Tag Archives: space

Film: Die Schneider Krankheit

by Editor

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!!!

Podcast Novel: A Princess of Mars (Chapter 16)

by Editor

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A Princess of Mars

This is the first John Carter of Mars novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan books. It was his first novel, published in 1917 and it’s a work of rip-roaring science fiction that has inspired many of the great writers in the genre.

Chapter 16: After a serious and long-overdue talk with Dejah Thoris, John Carter plots a dangerous escape to the city of Helium.

You can find all the previous chapters of the book here.

You’ll find regular podcasts of all the chapters over the next couple of months. Subscribe to our feed.

Duration: 00:22:09
Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved.

Podcast Novel: A Princess of Mars (Chapter 15)

by Editor

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A Princess of Mars

This is the first John Carter of Mars novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan books. It was his first novel, published in 1917 and it’s a work of rip-roaring science fiction that has inspired many of the great writers in the genre.

Chapter 15: Sola reveals a deadly secret and tells John Carter the terrible story of her origins, revealing a deep hunger for revenge.

You’ll find regular podcasts of all the chapters over the next couple of months. Subscribe to our feed.

Duration: 00:18:41
Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved.

William S. Burroughs on Human Race and Space

by Editor | 1 Comment

Someone named Brian Duffy at Massachusetts College of Art and Design made this peculiar animation featuring the voice of William S. Burroughs. He gets that face animation of Burroughs just absolutely perfect. And that copy of Naked Lunch is the exact copy I’m reading this very evening. Who is this animator?  He’s very good.

You know, this is what’s so great about reading today, so far and beyond what any other time has allowed people to enjoy.  It’s that you can read something like Naked Lunch and think ‘Whew!  What a weird creature that Burroughs must have been!  What a lunatic!  Very sharp and very crazy.’  And then you can go out across the Web and find all sorts of fantastic films that have him walking around in them.  You can find some kid up in Massachusetts who reads this lunatic and gets so inspired that he makes an incredible film about some one little thing Burroughs said at some point in his long life.  Amazing.  It’s never been better to read than now.

Podcast Novel: A Princess of Mars (Chapter 14)

by Editor

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A Princess of Mars

This is the first John Carter of Mars novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan books. It was his first novel, published in 1917 and it’s a work of rip-roaring science fiction that has inspired many of the great writers in the genre.

Chapter 14: John Carter is in love but does not know how to behave.  Then he gets into a ferocious duel and must fight for his life.

You’ll find regular podcasts of all the chapters over the next couple of months. Subscribe to our feed.

Duration: 00:19:13
Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved.

Animation: E.T.A.

by Editor

E.T.A. was directed by Henrik Bjerregaard Clausen, with character modeling and animation by Søren Andersen and Michael la-Cour.  The production company is called Junk.  The film gets the whole thing with the orbiting spaceship and the cockpit just perfectly.  It’s short and sweet and funny.  I love sci-fi with grungy control rooms and crap lying around.  And of course I bet GM built the poor guy’s ship.  Definitely.  It’s a junker.

Podcast Novel: A Princess of Mars (Chapter 13)

by Editor | 1 Comment

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A Princess of Mars

This is the first John Carter of Mars novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan books. It was his first novel, published in 1917 and it’s a work of rip-roaring science fiction that has inspired many of the great writers in the genre.

Chapter 13: John Carter proves how treating his ride with gentleness gets better results.  He also takes a lovely and revealing walk with a woman of Mars.

You’ll find regular podcasts of all the chapters over the next couple of months. Subscribe to our feed.

Duration: 00:14:11
Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved.

Have a Drink on the Moon

by Editor | 2 Comments

moonwaterIf you’re planning on heading to the moon any time soon, you’ll at least be able to get a drink.  NASA announced today that the Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite has discovered water on the moon.  The mission intentionally crashed a rocket stage onto the moon’s surface, creating an enormous plume of ejecta.  When the plume was analyzed by spectrometers on board the satellite, the evidence of water became clear.  In the photograph, you can see the debris plume showing up as the little gray fuzzy area inside the black boxes.

There are many ways the water could have gotten there.  It could have come via solar winds, comets, giant molecular clouds or some kind of internal activity.  Scientists say that it could even have come from Earth.

NASA Makes a Free iPhone App

by Editor | 1 Comment

390825main_missions_160NASA has released a free app for the iPhone that offers dynamically updated information, images, and video from many of its ongoing missions.  NASA seems to be suffering through a confused decade in which it wonders what vehicle should replace its aging shuttle fleet, whether to dump the International Space Station into the ocean to save money, whether to go back to the moon, or whether Mars might be a suitable destination for a manned visit.

I think it’s probably safe to say that NASA is learning an enormous amount through its telescopes, satellites and rovers.  I suspect that very little is really learned from sending three or four humans to the moon other than how to keep three or four humans alive on the moon for a few weeks.  Perhaps NASA should just relax a little and stop worrying about making people interested in what it’s doing.  Perhaps they should just worry about collecting information.

Podcast Novel: A Princess of Mars (Chapter 12)

by Editor

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A Princess of Mars

This is the first John Carter of Mars novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan books. It was his first novel, published in 1917 and it’s a work of rip-roaring science fiction that has inspired many of the great writers in the genre.

Chapter 12: Someone spied on John Carter’s conversation with the prisoner and now he learns just how dangerous his situation really is.

You’ll find regular podcasts of all the chapters over the next couple of months. Subscribe to our feed.

Duration: 00:11:25
Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved.

Podcast Novel: A Princess of Mars (Chapter 11)

by Editor

DOWNLOAD MP3 AUDIO

A Princess of Mars

This is the first John Carter of Mars novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan books. It was his first novel, published in 1917 and it’s a work of rip-roaring science fiction that has inspired many of the great writers in the genre.

Chapter 11: John Carter helps the beautiful prisoner move into new quarters and has a revealing conversation with her.

You’ll find regular podcasts of all the chapters over the next couple of months. Subscribe to our feed.

Duration: 00:14:49
Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved.

Podcast Novel: A Princess of Mars (Chapter 10)

by Editor

DOWNLOAD MP3 AUDIO

A Princess of Mars

This is the first John Carter of Mars novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan books. It was his first novel, published in 1917 and it’s a work of rip-roaring science fiction that has inspired many of the great writers in the genre.

Chapter 10: John Carter meets the beautiful prisoner and proves himself more than a match for a martian green warrior.

You’ll find regular podcasts of all the chapters over the next couple of months. Subscribe to our feed.

Duration: 00:21:39
Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved.

Interactive Moon Mission Underway

by Editor

MoonMission

Yesterday I posted about the JFK Presidential Library’s interactive recreation of the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing mission. The mission has now reached stage 6 with the command module at a distance of 22,000 nautical miles from earth. The site is doing an absolutely marvelous job of making you feel as if you are riding along with the historic Apollo 11 mission. They have all the real-time radio communications between the astronauts and Mission Control. So you can listen to exactly what was happening through every second of the entire mission! They also have video clips that fit the current point you are watching in the mission.

This was an excellent web idea and it is extremely well executed. I can’t wait until they reach the part with the Lunar LEM trying to find its landing spot on the moon!  Go see the We Choose the Moon site right away!

Animation: The Astronomer’s Dream

by Editor

The Astronomer’s Dream is by Malcolm Sutherland. I can hardly make any sense out of it but I see endless repetition, making of the same mistakes over and over again, Buddhism, the serpent eating its own tail, ancient Mayan predictions and star observations, evolution, looking out equals looking in. That’s all I can make of it. It’s a strange piece of work. I like all the little lines and dashes in the weirdo drawings.

Podcast Novel: A Princess of Mars (Chapter 9)

by Editor

DOWNLOAD MP3 AUDIO

A Princess of Mars

This is the first John Carter of Mars novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the author of the Tarzan books. It was his first novel, published in 1917 and it’s a work of rip-roaring science fiction that has inspired many of the great writers in the genre.

Chapter 9: John Carter learns to understand the Martian tongue.  He listens to an interesting conversation among Sola and some other female Martians about the beautiful prisoner.

You’ll find regular podcasts of all the chapters over the next couple of months. Subscribe to our feed.

Duration: 00:08:39
Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved.