The A-Team Movie Review 7.5/10!

There are various ways in which to judge a movie.  Sometimes you don't judge purely on the quality of the product.  The A-Team is ridiculous.  The plot doesn't always make sense, there is very little logic, the action is huge and over the top, the characters are caricatures, but, it works.  Why does it work?  Why do components that generally make a bad movie result in an entertaining movie here?  Well, its because it captures and epitomizes the spirit of the TV series perfectly.  Sure, they could have made a gritty, dark, artistic movie, and it probably would have been high quality, but, that wouldn't have fit very well, the characters would have been off and it would have born no resemblance to the action series that so many people love.  And, its darn funny as well.  The characters are very well done, with the only stretch being Rampage Jackson, and his performance wasn't to terrible for a guy that’s really just not an actor.  Bradley Cooper was excellent as Faceman but Sharlto Copley truly stole the show with his characterization of Murdock.  He is not exactly a household name but he played Wikus in District 9 and he is very, very good.  Very surprising given his inexperience.  He is a guy to watch for in the future.  Jessica Biel doesn't really add anything, but she is hot, and this type of movie does require at least one really hot girl to be in it.  Its not going to win an Oscar or anything, but if you liked the television show you will love this movie, and if you are not a fan of the television show you can do a lot worse than watching this flick.  

Video Games aren't art? Anything is art.

Roger Ebert is quoted as having said that "Video games can never be art."  His logic for this is that you cannot take the pinnacle of its creation and compare it to the great works in filmmaking, art, poetry, literature, etc.  To use a metaphor quoted in his blog about this, video games are much closer to the chicken scratches on the inside of caves than they are to the Sistine Chapel.  This is an incredibly idiotic statement.  Actually amazingly idiotic, rarely does  a critic say something that makes me wish I could actually talk to the guy face to face and really see why he thinks this.  Perhaps he thinks that this will keep his fading reputation in with the pretentious bigwigs of the art house scene, or this is just last ditch efforts at staying relevant.  Regardless there are many reasons as to why this is just a purely flawed statement.  Firstly, no one can say what is or isn't art.  You can fully have the right to say something is bad art, or terrible art, or something even a third grader could do, but you don't have the right to say that something somebody put their hard work and soul into "ISN'T" art.  If someone considers what they are doing art, then it is art and no one can say different.  Secondly, saying something has to have reached its apex to be art is also idiotic.  Since the Sistine Chapel was achieved that means that all painting is art? Merely because one person was great in that field that means all others who could never hope to achieve that level are creating art because one person was great in it?  How about graphic art?  No offense to anyone in that field, I have seen a lot of quality work, a lot of really great work, but I have yet to see anything that belongs in the Louvre.  Does that mean that it's not art?  According to Ebert it does, and I don't think anybody in their right mind believes that Graphic art and design isn't a form of art.  Even in my field of art, photography, there have been many greats, but I don't think a single photography has reached the transcendental level of Michelangelo, Shakespeare, Joyce, Van Gogh, Etc.  Is that any less art because of this? NO its not.  And to follow on that line of though, I am a moviephile, I appreciate good movies, and I would doubt that 1/10 people I know have even seen even close to as many movies I have. I know cinema history, theory, and I know the great movies of all time.  And the greatest reason why Ebert's logic is flawed is because his field is no more art than video games are by his theory.  In no way shape or form has there been a movie made that can match the pure genius of the great works of art.  Hell, a large portion of the "greatest" movies of all time use Shakespeare as the direct basis of their screen plays.  The point is very few things can rival the beauty and awe inspiring nature of the works of the masters, saying that a field has achieved that mastery to be art is going to prevent most fields from being considered art.  And then saying because one great person practiced an art makes all of that form art regardless of who does and quality is also just pure idiocy.  Video games are developing as any art.  REGARDLESS of what you think about video games even in its beginning its essentially animation.  Its developed with hand drawn concept art.  Notice the term concept art.  Well, wait a minute Roger, since the sprites are rendered by hand generally first doesn't that make it art?  Then it tells a story.  Just like a movie does.  In fact most games nowadays are movies broken up by periods of time in which you blow shit up, or hit it with a sword , or driving around looking for stuff and progressing to the next point in which the plot advances.  The recent game "Heavy Rain" is a an example of what video game as art can be.  It is an incredibly detailed plot driven game that allows for virtually all aspects of the plot to be controlled.  It is cinematic, story driven, and has a better script than 60% of the new movies coming out.  Not all scripts for video games are great, but several games companies have been telling a great story for many years.  I was affected more by the death of Aeris in Final Fantasy 7 than I have been by any movie by that point in my life.  The story of Chrono Trigger was amazing and that was on a 16 bit system.  Ever heard of Final Fantasy 3/6?  That game has more detailed characters with more nuance than most movies could ever hope for.  And Square Enix is not the only game company that can tell a story.  Bioware's Knights of the Old Republic had a better story than the Star Wars Episode I did.  Rockstar hit it out of the park with their tale of revenge in GTA IV.  I can go on and on.  Video games can hold a narrative, tell a compelling story, and provides often awesome displays of CGI.  If James Cameron can make Avatar (which has a far inferior plot to most video games) through out a bunch of CGI and get praised for his "art." Then its absolutely idiotic to deny video game there place as an art.  It may not be quite to a level of a Sanjuro or an 8 1/2 but its getting damn close.   

Repost of an old blog from 07 on medical testing.

So I am taking a class at ASU and it is an online graduate class on the History of Medicine. One of our discussion topics was Medical Testing in prisons. Here is what one of our brilliant and ranking ASU police officers posted in the discussion board. 

"Well this week discussion is a tossup for me. The men and women in prison are there for a reason, they have been convicted of a crime. I'm not saying that everyone in the prison system is guilty, but they have been tried and convicted and sentenced to prison. Once convicted the inmates loses their right to anything.( Examples- right to vote, right to carry weapons, ect). I think that the companies should use the men and women in the prison systems especially the ones on death row. I don't think the inmates need consent to do this. Yes, you can in return for participating in the study give extra commissary. I think that most inmates are educated, being in law enforcement, we deal with the same people a lot on the street from the prison system and they come out smarter than when they went in. Most men and women in the prison system get their GED or read law books to try and make them smarter. I don't think they should be asked for consent."

Brilliant, not only does a law enforcement officer think they all prisoners no longer have any human rights, but he is under the delusion that apparently prison is good for them, and that it is an improvement for them. He thinks they are essentially animals. Actually maybe not that highly... this is another quote on the same thread.

" Its not that I am a bad police officer cause I take my job very serious. I have been in Law Enforcement since 1992. The thing that gets me is that once someone's convicted and sent to the state prisons, that they belong to the state. which means we have to pay for all there meals, all there doctors appointments, everything, even though they are locked up and guarded 24 hours a day seven days a week, we have to foot the bills. You are right they are humans,and I can see where some of the men and women have the right to consent.

I am a big animal lover to, so why test the animals, they have rights too. I don't think its right to do the animals either.

sorry to get the class stirred up, but just to let you all now that I do take my job very serious to protect and serve the state of Arkansas. Everyone has there own feelings about this, I knew this one would be a tough week for me. I just know that arriving on some of the scenes that I have in the past, just gets to you sometimes. Again I hope you can accept my apology for stirring things up."

Apparently he actually value animals to a greater extent than human life. Pretty amazing really.

My Guitar Project

Way back in the day when I was a gigging drummer I used to have this idea that I would take a drum set and sand down the finish then take baseball cards and attach them to the drum frame and refinish it. The drum set would then have the cards as collage finish and I always thought that would be quite awesome. I still want to do this, but I know longer really play drums, so I have decided that I will do it to a guitar.

I will probably go with a strat body, one of the unfinished ones. The rounded edges will make it easier, and prevent me from having to cut a bunch of cards up with an exacto knife to get the precise fit needed. I will probably go with the 1987 Topps set as my source for cards.  The 1987 set as seen to the left has a wood grain look and I think it would look quite nice as the finish.  I will probably use all St. Louis Cardinals cards, and 1987 isn't a bad year to do that with since it was a world series team.  The other sets I am considering are 1983, primarily because I really like that set, and 1978, mostly because I have a complete set collecting dust.  It will be some work to get it done, but I think it will make a good project.  1970's and 80's cards will make a good base for this project because the card stock is so thin and they feature virtually no gloss on the card whatsoever.