Total Recalled

How come I never hear about things until well after the fact?

For those who didn't click the link above (and probably some who did) let me elucidate: They are remaking Total Recall!

Why they are doing this is not really a secret. In short, fewer people are paying $13.00 a ticket to watch movies in room full of inconsiderate people, fewer people are buying Low-Def DVDs to watch on their High-Def TVs, and even fewer people are buying overpriced DRM protected locked BDs (Can anyone say "Netflix"?).

So Hollywood is turtling into the realm of 'Safe' movies (i.e. remakes, low budget productions, etc.). And what could be safer than remaking a successful movie. And that's not all, it's one of the most successful of the many adaptations of Philip K. Dick's writings. For the record, these other adaptations are Blade Runner (1982), Screamers (1995), Total Recall 2070 (1999 TV Series), Imposter (2002), Minority report (2002), Paycheck (2003), A Scanner Darkly (2006), and The Adjustment Bureau (2011). Also in the works are a Blade Runner Sequel and a Prequel.

Will I go see it? That is question that I can't answer yet.

Interestingly, it seems that Colin Farrell didn't get enough of a taste of (P. K.) Dick. Previously he played a fatally naive detective on Minority Report, opposite Tom Cruise. I just don't know how successful they will be replacing an Austrian Oak with an Irish Twig.

Be sure to check out the picture of the flying car prop over on the Wikipedia page.

P.s. Somebody please pick up the Lone Ranger project! So typical to cut a potentially good film when the crappy one you just made bombs at the box office

Oldie, But Far From Classic

Book Review - Whipping Star by Frank Herbert

Every so often I manage to attend the yearly book sale at my local library. Last year I just happened to notice the sign while driving by. . .

Fifty cents (CDN) for a hardcover is a very good price, assuming you can find something you like.

One of the books from my haul last year was Whipping Star by Frank Herbert. Now I admit that the last thing I read by Mr. Herbert was Dune. And that was over a decade ago. What I remember is that the book was kinda obtuse and overly dense. Of course, I was seventeen at the time that I read that tome.

Despite my first impression of Herbert's writing, I bought this novel.

Or perhaps novelette would be a more apt description. The first thing I noticed when I picked up the book was that it was quite thin. Opening the book revealed rather large font. Font almost large enough for the elderly to read.

That being said, it felt kind of refreshing to read a story that wasn't plumped up 500% like many books being written today.

Synopsis

The Empire was built on a gift from a mysterious alien race, a gift that allows instantaneous transport to any place in the universe. Now the last member of the alien race is being slowly tortured to death by a madwoman and it soon becomes clear that once the alien dies anyone who has ever transported will wink out of existence. . . and no-one is known to have not transported.

Verdict

My first impression of the writing was that it was amateurish. While reading those first few pages I surmised that this must be one of Herbert's early works. So I looked up some dates on the internet to confirm this idea, but alas, I was wrong. 1945 appears to be when his first short story was published. 1963 was when Dune appeared. 1970 is when the book form of whipping star was published (apparently a shorter version was published in Worlds of If Science Fiction the year before). I think it's safe to assume that Whipping Star was written to keep Herbert's pot of water boiling.

One thing that intrigued me was Herbert's invention called the Bureau of Sabotage, although it was not fully developed in this short work. In fact it mostly came across as just another government agency.

Herbert also created some cool alien names in this book which mostly offset the negative aspects of the Law of Alien Names. Despite this, the names match up to some pretty average aliens. That's not to say that there isn't some experimentation, especially with the eponymous race (what you couldn't figure that one out from the title?). At least, should a movie ever be made from this story, the aliens couldn't all be played by people with rubber masks.

The main character reads very much like an ethnologist from the 1960's. I picture him as a burly man wearing flannel, arrogant and full of bluster (pretty much exactly like this guy). His ethos is characterized by an oblivious humano-centrism, much as real ethnologists from the mid twentieth century were ignorant of their Euro-centrism. Central to this attitude is also the belief that everything can be understood (usually with only casual observation). Typical of literature from this period, this attitude is always correct and successful.

One last thing - I don't normally condone vandalising library books, but. . .



Rating: **.5/5

Hanna (2011)

Okay, not SF. Maybe fantasy if you take that word at its base meaning.

Whatever, I'm going to review Hanna anyway.

This could have been a good movie. At times it actually is a great movie. However, bad pacing and plot holes bring this one down.

Unfortunately for a 'thriller', this one starts out slow, without a hook, and continues in this rut for far too long. On its own, the opener wouldn't be such a bad movie. One I might not watch, but not bad. Does it fit where it is? Not so much.

Then the narrative finally switches and it seems that we get the movie that was advertised.

But the action is short lived. We then get a fish out of water story not unlike the movie Nell. Oh, there's also a bit of a lesbian romance.

Eventually the bad guys catch up with Hanna and there is a brief flash of excitement. Hanna totally outclasses these thugs, yet she opts to jump in the river rather than finish the bad guys off and rescue the family that has been helping her. The movie dishonestly leaves the fate of the family off camera. However, everyone else that encounters the bad guys meet gruesome ends and it is unlikely that the family would have escaped a similar end.

From here it's all downhill. The only gun seen (and used) belongs to the main antagonist which works quite well for her until Hanna remembers how to use it.

Ultimately this movie revels in a bleak, masochistic view of the world and offers little entertainment in return. I recommend last year's Kick-Ass over this movie.

Rating: **/5

Cyberpunk lives!

Guess I'm going to have to re-read Neuromancer soon. . .

I remember when I first heard about Cube. Like so many movies, the trailer was better than the feature. But It did prompt me to watch each of its sequels. (for a really good Canadian film check out Foolproof)

I haven't seen Splice yet. It really doesn't look like my thing.

At any rate, I think Natali is probably the right man for the job.

Blu-ray Sucks!

I'm sick and tired of Blu-ray DRM. More specifically, I'm tired of buying movies and having to wait upwards of a month to watch it because the latest firmware for my player isn't out yet. I'm tired of disc load times that creep ever upward. I'm tired of disc failures due to damaged DRM tracks. I'm sick because I payed for this headache. And I'm sick because I also payed for an expensive Blu-ray drive for my computer that requires an even more expensive piece of software that still won't play my movies!

The insanity of it all is that there is absolutely no reason to keep changing the encryption every time a new movie comes out. Let me be absolutely clear on this point: DRM does not stop pirates! What it does manage to do, and do quite well I might add, is piss of those of us that insist on giving our money to these jokers.

Now why is it that everyone seems to be joining Netflix?

Kobo Touch 1.9.5

Update!

The 1.9.5 firmware update (full details here) for the Kobo Touch adds a fully featured text adjustment menu. There is now a slider to adjust margins, a slider to adjust line spacing, and a slider to adjust font size. You can also select left aligned or justified text.

Most importantly, there are new Fonts! The Kobo Touch came pre-packaged with Avenir and Georgia. Now it also has Amasis, Delima, Felbridge, Gill Sans, and Rockwell.

You can even add your own fonts! There is room on the font menu for five more fonts that you can load yourself. Just make a folder called fonts (not Fonts) and put the OpenType or TrueType font files in there. Right now I have Bookman Old Style, Calibri, Charis SIL, Segoe UI, and a modified version of Nimbus (not fully functional on the Kobo) made by the mobileread forum user delphin.

I've also tried Book Antiqua, Cambria, DejaVu Sans, DejaVu Sans Mono, DejaVu Serif, Droid Serif, Garamond, Garamond Premier Pro, Liberation Serif, and Minion Pro.

Note: Italic and bold text in side-loaded books seems to have been broken by this update.

My wish list for future updates: Dictionary and highlighting for side-loaded books, library sorting options (Author, Genre, length, etc.), a notepad, first line indent.

Variable Star by Robert A. Heinlein and Spider Robinson

Sadly, I cannot recommend Variable Star by Robert A. Heinlein and Spider Robinson, but read on if you would like to know more.

Synopsis

A young man with a promising career as a composer, and who also happens to be the son of a Nobel Prize winning genius, discovers that the woman he wants to marry is actually the heir to one of the biggest, and wealthiest, dynasties in the solar system. He has been deemed worthy by the patriarch of the family and everything is ready to proceed. One hitch, he has to give up his career as a musician, his surname, and all the dreams he had for the future.

Sounds like a deal, right?

Instead he joins a colony ship heading out for the stars and far, far away from the only woman he has ever loved.

My thoughts

Let me state right off the start that I have never before read anything by Robert Heinlein nor Spider Robinson. Perhaps fans of either author will find more in this offering. Perhaps not.

To begin with, this is not a Heinlein book. Spider Robinson was told not to write one. This is a book based on an unfinished outline for a juvenile novel that Heinlein shelved early in his career. It also carries on with some of Heinlein's themes and is set in a version of Heinlein's 'Future History' universe. How exactly this version differs from Heinlein's own I can't really say, but there is one rather large event half way through the book that I'm pretty sure mucks things up really well.

It most definitely is not appropriate as a juvenile novel.

I don't know how Variable Star compares to Robinson's other works, but this one was not for me. His language skills are proficient enough; I have no problem there. The problem is that there are really three stories here, each of which could have been given their own treatment. Or rather, they should have received their own treatment. The first is a romance story, the second a tale of a generational ship, and the third. . . well I won't spoil it for you. The storylines sit mostly on their own, growing from the previous story but never returning, not really interdependent. Each could probably have been worked to stand on their own as a short story or novella. Each has enough changes in theme or genre to cater to an entirely different audience than the last.

I also found that too much depended on sheer coincidence. It's a pet peeve of mine. I find that it interrupts my suspension of disbelief. But that might just be me, and I realize that coincidence is not only necessary in some degree for most narratives, but that it actually does happen in real life too.

Parting Shots

Apparently there are three sequels forthcoming. Maybe then we'll get an answer to the mystery of the poppy incident.

I did enjoy the little tidbits of Canadiana that Robinson inserted here and there. Now if he would just learn more about the rest of his adopted country. . .

I wish I had bought the paperback version. I got the hardcover on impulse; it was in a bargain bin at Coles. Normally I like to do a little research before a purchase, but hey, the price was right. What I later learned was that the Cover Art, mostly covered up by a text box on my copy, was done by none other than Stephan Martiniere (whom I wrote about here). As you can probably tell from the article behind my parenthetical link, I'm a fan of his work. Such work as is displayed much better on the paperback edition. . .

Rating: **/5