“Bella” (2006)

Wow.  Just… wow.

If you haven’t seen this movie, I suggest you immediately run out and buy/rent a copy.

If you have Netflix (and a broadband internet connection) you can watch it online, as part of your subscription.

(Click HERE to go to the Netflix page for “Bella.”)

Absolutely beautiful movie, with a strong (but somehow not preachy) pro-life message.

Have a box of Kleenex ready.  You may need them.

Special thanks to The Fair Theater, Compassionate Care Pregnancy Center, and Michael Cox of Stonebridge Fellowship for making tonight’s public screening of the film possible.

So, anyway…

Go see it. Could be the best comic book movie ever. (Be sure to stick around until the credits are over.)

Emo or Robo? YOU Decide ‘08…

The worst part about the future is that it usually fails to deliver on its promises.

Flying cars? No.

Five-hour work week? Not for me. (Or you, probably.)

*Alien invasion? Still watching the sky… although John Edwards comes pretty close to what I’d expect to see.

Once in a while though, the future really pays off. Big and awesome-sauce:

Yep, strength-enhancing, robotic exoskeletons are here. Here’s the story (click it or ticket.)

And HERE’S a link to some streaming video of the suit in action.

While not quite to the coolness-level of this…

… or this…

… it IS nice to know that we’re on our way to the future of 1986 that both Daniel and Ripley know and love.

Can you imagine? Taking out the garbage would be FUN again. (Lift the dumpster over your head, walk to the city dump, shooting lasers at hapless passers-by, and BANG, no more sanitation collection fees. And more lasers, or possibly a cheeseburger, on your way home.)

*******************************************************************************

In sadder news (no sick humor intended, honest,) a report on EMO culture came out in today’s UK paper Daily Mail. It tells the story of a 13-year old named Hannah who took her own life a few months after wrapping herself in Emo. Here’s the link (click).

It’s a sad story, and an eye-opening look for those of us who have little to no inroads into this massive (and arguably unhealthy) cultural phenomenon. I’m not going to go so far as to say that “emo made Hannah kill herself,” (I’ll leave that to the blog pundits), but I have personally known several high-school kids (especially girls) who are into the hairstyles, music, fashion, and self-mutiliation associated with emo.

It’s gotten to the point where I really want to slap the next person who makes a joke about slitting one’s wrists.

PARENTS: Talk to your kids. Now. About lots of things. Often.

* Obviously, I’m not talking about ILLEGAL ALIENS invading. We have plenty of those. Oh look, there goes one now…

NEWS FLASH!!

The world is a crappy place.

In other news, things DO tend to get better, given a long enough timeline.

Now go watch Cloverfield. In a dark room. Without people around to spoil it for you.

WANT…

Read about this little beauty HERE (click).  Then buy me one out of the sheer goodness of your heart, kthxbb.

“You can’t take the sky from me…”

HERE (click) is a post I wrote over at ScrewAttack about the greatest show you never saw, Firefly.

CLICK HERE to watch the entire series online for free.  (Thanks to Hulu.com.)

Playwright David Mamet is “no longer a brain-dead liberal”

This comes to us from a delightful essay in The Village Voice — which should be a shock in and of itself — written by David Mamet, one of my favorite play and screenwriters. While writing a play about a greedy, conservative president and his liberal speech writer, Mamet came to the realization that he was NOT the liberal that he always thought he was:

I found not only that I didn’t trust the current government (that, to me, was no surprise), but that an impartial review revealed that the faults of this president—whom I, a good liberal, considered a monster—were little different from those of a president whom I revered.

Bush got us into Iraq, JFK into Vietnam. Bush stole the election in Florida; Kennedy stole his in Chicago. Bush outed a CIA agent; Kennedy left hundreds of them to die in the surf at the Bay of Pigs. Bush lied about his military service; Kennedy accepted a Pulitzer Prize for a book written by Ted Sorenson. Bush was in bed with the Saudis, Kennedy with the Mafia. Oh.

The full article can be found HERE (click). It’s a medium to long read, and there are a couple of wirty dords, but if you’re a media/political junkie like myself, you should find it immensely insightful and entertaining.

You can see a few of the films Mamet wrote HERE (click). Some of my favorites on the list include Wag the Dog, The Untouchables, The Winslow Boy, The Spanish Prisoner, The Edge, and Ronin.

Beam THIS up…

William Shatner, one of my top five favorite Canadians of all time (the other three being Alex Trebek, and the members of RUSH) recently admitted that he’s never seen any of his performances in Star Trek… neither the original series nor any of his seven feature-length films in the long-running sci-fi franchise.

Why not? In The Shat’s own words, it’s because “I suck.”

So? That never kept me from watching…

“Get a life, people!”

(Click HERE to read the Telegraph article.)

Download video from YouTube, Google Video, etc…. for free.

Howdy folks out there in the REAL world!

During my week-long flu hiatus (currently being followed by my weekend-long nursing-of-the-rest-of-the-family-back-to-health,) I watched a loooooot of internet video.

Since YouTube is blocked by my school’s content filter, my students don’t get a chance to see the occasional worthwhile video that I find there (yes, there ARE a few… the video projects of Johnny Lee, for example (click).) I wished there was some way that I could SAVE certain videos to my laptop, so I could show my kids firsthand.

There is. Just go HERE (click).

Click the Download button to install the program. It will ask you if you also want to install their FLV Player… I would suggest you answer YES. (FLV = Flash Video, the format you find on most click and watch websites.)

There’s a tutorial that tells you all about how to use the program HERE (click), but let me save you some time:

1. Find a video on YouTube that you want to download. Click the address bar in your internet browser, then right click it and pick “copy” or just press Ctrl-C.

2. Open the program by clicking the “Moyea FLV Downloader” button that gets put on your desktop and/or in your Start Menu.

3. Click the “Show Browser” button at the bottom left.

4. When the new window pops up, right click in the empty bar on top and pick “paste” or just hit Ctrl-V. Hit enter.

5. The new window will start loading up the site, and a checklist will appear on the bottom, listing the downloadable videos on that page. You can then pick the ones you want, and start them to downloading. The main window will show you the progress of the videos you are downloading (you can do several at once.)

That’s it! Easy as pi.

Enjoy your weekend, and say hi to Mrs. Bowers for me.

Dear Hollywood:

Stop.  Making.  Crappy.  Movies.

Thank you,

– johnseeking