For those of you who don’t know, I co-wrote the video game ASSASSIN’S CREED II. A very exciting gig to be part of.
Just last week, one of the sequences I wrote solo was released as a DLC (Downloadable Content) – and to promote it, a trailer was released.
You have to watch it. This is very cool.
I love seeing all my dialogue and action scenes rearranged into trailer moments.
My favorite is a line taken from the beginning of the sequence — when Ezio hears he’s going to be helping the very sexy Caterina Sforza. And being the horndog he is, says: “I think I’m going to like this mission.” — But for the trailer, they build up slowly to it, using all these incredible action shots: Boom! Boom! Boom! And then cut to Ezio, smiling knowingly:
Um, as you may have noticed, I haven’t really given Subverse much love this year. It is what it is.
But I invite you to take a gander at my new and very exciting (and very different) new site. It’s an Image Stream, that I curate with my friend Donovan. It’s kinda deep.
Man, I have always loved this Hal Hartley dance number!
And whatever happened to Elina Löwensohn? She was too cool and so beautiful.
I got to rent her video tapes at Kim’s Video once, 12 years ago when I was but a lowly video store clerk. I told her I was a fan. She was surprised I knew who she was, and hung out and flirted with me for a few minutes. Made my day!
Check out some great animated pieces I found online this morning.
This is a music video from an Israeli singer named Oren Lavie, with some lovely uplifting stop-motion. Utterly charming…
There’s a page all about how the video was made: here. It notes:
* Some of the bed sheets used in the video were taken from Oren’s own bedroom and are now considered collectors items, worth at the moment not very much and therefore used as bed sheets.
Here’s a trailer for a film called “Sita Sings the Blues,” that was animated by a woman named Nina Paley.
Here’s the description:
“Sita is a goddess separated from her beloved Lord and husband Rama. Nina is an animator whose husband moves to India, then dumps her by email. Three hilarious shadow puppets narrate both ancient tragedy and modern comedy in this beautifully animated interpretation of the Indian epicRamayana. Set to the 1920’s jazz vocals of Annette Hanshaw, Sita Sings the Blues earns its tagline as “The Greatest Break-Up Story Ever Told.”
Okay, I’m clearly in a childish mood these days. First “Where the Wild Things Are,” and now this. But so be it, this made me very happy too.
Feist singing her song “1, 2, 3, 4″ on Sesame Street, changing the words to better fit. But it already seems as if it was always meant to be right here…
Yummm…
These first images released from Spike Jonez’ and Dave Eggers’ “Where The Wild Things Are” are making me very happy. (click the pics for larger images)
And you must check this out too: A small scene has leaked online, and it’s adorable.
You can really hear Eggers’ voice in the writing. And it has that casual, psychedelic feel of the old “Little Prince” film from the 70s. Just a kid chatting with his imaginary monster, the way any kid would.
And, though I know some people aren’t too excited that Jonez chose to use animatronic puppets for the Wild Things, I personally think it’s great. We’re so used to seeing everything done with CGI these days, but you just can’t beat the reality of old school, man-in-a-suit muppetry. It’s Big Bird, who’s just so clearly, physically there standing in front of us. He’s literally keepin’ it real. I applaud that.
This week’s eclectic mix moves from soul to hip hop, through big orchestra to singer-songwriter lushness. But each track has that sticky funk, that gets in your head and makes you want to groove. Whether they’re singing about the stickiness of good lovin’, that makes you want to hang around for more – or the sticky good greenery you want to roll up and huff and puff – these ten tunes are gonna get in your soul, and keep you coming back for more.
Sample the tracks individually, or download a Zip File (78MB) of all the tracks here.
I really am a little obsessed with zombies. Even this bizarre video caught my attention, and even kinda gave me the chills.
At the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center in the Philippines, inmates have found the perfect way to pass the time: memorizing the dance choreography to American pop anthems of the 80s. The crowning achievement has to be their rendition of Michael Jackson’s ”Thriller” video, complete with a guy in drag playing his date, while they’re surrounded by hordes of unruly undead (performing pretty awesome zombie dance moves!).
Now, is it just me, or at the beginning when that “couple” is suddenly surrounded by a thousand orange-jump-suit clad zombies, and the trannie girlfriend is acting all terrified – well, it’s really a little scary, isn’t it?
I’ve always intended for Subverse to be an MP3 blog (among other things). But I have been woefully lazy in the year and three months now that this site has existed. It’s time to start following through on my original idea.
My hope (or rather, as my shrink insists I say, my plan) is to put up two mixes a month – every other Sunday.
SUNDAY MIXES: Consisting of curated music on a theme, ideally meant to be listened to in order, as a DJ-ed set.
A mix-tape from me to you.
Today’s theme is simply the weather of this weekend I’ve spent at the farmhouse (in upstate New York). It’s gone from breathtakingly beautiful summer sun across the flower gardens and lush green hillsides – to moody grey hours of drizzling rain and thunder rumbling in the heavy clouds. Only to, once again, be surprised by a peek of golden light breaking through the grey over the Hudson River just before sunset.
And so today’s Sunday Mix No. 1 offers a similar journey. From the joy of a sunny morning upstate, to the quiet of an afternoon indoors, and back again.
Electric Sheep is a nu-jazz group associated with Kyoto Jazz Massive. More important is the vocal contributions of Ua, Tokyo’s answer to Bjork. Beautiful and mysterious, Ua is much too little known in America, and she should be very famous. Her voice is transfixing and uplifiting, whether she’s scatting or jazzing or deep soul-ing, i want to crawl inside the sensuous sounds she makes and rest there a while.
My god, what a blast from my childhood…
I actually still have that red-and-blue Shogun Warrior in my room in my parents’ house. And for years, I’ve had no idea what he was or where he came from.
I love when little mysteries like these are solved.
His name, apparently, is Great Mazinga! (With rocket launchers.)
Love it.
“Hey, sweetheart. Wanna come up to my room and see my great mazinga?”
And that line about Godzilla: “Imagine his breath is a blast of fire!”
I’m afraid I’ve dated girls I didn’t have to imagine.
Thanks to Plaid Stallions for the hook-up. A great romp through the past.
This is quite amusing. An episode of the short-run British TV series “Danger 50,000 Volts,” in which Nick Frost and Simon Pegg of “Shaun of the Dead” teach us valuable lessons about how to survive a zombie apocalypse.
“When I was growing up, only the geeky and socially marginal people were into stuff like Spiderman and JRR Tolkien. But in the last five years they’ve become the biggest entertainment phenomena around. How did it get so nerds are suddenly driving popular culture?
“I almost miss the stigma that used to attach to these things. Now everybody’s into Tolkien. And I feel a little like, hey, I’ve been into that stuff my whole life. And in fact, you used to beat me up for it.”
“Everybody has that thing where they need to look one way but they come out looking another way and that’s what people observe. you see someone on the street and essentially what you notice about them is the flaw. It’s just extraordinary that we should have been given these peculiarities. And, not content with what we were given, we create a whole other set. Our whole guise is like giving a sign to the world to think of us in a certain way but there’s a point between what you want people to know about you and what you can’t help people knowing about you.
“And that has to do with what I’ve always called the gap between intention and effect. I mean if you scrutinize reality closely enough, if in some way you really, really get to it, it becomes fantastic. You know it really is totally fantastic that we look like this and you sometimes see that very clearly in a photograph. Something is ironic in the world and it has to do with the fact that what you intend never comes out like you intend it.”
The corrupt and brutal regime of President Ceausescu of Romania was infamous across the world. His ferocious government had run the country emphatically for many years, crushing any sings of dissent ruthlessly. In November 1989 he was re-elected President for another five years as his supporters at Party Conference gave him forty standing ovations.
On December 21st the President, disturbed by a small uprising in the western city of Timisoara in support of a Protestant Clergyman, was persuaded to address a public rally in Bucharest.
One solitary man in the crowd, Nica Leon, sick to death with Ceausescu and the dreadful circumstances he created for everyone started shouting in favour of the revolutionaries in Timisoara. The crowd around him, obedient to the last, thought that when shout out “long life Timisoara!” it was some new political slogan. They started chanting it too. It was only when he called, “Down with Ceausescu!” that they realized something wasn’t quite right. Terrified, they tried to force themselves away from him, dropping the banners they had been carrying. In the crush the wooden batons on which the banners were held began to snap underfoot and women start screaming. – The ensuing panic sounded like booing.
The unthinkable was happening. Ceausescu stood there on his balcony, ludicrously frozen in uncertainty, his mouth opening and shutting. Even the official camera shook with fright. Then the head of security walked swiftly across the balcony towards him and whispered, “They’re getting in.” It was clearly open on the open microphone and was broadcast over the whole country on live national radio.
This was the start of the revolution. Within a week Ceausescu was dead.
- from graffiti artist Banksy, in his book “Wall and Piece”
Source: John Simpson BBC News
meaning simply… do you really need so much of it?
here’s a fun little Flash anime Time Eater for all you with just too much of it.
a little old school skateboarding, Atari “Pitfall” style.
it’s utterly pointless and repetitive, and yet, i don’t know, tapping away at those little arrow keys (and Space to jump!) brings a sort of Zen calm over me.
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