Let me know what you think, why not?

Embedded above, for your enjoyment, is the new hit smash from Nick Vogt.  Remember Nick Vogt?  Well he makes music, too, and this one’s about that very special day where everything’s a Love Themepark.  Enjoy.

Clean Garage

Here are what I remember of the previous one hundred posts:

1. We’re still not eating pie.

2. The relationship between Gary Coleman and Gary Oldman is still… being researched.

3. I’m still looking, Mr. Icke. I’m still looking.

4. Vvinni: Episode 1 was just too long.

5. Vvinni: Episode 2 was even longer.

6. Vvinni: Really? Posting three all at once?  You could have saved some.

7. Vvinni: Now you’re just running out of ideas.

8. IMdB is much more Puppy now. And thank God for that.

9. Mr Coyne: You are still groovy as Hell. Never forget that, will you?

10. Vvinni: Nobody watches these, you know.

11. JCVD: One of the year’s best?  Certainly one of Van Damme’s Best.

12. Vvinni: I like your hat.

13. The birds still want to eat the noodles, but they never will.

14. You know, Mr. Gaiman?  I think I’m seeing a common motif in your work.

15. Vvinni: YOU’RE MIXING PLASTICS WITH GLASS.

16. It’s almost time for my Yupd!

17. ZARDOZ. ZARDOZ. ZARDOZ. Beyond 2001, Beyond 2010, Beyond Love, Beyond Death.

18. Vvinni: We’re going back to the graveyard.

19. Shopping Penguin? Shopping Penguin.

20. I gave it  the “Lizards” tag because the Dream-Eating monster is only able to use the reptilian part of his brain. I AM WITTY.

21. He-Yah! We gotta save the farm, rope those… cows…

22. My other documentary was about carpet.

23. It’s changed in ways you can never imagine.

24. PEA SOUP?!

25. Hello.

26. Vvinni: It makes me feel kind of bad I haven’t been having as many adventures this semester.

27. Worship me as a God.

28. YOU’RE TERING ME APART, LISA!

29. It’s still dripping blood all over my floor.

30. I left off here.

31. I picked it back up here.

32. Then I got shot by some bullets.

33. It’s cold inside, you’ll have to wear a cape.

34. I feel I’ve made much more intriguing work than what I did Freshman year.

35. Really? This is when the quest began?  And I haven’t picked it back up until… a few weeks ago?  I am NOT doing a good job questing.

36. Vvinni: You’re trying to hard. Stop it.

37. Exploding Goldfish Films. Check them out, why don’t you?

38. OH MY GOD, IT’S A BEAR!!!!

39. See. This is a documentary about Carpet!

40. Help! It took six months to make this!

41. I kill you both.

42. Andrew did this, I have nothing to say about it.

43. Eggs: A common motif of mine.

44. The world would melt were it made of cheese.

45. OH DEAR GOD IT’S ANOTHER BEAR!

46. One of the best of 1991?

47. I got the problem fixed, but now I can’t see my tongue.

48. That’s definitely a Bear.

49. Chickens, Money omelets, and axe-wielding.

50. Gum: It’s really a disappointment nowadays.

51. No, Bicycles!

52. Goodbye.

53. Ethan Holbrook: He Travels through time and Astronauts.

54. If you want to know more about Discouraging Words, then you should be reading the EXGfilms blog. I’m too busy posting movie reviews that are too long and Filler.

55. The cat represents life because we are all being held by the arms of fate that are attached to the torso of our decisions and that torso is the torso of another cat which, oddly enough, represents the plight of minimum wage worker at Wendy’s.  So, in conclusion: A Cat is a hamburger.

56. J’ai besoin d’étudier à un examen français.

57. Sharks.

58. Sharks.

59. Sharks.

60. Sharks.

61. Sharks.

62. Sharks and Film.

63. Sharks.

64. Skin Removal Cream, Skin Removal Cream, Skin Removal Cream. SKIN REMOVAL CREAM! Skin. Removal. Cream. Skin Removal Cream? Skin Removal Cream! Skin Removal cream skin removal cram, skin, removal cream. Skin Removal Cream. Skin Removal Cream. SKIN. REMOVAL. CREAM. Skin, Removal, Cream, Skin, Removal, Cream. Skin Removal Cream; Skin Removal Cream. Skin Removal Cream: If it weren’t a product, it would BUY YOU! SKIN REMOVAL CREAM?!!!!

65. It is five o’ clock, and so Tea Time is over.

66. A Surprisingly coherent corpse, unlike a certain other one coming up.

67. One of the best of Moon-related sci-fis of 2009?

68. THERE ARE TOO MANY BEARS ON THIS BLOG.

69. ❦

70. Something (A Post).

71. Discouraging Words: Coming Summer of 2010.

72. Nom nom nom nomnom nom nom nom. Nom nom nom nom nomnom nom. Nom nom nom nom nomnom nom. Nom nom nom nom nomnom nom. Nom-nom, nom-nom, nom-nom, nom-nom. Nom-nom, nom-nom, nom-nom, nom-nom. NOM NOM NOM NOMNOM NOM NOM NOM. NOM NOM NOMNOM NOM NOM NOM. NOM NOM NOM NOMNOM NOM NOM NOM. NOM-NOM NOM-NOM NOM-NOM NOM-NOM NOM.

73. I don’t even care what the next post was, THERE WERE HAMSTERS IN THE LAST ONE.

74. Let’s see… Was there a tiger in this one? No, just time travel.

75.  Nathan Fillion: A Man of many talents. Like being both an astronaut and cowboy. Also, being pure evil’s right-hand man and an award-winning novelist.  Truly he accomplished more in a lifetime than any man can.

76. Nick Vogt: A Man whose cat might be a monster.

77. Trail of Terror?

78. I can’t stop this feeling. Deep inside of me. Girl you just don’t realize what you do to me. When you hold me, in your arms so tight, you let me know everything’s alright. I-I-I’m hooked on a feeling. And I’m high on believing that you’re in love with me.  Lips as sweet as candy, your taste is on my mind. Girl, you got me thirstin’ for another cup of wine. Got a bug from you, girl, but I don’t need no cure. I just take your picture (?) If I can be sure. All the good times, when we’re all alone, keep up girl. Yeah, you turn me on. I-I-I’m hooked on a feeling and I’m high on believing that you’re in love with me, oh yeah. All the good times, when we’re all alone. Keep it up girl, yeah you turn me on I-I-I’m Hooked on a feeling and I’m high on believing that you’re in love with me. I said I’m hooked on a feeling. And I’m high on believing that you’re in love me. Yeah, I’m hooked on a feeling!

79. A whole new web is about to be spun, methinks.

80. Does this mean I might be the next Batman?

81. 100 Untitled pieces, most them involve things breaking.

82. Nathan Fillion: He also battle killer slugs from outer-space. Truly, he is a god.

83. Heart attacks.

• 84. OH NO, IT’S ANOTHER BEAR!!! THIS MAKES FOUR! FOUR BEARS!!!
• 85. Beat yourself with a 2×4.
• 86. OooOooOooOOOO Castles. SpoOOOoOoooOOky.
• 87. But doesn’t that explain us all?
• 88. I’m thinking of being Everything next year for Halloween.
• 89. Towed away at owner’s expense.
• 90. Vvinni: I’m thinking of a wall now to block their thought beams.
• 91. I am Rea-Gan! I am-Rea-Gan!
• 92. Don’t even think about coming to rescue me because I’m probably dead.

93. I just made another letter which I baked in the oven with a honey glaze. It was for Christmas.

94. Sword of Doom: One of the best?

95. Why did you kill this Lawn Ornament?

96. Wagga wagga wagga.

97. You’re tearing me apart, Mummy and Robot.

98. Ronald Q. Metellus: Man of Mystery and probably Sandwiches.

99. Joss Whedon: I wish you luck in your ventures outside of the television box, for I shall be on your side when all comes crashing down.

100. I- Oh no. I… I’m going to have to start this post inside of this post now… uh Okay. Here goes: WTIVVVVIMVJVTYVIZVSIHMIPHVWYIIITIIRVEOSHIAETOOITCGNGEITJSSSSSSSSIAOT❦DNILNNTIAD1NHOBOBITVIDISWWYRJ. I-On. I…Igthtstpiotpn… uO. Hg:

WIVVMJTVZIMPVYITIVOHATOTGGIJSSSSZTDINTA1HBBTIIWYJ. I-o. I… I… u. H:

IMP TIVO HAT DIDN’T HAVE. I. I… H:

Adapt vivid, thine moth. I. H:

AVTMIH:

01000001010101100101010001001101010010010100100000111010

000000010000100010001000100

.    .   .   .   .

⠂⠄⠠⠤

⠦

∴

…

-

0

∅

And what's that? THEY ARE FIGHTING.

We know enter into the fray. Round 1: The Script.  Once Aztec Mummy vs. The Human Robot ended I thought to myself what the point of sitting through that was.  Of course, the same can be said about The Room and Troll 2.  The difference?  The Room made me want to tear my head off and… probably use it as a punch bowl that is thrown at a cactus… for science? The same can be said about Troll 2, except the punch bowl would probably my leg; still something I need, but not as useful as my head is.  After Aztec Mummy vs. The Human Robot I felt kind of sad.  Yes, there is an Aztec Mummy and it fights a Human Robot.  This would be a fantastic payoff, however one must sit through approximately an hour and a half of terribly expository dialogue to get to it.  Thus, by the time the prophecy was fulfilled I didn’t even want to see the Aztec Mummy fight the Human Robot, I just wanted to sleep in a warm bed or eat an ice cream cone.

The Human Robot

Round 2: Special Effects.  The Room has no special Effects.  What happened to Wiseau is a skin condition, and we shouldn’t laugh about it.  Troll 2 had puppet goblins that vomited green goo. One of the goblins could talk. One of their eyes could explode. All of them were used multiple times.  In Aztec Mummy vs. The Human Robot seemed to have taken the character design for the Goblins in Troll 2 and made a papier maché suit out of it.  The Human Robot was a man wearing a cardboard robot suit… a cardboard HUMAN robot suit.  Also, I’m pretty sure the robot’s arms were too long.

La Momia Azteca

Round 3: Lighting.  Enrique Wallace, Cinematographer for Aztec Mummy vs. The Human Robot, you just took a 1K light and shined it in the general direction of people.  That’s not cinematography, that’s just a waste of electricity.  Tod Barron, Cinematogrpher for The Room, you just saw an infomercial and decided light was that.  Giancarlo Ferrando… you work in Pornography, you have an excuse. Which of these three is worse?  I haven’t been making decisions for this entire post, why start now?

The Battle

Round 4: Acting. If the editor of Aztec Mummy vs. The Human Robot cut around all of the painful pauses for lines from the actors, then the movie would have been half as long.  Also, when you’re upstaged by Captain Cody vs. The Radar Men from the Moon you’ve got a problem.  As for Troll 2 and The Room, see my earlier comment regarding skulls, cacti, and science.  As a close to this short section: Luis Aceves Casteñeda, you’re Mexico’s answer to Orson Welles. Congratulations!

But enough of this prolonged banter, let’s get to the ranking between these three films.  Troll 2 still stands at the top: It was despicably bad, it was traumatizing to several children, and I HATE BOLOGNA. Next at the Number 2 spot is The Room: It was terribly incompetent, but it’s earnest and I feel sorry Mr. Wiseau and his relationship issues.  As for Aztec Mummy vs. The Human Robot: It shouldn’t have been made and I don’t think the world is any better because of its existence.  However, unlike the other two, the world isn’t worse off because of it.  So this goes around spot #25 or so (UPDATE: La Momia Azteca Contra el Robot Humano is no longer on the Bottom 100, but Troll 2 has made it back to #54 on The List).

So there, I’ve watched another bad movie and written something needlessly long about it.  This has been different from a Without the T’s because… I’m going to go get pictures of mummies and robots and perhaps make them fight in Photoshop. Goodbye.

A sory abou a psychoic swordsman in Feudal Japan.

Let’s sart talking about the movie.  Let’s star talking about the script.  It’s got a lot of scenes of talking and ploting, as do many Japanese films from this era.  Yes, it can be tedious, but it’s also inertwined with scenes of horrible hand-chopping violence.  Which is always nice.  As I said above, Sword of Doom combines elements of noir (an all around feeling of doom and dread), the ridiculous action (Sword fights, hand-chopping, sword fights, talk about fighting, and sword fights), Igmar Bergman (The talking and inaction), and the Japanese Ghost Film (this comes mainly through the subtex and what’s going on underneath the dialogue.  It also comes in the ghosts).  So we’ve got a script with heavy subext going on between the characters where one word from the main character (an unstoppable killing machine with a sword) can say leaps and bounds about his character.  Yes, it’s long, yes, there is a reason they’re called “samurai epics”, but DAMMIT I LIKE IT.

Let’s move on to acting, shall we?  The stone face is an acting technique hat can either make or break a film.  We’ve seen it put to excellent use in the films of Buster Keaton, in noirs such as In a Lonely Place or The Big Sleep, and even in films like Naked Lunch.  On the flipside we’ve seen terrible blank and flat performances from movies such as The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Decided to Stop Living and Become Mixed Up Zombies!!? and the television show “Heroes”.  So what is the difference between these two?  For, I would say Tasuya Nakadai, who plays Ryunosuke Tsukue (wielder of the Sword of Doom and the Silent Technique), provides a stunning stone-faced performance.  The difference between stone-face and flat (good and bad, undersated and “I found this guy on a stree”) I believe all boils down to what I feel is at the core of my acting philosophy: The eyes.  You do not act with your hands, or your face, or your feet, but you act with your eyes.  For the eyes are the gateways to your soul, and if you do not believe what you’re saying, if you are merely reading words off of a page in front of a whirring machine, then it will show in your eyes.  In Sword of Doom, when you look into Ryunosuke’s eyes you see a sociopathic detachmen, you see calculation and angst, you see… DOOM.

Finally, I’m going to quickly talk about the cinematography of the film.  Here we once again head into Bergman-esque terriory with bizarrely framed close-ups and even stranger medium shots where the frame is so deep you can throw a rock into the screen and it’ll fall forever until it hits the girl who standing sideways back there. Yet, these oddly consructed closer shots are mixed with Japanese new-wave wides as we’ve seen in the work of Kurosawa and Teshigahara.  The camera is staic and what maters in the frame is not our actors, but rather the atmosphere around them and the effect the characters have over the atmosphere. So now, it’s time for our favorite part of Withou the ‘s: My arbitrary assignment of a grade:

A film I should own.

I give it an A. The atmosphere this film creates is incredible, as it’s one of dread and mystery.  It’s a world that is unforgiving and evil, much like the “City at Night” of film noir.  Only, unlike noir, it’s a world hat is rooted in emptiness and nature, a world where person’s psyche becomes his environment and at the root of all of the characters’ minds is something dark and desructive.  Also, I rather like the melding of genres… and dropping names. Orson “Fucking” Welles… bitches (Sorry for the profanity, but I’m pretty sure tha’s what it says on his tombsone).

Me being myself, I chose to go a different route.  I chose to shoot and create my own apocalypse.

This proved to be rather difficult however, because as of right now I still don’t know the Boulder area nor do I know any people to con into being on a film crew or to be actors.  This meant I had to make the apocalypse alone.

With the help of Andrew Gingerich, the Wikimedia Commons, and Night of the Living Dead, I’ve created this: Shrimpocalypse! Now originally it was to be due yesterday (Friday), however it’s been pushed back a week.  This means that you, my seven readers, can tell me if this works or not.  Please, any feedback you can give would be greatly appreciated. Please. Tell me anything.

Another Video?! I am on a roll, or rather making up for lost time.

This is second of the video projects I’m doing for my “Constructing the Urban Landscape” class in Boulder (How I plan to construct something Urban in Boulder, I still don’t know).  This assignment was fairly open, we merely had to pick a spot one block outside of campus and explore space through film.  The spot I actually picked wasn’t one block away from campus, but I’m completely content with the place I picked.  It’s an abandoned pool by a playground with a rocket ship.

Anyhoo, let me know what you think. And, if you give me some good criticism before tomorrow (Friday Nov. 6) at 1:00 I can actually re-edit it to fix the errors. For once, I got something done before “on time”.