The Day The Earth Stood Still

Yesterday, I bought the DVD of the 1951 sci-fi classic The Day The Earth Stood Still. Hard to believe that this film was directed by the same man (Robert Wise) who directed The Sound of Music.

But that’s not why I used the title for this entry. You see, today I was laid off from my job. It seems to be a trend. This is the second time in three years that I’ve come home from SxSW and lost my job. This wasn’t entirely unexpected, or even unwelcome, but it’s still a little bit traumatic.

As some of you may know, I came back from Austin energized to move on with my life and do something for a living that I actually cared about. Sometimes life has a way of making the hard decisions for you. So, today the earth stood still, for a moment. But just for a moment. It’s up to me now to shape the future, as much as that’s possible.

Huzzah 4 Zilla!

Davezilla was written up in the Detroit News for a story on blogging. Does he really write his blog entries by hand in a notebook at Starbucks? On a side note, I didn’t realize that Ernie was really 12 different people and that one of those people isn’t real (note: I think they confused Ernie’s blog with one of his web games, in this case, PuppetMaster II). Props to Nikolai, too, who gets to talk about the Bloggies!(via natalie)

Spoon In The Internet Live Music Archive

This isn’t exactly breaking news, but Spoon has given permission for people to upload any live shows to the Internet Live Music Archive. There’s just one show there now, but expect this to grow over time. The files are in a lossless audio format (ie. not MP3) and it might take a bit of techie know-how to work with them, but I think that you can make some really great sounding CD-Rs from this stuff.

Oscars

I have surprisingly little to say about last night’s Oscar ceremony. I was pleased that Chicago didn’t sweep everything. I was pleased that The Pianist got some recognition. I enjoyed Adrien Brody‘s speech, especially the snogging he laid on Halle Berry. I was disappointed that three of the year’s best movies were essentially ignored: About Schmidt, Adaptation, and Far From Heaven. I wasn’t surprised that Michael Moore made an ass of himself (but I still like him). And though I don’t like Eminem, I’m glad his song won. I liked Steve Martin’s low-key but sometimes biting humour. And I’m happy that they finished by midnight. That is all.

Some friends told me that the Independent Spirit Awards were much better, and I’m disappointed that I wasn’t able to watch them.

42 Up

In 1964, British television aired a documentary entitled Seven Up, in which they interviewed a group of 14 seven-year old schoolchildren. Every seven years later, another documentary appeared to follow the progress of their lives. 42 Up (1998) is the latest of these films, and it is utterly compelling. The way the film maps the course of these children’s dreams and aspirations through the years gives you a real insight into both their individual lives and the society in which they grew up. My only regret is that if I watch any of the earlier films, I’ll know what happens afterward. Watching this film made me wonder if I’d like my life to be documented in this way. It must have been difficult for these people as middle-aged adults to look back on some of the things they wanted when they were children or teenagers or young adults. Happily, this film finds almost all of them in a period of contentment as I suppose is the task of middle-age. Highly recommended, although I’d try to track down some of the earlier films first.