// Category Archive for: Media

The Beatles vs. Jesus

By Ayan Farah

It’s pretty hard to evade controversy when you’re in the most popular rock and roll band in the history of the world. Especially when you’re its most outspoken member. That band is, of course, The Beatles, and the aforementioned extrovert is none other than John Lennon.
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Catfish: Beyond Real And Beyond Fake

By Less Lee Moore

Living on the Internet means that you often have to dodge spoilers. Luckily, the Internet is also so crammed with information there are enough things with which to distract yourself.

Such was the case with Catfish, a 2010 documentary that caught my attention via its unsettling trailer, which seemed like a faux documentary horror movie along the lines of The Blair Witch Project or the Paranormal Activity series. It was clear that an appreciation of the film was a case of “less is more,” so I added it to my DVD queue and successfully avoided spoilers for almost two years.

When I finally watched Catfish earlier this week, my stomach was in knots for at least 45 minutes until the movie completely . . . I’ll stop here because if you haven’t seen Catfish, you should watch it, and you should watch it not knowing any more than I did.

Catfish is a remarkable film and one that is thrilling, upsetting, disturbing, and moving. It makes incredible use of technology in its presentation of the Internet persona through GPS, Google, YouTube, Facebook, and all the other forms of social and searchable media we use every day. Such technology is so easily accessible and so widely used that it becomes a part of our lives that we take for granted, even though we assign it so much importance. We take all the veracity it reveals to us on faith.

As far as Internet personas, it’s common knowledge that we want to show everyone the best of ourselves, even if that means we make ourselves seem better than we are. But there is always a gap between our “real” selves and our Internet selves.

The width of this gap will likely determine how you treat your Internet friends. Do you treat them the same as your “real life” friends? Better? Worse? Do you subscribe to the “It’s just the Internet” theory to make yourself feel better about what you see and read there? The width of this gap will also determine how much Internet interactions affect you when you’re not on the Internet.

These were the ideas swirling around in my head right after I watched Catfish and right before I started looking up reviews online. Then, much like the film itself, everything changed. SPOILERS BEHIND THE CUT!

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Best Of 2011: Less Lee Moore

As always, I wish I’d had the time and resources available to experience more, but here are some of the things that made 2011 memorable (in alphabetical order, to be fair).

À l’Intérieur (Inside) at TIFF Bell Lightbox, August 20: Though I’d already watched this film three times on DVD, I felt that I needed to see it on the big screen. I’ve probably said this a few times already, but it’s still true: it manages to completely transcend the horror genre to become a bona fide work of cinematic art. It is indescribable and powerful and if you haven’t experienced it yet, you should.

Adam Ant: For all those folks who thought he was a crazy, bloated has-been, recent live performance clips on YouTube will more than prove those half-baked theories wrong. He’s so much more than the guy who did “Goody Two Shoes” and any and all adulation for him is well deserved. His descent into madness, fall from grace, and subsequent return to form (used in the truest, most non-cliched sense ever) are remarkable achievements. He remains, after thirty years, a huge inspiration to me. (more…)

Jimmy Carter and The Rabbit Incident

Even at the best of times, it’s no picnic being the President of the United States. Being President in the 1970s was practically impossible.

Nixon inherited the bloody Vietnam conflict and struggled to govern a deeply divided nation through the oil crisis, economic stagnation, and that little Watergate thing. Athletic, competent Gerald Ford started out his brief presidency by pardoning Nixon for his crimes, heroically sparing the country an even more divisive trial; for his trouble, he got not one but two assassination attempts, and Chevy Chase turned him into a bumbling national joke. But nothing compares to the travails of our Thirty-ninth President, James Earl Carter. Double digit inflation. A bloated and unresponsive federal government. The collapse of Iran, the rise of radical Islam, and the intractable hostage crisis.

And the rabbits. The relentless, murderous rabbits.

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Five 1970s Ads That Make Me Facepalm

By Emily Carney

Apparently in the 1970s, taste and class were elements not yet added to advertising pitches. I have several interesting books related to 1970s ads including some truly classy ones. I actually bought these when I briefly studied ad writing in college. I am just going to provide a brief capsule summary of “the best” and I will allow you, dear reader, to write the rest of the scenarios depicted in your skull. Good luck and have fun.
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Craziest 1970s Pitchman: When Neil Armstrong Pimped Cars

By Emily Carney

The best visual representation of the madness in 1970s advertising is probably former Apollo astronaut and space hero Neil Armstrong being seen advertising Chrysler automobiles.
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Girl Talk, All Day

By Janet Brusselbach

It feels really good to be listening to free music that’s not only intended to be free, but that’s also really good.
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San Diego Comic-Con Diary, Day Four

By Christian Lipski

Read:
Day One’s Diary
Day Two’s Diary
Day Three’s Diary

And then there was the last day. We eventually got up and packed our bags for checkout, and made our way to the convention floor for our last visit. Since it’s the last day and exhibitors want to ship as little as possible back home, there are rampant sales and many attendees only buy Sunday tickets.

Mile High Comics put their entire stock on sale for 50% off, for example. Independent publishers were willing to make deals, for the most part.The show closes at 5 p.m. as well, so the action in the convention center was tinged with both sadness and anxiety.
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San Diego Comic-Con Diary, Day Three

By Christian Lipski

Read:
Day One’s Diary
Day Two’s Diary

After going to bed sometime after 1 a.,m. the night before (late dinner), Saturday morning was pretty much a wash. I had a press conference for Futurama at 11:30 a.m., so I took off for the convention center. The room was about two-thirds full, and we all shifted about until the event began.

Matt Groening, David X. Cohen, Billy West, Maurice LeMarche, and Lauren Tom filed in to have their pictures taken before ascending the dais. They apologized for the absence of the voice of Bender, John Dimaggio, but it was explained that “Dimaggio” was Italian for “running late.” He did show up presently, and the conference began.
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San Diego Comic-Con 2010 Diary, Day Two

By Christian Lipski

Read:
Day One’s Diary

By the second day I feel much less pressure; I’ve already made a day’s worth of forays into the wilds, and though I haven’t seen nearly all of what there is, I have a good sense of the floor’s layout and content. I also know that it’s nearly useless to try to get into large sessions, since the amount of time you need to devote to the line-waiting is better spent wandering the floor below.
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