The best thing Eli Roth has ever done. “This year there’ll be no left overs”
Pictures taken off my camera in relation to my job(s) and feature film production
For all you Dexter fans, here is preview for a webisode animated series my friend is working on for Showtime
The film The Hurt Locker (2009) follows an Army bomb squad unit through many explosive encounters in Baghdad, Iraq during 2004. Kathryn Bigelow (Point Break) has made one of the best actions of films of the year. Even her ex-husband James Cameron has hailed the movie as the Platoon of the Iraq war. Shot simultaneously on four 16mm cameras, the movie appears more like a documentary although it is shot with actors. Filmed in Jordan only four miles away from Iraq war zones, Bigelow was able to use actual refugees from Iraq as extras.
The film challenges the conventions of the average Hollywood action flick by playing off the element of surprise and killing off the biggest actors first. The ambiguity of not knowing who are innocent Iraqis and who could be insurgents adds to the suspenseful atmosphere as well as the frightening soundtrack. The movie can’t be called war propaganda although it does glorify the people who risk their life to save others.
The best moment of the film occurs when one of the soldiers goes back home and becomes mesmerized by the numerous cereal brands in the supermarket aisle. Written by a journalist stationed in Iraq, the movie has a sense of realism not found in action films of the past years. I predict Bigelo will be the first female to win the Academy Award for Best Director. Let the bets begin, it’s Oscar season,
Check out the best 8 minutes of the film on Hulu!
Next film review, Inglorious Bastards and a director Q&A with Quentin Tarantino.
Coming together just as I imagined…
Running through the underground
And this is your warning
4 minute warning
![A Brief History of USF
Looking at a photograph from the late 1930s of the area that spans from Masonic to Stanyan and Fulton to Geary, one would never guess it would eventually become a college campus. “The whole neighborhood was originally [three] cemeteries,” said Glenn Loomis Director of Community Relations at the University of San Francisco. The bodies were eventually moved to a mass gravesite in Colma throughout the years as the various tombs were excavated. However, some university employees claim that on occasion workers continue to discover random artifacts such as a handle from a casket or a piece from a tombstone. In 1927, the St. Ignatius College, which was formerly located on Market Street, moved to the Inner Richmond where “students from farm families were able to pay for their tuition by bartering potatoes and other crops,” said Loomis. In 1930, the college changed its name to the University of San Francisco in order to create a distinction from the St. Ignatius High School, located on the lot that presently occupies the Koret Gym. Around the same time, the San Francisco College for Women was built on Lone Mountain and provided education for females during a period when USF would only allow male students. In 1964, the university became co-ed and by 1978 the school “purchased Lone Mountain for about five or six million dollars,” said Loomis. Today, the mountain, which contains 22 acres, is estimated to be worth about twenty million, quite an increased compared with the price paid about three decades ago.Over the years, some Terrace street residents, who are surrounded by the university on three out of four sides, have become less tolerant of student behavior. However, it’s not just noisy undergraduates who wake residents up in the early morning. “I yelled and I screamed and I threatened,” said Loomis discussing the issues he’s had to deal with involving a number of university garbage trucks that were waking up neighbors at four in the morning. Finally, “We took care of the garbage ourselves,” said Loomis, who started a program that had feasible garbage pick up times and also encouraged the university to concentrate more on compositing and recyclingAfter nearly 150 years and 27 presidents, the University of San Francisco, which presently occupies around 55 acres, continues to purchase land and buildings around the campus each year. Recently, Loomis gave university students a tour of a newly acquired residence on a Terrace street. The house, which was built around the 1940s, had chandlers in nearly every room except the bathroom. Accordingly to Loomis, “The average sale price for homes [in the Terrace region] is over a million dollars” and continues to rise each year. Although the streets are located between main campus and Lone Mountain, less than five percent of the residents are university staff.](http://21.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_krd0w7s8Uc1qzv3gbo1_400.jpg)
A Brief History of USF
Looking at a photograph from the late 1930s of the area that spans from Masonic to Stanyan and Fulton to Geary, one would never guess it would eventually become a college campus. “The whole neighborhood was originally [three] cemeteries,” said Glenn Loomis Director of Community Relations at the University of San Francisco. The bodies were eventually moved to a mass gravesite in Colma throughout the years as the various tombs were excavated. However, some university employees claim that on occasion workers continue to discover random artifacts such as a handle from a casket or a piece from a tombstone.
In 1927, the St. Ignatius College, which was formerly located on Market Street, moved to the Inner Richmond where “students from farm families were able to pay for their tuition by bartering potatoes and other crops,” said Loomis. In 1930, the college changed its name to the University of San Francisco in order to create a distinction from the St. Ignatius High School, located on the lot that presently occupies the Koret Gym. Around the same time, the San Francisco College for Women was built on Lone Mountain and provided education for females during a period when USF would only allow male students. In 1964, the university became co-ed and by 1978 the school “purchased Lone Mountain for about five or six million dollars,” said Loomis. Today, the mountain, which contains 22 acres, is estimated to be worth about twenty million, quite an increased compared with the price paid about three decades ago.
Over the years, some Terrace street residents, who are surrounded by the university on three out of four sides, have become less tolerant of student behavior. However, it’s not just noisy undergraduates who wake residents up in the early morning. “I yelled and I screamed and I threatened,” said Loomis discussing the issues he’s had to deal with involving a number of university garbage trucks that were waking up neighbors at four in the morning. Finally, “We took care of the garbage ourselves,” said Loomis, who started a program that had feasible garbage pick up times and also encouraged the university to concentrate more on compositing and recycling
After nearly 150 years and 27 presidents, the University of San Francisco, which presently occupies around 55 acres, continues to purchase land and buildings around the campus each year. Recently, Loomis gave university students a tour of a newly acquired residence on a Terrace street. The house, which was built around the 1940s, had chandlers in nearly every room except the bathroom. Accordingly to Loomis, “The average sale price for homes [in the Terrace region] is over a million dollars” and continues to rise each year. Although the streets are located between main campus and Lone Mountain, less than five percent of the residents are university staff.
What will be better Mr. Fox or Wild Things?
Spike Jonze vs. Wes Anderson
I saw the Coen Brother’s new film, A Serious Man last night at an advanced screening. The movie had an ambiguous opening and ending (as most films by the Coens) but received a number of laugh out loud moments - my favorite of which being when a Rabbi tells a story about a dentist who discovers the words ‘Help me’ written in little Hebrew letters on the inside of a goy’s mouth. The movie was accompanied by a number of great songs from 1967 including Jefferson Airplane and Jimi Hendrix. Here is an audio interview with the Coens on the new flick and here is a link to all their scripts.
Ouroboros
