WHAT?

Is it just me, or does my blog weird?

Which Colossal Death Robot am I?

Holy Prime Directive, you're Robocop!
Well, you're neither colossal, nor technically a robot, but your arthritic lurching and dubious morals have found their way into the hearts of futuristic rebels and children everywhere. You walk through fire, catch bullets from the air, and you never, ever smile. Combine this with an abstract, almost random concept of duty and honour, and you have a police officer one cannot fail to adore.
Thank you, Robocop.
You can protect the innocent with the following police badge:



Which Colossal Death Robot Are You?
Brought to you by Rum and Monkey

Another mans View

Ever have that feeling that certain movies never got the credit they were due? Under rated films, are among my favourite, the ones the oscars fail to pick up on, or that dont get enough media attention and promotion. Thats another thing, I feel that too much attention and promo can seriously damage a films credibility. I'm not talking Star Wars or LOTR here, as those are in a league of their own. What I am talking about are films like Bad Boys 2, in absolutely no ways a masterpiece, but because of all the media hype around this film I avoided it, and only ended up seeing it 2 or 3 years later. Not bad, but not under rated either, more like over rated.

I was going somewhere with this and got side tracked there, so off the dirt road and back on track now. This guy thinks that these are the last 10 years most underrated films, one for every year.

2004- Spartan (personally I thought it was rubbish)
2003- Dark Blue , very good film but not necessarily underrated
2002- Undisputed, once again, enjoyable, but far from under rated, it is what it is
2001- Josie and the Pussy cats, What? ha ha
2000- American Psycho, hmmm, Underrated
1999- Office Space,in my opinion a cult classic,masterpice,any more credit and it loses its appeal
1998- Mr Jealousy, never seen it, dont know anything about it, cant comment
1997- Starship Troopers, underrated? I dont think so,another 1 of those classics,Sci-Fi this time
1996- Deadman, soon to be released no DVD, so maybe not that underrated
1995- The Underneath, dont know it, but it sounds good

You know what? I cant make a list, because I like under rated films, I dont even think of them as under rated, I think of them as secret treasures, yeah I know, but I couldnt think of a better term. So I suppose this is my list of movies (although some won awards) that didnt get the attention they deserved or should I say werent watched by a large/main stream audience (underrated just sounds so negative).

My list:
2004: Napoleon Dynamite
2003:House of Sand and Fog (and Big Fish)
2002: Equilibrium
2001: Crazy/Beautiful (and Memento)
2000: Traffic
1999: The Virgin Suicides (and Human Traffic)
1998: BASEketball (just for laughs)
1997: Chasing Amy (and Donnie Brasco )
1996:Jude
1995:Before Sunrise (maybe its just me, but I only heard of this film when the sequel came out)

This is a 25 minute list, and I'm sure I've left out many, but if you havent seen any of the above, go and watch them, theyre all good.

Which World Leader am I?

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Apparently I'm Gandhi.

Never even heard of this film, but apparently its me

What Classic Movie Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Yes Im doing those funny tests again, apparently this is me as a classic movie? Im gonna get this film and let you know if it was any good (but not in the next two weeks). Anyone seen it?

(I really wanted to be the Godfather)

A Silly Trend

Lately I've been doing a bit of blog surfing again, and it seems that theres this new silly trend that bored bloggers around the world are doing. Heres what you do, its really simple, go to google, and type your name followed by the word 'needs'... and then hit enter, obviously.
eg: George needs
Then blog the first five things that come up.
Heres mine:

Greg needs your help.
Greg needs a friend.
Greg needs to be occupied and employed.
Greg needs another arm.
Greg needs some Lunch money.
Greg needs to do something about his evil twin. (couldnt leave this one out)

Okay, so they werent the first five, 'Greg needs your help' had the first 3 places, so obviosuly I'm not going to repeat that, because not only doest that mean I need your help, it means I really need your help! Do I?
'Greg needs a friend' aawww cute.
I definately need to be occupied and employed.
I need another arm? I've already got two, what more could a guy ask for?
Lunch money, thats just hilarious! I really do, I didnt make lunch today and forget to draw cash so I can get something from the sandwich man that comes to the office every day. HA HA HA!
My evil twin? That could explain my issue with authority! It wasnt me, honest!

Intelligent, but Dangerous

I've written about him before, but for some reason I seem to keep going back to him, Nietzsche. Philosopher, Psychologist and Philologist (study of ancient texts and languages), a man who many would say was a dangerous thinker, avoid his works. But that’s like saying dont walk in your socks, of course you're going to do it. I've been reading bits and pieces about him, but it was when I discovered that he talks largely on a topic I find extremely interesting, 'Nihilism' that I started reading again. I wasn’t even aware that such a word existed.

Nihilism as a philosophical position is the view that the world, and especially human existence, is without meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value.

Now this interests me greatly, I suppose its why I love listening to people's responses when I ask:
'Okay then, so what's the purpose of a Lion? what’s its function?',
'To eat the buck of course'
'Okay then, and the bucks purpose?'
'To eat the grass'

Now other than survival and natural linkages in the food chain, there is no productive/ constructive/ practical reason for a Lion to exist, it is merely there. Why? is my still my question.

So back to Nietzsche, 'God is Dead' a statement he once made that caused massive unrest and resentment. People didn’t understand what he meant though. By saying that God is dead, (lets just call him 'N' from now on) N isn’t saying that God is physically dead, but that man has killed Him, it was N's controversial way of saying that God has ceased to be a reckoning force in people's lives, even if they don't recognise it.

"God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we, murderers of all murderers, console ourselves? That which was the holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet possessed has bled to death under our knives. Who will wipe this blood off us? With what water could we purify ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we need to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we not ourselves become gods simply to be worthy of it?" - Nietzsche

Apparently its one of the most commonly misunderstood phrases of 19th century literature.

The death of God is a way of saying that humans are no longer able to believe in a cosmic order. The death of God will lead, Nietzsche says, not only to the rejection of a belief of cosmic/physical order but also to a rejection of absolute values themselves -- to the rejection of belief in an objective and universal moral law. This leads to nihilism, and it is what Nietzsche worked to find a solution for by re-evaluating the foundations of human values. This meant, to Nietzsche, looking for foundations that went deeper than the Christian values most people refuse to look beyond.- (Wikepedia, 2005)

Wonder how long thats gonna take, with the way this world is going, I dont think it'll be too long.

Too much time?

These days thats me. So what do I do? Something Productive? Creative? Intelligent?... nope, instead I take silly tests that tell me everything from what sports car I am to my career type and living style.

According to this site, I 'am' an SLK, should be living in Chicago (suits my personality apparently), must see European city is Rome (actually London), the mind-body approach is my ideal natural defence against illness, I'm already using 27 of 39 critical feng-shui techniques, the room in my house I'm most at home in is my Garage, I have an unusually strong talent in the area of precognition when it comes to ESP and thats where I stopped the tests.

I've also added a weather forecast to the side bar in case you need to know what the weather in London is like. I'll give you a tip, in the months from October-April, think overcast or raining and you wont be wrong, and between May- September, think slight possibility of sun and you'll be right.

I'm getting better at this

Decision making that is, I hate making decisions, but after the lat 3 days I'd like to think I've improved my decision making skills, like Napolean Dynamite does with his never useful 'skills'.

For days now, I've been scouring the net for answers. Checking benchmarks, reviews, and anything on the subject matter I could get my hands on. Eventually I got the answers I was looking for.

When buying a new PC, its not just a case of 'okay that looks nice, I'll get that'. Its all about performance, features, over-clocking ability, speeds, and way more technical things that I wont bore you with. So I had to decide which chipset to go for, the over heating, unstable, but blazing fast AMD, or the cooler, better all rounder Intel? A million webpages of research later and Intel wins, why? It won more benchmarks and the mainboard that goes with it is more future proof, it also supports a faster ram speed than AMD.

Then onto graphics, the newer chipset Nvidia Gefore 6600GT or ATI's relaunch of an older chipset Radeon X800GT? I've always been an ATI fan, everythings just prettier with an ATI, so once again after compairing endless benchmarks, I went ATI. This was also because in CT the X800 is just way over priced, and I never would have bought one.

The rest was easy. Now I just sit back and wait for my PC to arrive.
Feels like Christmas already.

Sorry, this is real life

Anyone who plays computer games, uses photo editing software, or is a 3d graphics designer will know what I'm talking about here.

When you use a computer for long enough, you get used to the idea of being able to 'undo' many things. With RPG games, I am constantly reloading a previous saved game if my character dies, or I've messed up somewhere. The same applies when editing photos, make a mess up? Ctrl + Z and your problem solved. Typed the wrong thing? Ctrl + Z.

For anyone who still doesnt know what I'm talking about, Ctrl +Z is the shortcut for undoing your previous move/ error. The problem comes in when you get so used to having this feature under your belt that you forget it doest apply to real-life situations.

One of my best friends back in CT feels the same way; i.e. when a girls response is 'WHAT!!??' instead of what you were expecting, Ctrl +Z would be really nice to have, unfortunately we need to learn that it only applies to the world of silicon chips and pixels.

(the above pic is from a really original t-shirt manufacturer on the internet, it sums up my feelings on the subject)

And how exactly do I ingest those?

I'm not sure if its just me, or if living in London makes you more prone to the common cold, but since I've been here, I've had at least 3 cases. I'm also not one to take medication, not that I'm die-hard or anything but I just don't like the idea of chemicals I know nothing about being dissolved in my body.

So yesterday I eventually got around to the pharmacy, vitamins I thought, that's the answer. Of course, as expected there was as many variations of multi vitamin's A through Z as there are DVD's in a Virgin megastore. I eventually, after much debate with the friendly pharmacist settled on something called 'Wintervit'. It claimed to have all the essential vitamins and what not that I needed to avoid future colds. After reading the little bit on the side though, I noticed that there was some kind of mushroom ingredient, also known as 'The Dancing Mushroom'. That sold me, all this stuff is nonsense anyways, but a company who is so open about selling nonsense in a bottle was going to get my hard earned £6.

I got home and after opening the bottle had a good mind to march back to the pharmacy and ask how exactly I am meant to take this?! These things are like mini torpedoes they're huge!

Are they flippin suppositories?!There'ss no way I'm taking them ifthat'ss the case, every time I think about that I conjure up images of Trainspotting and Ewan McGregor putting things where they should never be put.

Of course they weren't suppositories,they're just massive, but that must mean that they're jam-packed with vitamins right?

Disgusting!

If you havent yet seen this film, I advise you dont. I'm always on the look out for different films, the non mainstream stuff, most of it is good, original, interesting and very seldom disturbing.

The other day I stumbled accross 'Happiness', I forget how, but I did, it looked interesting and with comments like these:

"Shattering...You have to see it*****" - Empire.
"Simply Unmissable" - Jonathan Ross, Film 99.

why would I not watch it. Simply unmissable? I would rather say essentially missable, without a doubt. What is described as a black comedy is actually a story about a child molester living in suburbia. The movie almost portrays this man as a victim. Its sick, and hopefully wont be in my collection long, even if I get £2 for it, I'l take it, only cost me a 5er luckily.

Early Christmas List

If you dont know what to get me, then here it is. Of course you're going to have to be willing to spend loads of money on me though.

I love Calvin and Hobbes, and recently saw this on Amazon, never even knew it was out. Its the complete collection of every single cartoon published by Bill Waterson.

Calvin and Hobbes is without a doubt the best cartoon strip ever, and no I dont care what your opinion is, its the best, no argument!

Working with convicts

Lately my job situation has been one of those on and off types, not fun, but hey thats life. Currently, its on, but soon it may be off again. So I decided that weekend work would help fill my pockets.

I got in touch with one of my ex-housemates bosses, he runs a security firm that hires out gaurds to various companies, for corporate events, exhibiton shows, concerts etc. I got some work for Saturday night, ushering people around at the London School of Business, a nice easy job.

I arrived on the scene after meeting up with a very dopey Nigerian who was to work at the same venue and apparently knew where it was according to the boss. Not so, this guy probably took us on the longest and most scenic route to get there, through Regents Park, over bridges, next to lakes and under tunnels when we could have just walked up the high road for a bout 5 minutes and turned left, instead it took us about 20 minutes. Idiot!

So after chatting to some of my new 'colleagues' I find out that most of them are ex-cons! I decided I was better off not knowing why they had spent time behind bars. What got me, is that these are 'ex' criminals who are now working as security gaurds! crazyiness. Nice guys though, so as the night goes on, we get told that we're more than welcome to help ourselves to the food on offer (International Food Fair), of course they would say this when all the food is gone! all except Apple pie being forced on people by drunk Americans. Apple pie sounded good to me, and it was, Apple Pie and Stella... and Carling, I dont know what it is with English people and the work-booze connection, but I'm not complaining.

Okay... it sucked!

Do you remember a while ago I was having the book vs film debate with myself? Well so far its 1-0 and I'm losing, I love films, my one and only constant passion, so obviously I'm going to argue that films are better than books, and they are, but films based on books are a different story.

I bought a book a few weeks ago, 'The unbearable lightness of Being', a damn good read, not brilliant, but definately worthy of a read or two. So there I was searching the net, and happened to stumble across the title under IMDB's site, a movie based on the book that i just bought? Cool right? NO! I read the book first, eagerly anticipating the film, hoping, praying that it would be as good as the book, and if I was lucky? even better than the book. No such luck though, the film sucked! big time! It now ranks in my top 5 worst films ever, not quite sure what the others are yet, but ULOB is definately in there!

It's like someone read the book and just cut random scenes out, stuck them together and put them on film, absolute rubbish! It had no emotion, no character development and probably the worst ever acting role to come from Daniel Day Lewis, and Juliet Binoche? She doesnt shave under her arms! Uggh!

So, it was disappointing, but I still wont say that all books are better than the films, take LOrd of the rings, for example, I read most of the books (not all), and while theyre good, the films are better, Tolkien rights them as if it was reading for kids, where as the film seems to be done for a much older audience.

Then theres High Fidelity, never read the book, but its one of my favourite films.

Any other film/book comparisons?

The new 007... unfortunately

After months of 'who's it gonna be?' We now have Daniel Craig as the answer, the star of London gangster film 'Layer Cake', Craig who looks nothing like a James Bond.

He's gritty, rough looking and doesnt fit the ladies man profile in the slightest. Oh well we'll have to see what the make up crew and his acting will do for the next film 'Casino Royale' due for release next year.

Not that my opinion matters in the slightest, but I would much rather have seen Clive Owen, or even Eric Bana give it a go. Even Ralph Fiennes or Christian Bale would do, and a bonus of playing Bond? You dont get type cast.

What really gets me, is I had to read about this on the net, when the entire press conference took play a few feet away from my office today. That bridge in the background? Thats Tower Bridge, I can see it from the office windows!

"Flanked by Royal Marines, smartly suited Craig boarded a rigid raider craft at HMS Belfast, which sped under London's Tower Bridge before mooring at the jetty of HMS President, where he was introduced to the world's press." - (www.thisislondon.co.uk)

Mental Hospital Switchboard

Please press hash now to continue, whether it appears on your keypad or not. If you do not have a touch-tone phone, go out and buy one. Then call again.

Please choose one of the following options:

If you are obsessive-compulsive, press 1 over and over and over again;

If you are multiple personality, touch 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8.

If you are hysterical, don't touch any buttons whatsoever, something terrible might happen;

If you are bipolar, touch 1, then 9;

If you are schizophrenic, don't touch any buttons, a little voice will tell you what to do;

If you are paranoid, there is no need to touch any buttons. We know who you are, we know where you live, and we will be coming to get you very soon.

If you are a psychopath, rip the cord out of the wall and run away with the phone;

If you are an anal-retentive psychopath, take the phone apart. Place each piece in a plastic bag. Tape each plastic bag tightly shut. Place all the plastic bags into a large, brown paper bag, which you then place in the southeast corner of your freezer.

If you are depressed, do not touch any buttons. It wouldn't do any good anyway.

If you are manic, touch as many buttons as you can as fast as possible;

London Film Festival

Oooo, looks good. 180 films? thats just crazy. But after scanning the web pages, I've got my list, my 'planner' as the LFF site calls it. Hopefully I'll actually make it to a few of these.

October 20th 20:30
Screening Elizabethtown - Odeon West End Screen 2notes

October 21st 18:30
Screening Manslaughter - National Film Theatre NFT1notes

October 22nd 20:30
Screening Proof - Odeon West End Screen 2notes

October 23rd 14:00
Screening Ultranova - ICA Cinema notes

October 24th 20:45
Screening Geminis - National Film Theatre NFT2note
or 20:30
Screening Separate Lies - Odeon West End Screen 2notes

October 27th 18:30
Screening Lonesome Jim - Odeon West End Screen 1notes

October 28th 18:00
Screening Shopgirl - Odeon West End Screen 2notes

November 1st 18:30
Screening Everything is Illuminated - Odeon West End Screen 2notes

Of course these arent extremely eagerly anticipated films for me, but there are still some good ones worth seeing. I just wish 'Superman' would get done with filming and be released so I can pay full attention to other films.

And then there was one...

When I arrived in London I was fortunate enough to move into one of the coolest house shares in London (although short lived). Great People, 2 Polish sisters, one crazy Canadian, a strange Australian couple, a mad Australian gardener, another even madder Australian cowboy and a South African boy who, like myself, thinks too much.

The first to leave was the gardener, or landscaper if you glorify his position as I sometimes do mine. Then the (annoying to some) Australian couple moved to Finland. Some time after it was the crazy Canadian's turn, the middle of the night waking, side street relief, dronk verdriet, good film loving Marcia. Probably the first Canadian I had actually ever met, and still by far the coolest. Marcia is original, I'll just leave it there. Like Dayne, her exploits are too R-rated for this blog :P Then the younger of the sisters, the fashion loving, late working, subtitled film watching Asia left for the USA. The baby of the house.

The house was gone, no longer did the lancaster massive exist. After dodging immigration officials, trying to find a bed to sleep, and a plane ticket home, Chris the 'house painting, film studying, cant handle my booze and I know it saffer was next, home to Cape Town, hmmm I miss home.

So 2 left, the older of the two polish sisters is still here, living on the opposite end of London with no plans of leaving. So that leaves Dayne, the depth charge drinking ... you know, if I mention anything else about Dayne you're sure to be shocked, you only see in movies the things he does. So yeah Dayne was the last to leave, back to the land down under, Bris- Vegas, just kidding dude, Brisbane. My Spanish bar partner in crime.

So that leaves me, of course I've got my own house with my own strange housemates, but I still miss the Lancaster crew.

... and then there was one.


Film of the day: Office Space