Place of Stuff

Dead Like Me is back on TV. Us UK types can catch it on the Sci-Fi channel. This is a very blackly funny show about the daily lives of a team of grim reapers. The team help certain people pass over to the other side.

The humour comes because they have to also live their daily lives - have jobs, love lives and so on. The deaths are often gruesome and always unexpected. And the stories are often touching.

The tales are largey told from the perspective of Georgia - a young woman killed when a toilet fell from the Mir Space Station and then recruited to reaperdom. They are all very cynical and dry and always funny. More info from Wikipedia and from a fan site.
Continue reading ‘Dead Like Me’ »

The title of this post is the title of an interesting film I saw last night - This Film is Not Yet Rated. The film came out in September 2006 in the UK, so I’m a little behind the times, but this is a fascinating documentary about the MPAA and the US film ratings. Do you know which rule states when a film goes from an R rating to an NC-17 rating? Nope, me either. Interestingly, according to the documentary, the MPAA either doesn’t know or doesn’t want anyone else to know.

The MPAA comprises 7 media companies and members of each company sit on the board. The film shows that the board is biased towards violent films (violent films tend to get an R rating) and against sex - homosexual acts in particular as they tend to get an NC-17 as against an R for heterosexual sex. The board, at the time the film was made, would not disclose any names of raters, only the head (Joan Graves at the time). This is to prevent them being influenced by film makers. Odd since the film makers made up the MPAA and effectively run it.

It also showed the draconian appeals system - those on the appeals board are anonymous even at the appeal and filmmakers appealing against their rating cannot cite other similar film’s ratings to help their case. There are also 2 church representatives on the appeals board, for some odd reason. They may or may not vote at the appeal, but they can make comment during deliberations.
Continue reading ‘This Film is Not Yet Rated’ »

Let’s take a bit of a break from the WordPress hassles eh. I love martial arts films and love to see Jet li kicking in the bad guys. Watch with me as Jet Li has a bit of a tussle with the French police:

Jet Li Kiss of the Dragon Fight Scene

Enjoy :ph: :ninja:

For the first time in ages, I am actually excited about an upcoming film release. For once, it appears that a game to movie film will actually a) be faithful to the games, and b) have a decent plot.

Silent Hill The Movie is being released by Sony Pictures and stars Radha Mitchell, Laurie Holden and Sean Bean. The cast list looks pretty short, in keeping with the games. From the trailer I watched, the town is foggy and claustrophobic and the whole thing should have audiences on the edge of their seats. Just like the game (are we seeing a pattern here?)

Now, I can fully accept that a number of you are sitting there wondering what the hell I am banging on about. You poor misguided fools. Silent Hill is game one of four and was originally released for the Playstation One by Konami. It has been compared to Resident Evil, but beyond them both being Survival Horror games, I fail to see the connection. I think Silent Hill is far better than Resident Evil, but then I’m not a fan of RE so I would say that.
Continue reading ‘Silent Hill - the movie’ »