Filmmaker Harris Loureiro went to the store and bought himself a bunch of robot toys. Then he made a Transformers movie. It’s a wild, action-packed thrill ride of a stop-motion extravaganza, complete with voice overs and a fittingly super-dramatic score. Have fun!
Tony Altamirano’s film as been an official selection at the New York City International Film Festival 2011, Beverly Hills Shorts Fest 2011, Capital City Film Fest 2011, and the San Francisco Frozen Film Fest 2011. It’s a neat little science fiction surprise with a twist. I like its point of view on the imagination’s ability to transform reality even while putting one in mortal danger.
Justin Rosewell made this odd little science fiction tale about a young man who senses something wrong with the world.
Humorous, cheesy and somewhat difficult to sit through! It’s got robots that are Dalek imitations, Gerry Anderson-style figures, vehicles and headquarters! This is the 1964 pilot episode for a puppet science fiction TV show that never aired. Paul Starr featured Ed Bishop, the actor who later played Commander Straker in the classic 70s UFO series, in the lead role. The show was created by Roberta Leigh who had already produced Space Patrol. In this episode, atomic power plants on Mars begin to explode and Paul Starr must investigate a threat to take over the red planet.
This is a 2007 documentary produced by Martín Florio on science fiction author Philip K. Dick. The great author behind the novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, the basis for the ultimately disappointing Blade Runner film, is portrayed by his many former wives and friends as having been obsessed with images that he perceived as having a divine origin. I detect a fair amount of condescension on display here from these former close relations, especially from fellow science fiction author K.W. Jeter. I think the general sort of hand-waving dismissal of Dick’s ideas and visions is foolish and indicates to me that Philip K. Dick made the relatively common mistake of surrounding himself with dimwits. Decide for yourself as you watch this interesting film.
Watch parts 2 – 9 after the jump.
Czechoslovakian animator Karel Zeman made The Fabulous World of Jules Verne in 1958 and it is, without exception, the finest example of Verne on film that I have ever seen. It is an adaptation of Verne’s novel, Facing the Flag. The combination of live action and Mysti-Mation (sets and animation painted to look like illustrations) not only evokes the atmosphere of old book illustrations, but it evokes the visual act of imagination that happens when I read a Jules Verne book. This film is perfection. I’m somewhat distrustful of the ‘steampunk’ movement but I would certainly imagine that this film must be one of its holy grail objects of worship. It should be for sure. Disney could never come close to this, then or now, because they are focused solely upon happiness.
Parts 2 through 8 after the jump!
Well I’m just very pleased about this. The Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles has given my film, Yellow Plastic Raygun, the award for Best Experimental Film. I was having quite a nice week attending various parties and screenings at the festival. Its use of multiple locations in the heart of downtown Los Angeles gives one a real sense of taking part in the life of the city and being involved with something that’s helping to foster the exploding art and film scene in downtown. Most of the short films were screened in the new Civic Center Theater at the intersection of First and Main Streets, in the shadow of the famous City Hall tower that has appeared in so many crime shows and film noir classics. I attended the screening of my own film this past Saturday evening and was amazed at seeing it large since I had put so much work into it on small monitors. What’s great about the Downtown Film Festival is that it shows a wide range of filmmaking styles, crew sizes and budgets. They show films made with lots of production resources right alongside films made by individual artists working with inexpensive HD cameras and even cell phone cameras. I am very proud to have won this and I look forward to more great festivals in downtown Los Angeles from the people who put this together.
The Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles has made my latest short film, Yellow Plastic Raygun, part of their official selection! So if you are in Los Angeles on Saturday, September 11, 2010 and you want to see an evening of short films, come by the Civic Center Theater at First and Main Street right across from the City Hall building. The shorts program starts at 10:00 pm. Here’s a link to the festival schedule.
I am very happy about this. I like the idea of a film festival right here at home where I can go and hang around with some other insane filmmakers. It should be an interesting Saturday night.
In general, I am deeply suspicious of the web trend for geeks to head toward steampunk, octopuses, and all things Cthulhu. There’s a vague and creeping racism underneath the cute old-fashioned, brass-fitted surface. I’ve also held a certain amount of contempt for H.P. Lovecraft. I think the guy was a closeted white supremacist with a knack for telling horrifying tales that are about white supremacists. I can imagine him as Sarah Palin’s favorite author… if she reads. The Cthulhu stories are genuinely frightening and his writing does contain a high creep quotient. But I’m just about ready to launch DOS attacks on sites that dig every alien octopus that shows its tentacles.
This, of course, is Lovecraft’s Call of the Cthulhu in under 2 minutes. It’s very well done and I like the use of the newspapers to move the story. Declan Moran made it. He also made Dante’s Inferno in Under 2 Minutes.
This animated short is by Joe Bichard and Jack Cunningham. Drill baby drill! On Mars! This is what happens when you run around punching holes in things.
Hey! I thought I had the darned movie already! But now there’s yet another ‘restored’ version of Fritz Lang’s 1927 science fiction masterpiece, Metropolis. Boy is that a gorgeous trailer though! Wow! And the music is far better than what’s on my DVD. This is the movie that just keeps making itself over and over and over.
I want to make a feature film and I’ll release the 2-hour version, but there will be 17 hours of ‘lost footage’ hidden in various places around the globe so that the movie can recompile itself over the decades into an ‘official version’ which bears absolutely no resemblance to the original movie. Or better yet, I’m going to start shooting fake Metropolis footage and then discover it in the broom closet of an old bus depot in the middle of Kansas. So the movie will suddenly expand to 4 and a half hours.
This is an LP of a 1957 recording of Aldus Huxley narrating his science fiction masterpiece, Brave New World. The music is by Bernard Herrmann. Of course, it’s not really the book. It’s a 1 hour radio dramatization. The book is a frightening look at a future of genetic breeding and an anesthetized population of perfectly content people without desires. They are kept uninformed and comfortable so that they will remain peaceful and easy to control by a ruling order. They are made to cherish their servitude and oppression.
Huxley believed that George Orwell’s vision of the future in 1984 was too extreme and that oppression of large populations would be watered down into something resembling pleasure and entertainment. They were both partly right.
So read Huxley’s book and think about the world around you and how little is really expected of you.
Well I’m just very pleased about this. The Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles has given my film, Yellow Plastic Raygun, the award for Best Experimental Film. I was having quite a nice week attending various parties and screenings at the festival. Its use of multiple locations in the heart of downtown Los Angeles gives one a real sense of taking part in the life of the city and being involved with something that’s helping to foster the exploding art and film scene in downtown. Most of the short films were screened in the new Civic Center Theater at the intersection of First and Main Streets, in the shadow of the famous City Hall tower that has appeared in so many crime shows and film noir classics. I attended the screening of my own film this past Saturday evening and was amazed at seeing it large since I had put so much work into it on small monitors. What’s great about the Downtown Film Festival is that it shows a wide range of filmmaking styles, crew sizes and budgets. They show films made with lots of production resources right alongside films made by individual artists working with inexpensive HD cameras and even cell phone cameras. I am very proud to have won this and I look forward to more great festivals in downtown Los Angeles from the people who put this together.
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Science fiction author William Gibson (Neuromancer, Spook Country) is answering questions about writing, publishing and general work habits on his blog.
Via Boing Boing
This 2008 film was written, produced and directed by Javier Chillon of Madrid, Spain. The director of photography was Luis Fuentes. Artistic direction by Ángel Boyano. In the fifties, a Soviet cosmonaut chimpanzee crash-lands in West Germany. Within weeks, a deadly virus has spread across the country and confounds all the scientific experts. The film is composed of entirely original footage made to look like a fifties documentary or newsreel. The very first shots with the camera tilting down through the trees to show us the crash site at long range is a nearly prefect rendition of old documentary style right down to how the camera would move. You have to really know what you are doing to come up with shots like that. Very fine work.
This is science fiction that is a deadly accurate portrayal of the calm, governmental, ponderous yet urgent, carefully-framed and full-of-import quality found in mid-century documentary films. The humor is sly and builds its effect gradually. It’s also somewhat frightening.
Found at No fat clips!!!
