For those who don't know about my obsession for calling the computers I have with the names of demigods of the most various religions and mythologies, Gilgamesh is the name that received my desktop computer ---a PentiumIV at 3GHz with 1.5GB of RAM--- a few years ago. So, if you ant to know more about the great king of sumerian mythology, Gilgamesh, just visit the wikipedia, concretely this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilgamesh.
Well, just changing the subject and aiming to the main theme of this post... I bought a new graphics card for my desktop computer!!!! Above of these lines you can see a photo of the real cover and card; quite little but with killing features, in terms of its (relative :P) low cost!!.
Because of the old age of Gilgamesh (more than 4 years, although I amplied its RAM to improve its performance), its graphics card was initially a nVidia GeForceFX 5200, very limited... after some time, my Degree Project (now morphed to Master Thesis :P) gived me a nVidia GeForce 5950 Ultra; that's the best graphics card of 5000's series, but now, coursing a Master in Graphics and Visualization, I will need more potence.
Nowadays, the AGP port has been diceased by the PCI-Express supremacy. However, the huge graphics accelerator cards vendors, ATI and nVidia have recently bet on the retired AGP port and and have released some good cards.
I must admit I don't know much about ATI cards, so I have gathered my energies and neurons for try the best card for me: I don't play any kind of videogame!! But I will work with computer graphics, and I need huge characteristics; that means, I don't want a monster card, but a little monster one XD In the follwing table you can see the specifications for my new GeForce 7600GS and other similar cards (also from nVidia, and both all working in AGP):
GPU 7300GS 7300GT 7600GS 7600GT Core clock (MHz) 550 350 400 560 Memory clock (MHz) 533 667 800 1400 Memory interface (bit) 64 128 128 128 Memory type DDR2 DDR2 DDR2 GDDR3 Pixels per clock 4 8 12 12 Vertex shaders 3 4 5 5
If you are experimented in this terms of technology, you will see that it's not a bad target :P Yes, there are better cards (the 7600GT model, or even the 8600GT, but the last one is too much expensive and it's not worthy for me...), but I only wanted a good graphics card supporing Shader Model 3.0 (because the old GeForce 5950 Ultra only supported until Shader Model 2.0). And now, I have it!! :) Even with the same RAM memory (256MB, engineered with faster technology: DDR2 instead of SDRAM :P).
I don't think there will be mounts of people commenting this post because of the strange theme... but I know there will be a little bit of visitors that, at least, can understand some lines of that :P And what the hell? I simply wanted to tell you this new :)
read more...
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Gilgamesh has a new graphics card: an nVidia GeForce 7600GS
Monday, October 22, 2007
God exists, and it's fan of Ferrari :)
Oh my Gooooood! I've seen Formula1 on TV for several years (I still remember Alain Prost or Damon Hill on the road... snif...), but there was no championship like this years'. Really, Formula1 has lived more off the circuits that in them, because of multiple affairs:
- McLaren's spy case of Ferrari's F2007 concept car;
- and of course, the divergent cardinality of Fernando Alonso's complaints in terms of mobbing from his own team McLaren and from the FIA (Formula1 International Association)
So, let's go to know who is the new Formula1 World Champion. After an amazing and incredible and (why not saying?) miraculous race (I will write about it later mwaaaahahaha), Kimi Räikkönen, twice runner-up (years 2003 and 2005), is finally acclaimed as World Champion of 2007!!!
During all the grand prizes of this 2007 championship, no pilot was the favourite candidate to get the World Champion qualification; who will write his name in the Formula1's History was a real mistery; indeed, until the finalization of the last GP, on Interlagos (Brazil), three men were candidates to achieve the World Champion qualification:
Qualification before the last GP (on Interlagos, Brazil):
- Lewis Hamilton (107 points)
- Fernando Alonso (103 points)
- Kimi Räikkönen (100 points)
But the miracle went on!!!! :) As a Ferrari fan, I wanted Räikkönen as the champion, but I cannot suffer Alonso (I'm a genuine anti-Alonso, in association with my Ferrari idolatration); thus, between the two McLaren pilots, I chose Hamilton as my candidate (because of, if Alonso win, after two consecutive won championships, and after being a martyr this year, he will be very very very insufferable ¬¬).
Well, let's go with the race description!!! At the beginning of the race, Felipe Massa had the pole position, with Hamilton on the second place; Räikkönen was the third one, and the last (well, actually the 4th :P) was Alonso.
When the GP started, Räikkönen and Alonso overtook Hamilton, and then, the british pilot got too much nervous and went off the road (losing six more positions, staying at the 8th!!!). A few curves later, the McLaren MP4/22 car had a software error (Lewis wasn't capable to shift gears), and after a system rest made by Hamilton himself, the car reacted but he was in the last positions!!
Later, Lewis Hamilton didn't want to give the championship to Alonso (althogh, if Räikkönen could overtake Massa, the finnish would be the champion!!), and began an desperate racing for achieving the first positions; finally he passed through the finnish line in the 7th position, incrementing in 2 his total points.
In other way, but, Alonso didn't change his position and finished in the 3rd position... but tadaaaaaaa!!!! With a brilliant strategy of Ferrari, consisting in a Massa boxes-stop 3 laps before the Räikkönen one; he had an important mission then: begin the fastest driving and delete the gap of 3 segonds separating the two Ferrari cars. And the mission was successful! Räikkönen entered pit-lane and, when he returned to the circuit, he was the first!!!The race finished finally with the finnish pilot in the first position, and Massa was the second (with Alonso in a 40-second gap in the third place). As I said before, Hamilton finished in the 7th place, and then, the championship qualification was just like that:
Qualification after the last GP (on Interlagos, Brazil):
- Kimi Räikkönen (110 points [+10])
- Lewis Hamilton (109 points [+02])
- Fernando Alonso (109 points [+06])
Just like that, in the following photograph you can see the three candidates to the championship qualification; from left to right: Fernando Alonso, Jean Todt (Ferrari's boss), Kimi Räikkonen and Lewis Hamilton).
I must admit that, in home, my dad and me uncorked a cava bottle (Codorniu Non-Plus-Ultra, bought for the non-Alonso-victory) and we drink in honour of the Räikkönen world championship (and also, Ferrari won the constructor championship!!!)!! :)
For finishing this post, I can only say: congratulations to Kimi!! And of course, congratulations to Ferrari team!!
read more...
Thursday, October 18, 2007
More than 250 thanks and kisses to everyone!! My blog has more than 250 visits!!
Woooooow!!!!! A few moments ago I saw that Ignis Lacrima, my blog, has reached (in minus than one month!) the magic number of 250 in the visit counter!!! Thank you to anyone that visits my blog periodically, this number could'nt be possible without you :)
In addition, I have to say that this number is realistic: the counter increments in one if there's an IP entering to Ignis Lacrima (or any page depending of the blog), and it have passed more than 30 minutes since the IP's last web charge (of course, if the IP is new, also increments in one the counter :P); that means that the counter is realistic in terms of people, not in pages visited.
Now I only hope to reach the number of 250 comments, but at this moment I think it's impossible (there's only 19 comments... snif snif...); I admit my piece of fault, maybe my posts don't permit mounts and mounts of opinions or comments... but I know that there's people that are afraid of writing... please, don't be afraid!!! Ignis Lacrima doesn't beat :) It's a quite rare blog, I know, but not more strange than me, isn't it? ;)
I will try to write posts thinking of provoquing and motiving interventions... but I would like to receive comments about my posts :) feel free for write, you mortal!! In this lair your words will be always welcome!! :) As long as the humble priest devote of Hefestus ---the Ancient God of Fire and Metal--- would be surrounding this domains, the tears of fire will light the people's feelings and opinions... mwaaaahahahaha (ok, ok, freak mode turned off... ¬¬)
In resume... thank you again for yor visits, and I hope this rythm will be still maintained, or even incremented ;) Bye byeeeeee!!! And see you here, poor mortals! :)
read more...
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Concert: Kamelot's Ghost Opera World Tour 2007 (or the Rising Horns of the Hordes of Mephisto)
Well, because I think that the Sitges 2007 chronicles in 4 volumes have been turning on a little tidy (for me, but overcoats for you, readers :P), so go on; I will change the subject and I want to write a chronicle about the another important event in this month (at least for me :$): the concert within the Kamelot's Ghost Opera European Tour Part III that the norwegian-yankee band did in Sala Razzmatazz 2 on October Friday 5th of 2007. The entire concert was amazing, even the austrian rookie supporters Serenity, whose, with a unique album released, give us a splendid show; and Kamelot, of course, performed their setlist perfectly, with no errors, with all the energy, with Roy Khan plenty of splendor and very confident.
But let's go with the review of the concert; I hope don't be too much extense as long as I'm being with the Sitges chronicles :$ The title of this concert, as you can see in the post title, is "The Rising Horns of the Hordes of Mephisto" ; well, I wanted to be pompous, it's true :P but I think I'm not so exaggerated when I say that Kamelot will provoque an extasis to all the audience (and specially in the song March of Mephisto, clearly epic war-like song, already a Kamelot classic piece) that the headbanging and the horns were full of energy in large moments (the day after I was even neck-injured XD).
* Part I: the austrian supporters Serenity
With 15 minutes of lag, I entered to Razzmatazz 2. I ran inside for buying at the beginning the shirts (I'm a consumist, it's true :P): a t-shirt of Ghost Opera, and a longsleeve of Serenity; a total of 45 euros, it was not cheap but I'm happy for having them :)
Then, the audience was entering with no chaos, and after 30 minutes, a familiar song sounded by the huge speakers: from Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl score by Klaus Badelt, the end credits piece, I'm a Pirate, the most famous theme in Pirates saga, surrounded us energycally. It was the signal for the beginnig of the event.
While the score was passing through our ears, the members of Serenity were featured over the scenario, and began with a middle-rythm song of his unique album, Words Untold & Dreams Unlived, called Forever; in my opinion it would had been better beginnig with Reduced to Nothingness, a fast power metal song, but the cited piece was the third one in their setlist, just like that, I was able to enjoy this song finally :)
Between these two songs, they performed the arabican Canopus 3, the opening song of the album. I apologize for not remember the entire setlist (nor the exact order of all the pieces), but with an only album, their show was too much short :( Although, my three favourite songs (the cited Reduced to Nothingness, Engraved Within and Thriven) were performed, and I began my particular headbanging brutally :P Overcoats, Engraved Within was the best song in terms of audience reaction dedicated to a not famous supporter band I had ever seen (well, with Firewind in the Angra concert the audience was even more tribal!! yiaaaah!). I never imagined that people liked Serenity so much, but I'm deeply glad for them.
Serenity are really a good band, and their compositions are powerful: melodic power metal mixed with progressive environments. And they demonstrated us their clear future performing a previously unreleased song , that will appear in their second album. An excellent song, indeed; in the same quality line of the first album; maybe even more mature.
Serenity setlist (about 1:00:00):
Pros: The connection of the band with the audience. Really incredible, both all enjoyed the show, the band and us. And of course, when Georg Neuhauser (the singer) show us the estelada he had in his keyring... wooooow brutal!!!
Cons: Maybe the sound; sometimes it was difficult to hear well the singer.
Best Track: Engraved Within; very well performed, and at the same time, the audience reacted brutally in the interludium; after the song, Serenity was acclaimed by all the people, as an entusiasthic response to band's efforts.
* Part II: Kamelot, King Khan and the Knights of the Metal Table
After one-hour show by Serenity, and 15 minutes for preparing the scenario for Kamelot spectacle, the band of Roy Khan started their performance. The lights turned off and a lady, emulating the Ghost Opera cover, appeared on the platform with their eyes bandaged and a violin; then, Solitaire started to sound. I recognize that this intro has a violin complex melody, and the lady obviously was nervous, but I noticed too much that she was doing playback XD but this was the only bad thing in the Kamelot concert hehehehe; when the violin solo finished, the entire band has already in the scenario, and they started the concert, of course, with Rule the World, the second song of Ghost Opera.
This middle-rythm was awesomely performed, with Khan singing perfectly; and then, the next song, a classic song included in Black Halo album: When the Lights Are Down. The audience exploited in horns arised and singing loudly (and, we must recognize it, so badly XD). Above these lines there's a video extracted of YouTube offereing this moment XD. In my own defense, I must say that the video is recorded from the left side of Razzmatazz , and I was in the third row of the right one; then, you cannot hear me singing :P
Later, a song also performed in their previous tour in 2005, Soul Society, that didn't turn off the people enjoyment; and then, a song of the new album: Mourning Star (but with no gregorian intro chants...). And, finishing the song, a surprise I awaited in the Black Halo tour: Descent of the Archangel (without the appearence Luca Turilli, of course :P), with a specially motived Roy Khan interpreting even the injured and fallen angel at the beginning of the song!! really nice :)
And after that, another previously unperformed song, the great ballad Abandoned, from Black Halo (I think for giving the instrumentalists a deserved resting); Khan was supported all the song by us, the audience, in one of the most beautiful songs of Kamelot.
The Human Stain, the most powerful song included in Ghost Opera, was the next song, and later, a break for Roy Khan: a great instrumental interlude that included a guitar solo by Thomas Youngblood, supported by the rest of the band, and for finishing this instrmental part, a drum solo by Casey Grillo (aka Son Goku XD what a freak hair style!!! XD).
Woooooow, the return of Roy Khan couldn't be better... two songs incredibly good in the Kamelot discography: Center of the Universe and the also previously unperformed live (and, I recognize it, I think they will never perform live!!!) Memento Mori!!! Oh my god, this moment was really orgasmatic!!!! These two songs are my favourite of all the Kamelot pieces!!!! When these two masterpieces were at their last, Oli Palotai offered us a keyboard solo, demonstrating his amazing technique (although, the solo is prepared, I think :S in the DVD Kamelot recorded the last year, On the Cold Winter Night, the Palotai solo is very similar...), for continue with another classic song: The Haunting , this time without Simone Simmons but with the appearence of the "violinist" that sang all the female parts of the songs (that is: the beginning of Descent of the Archangel, the interlude of Abandoned, and the chorus line with Khan on Love You To Death , one of the last concert songs). Sorry, I don't remember her name, but she sang very very very well! :$
And the final song of the first part of the concert was the classical song from Karma: the highly acclaimed Forever, which included, as in the performance in the Live DVD, a interlude part with all of us trying to follow the melodic lines of Roy Khan (he was singing first, and then we were trying to emulate him XD). I must to say that we sang rather well, except in the last part, where more than a half of the people screamed very badly XD but it was soooooo nice :) you even can see it, what else? :P
Finishing Forever, Kamelot made a farewell and went out from the scenario; a few minutes later, they came back and offered us three more songs: two of them new, Ghost Opera and the ballad Love You to Death (come on, raise up these lighters!!!! :P), and a classic one, the second and last song from Karma: the song with the same title as the album, Karma (one of their most complex songs, together with Memento Mori). We all were already ecstatic, but when the band went out from the scenario again, we claimed Kamelot for more songs, we wanted more soooooooooooongs!!! And our prayer was heared: Kamelot came back for one more song, the last one, and the song that provoques more extasis in the people: March of Mephisto!!!!!!
And with Khan enjoying us to rising up our horns as long as we were jumping and headbanging in a histeric mood, the confert arrived at the end. I think Kamelot had a good time in Barcelona, because Khan smiled and laughed several times with us while we chorused the band's name, or even the happy moment in the concert: in the final part of Forever, when we disturbed his final scream doing it us before him XD
Definitely, an excellent experience, and I can't wait for the next Kamelot tour!!! But well, in the next month Dream Theater (with Symphony X) and Sonata Arctica (together with Epica) will arrive at Barcelona and the headbangings and the horns of metal will be risen again!! mwaaaahahahahaha
Kamelot setlist (about 1:30:00):
Pros: All the setlist was awesome, all the songs are incredible, and even all of them are included in my kamelot's favourite songs list.
Cons: the absence of Nights of Arabia or the high acclaimed ballad Don't You Cry. Also, The Haunting and March of Mephisto in full length would be better... :S
Best Track: Memento Mori; the performance was incredible, and I only can give praises for that: this is the most complex song composed by Kamelot and its live performance isn't an easy task (in fact, on their previous tour they didn't perform the song; although, the instrumental interlude included parts of it)
I hope I have been transmitted my strong emotions about this concert, and had provoques similar feelings to you when will read this post :) see you in Ignis Lacrima, poor mortals!! And long live to metal!!!
read more...
Sitges 2007: the aftermath; Noir and epic movies. (volume 2 of 4)
In addition to the first volume of my visual (and reading XD) experiences in Sitges 2007, I will show you all the second volume, more quiet and not so violent films: the noir films, together with the epic ones.
Buddy movies, police and thieves, triads, yakuzas, pursuits, shooting scenes... all is permitted in noir cinema.
And the epic movie collection sine frew years rose from Corea and Japan was featured in Sitges too. Concretely I saw a south-corean movie, plenty of fantasy, and an incredible chinese/southcorean/japanese co-production based on intelligence and strategy in decisive battles.
* Chapter 1. Lé cinèma noir by Hong-Kong: the Milkyway domain.
Talking about noir cinema in Sitges Festival of Cinema is talking about Milkyway, cofundated by Johnnie To and Wai Ka-fai. Breaking News, Exiled , or the movie saga about chinese triads, Election, are a clear example of this kind of movies, always placed in Hong-Kong, the harbor of smells... And this year is not an exception!!! At this show, I could see Eye in the Sky, Mad Detective, and the hit of the year: Triangle . There were other movies, like Confession of Pain, from the creators of Infernal Affaius (the movie in which Martin Scorsese based his great Departed movie), but I wasn't able to see them, because of incompatible schedule :(
Well, let's explain the movies I did see indeed. The first one, Eye in the Sky, is the first direction chance of Yau Nai-hoi, usual writer and screenplayer of Milkyway. In his first movie, the action is seen from the sight of the police unit of criminal surveillance , unit named as the movie. Simon Yam, in an incredible interpretation, is the captain of this unit and the instructor of a new rookie, while a cat-and-mouse game is developed during all the 90 minutes of the movie, trying to catch a band of jewelry thieves. Trepidant and curious, a movie that I recommend: it has the typical Milkyways handicap (maybe the peculiar humour of Johhnie To is not present, but the other factors do are there), and Simon Yam does an excellent intepretation. Excellent rookie Yau Nai-hoi!!!
The second movie, Mad Detective, is a curious experiment made by the always brilliant Johnnie To . With his already classical serious gags, he are introducing us in the world of a retired detective with a strange ability: he can see the internal mind of the people , reflected in the movie with a real person walking in place of the person itself. A unsolved crime is still live, and the actual investigation leader goes to this man to get help. Like an autenthic paranoia, as long as movie walks we can observe the sickness that surrounds this Mad Detective, who can see 7 different personalities in the main suspect, a corrupt policeman. Mixing real vision and Mad Detective vision, this film is a little poor in the argument, but if the investigation was a little complicated, this film will be absolutely surrealist. Really, this film evoques the sickness of the detective in front of the investigation, rather poor. A curious film, in fact. And really a good movie, if you don't take care of the real argument :)
And the last one... the highly expected Triangle, the cocktail of Milkyway!!! A single mobie directed by three of most great directors in Hong-Kong: Tsui Hark, Ringo Lam and Johnnie To himself, are signing this peculiar movie. Every director was the only and unique author of a single part of the movie (beginning, middle and final, respectively in the order of directors' previous listing).
It's not a great movie in terms of argument, but it's incredible the amazing coherence in the film (really I thought the coherence was the main problem...), and the final scene is really superb: great Johnnie To!!! Good movie, but not a masterpiece... what a pity, it could have been an important factor for Hong Kong industry to Occident.
* Chapter 2. Benny Chan and the impossible coreographies, and the Shanghai 30's...
For those who don't know Benny Chan, he is Jackie Chan's brother (oooh, do you really know Jackie, eh? :P), and the director of almost all the movies Jackie did in Hong Kong (well, director of the movies didn't directed by Jackie himself ---he has directed a lot of movies---) including New Police Story, the new movie after Jackie's standing in USA. So, with this feature, you can imagine that every movie Benny Chan does, it includes a lot of coreographies, pursuits, impossible jumps, and multiple and agonic furniture destruction... an authentic festival of acrobacies and broken crystals XD And Invisible Target, of course, is not an exception.
An assault to a bank's armored wagon is the main case that faces off the criminal band responsible of the attack with three policemen very dispare: one lost his girlfriend in the cited assault; another one has been humilliated and wants to recover his prestige; and the last one wants to know about his disappeared brother (an anecdothic affair with this last policeman is that the character is really interpreted by Jaycee Chan, son of Jackie Chan).
Invisible Target is really a very good movie, it deserves mounts and mounts of praises: all the film is plenty of action, and not normal action but mastodonthic action: every piece of furniture will be broken; every building will be punished with explosions; all the characters will receive enormous beatings... and humoristic gags will also make appearance. All of these factors provoque that the movie results very very nice. It's not a great movie, but indeed it's one of the most happy movies of the festival. Benny Chan rules!!!!
Although, I cannot say the same for the next movie: Blood Brothers; charged of good intentions and original presence, this Shanghai 30's drama of two brothers and a friend, three all friends since they were children, that will be lead from their little village to Shanghai to improve their economy and live quality, doesn't connect with the audience. They will be soon driven to dark affairs, obeying the capo of the criminal domain of Shanghai. Interesting argument, but the movie, produced by John Woo, is quiet engaging missing. At least, I didn't connect with the movie, I found it very... artificial :S However, the movie deserves a special mention for the ambientation, and the atmosphere of the 30's is very well featured.
* Chapter 3. The Epic movies surrounding Asia
Changing totally the subject, now I will talk about two epic movies I saw in this festival: Battle of Witts and The Restless. I also saw Dororo but I have already reviewed this movie in the previous post of "day one" of the festival :P So, I will only write about the other two movies.
The Restless is a south-corean epic movie, that drunks directly (in terms of epic atmosphere) over another epic movie made in south-corea, Musa the Warrior. In The Restless there is a history about Yi Kwak, who after losing his girlfriend (she was executed as suspicious of witchcraft), enters at the Order of the Chuhyongdae, the royal demon slayers.
But this order was betrayed and annihilated by the villagers of realm, and Yi Kwak is the only who is still life. But in the beginning of the movie is murdered. When it awakes, he appears in the purgatory, the zone between heaven and hell. Then, he will discover a complot executed by the spirits of the Chuhyongdae, that pretend using the purgatory as a passenger for invading the mortal world and domain it as the King Spirits.
This is the first film by Cho Dong-oh, an authentic visual show (the battles are very beautiful and spectacular) and a good epic movie. Maybe a bad thing is the final of the movie itself... too much romantic and maybe too much Dragon-Ball-stylistic :P But, if this Son Goku spirit doesn't matter to you, you will enjoy this film.
And for the last, Battle of Witts. A coproduction of the three most influent asiatic countries (with permission of India): Japan, China and South-Corea. Ambiented during the same epoch than Zhang Yimou transported us in his movie Hero, the movie is about Ge Li, a mozi, a historic group of war strategues, whose mission was defend the poor people in front of the major armies with the intention of establishing peace again.
Great battle scenes, with the spectacular coreographies of Dororo or The Restless (or the movie collection of Zhang Yimou, like Crouching Tiger and Hidden Dragon or Hero or The House of Flying Daggers). Here the battles remember the old peplum movies of Dino de Laurentiis in Hollywood (but with the actual resources of course), more cruent and realistic. The betrayal, the drama, the love story... also have their wn place in this movie.
A highly recommended movie in all of aspects and factors: serious, rigurous, it tells a piece history not known in Occident, and Andy Lau gives us a splendid performance in his role of Ge Li, the mozi.
Pay attention also in the great soundtrack composed by Kenji Kawai (composer of the two Ghost in the Shell movies, Avalon, the two movies of Death Note ---commented in the first volume of Sitges 2007 chronicles---, Seven Swords, Ringu movie series, and even the videogame music for Nobunaga Online). If you enjoyed Avalon and Seven Swords orchestral pieces, you will enjoy this Battle of Witts score.
And no more for this moment; there are only 2 volume left!!! I will try to write in a minor scale, or it will be too much tedious for reading :$ I apologize for the large texts, but 27 films cannot be reviewed with 2 lines per movie :S
See you in the Lair of Fire and Tears, poor mortals!!
read more...
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Sitges 2007: the aftermath; Thriller, horror, and gore movies (volume 1 of 4)
Hello to everybody!!! I apologize for having this blog soooooo alone, without new posts in this last week; but the Sitges' Cinema International Festival of Catalonia have absorved me totally and, when I arrived at home every night, I was too much tired to, even, engage te computer... Master classes in the morning, lunching directly in sitges after university, and viewing movies till evening... oh my God!
So, in a certain way, this post will be partitioned in four volumes, because I want to talk about the experiences and movies I've seen in 9 days (27, finally... I'm sooo crazy!!!), and the post would be too much large, and obviously, tidy :P
Then, I decided to divide the post in this way:
- Thriller, horror, and gore movies.
- Noir and epic movies.
- Animation movies.
- Sci-fi and experimental movies (yes: Park Chan-Wook, Takeshi Kitano and Takashi Miike will be able to be found there :P).
Let's go, then.
* Chapter 1. Why USA makes always the same typical movies?
First of all, I must admit that I'm specially predilected for asiatic movies, concretely from Japan, China, Hong-Kong and South Corea. Because of that, the oriental cruelty provoques a general unenjoyment of yankee gore movies.
This is the example of Dead Silence, by James Wan; the creator of the Saw trilogy (there's a fourth chapter in preparation) decided to release a terror movie based a devil ventriloquism doll, responsible of strange murders. All the topical and typical clichés of any horror movie appear here (storms, abandoned buildings in the night, basements with no lights...); so, in conjunction with a soundtrack that announces every fear scene (that are really bad made), the result is an authentic bad movie. The only good detail in the movie is, as Wan always does in his movies, the last minute. I even think that Wan invented this last scene, and then he wanted to do a movie with this final; because the film is boring and typical and with no remarkable things. Really boring...
* Chapter 2. Different approaches to fear and suffering...
But it was the first horror movie I saw in Sitges. Three days later, two consecutives movies, WAZ, by Tom Shankland, and Black House, by Shin Terra, provoques a smile in my face and made improve my opinion about gore in Sitges Festival. I named this two movies simultaneosuly because two both have the same bad thing: the final scenes...
The first is a UK-USA coproduction, a untypical thriller mixing of Seven and Saw. I Say untypical because, although is certainly a thriller very similar to Seven (and, of course, also similar to all the thrillers born because of Seven, like the Morgan Freeman and Ashley Judd co-protagonized ones), you know who is the guilty before the middle of the film!! And, yes it's true, the police main character, is typical, but Stellan Skarsgard is in state of grace with this role :) The movie works well, but only until the final scene, too much romantic and in a hated it-must-finish-well mood :( It's pitiful because to reflect how much pain you can suffer before kill a deared being is a ver interesting affair...
The second one, a south corean production, reflects the evilness of an insurance-cheating-thirsty society. The main character is an insurance agent that thinks that a man has suicided his own son for gain the insurance prince; but it's only the beginning... this agent will be evolved by a sick atmosphere of cheats and gore scenes based in cut body parts for gain more insurance money... a good movie, very direct and cruel (and cruent), although the final scene (the last 30 minutes) are too much hollywood-like; what a pity, because the movie works very very very well...
* Chapter 3. The japanese style of mixing horror and thriller...
After this, I must follow with two japanese movies between j-horror and thriller: Kaidan, by Hideo Nakata (the famous creator of Ringu film series) and the 2-movie-set of Death Note, by Shusuke Kaneko.
What can I say about Death Note? Based in self-named manga created by Tsugumi Oba with Takeshi Obata, tells about the son of a Japanese Police General that finds a notebook which kills the person who owns the name that is written in his pages. Light, this boy, decides to start a crusade to kill all the criminals and bad people, and this mission provoques an Interpol investigation, leaded by L, the misterious and rare P.D. (great interpretation of Kenichi Matsuyama). The film approaches horror scenes, thriller, moral dilemmas (is a good act to kill a bad person? what is a bad person, really? this aim deserves cruel acts for completing the mission, like killing good persons as a minor and collateral damage?), and the result is a good movie (divided in two 2-hour-films). Although the manga story is much altered, the result isn't a bad movie.The other movie, Kaidan, is a new kind of movie for Hideo Nakata. After doing horror using actual technologies, Nakata takes the rides of a historical movie, ambiented in Edo Age, treating of a woman, deeply in love with a guy (a beauty guy in the movie, but... the actor is incredibily ugly!!!! Oh my god!!!!), that dies because of a curse (born in a murder that involved some years before the parents of two both). After that, every woman that joins this boy are pursuited by the spirit of this woman (with scenes of clear reminiscence of Ringu, with the spirits appearing slowly and perfectly visibles). The movie rythm is a little slower than the ideal one, and thare are maybe too often horror scenes, but it isn't a bad movie.,although, is distant far of Ringu quality.
* Chapter 4. The French gore is arising
To finish this volume, I want to talk about the surprise of the festival (at least for me); À l'Intérieur, by Julien Maury and Alexandre Bustillo (that made act of presence in the projection I saw, and did a minor discurse :P). It's only 80 minutes of duration, but what 80 minutes!!!
Two women, one of them pregnant (the baby is intended to be born the day after of the day of the action), and the other, plenty of anger and illness, full intended to stole the baby, from his mother!! A collection of stabbings, hits, mounts and mounts of blood... an authentic war in a house between two women (and other minor characters involved in the action).Highly recommended movie, but pay attention!! If you found Saw 3 too much heavy and cruel and gore... forget this movie!!! But if you enjoy the classical Johnnie To or Takashi Miike gore scenes... this is your movie!!! So, congratulations to these two directors for this nice and cruel movie, and congratulations because of the splendid interpretations of Beatrice Dalle (the femme fatale) and the rookie Allyson Paradis (rookie but a very very very good actress!!).
No more for now. Over this week I finish the Sitges review of films (with my personal opinions, of course). Be happy and I hope this reading would have been constructive :) See you!! read more...
Friday, October 5, 2007
Sitges 2007: day one, Dororo; and 3 new films added to my movie set...
Wow, the first day of Sitges 2007 have finished... I've seen Dororo, a great japanese epic film with the classical comical scenes from the well-known (and disappeared...) Osamu Tezuka (creator of the original manga); I enjoyed it very much, very recommendable :) The pitiful thing of that movie is that is the first volume of a trilogy ¬¬ I'm impatient for the other two sequels!!!
Besides, today there has been a negative note: the apotheosic rain fallen over sitges during all the day!! When I have arrived Sala Tramuntana (it has been quite difficult, because I didn't go to there until today... :S), although I wear a black umbrella over me, I was totally wet (informatic people, please, don't think in perversions XD)... the sewers weren't able to swallow all the water and rivers of the liquid element flew over the streets... It has been an autenthic adventure walking on Sitges today XD
For those who don't know about Dororo manga (yesterday I should had been included :S), the story is about a poor boy, son of a clan leader involved in a cruel war with other clans for the supremacy in Japan. He, before his own borning, is privated from his body because his father sells it to 48 demons, in exchange of more power and the domination of the entire land.
The movie runs 20 years after this perverse act. The boy, with blades as arms and legs, is executing his own vengeance killing all the 48 demons for recovering the 48 pieces that are forming his orignal body. Decent FXs for the demon battles and precious costumes and scenarios, good music (and curious; notice the flamenco-style piece in a demon battle scene in the middle of the film, and also in the end credits sequence :D) and convincent actors' performances englobe a nice filmic experience. In Japan this movie has been a recaudation phenomenon during months and months.
And after all, I must admit that I've bought tickets for 3 more movies!! :$ The chosen are Dead Silence (the new movie of Saw director), Nocturna (a prized spanish animation film with an interesting starting point), and the impossible.first-correct-reading Tekkonkinkreet by Michael Arias (he has been involved in the Dreamworks' animation projects Prince of Egypt and Road to Eldorado).
So, completing the schedule planning of this weekend (saturday 6th and sunday 7th), the final calendar is as follows:
October 6th, Saturday
October 7th, Sunday
For the love of goooood!!! Come on, buy tickets and come with me to Sitges!!!! It will be sure a nice experience!!
ps: oh, you can be calmed and breathe in a normal way... I won't do a review of all the films of Sitges :P simply, for being today the first one and the first (and unique) movie, I've decided to talk about Dororo in addition of announcing the 3 new movies I will see, being a total of 25 films in 22 sessions... maybe, if there is a superb film in my planning, I will write a review of it, but it's not sure :P
read more...
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Festival de Cinema de Sitges 2007, or the beginning of a neural massacre
After too much days without internet connection at home (I hate Ono!! :@), I'm at laboratory where I'm working (or doing something like work XD) for writing about the most cinematic geek event of the year in Catalonia: the Festival de Cinema de Sitges 2007!!
For those who don't know about this festival, as in the last 40 years (40!!), during 10 days (from October 4th until October 14th) you can see in Sitges a collection of movies of diverse genres: terror, fantastic, animation... these movies are from a lot of countries, but for me, the asian ones are the most important (because these movies from China, Japan, Corea... will never be released in normal cinema teaser, at least in Catalonia ---except a little bit of exceptions---).
Well, you can see the projection schedule at this link: www.cinemasitges.com; however, now I'll show you the movie series I will see this year; be prepared, there are 20 sessions!!! And I'm already bought the tickets :)
October 4th, Thursday
October 5th, Friday
October 6th, Saturday
October 7th, Sunday
October 8th, Monday
October 9th, Tuesday
October 10th, Wednesday
October 11th, Thursday
October 12th, Friday
October 13th, Saturday
If anyone wants to see any movie and wants to see it with me, just tell me and hurry!! Buy the ticket before people buy the rest of them!! :P
See you in Sitges!! (or not...)
read more...
