"Do your worst, Mr. Hughes..."

[zrath]

"Hi there!" (ticker-tape, ticker-tape)
"My name is Eddie, the shipboard computer, and I'm pleased as punch to report that Zrath has a new post for his LJ!"
(ticker-tape, ticker-tape, ticker-tape, ticker-tape, ticker-tape, ticker-tape, ticker-tape, ticker-tape)

Thank you Eddie. Now, shut up.

Yes, new post, and job stuff is up first.
I had an interview at Google a while back. They needed people to test their new Picasa application.
It's a nifty photo organizing and manipulation thingy. Look for it soon!
None of the people who interviewed were hired, so I don't feel so bad.
However, I can't shake the nagging feeling that they're practising sizism and weightism.
The reception area had a fridge stocked with "Naked Juice" drinks (yum!), the receptionist said something about the
company encouraging a healthy lifestyle (a good thing), and everyone I saw was average height, thin and trim.
Like I said, just a nagging feeling...

I was supposed to interview with Fox Sports for some website testing, but I've heard absolutely nothing.
Yesterday, I had an interview scheduled at Vivendi Universal Games, but it was cancelled the day before.
It might happen in a couple of weeks. Hmmmmmm, whatever.

Meanwhile, it looks like I've been hired by a game developer I cannot name at this time, to work on a console project.
All I can say is that it's probably a PlayStation 2 game and it involves racing of some kind.
I dearly wished it was Wipeout, but there are no Wipeout games in the work for PS2.
The one currently out on the PlayStation Portable is supposed to be quite good. (Whiiiine!)
Anyway, the agency is doing a background check on me ("Are you a serial killer?" "Urrrr, no.") and is gonna send me
some paperwork to read and I suppose fill out and send back, or something. Once that's done, I'll know when I'll start.
Short-term contract work, pays a bit more than Sony did. So, woohoo!!



The Sibling Report
Still pugnacious and cantankerous and desiring to kick everyone in the ass.
In other words, same old same old.
He's worried about the muscles of his face relaxing though. He's starting to develop jowls, a bit like a bulldog.
I hope his face snaps back to normal once the chemotherapy is over. We saw a man at the hospital whose right side of
his face was fully collapsed and flapping around. This is probably what scared the hell out of Pascal.
He thinks this will happen to him too. I seriously doubt it, because the man was getting a much larger dose of chemo,
and he's probably been under treatment for a while. And I think something else caused his facial floppiness.
The brother's got another dose of chemo scheduled for next week, but he's gonna have it delayed.
There's too much stuff happening next week and he needs to be fully lucid and on the ball!
DJ Pascal in full effect y'all! Run for your lives!



Netflixing:

The Merchant Of Venice - Al Pacino, Jeremy Irons, Joseph Fiennes, Lynn Collins (2004)
Lavish and faithful adaption of Shakespeare's classic. Superb acting. I had a bit of trouble with the language
at the beginning, but I got somewhat used to it. It's a completely different manner of speaking from what I know.
I had a rather tense moment when I realized just what Shylock intended to do to get satisfaction on Antonio's default
of the loan, during the tribunal scene near the end of the film. Shylock meant to cut away part of Antonio's flesh from
his chest, nearest to the heart, which is too close to what the doctors will do to my brother after his chemotherapy ends.
Bu the moment passed and everything was fine. Good stuff for fans of the Bard.

The Phantom Of The Paradise - Paul Williams, William Finley (who reminds me of Mike Jittlov), Gerrit Graham (1974)
I've never liked the "Rocky Horror Picture Show". There, I've said it!
I just can't get into it. Twice I've tried to actually sit down and watch it, and twice I've failed utterly.
I either stopped the tape/DVD/whatever, or left the room outright.
I've heard tell that some people consider "Phantom" to be superior to "Rocky".
And after watching it, I have to say that I am in agreement. I certainly enjoyed it a lot more than "Rocky".
The music style is closer to what Elton John would record later, plus there's all the cool gothic musical cues.
And it's just all around better: better sets, better dialogue, better cinematography, and the Beef character is hilarious!
I LIKE IT!! I'll have to own it.

The Aviator - Leonardo DiCaprio, Cate Blanchet, John C. Reilly, Alan Alda, Alec Baldwin, Jude Law (2004)
They gave the directing Oscar to Grandpa Eastwood again. They snubbed Martin Scorsese again. Man, that made me mad.
Hollywood still hates Howard Hughes, even after all these years. Oh yeah, 5 Oscars, including Best Supp for Cate.
Not good enough though, nope. Marty should have won that Best Director Oscar, in my opinion.
"The Aviator" is a great film. DiCaprio does an amazing job as the young Howard Hughes, whom noone takes seriously
at first despite his obvious talent and skills (hey! Sounds like the way some people feel about DiCaprio himself!).
It's a period piece spanning the mid-'20s to late-'40s and it's really well-done.
This, by the way, shouldn't really be listed under Netflixing, as I purchased this DVD.
Thanks to a nearby DVD and videogame store that gives good credit on used games, I was able to lay down just $4
for my very own copy of "The Aviator (Widescreen 2-Disc Edition)". And all it took was one PS2 game I was done with.
I love it!

Appleseed - the CGI-manga movie based on Masamune Shirow's seminal manga
If you're at all interested in science-fiction and enjoy a good action flick with a dense plot, rent this now!
It jettisons most of the snooze-inducing talk seen in the other Shirow oeuvre (ie: "Ghost In The Shell 2: Innocence"),
and replaces it with eye-popping mechas, dazzling action sequences, and PLOT! It's a love story! It's a conspiracy!
It's Beauty And The Beast meets Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell, with a cyborg Beast (hi Briareos!).
The visuals take a little to get used to. It's entirely in CGI, but the characters are cell-shaded to look like manga
characters, so it looks like a 3D version of a color manga. It's unusual and actually quite nifty-looking.
Oh yeah, and it's got a kicking soundtrack with a lot of names familiar to me: Basement Jaxx, Boom Boom Satellites,
Carl Craig (the Detroit Techno GOD!), Ryuichi Sakamoto (Honneamise!), Paul Oakenfold, Atom, Akufen, etc...
The soundtrack CD is a 2-CD set. I must have it!!



Next time, I'll talk about "The Lords Of Dogtown", a movie near and dear to both my heart and my brother's heart.
We used to skateboard in the late '70s and we wanted to be like these guys!

Comments

[porsupah.livejournal.com]

Great to hear the Zrath Mk.II is faring well. How much longer is this therapy going to continue? Are they able to tell how effective it's being?

Appleseed: oh, yes. I'm very picky when it comes to action flicks especially, as I'm not usually aligned with Hollywood-style "leave your brain at the door" popcorn cinema, where an action pic will have a monumental pyrotechnics budget, and a script someone gave a hobo two bottles of Thunderbird for. (Overpaid, I'm led to understand, in cases like Torque or 2 Fast 2 Furious) But Appleseed balances out well - characters you can actually care about, high drama, sinister plotting, gorgeous "cinematography", and absolutely no shortage of action. Probably a great choice for a group viewing with plenty of good pizza and beer. ^_^

You don't like RHPS? OH NOES! ^_^ Oddly, I didn't take to it at all until I was getting into University - and then, it suddenly made sense. Well, as much as it can. ^_^ What did you make of "The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert", "Hedwig and the Angry Inch", and "Girls Will Be Girls"?

And for more Shakespearean fun, have you seen Shakespeare in Love? Quite an unusual film, and genuinely witty.

Erf! I need to come up with a review or two sometime, but I've been getting so horribly behind.. I've probably enough for a couple weeks' solid viewing at this stage. Not a matter of a lack of time, as a lack of company, being as geogrpahically isolated as I currently find myself. :-P A fully working, reasonable PowerBook would help, rather than being stuck on a 14" TV for such purposes, but still. Not such a grand concern, hein?

Hmm. And I still need to see the H2G2 movie.. maybe during tonight's bath. :)

[porsupah.livejournal.com]

BTW, if you'd like to check your mail, you'll find something of interest. ^_^