t seen since the 1940s."

The reasons for the surge, besides a high teen population at present (over 30 million), include more quality young adult literature in just about every genre, with fantasy and graphic novels being particularly in vogue.  But it’s not just buying – teens are also visiting libraries in greater numbers, and many librarians are seeing a greater circulation of teen fiction than adult fiction. 

Oddly, the article doesn’t really credit online activity for this upswing; it actually notes, "The staying power of books is especially remarkable given the lure of YouTube, MySpace and other techie diversions."  But as any teen or adult can tell you, you need to be able to read, and read well and fast, in order to fully partake of online "techie diversions," and once you’re reading stuff you like, you’re bound to read more.

Categories

Archives

Everything you need to make great comics!

comicmix-pro-300x69-2

Nucleus X

Bookshop Zaks