Year: 2005

Angels in America

You might be a little surprised by the fact that the amount of movie review posted in the last few days decreased dramatically. I assure that I haven’t stopped watching movies. Neither I have decreased the number of them. And neither I am going totally lazy with blogging. It’s just that I have been watching “Angels in America“.

You might be tricked by the “mini” sign at IMDB at first, but please don’t be. If you will check the duration field a bit lower on the page, you will find a magnificant number of 352 minutes, which is almost 6 hours. Yup. “Angels in America” is not exactly a movie. It is a 6-episode series (approximately 1 hour each) done by HBO. It is not a movie, but it is as close as the television program can get. It’s a film.

And not only it’s just a film, it’s really great one. It is one of the best films that I have seen in the last 10 years. Maybe even in my whole life…

This is a story about few people in New York City at the end of the 20th century. Some of them are homosexual. Some of them have AIDS. There are some angels and mormons around. There is a great drama going on.

Having said that this movie is one of the best I have seen, I can be a little bit more concrete:

  • It is one of the best dramas that I have ever seen.
  • It is one of the best films on religion and belief that I have ever seen.
  • It is one of the best films on homosexuality that I have ever seen.
  • It is one of the best films on AIDS that I have ever seen.
  • It is one of the best films on general philosophy that I have ever seen.

A really excellent story is supported by acting of such talants as Al Pacino andMeryl Streep. Outstanding performances were delivered by Justin Kirk, Ben Shenkman, Mary-Louise Parker, and Jeffrey Wright. Others did pretty good too.

There was some really amazing photography and unbelievable camera work. By the way, if anyone has seen this movie and can tell me how they could possibly do those mega super huge zooms, please do so. I have no idea at the moment.

Anyway, the film does score a pure, clean and hard 10 out of 10 in my book. The only complain that I have is a slightly longer pauses when the phylosophy kicks in. There are ideas and thoughts that not everyone of us think over that often. Feeding those at a speed of light is not a very good idea, since people in the audience get lost. Olga and I were both losing the grip several times by ideas provided by different characters in the same dialogue. Now is there anything wrong with that? Depatable, but it’s there.

I will for sure watch it at least once again to give more attention to details. I also would like to have it on DVD in my home collection. Now the question is why Hollywood is not making films like that?

Prozac Nation

I just watched a really amazing movie on DVD – “Prozac Nation“. It is based on a best-selling book by Elizabeth Wurtzel, which tells the story of a depressed young girl, daughter of devorced parents. The interesting part is in the perspective. This girl does not realize that she has a depression and needs to be treated, which is the problem that a lot of people are having. I don’t know how accurate the movie was done, since I haven’t read the book, yet. So I won’t comment on that.

Apart from the perspective, another different side of the film was casting. There were plenty of celebrities, but mostly all of them are young Hollywood stars – Christina Ricci, Anne Heche, Michelle Williams, Jason Biggs and Jonathan Rhys-Meyers. Older generation was represented by Jessica Lange. All of them weren’t for nothing. There were plenty of excellent acting.

Excellent photography and good soundtrack do compliment the movie.

Directing was rather weak, I think. There wasn’t enough drama and cast wasn’t pushed to the limit, although some of them went pretty far.

Overall, an excellent film – 9 out of 10.

Jacket button

Jacket button

Today’s ‘Picture of the day’ submission portraits a piece of my jacket. I find it a bit amuzing that I was wearing this jacket for many years, also at times when I was trying to find a subject to photograph, and I never looked at it. It turned out to be pretty photogenic. Mostly it is due to the many interesting colors (a combination of white, greenish cyan, blue and black) and textures (it is combined of slightly different fabrics too).

Once again I am convinced that pictures are all around us and all we have to do is just stop for a fraction of the second and look.

Album location: /photos/2005/2005-01-18_POTD

News from Fedora front

The preliminary schedule for Fedora Linux Core 4 has been released. In short:

  • test1 is scheduled for February 21
  • test2 is scheduled for March 21
  • test3 is scheduled for April 18
  • final release is scheduled for May 16

In terms of features we can expect GCC 4, Xen integration, more Java, more SELinux, and a bunch of usual updates – KDE 3.4, Gnome 2.10, Xorg 6.8.2, etc. You can read the copy of the mailinglist message from Bill Nottingham for more details.

Also, Fedora Core 2 will most probably be transfered to Fedora Legacy project around the time of test2 release, which is currently scheduled for March 21.
And on the minor notes, Gimp 2.2.2 has been released to Fedora Core 3 updates. Here is an announcement you might want to read. In short: new directory .gimp-2.2 will be created in your home, so you might want to check your preferences, plugins, and other stuff. Also, not all fonts could have been distributed due to the licensing. You can download them by yourself from here. (freefonts) and here (sharefonts).

Plan your upgrades.