WALL·E

As part of our summer holiday, the family Jordan visited Taunton Odeon to watch Pixar's latest blockbuster. The general consensus from my progeny was that it was a cute and enjoyable piece.

WALL·E was a curate's egg to me, the animation is some of the best I have ever witnessed, and the humour is creatively understated.

The decision to make most of the dialogue out of wordless blips and blops was courageous, and it works brilliantly.

The 'battery-farmed' humans are well observed, managing to be both pathetic and charming, although the captain's transition from 'passive' to 'hero' was a little sudden.

The Disney/Pixar optimistic-humanism continues to jar with my world-view, with no real explanation given as to why this bunch of humans are going to make any better a job of sorting the world out than the ones that preceded them.
------------

We're back...

from a very enjoyable 7 days of sleeping, reading, sunbathing, swimming, eating, drinking and watching movies and TV episodes on the kidz' computers.

The journey was uneventful, and the trains were air-conditioned and comfortable. However 14 hours to get to the South of France is a little too long (Zak was losing the will to live by Lille, and even I was beginning to ask "Are we there yet?" by Avignon).

Oh, and don't believe anyone who tells you there will be plenty of room for your luggage. We spent the return journey from St Raphael to Lille with our suitcases precariously balanced on the table between our seats.

For pictures of our stay visit my Flickr photostream.

Now, off out to get tea, milk, eggs, bacon and pastries.
------------

Off to St Fréjus

Up at 4.00am (assuming we have actually gone to bed), take the 140 bus to Harrow-on-the-Hill, then the Metropolitan Line to St Pancras, from there to Lille, then a long trawl to St Raphael.

Once there, Cyan will use her French skills to procure a 7-seater taxi that can ferry us to the St Fréjus Eurocamp site. Assuming all this goes smoothly we will be spending a leisurely week in a 3-bedroom air-conditioned trailer.

I have Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow to read and will occasionally emerge to swim, shop and eat. If there is internet access there may be the occasional blog and Flickr entry. If not, see you in a week.
------------

London-Somerset-London, 20-21 July

Right Beside You - Sophie B. Hawkins
Feuer Frei - Rammstein
Can You Dig It - The Mock Turtles
Bum Bum - Mabel
More Than A Feeling - Boston
Jessie's Girl - Rick Springfield
It Started With A Kiss - Hot Chocolate
Until The End of The World - Apoptygma Berzerk
Got To Get - Rob 'N' Raz feat. Leila K
I Wish I Could Fly (Orville's Song) - Keith Harris & Orville
Seven Little Girls (Sitting In The Back Seat) - Paul Evans
Up All Night - The Young Knives
Groovejet (If This Ain't Love) - Spiller (with Sophie Ellis-Bextor)
You're Moving Out Today - Carole Bayer Sager
Kill the Director - The Wombats
Sandstorm - Darude
Lend Me Your Face - Fight Like Apes
Oh My Gosh - Basement Jaxx
This Town Ain't Big Enough For The Both Of Us - Sparks
the real sugar baby (slim shady parody) - Sugar Baby
Stella - Ida Maria
Make Mistakes (Radio Edit) - Infadels
Shine A Little Love - Electric Light Orchestra
Waiting For A Star To Fall - Boy Meets Girl
Two Doors Down - Mystery Jets
Can't Stop Movin' (Radio Edit) - Sonny J
Baby, Now that I've Found You - Foundations
Not Nineteen Forever - The Courteeners
Crazy Angel - Kill Hannah
Don't Go Breaking My Heart - Elton John & Kiki Dee
Spanish Stroll - Mink DeVille
Black Betty - Spiderbait
Tell Me When - Human League
Bouncy Ball (Single Version) - Ladyfuzz
Let's Talk About It - White Denim
Walking On Sunshine - Katrina And The Waves
Let's Make Love And Listen To Death From Above - CSS
The Key The Secret - Urban Cookie Collective
Shake It Shake It - Thomas Tantrum
Give Him A Great Big Kiss - Shangri-Las
I Like the Way (Radio Edit) - Bodyrockers
Boten Anna - Basshunter
Are You Gonna Be My Girl (alt) - Jet
Pump Up the Jam - Technotronic feat. Felly
Just a Song About Ping Pong - Operator Please
Concrete And Clay - Unit 4 Plus 2
Hippy With a Banjo - Those Darn Accordions
Hot Love - T.Rex
I'm Not Sorry (Single Version) - The Pigeon Detectives
Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt (single) - We Are Scientists
Hummingbird - Born Ruffians
I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance With You - Black Kids
Secret Smile - Semisonic
Take On Me - Reel Big Fish
Cease and Desist - Brakes
Give me some kind of sign girl - Brenton Wood
There Ain't Half Been Some Clever Bastards - Ian Dury & The Blockheads
DVNO (Radio Edit) - Justice
American Idiot - Green Day
Make Me Smile (Come up and see me) - Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel
Learn To Fly - Foo Fighters
Handsfree (If You Hold My Hand) [Radio Edit] - Sonny J
Backfire At the Disco - The Wombats
Voodoo Child (Radio Edit) - Rogue Traders
Paris Is Burning (Radio Edit) - Ladyhawke
Tight - Mindless Self Indulgence
Wake Up Little Susie - Everly Brothers
Get What You Want - Operator Please
Colourful Life - Cajun Dance Party
Pretty in pink - Psychedelic Furs
Fashion Crisis Hits New York - The Frank & Walters
Pale Bride - The Von Bondies
X Offender - Blondie
Just Can't Get Enough - Depeche Mode
Queen of the World - Ida Maria
Juliet - Army Of Freshmen
Can't Go Back - Primal Scream
Pork and Beans - Weezer
Paris Is Burning - Ladyhawke
Gobbledigook - Sigur Rós
Du gamla du fria - BassHunter
Sam Hall - Johnny Cash
Blame It On The Boogie - The Jacksons
Hurricane Jane - Black Kids
Stupid cupid - Mandy Moore
Freedom Park - Marah
Toe Jam (feat. David Byrne) [Radio Edit] - The BPA
Shut Up and Let Me Go - The Ting Tings
Freak Scene - Dinosaur Jr.
The Other Man's Grass Is Always Greener - Petula Clark
White Winter Hymnal - Fleet Foxes
The Devil Went Down to Georgia - The Charlie Daniels Band
Celebrity Skin - Hole
Better Get To Livin' - Dolly Parton
Valerie (Baby J Remix) - Amy Winehouse & Mark Ronson
Elvis Ain't Dead - Scouting For Girls
Ruby don't take your love to town - Kenny Rogers
Young Girl - Gary Puckett & The Union Gap
Sweet About Me - Gabriella Cilmi
Dance Wiv Me (feat. Calvin Harris & Chrome) - Dizzee Rascal
China girl - David Bowie
No Social - The Shortwave Set
Sequestered In Memphis - The Hold Steady
Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend - Marylin Monroe
You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' - Righteous Brothers
Rasputin - Turisas
Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight ) - ABBA
I.O.U. (7" Version) - Freeez
I Told Her On Alderaan - Neon Neon
Cry For You - September
Letter from God to Man - Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip
I'm Gonna Make You Love Me - Supremes & Temptations
Your Friendship is the Best - Winnie the Pooh
Buried Alive By Love - H.I.M. (His Infernal Majesty)
Mono - Courtney Love
Nasty Nasty - 999
Disco Inferno - Trammps
------------

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns

'Batman: The Dark Knight Returns' was originally a 1986 DC comic book series, written and drawn by Frank Miller. It revived Batman's 1930s roots as a damaged and edgy superhero.

Set in the 'near future', Batman has been 'retired', following the death of the second Robin, and a gang of schoolchildren calling themselves the 'Mutants' are terrorizing Gotham City.

Following a failed attempt to rehabilitate Harvey Dent (Two-face), Batman, erm, returns and defeats Two-face. But rather than hailing Batman as a hero the media questions his motives, portraying him as a dangerous, psychopathic vigilante.

And so begins a sprawling, complex adventure that includes the Joker, Green Arrow, Superman and a 13-year-old female Robin. The drawing and inking is uniformly excellent, and the writing is a good example of how you can maintain a strong narrative without pages of explanatory prose (Watchmen 'cheats' in this area).

If you think that graphic novels are just comics for semi-illiterate growed-ups, this is the book that may change your mind. If it doesn't, I can't think of one that would, except maybe Miller's equally superb Sin City series. Oh well, that's another blog to prepare.
------------

Watchmen, the movie

I blogged on the graphic novel a while back, and mentioned that a movie was imminent. Well, a trailer is now available.
------------

Iceberg Water Climber

Forget bouncy castles, for a mere $6,000 you could purchase a 14 foot Iceberg Water Climber. Three of its sides feature climbing walls of varying difficulty, and the fourth is a slide. Ocean not included.
------------

My wishlist for the next iPhone

The second version of the iPhone has arrived, and it is very hard to find a negative review of it. And there have been more of them sold in a weekend than most mobile phone models sell in a year. I will soon be the only person on this planet without one.

But I'm gritting my teeth and waiting. My 4-year-old 60GB iPod Photo is still working fine, and my Nokia E65 is more pocketable, and has useful features that the iPhone lacks.

So Steve and Jonathan, here's a few features to put on your 'iPhone III' to do list. Ta.

- 64GB of memory
- The option to use a keyboard via Bluetooth
- Wireless modem functionality
- A better camera, with optical zoom and video ability
- Stereo Bluetooth
- Cut and paste
- 640 x 480 pixel screen
- A 'big text and buttons' option for in-car use
- Ability to run .flv and .mov files
- WiFi streaming of music to Airport Express
- A micro-SD slot
- Option to view time/to do list in sleep mode
------------

Humans to merge with machines

CNN reports: [edited]

A group of experts from around the world will hold a first of its kind conference Thursday on global catastrophic risks. They will discuss what should be done to prevent these risks from becoming realities that could lead to the end of human life on Earth as we know it.

On the final day of the Global Catastrophic Risk Conference, experts will focus on what could be the unintended consequences of new technologies, such as superintelligent machines that, if ill-conceived, might cause the demise of Homo sapiens.

"Any entity which is radically smarter than human beings would also be very powerful," said Dr. Nick Bostrom, director of Oxford's Future of Humanity Institute, host of the symposium. "If we get something wrong, you could imagine the consequences would involve the extinction of the human species. We want to preserve the best of what it is to be human and maybe even amplify that".

Transhumanists, according to Bostrom, anticipate an era in which biotechnology, molecular nanotechnologies, artificial intelligence and other new types of cognitive tools will be used to amplify our intellectual capacity, improve our physical capabilities and even enhance our emotional well-being.

The end result would be a new form of "posthuman" life with beings that possess qualities and skills so exceedingly advanced they no longer can be classified simply as humans.

- - - - -

Brett's 2p'orth: The rest of the article is worth a read, although a bit of a 'Gosh-wow' piece, it addresses an issue that is inevitable and whose ethical ramifications are complex and ambiguous.
------------

Balmuda Highwire LED light

Balmuda Design reports: [edited]

Highwire is a LED desk lamp which emits enough light for practical use. Generally a desktop work area needs around 300-700 lux of light in order to be able to work comfortably. Highwire produces more than 1,000 Lux.

Highwire is not only the brightest LED desk lamp but also has an incredibly long life span. It keeps 70% of its original light output even after 50,000 hours. The colour emitted by Highwire matches the color of a computer display. The light coming from Highwire does not include infrared rays and so emits less heat.

Highwire is equipped with a slow start and stop mechanism in which the light gradually brightens when turned on and dims when turned off.
------------

Jupiter loses third red spot

New Scientist reports: [edited]

Jupiter's third giant red storm has been chewed up by a collision with the planet's other two red spots and does not appear to have survived.

Astronomers are still scrambling to capture pictures of the aftermath, but it appears Jupiter's third spot was torn up last week when it squeezed between its larger cousins, the Great Red Spot and Red Spot Junior. The third spot first appeared earlier this year when a white storm turned scarlet.

On Wednesday, traces of clumpy red material seemed to have survived, although "it's not really a spot any more", Glenn Orton at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, US, said. "It's just sort of scrambled. It's a blob."

Jupiter's spots are massive, hurricane-like storms. The Great Red Spot, which is three times the diameter of Earth, has been raging for at least 340 years. Red Spot Jr, also known as Oval BA, turned red in 2006.

The third red spot had been moving toward the Great Red Spot, but its ill-fated positioning between the two other spots came as a surprise. "I didn't think it would get mashed between two of the largest storms in the solar system," Orton told New Scientist. "That's not something anyone anticipated."
------------

Pioneer Kuro PDP-LX5090 plasma HD TV

Register Hardware have published a review of Pioneer's new plasma screen. There is a lot of talk about LCD vs plasma performance, but from my experience the bottom line is that a good plasma screen beats a good LCD screen every time, creating an more involving, natural visual experience. And it looks like Pioneer's latest series has improved things another notch.
------------

John Adams

Based on David McCullough's bestselling biography, 'John Adams' chronicles the early years of the United States of America, with special focus on its second president, his family, friends and colleagues.

Paul Giamatti plays John Adams with breadth, depth and gritty conviction, while Laura Linney is fantastic as Abigail, his devoted wife, friend and loving critic.

The complexities of the human relationships involved in the formative years of independent America are deftly portrayed, as are the huge differences in the transport, communication and medical knowledge that existed at the time.

The English are definitely portrayed as 'baddies', but never in a caricatured manner, and John Adams' meeting with the English king is particularly illuminating.

The last years of John Adams life are detailed and measured in pace, as the once vigorous participants in America's independence grow old and die. Often sad, but never maudlin, this is the most successful part of the series.

History is not my strong point, and American history even less-so, but I feel like I know a little more after the 7 hours I spent watching this series, and hope there will be others like it produced in the future.
------------

Tour de France 2008

Big Picture has collected a stunning array of images depicting this gruelling test of muscle and technology.
------------

Batman Gotham Knight

I blogged on this one a while back. My copy arrived today, and I was pleased to discover that my fifteen quid had purchased not just a Blu-ray disc in a cheap plastic case, but a well-produced character guide as well. Will report back as to whether the film lives up to expectations.
------------

Bic to market 'disposable' phone

Digital Lifestyles reports: [edited]

BIC, famous for disposable pens and lighters, is launching the BIC Phone in France.

As with their other products, the BIC Phone focuses on core functions - making and receiving phone calls & texts.

Available in two colours, citrus orange and lime green, the USP of the BIC mobile phone is that it’s ready to go when you buy it - the BIC Phone is charged and ready to go with 60 minutes of credit onboard.

It’s going to be available, from around September, only in France, in major supermarkets and local convenience stores for 49 Euros.
------------

The Condemned

I didn't have high hopes for this World Wrestling Entertainment vehicle, but it had some surprisingly good reviews, and was available to rent on Blu-ray, so I thought I'd give it a try.

The storyline is simple, put 10 death-row prisoners on an island with the aim of only one of them leaving it alive.

So far, so predictable. But the sub-plot is that there are web-cams across the island, and evil millionaire Ian Breckel (Robert Mammone) is betting that millions of people across the world will pay $50 per person to watch the show online.

Although there are going to be no Oscars awarded for the acting, the growing realisation among Breckel's employees that this is very, very wrong is well played, and the way that the 'entertainment' they are creating becomes reality is well-paced and involving.

Man-mountain Steve Austin plays the 'good-guy' part well and, after a shaky start, Vinny Jones brings a convincing damaged nastiness to his familiar 'baddie' role.

As an action movie that will provoke a little thought, this one is worth a watch, and if you have the facility to watch it in Blu-ray, the 1080p image quality is superb.
------------

Eight stunning actresses, redux

OK, and I also forgot about Ziyi Zhang, star of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; Hero; House of Flying Daggers; Memoirs of a Geisha... simply stunning.
------------

HDR landscape

Klaus Norby has published a Blade Runner-style zoomable HDR photo, along with the 12 photos he used to produce it.
------------

Milla Jovovich

Was driving into work today, and realised I had left Milla off my Eight stunning actresses list.

I fell in love with her as Leelo in Fifth Element ("Multipass!" is now part of the Jordan family vocabulary). I have since seen her in a number of movies, some excellent (Joan of Arc and Zoolander), some not-so-excellent (Resident Evil), and some execrable (Resident Evil: Apocalypse, Resident Evil: Extinction and Ultraviolet).

Now I've got to work out who she would have replaced in the orginal eight. Decisions, decisions!
------------