Monday, October 29, 2007

How movies helped change America


Treasures III: Social Issues in American Film, 1900–1934. DVD Project Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Film Preservation Board

Prohibition, abortion, unions, atheism, the vote for woman, organized crime, loan sharking, juvenile justice, homelessness, police corruption, immigration – in their first decades movies brought an astonishing range of issues to the screen. [...] Treasures III brings this period to life ...

National Film Preservation Foundation

WB.

Friday, October 12, 2007

Primer

I watched this sci-fi movie yesterday. One of the rare cases a director was able to tell a scifi story without to strain the usual devices like phantastic machines and those foolish explanations about their functionality and the like. The movie hasn't any philosophical content nor intentions (paradoxes about parallel worlds and changing one by doing something in the other, even though the protagonists have to deal with them) and you can simply enjoy their profane and technical dialogs, which cover most of the film.

PRIMER is set in the industrial park/suburban tract-home fringes of an unnamed contemporary city where two young engineers, Abe and Aaron, are members of a small group of men who work by day for a large corporation while conducting extracurricular experiments on their own time in a garage. While tweaking their current project, a device that reduces the apparent mass of any object placed inside it by blocking gravitational pull, they accidentally discover that it has some highly unexpected capabilities--ones that could enable them to do and to have seemingly anything they want. Taking advantage of this unique opportunity is the first challenge they face. Dealing with the consequences is the next.

Primer

WB.

Tuesday, October 9, 2007

Fundamentalism vs. Evolution


The Creative Archive Pages of the British Film Institute feature

video clips made available for free download to users in the United Kingdom under the innovative Creative Archive Licence, to stimulate creative re-use for non-commercial purposes.

Watch the clip Fundamentalism vs. Evolution which shows a
Head-on train smash staged at 'Monkeyville' to typify clash in U.S.A. between adherents of Bible and followers of Darwin. All America is watching the blaze of conflict between Science and the Scriptures...

Fundamentalism vs. Evolution


WB.

Monday, October 8, 2007

Cesky Sen

I watched this beautiful movie yesterday. There is hope.

Cesky Sen

Yours,
WB.

Thursday, October 4, 2007

The Victory of all-embracing Control called a City

Watch this site. Its about the City of the Future according to the weird visions of its inventor.
Victory Cities

It's an entire city all under one roof, to be built and operated by private enterprise alone. There will not be just one, but many such cities throughout the entire world. Boasting no crime, no pollution, and no over-crowding, Victory City is a veritable utopia for those who've grown weary of trying to find solutions to today's urban problems.

One might ask whether this is still a city or yet an asylum for the normally insane. Will the people that might live there (actually no Victory City is existent by now) be called inhabitants or inmates?

Lock your doors,

WB.

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

hazardous waste

Once the hazardous waste of the future, but still much more beautiful than today's:
Computer History Museum

Use phoneboxes, lined paper and card files.
WB.

Punchcard Art

Watch this:

Do Not Fold, Bend, Spindle or Mutilate: Computer Punch Card Art - Virtual Exhibition

The punch cards in this exhibit were manufactured 35 years ago but were never used. The staff of the Visual Arts Center mailed the cards, or in this case canvases, to a wide selection of artists and cultural figures. Participants were instructed to create artworks using the cards and to return their artistic creations to the VAC. They were free to write, paint, draw, cut, print, and/or do whatever they wished with the punch card in direct contradiction to the traditional dire warning: "Do not fold, bend, spindle or mutilate."

Monday, October 1, 2007

more Science Songs

Here some more Science Songs (available as sheets) by Biophysicist Greg Crowther. Sing along!

more science songs