Black Mesa enfin disponible

Mercredi, nous vous parlions des 10 projets soutenus par la communauté Steam via Greenlight. Parmi eux se trouvait Black Mesa, un projet ambitieux permettant de rejouer tout Half Life avec une nouvelle bande sonore, et des graphismes remis au goût du jour grâce au Source Engine.

Si le titre n'est pas encore disponible sur Steam, sachez cependant que ses auteurs l'ont d'ores et déjà mis en libre circulation à partir de leur site. Vous pouvez donc foncer à cette adresse immédiatement pour télécharger cette petite merveille. Armez-vous cependant de patience, car le site crashe régulièrement sous l'afflux de visiteurs. Et si ce petit speech ne vous a pas encore convaincu, sachez que le jeu est entièrement gratuit.

· Télécharger Black Mesa sur le site officiel
· Forum Black Mesa

halloween horrors 2011 “ozone! the attack of the redneck mutants”

Our annual survey of the cinematic horror landscape wouldn’t be complete without a few nods at some of the homemade horrors that made it into (somewhat) wide circulation during the VHS boom years, and given that the pseudonymous producer-director team of Matt Devlen and Max Raven have just seen their two mid-80-s efforts, 1986′s Ozone! The Attack Of The Redneck Mutants and The Abomination (from the same year, apparently), released as a DVD combo pack from Muther Video (sans extras, it must be said, although the remastered full-frame transfers and stereo sound are both about as good as you could possibly hope for given the Z-grade source material) these seem like as good a place as any to start down the homemade moviemaking road this Halloween season.

Ozone!, as you can probably guess, features incredibly over-the-top semi-competent “acting,” an equally OTT plot, and plenty of fun, if completely unconvincing, gore effects. I’ll give Devlen (who sat in the director’s chair on this one while Raven produced) credit here — he didn’t aim for too much, like many backyard horror auteurs? seem to have this thoroughly misplaced compulsion to do, and set his sights squarely on what could be accomplished. He wasn’t out to prove that he could outdo Herschell Gordon Lewis with his first effort, but he wanted to make a film heavily influenced by Lewis’ non-stop array of blood, carnage, and viscera,? and that had its tongue just as firmly planted in its cheek.

The end result is unprofessional in the extreme, to be sure, wildly uneven in terms of tone, performances, and quality of effects, slow as molasses in places, and transparently, even jubilantly, juvenile. The goal of Ozone! isn’t so much to compensate for, much less hide, its numerous shortcomings, but rather to include a rather overt acknowledgment of them as part of the fun.

Look, the initial premise of a chemical leak at a toxic refinery causing local yokels in Arkansas (I assume, since I’m pretty sure that’s where this Super-8 spectacle was shot) to turn into hideous, melting, vomiting, killing, cannibalistic monsters due to said chemical leak not directly mutating the rednecks but burning a hole in the ozone layer right over the backwater environs they inhabit (remember, knowledge of how all this global warming stuff worked was pretty limited at the time) isn’t one begging to be taken seriously. Throw in a nosy college-student environmental activist who’s teamed up against her will with the son of the owner of the chemical (or is it oil? the script seems to want it both ways) company to get to the bottom of the problem, a plethora of wildly stereotypical hicks, and no money and you don’t have Oscar bait bait (or even anything like it) on your hands, but you do have the recipe for a fun, stupid night in front of the TV.

That’s all that Ozone! The Attack Of The Redneck Mutants promises, and by and large it delivers. Sure, you most definitely have to be willing to go with the flow and not let things like a wildly out-on-synch audio track (the soundtrack being recorded separately and laid down later in true no-budget style), preposterous hamming by most of the cast, shots with literally no composition to them apart from point-that-fucking-camera-and-shoot, and the kind of effects you could probably come up with yourself if you had the time and/or inclination not only not detract from your appreciation of the proceedings here, but rather form the backbone of it, but that’s never been a problem around these parts.

I’m not here to tell you that Ozone! is must-see viewing, or that it’s even a spectacular example of DIY moviemaking. It is, however, a good example of what you can achieve what a backyard filmmaking team can achieve when it sets out to do something squarely within its means — not much, to put it kindly, but the kind of “not much” that’s done with enough passion, heart, and balls that it ends up having its own kind of demented, but thoroughly watchable, charm. There’s no need to take any of it even remotely seriously since the filmmakers didn’t either, but there’s no need to feel guilty or stupid for finding most of it thoroughly entertaining, and frankly even endearing, nonsense.

Skyrim Le Patch Non Officiel enfin disponible

Bonne nouvelle pour les amateurs de Skyrim, à l'occasion de ses 10 ans d'existence le célèbre forum de moddeurs Wiwiland vient de mettre en ligne la première version du Patch Non Officiel français pour Skyrim (appelée PNOS pour l'occasion). Comme d'habitude avec les PNO de Wiwiland, ce fichier améliore sensiblement la traduction française puisque les moddeurs ont intégralement revu le nom des objets, corrigé les erreurs de traduction et retiré les abréviations du jeu. Wiwiland a également corrigé les divers bugs de quêtes qui subsistaient malgré les patchs officiels, remplacé des objets correctement dans le monde du jeu et amélioré le rendu de quelques textures HD.

Ce Patch Non Officiel n'en est encore qu'à sa première version. Il se télécharge sur nos serveurs contre 140 Mo et la liste des corrections ou le signalement de bugs restant se consulte à cette adresse. Sachez enfin que nous n'avons mis à disposition que la version installateur du jeu, mais il est possible de mettre la main directement sur les fichiers de ce mod en se rendant sur cette page.

Sachez enfin que les 10 ans de Wiwiland sont également l'occasion pour eux de lancer un concours, et que la liste des évènements liés à cet anniversaire se consulte sur ce topic.

Mise à Jour : L'administrateur de Wiwiland nous a demandé de retirer le PNOS de nos serveurs.

· Forum The Elder Scrolls V : Skyrim

250 clés à gagner pour la beta d'End of Nations

Vous êtes friand de versions beta et de stratégie ? Tester un jeu en avant-première vous procure des frissons le long de l'échine ? Alors nous avons ce qu'il vous faut !

End of Nations, le MMORTS en préparation dans les locaux de Trion Worlds, s'apprête à débuter son second événement de beta fermée. Ce dernier se tiendra du vendredi 3 août dès 6h00 du matin jusqu'au lundi 6 août à 6h00 du matin également. Si vous n'avez pas encore reçu de clé d'accès après votre inscription sur le site officiel, c'est l'occasion idéale d'en obtenir une grâce à TomsGames.

Pour réclamer l'une des 225 clés beta que nous vous offrons, il vous suffit simplement de posséder un compte TomsGames, de vous identifier, puis de laisser un commentaire sous cette news sans faute d'orthographe. Les gagnants de ce petit concours recevront leur clé jeudi 2 août en message privé. Si vous arrivez trop tard, sachez que 25 clés sont également mises en jeu sur le compte Twitter de la rédaction.

Bonne chance !

· Forum End of Nations

2012-12-21-524

Aerocool Readies Strike-X Fan-Controller

Taipei-based Aerocool is preparing to release the Strike-X fan controller, adding on to its Strike-X series of products.





The controller, occupying two 5.25” drive bays, features a touchscreenwith futuristic looking LEDs, five fan channels with fan-speed andthermal monitoring, and two front-side USB 2.0 ports and audio connectors. The Strike-X fancontroller comes in red/ black colors and can be purchased from majorretailers and e-tailers soon at a MSRP of 54.90 Euro.


News via [Techconnect]

2012-12-21-373

AC Ryan Relaunches PlayOn! HD

SINGAPORE - January 2010 - AC Ryan has relaunched its Playon! HD with new features, giving users the optimum viewing pleasure and convenience.

The Playon!HD supports audio and digital files, including those downloaded or streamed at quick time or real time from the Internet and computer, to be played on a television set directly. It enables users to enjoy their Full HD media on their large-screen LED or LCD TV with the highest 1080p Full HD quality.

Itallows you to play a plethora of audio, pictorial and video file formats and codec, including and not limited to MKV, H.264, RM/RMVB, AVI, MOV, WMV, ISO, MPEG, JPEG, HD JPEG, BMP, TIF, PNG and even Blu-ray formats.

The formula of the success lies in its simplicity and practicality. The Playon!HD centralizes all your media, using a user-installable 3.5 inch SA/ SA II hard disk drive, supports up to today’s largest 2 TB HDD.

Connecting with HDMI (high definition multimedia interface), the Playon! HD loads quickly within 5 seconds just as you would expect a living room consumer device to be. Whilst browsing for a file, a window displaying a preview of your files will be played as you scroll your media library, hastening the search process for a particular movie or video clip. Next, just press “Play” and enjoy the show!

The optional Wireless-N 300 mbps Adaptor (retailing at S$59) dongle brings the Playon!HD to the forefront of wireless high definition media streaming, where users can view Flickr, Picassa and news feeds off the player directly, bypassing the need of a computer. A built-in UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) has been integrated into the media box which enables the player to auto-detect UPnP Media Servers on the network to browse and stream media files from them.

Empowering data generation with content-driven innovations
The firmware can be updated frequently from http://www.playonhd.com/ official website to empower users the choice to upgrade online for free and stay attuned to the most dated firmware advancements. It is a reliable and stable source, and addresses feedbacks from users. The updates are as frequent as monthly.

Features of AC Ryan Playon! HD include:
- Movie Jukebox: With a stylish graphics user interface, the readily available thumbnails guide user through selection process, with information such as synopsis of the movie displayed, reducing the time of clicking into the option to read from the menu.

- Internet Radio: Once connected to the internet via your router, you can listen to your favourite music from the internet radio stations available on the World Wide Web.

- Internet Feeds: From reading the RSS news feeds to the viewing of photos from Flickr and Picassa portals, you can’t help but feel that the world just one click away.

- Bit-torrent Downloading: User can now download their files directly into the media player from online sources. This will free up the usage of the PC for downloading.

- Media Library search function: Helps the user to automatically sort their music, photos and movie files in alphabetical order or search by key word and by Artist, Year, Genre and Date etc.

- Wide Language Selections: Worried that mommy who does not understand English has difficulty handling the device? Worry not; the user-friendly menu comes with multiple languages, from Simplified and Traditional Chinese, English, Japanese and Korean to European languages. Once selected, the file names and subtitles will change accordingly.

On top of the above enhanced features, the Playon! HD retains the popularity of:
- File management is relatively simple as well as it supports file delete and file copy directly into its box.
- 2 years warranty as compared to the benchmark of 1 year in the market.
- It comes bundled with 2metre AC Ryan HDMI Cable, together with other necessary cables for video and audio output; and ready plug-ins for media storage like—External USB harddisks, two USB ports, Mediacard reader slots for SD/ SDHC/MS/ MSPro and Network.
- Stylish exterior ringed by blue lights that glow with each functional navigation. An understated piece of accessory for your sleek TV set. Skinz your Playon! for just S$19.90.
- Music lovers can look forward to the support of latest Dolby Digital Plus as well as the regular DTS and Dolby Digital pass-through. For use without amplifiers, the smart Playon! HD recognises and plays DTS and DTS-HD MA downmix.

Gaining strong international following
The AC Ryan Playon! HD is currently shipping to more than 30 countries like Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, New Zealand, Australia, Israel, Brazil, USA, Taiwan, Spain, Italy, etc.; and with more countries in the pipeline. AC Ryan Playon! HD is powered by RTD 1073 chipset, with a Recommended Retail Price of S$249 (without HDD), retailing at all Challenger and Carrefour outlets, and selected Sim Lim Square and Funan The IT Mall retail shops.

bleedin’ to the oldies “killer workout” (a.k.a. “aerobicide”)

I know what you’re thinking already, my friends — -can any movie possibly be as good as that cover? For that matter, can any movie possibly be as good as good as this cover —

The answer in this case is an emphatic “hell yes!”

If you’re a lover of B movies, and slashers in particular, writer-director David A. Prior’s 1986 offering Killer Workout, also released (as if you hadn’t figured it out by now) under the if-anything-even-better title Aerobicide has everything you’re looking for and then some.

Gratuitous nudity? It’s in there.

Gratuitous violence? It’s in there.

Bad 1980s hairstyles? They’re in there.

Even worse 1980s soundtrack music? It’s in there, too.

Lots and lots of cheesy-in-a-seriously-hot -way chicks in tight workout leotards? In there by the score.

What, then, is honestly missing from this flick? Absolutely nothing. It even had a reasonably coherent plot with a semi-involving little murder mystery at its core, not that you necessarily need that given all the other sheer awesomeness on display here, but it’s a nice plus.

From the very opening scene, you’re guaranteed to be hooked : a rather shapely young lady arrives home at her apartment and checks her answering machine messages to find that she’s flying to Paris tomorrow to shoot the cover of Cosmo magazine! Her agent (or whoever it is) warns her not to have any tan lines, though, so she heads to her favorite tanning salon and strips completely naked to lay out and soak up that UV goodness. Once she closes the bedcover (or whatever it’s called), though, a horrendous malfunction traps her inside and the heat cranks up past max. Does she live? Does she die? All will be revealed, even though we spend the first 3/4 of the movie wondering just what the fuck any of that had to do with anything.

Next we jump ahead to the present day (although the events in the pre-credits opening sequence could well have happened the night before for all we know at this point) we’re at a typical 80s aerobics studio owned by a lady named Rhonda (Marcia Karr) that’s called, unimaginatively but admittedly appropriately enough enough, Rhonda’s Workout. Rhonda is stuck leading that day’s group session (filmed in lovingly close-up detail) because her perpetually untrustworthy employee? Jaimy (Teresa Van der Woude) is running late yet again, She gets there in time to clean and lock up and gives Rhonda essentially no excuse whatsoever for her tardiness (the condoms that drop out of her purse in the parking lot clue us in, though) but promises it will never happen again for what we can tell is the umpteenth time.

In the showers after class, though, a fetching young lass is murdered gruesomely with a giant safety pin, and when Jaimy finds her body stashed away in her locker while pursuing her decidedly unglamorous cleaning duties, she screams and screams and screams and next thing you know the cops are there, led by Detective Lieutenant Morgan (David James Campbell, who’s got the 80s moussed-hair look down every bit as well as any of the women in the flick), who hard-assedly (think I invented a new word there) interrogates Rhonda, Jaimy, and anyone and everyone else associated with the club.

With no real leads to go on, his investigation grows more urgent — and he grows more stereotypically belligerent — as more people associated with the club all start turning up dead in and around Rhonda’s joynt, all despatched in the same manner — by giant bad-ass motherfucking safety pin.

To complicate matters, Rhonda’s absent silent partner in her operation, one Mr. Erickson, send in a new male employee named Ted (Chuck Dawson), who seems to have a habit of snooping around in Rhonda’s file cabinets.

Who is he? What’s he really up to? Again, all will be revealed, because unlike a lot of B-movies, every loose plot strand in this one is explained in at least something like a satisfactory fashion.

Mostly, though, it’s the details that matter in Killer Workout, and I’m thrilled to say it gets them all right. Inventive and gruesome kills, big hair, bigger boobs, cheesy period fashions and hair — we already went over our little checklist of everything that could possibly make this movie awesome, so you already know they’re all present and accounted for. And you can add barely-competently staged fistfights, scenery-chewing overacting, stereotypical gender roles, and a truly gleeful fourth-wall-busting ending to the list, as well.

You could want more from a film than that, I suppose, but why be greedy?

Is Killer Workout a great movie? Of course not. But it’s definitely a great B -movie, and that’s what we’re all about here at TFG. Consequently, it earns, and I do mean earns, your humble host’s highest possible recommendation.

Killer Workout is, sadly, not available as an official DVD release in Region 1, but fortunately that doesn’t stop the ever-enterprising Flesh Wound video from offering it anyway, and if you feel no moral qualms about needing to see this flick ASAP (and you really shouldn’t), then I suggest you get off your ass and go over to http://www.fleshwoundvideo.com right away. As usual, Todd there does as good a job as humanly possible in transferring this over from the given source elements (which I assume in this case to be VHS). It’s a nicely-done full-frame transfer with an equally nicely-done opening title menu that, for all intents and purposes, looks like the “real” thing — and is probably as close as we’re ever going to get, anyway.

There are better movies out there than Killer Workout — lots of them, in fact. But I doubt you’ll have more fun watching them. If I were burying a time capsule in 1986, I’d put this in itside. It tells you everything you need to know about the era it comes from. It’s more fun to watch now than it probably was when it came out, and in 50 years’ time plopping down in front of the tube to it is gonna be an even better time.

special guest column sarah palin reviews “transformers revenge of the fallen”

Editor’s Note : While we’re certainly pleased to have such a distinguished guest as our first celebrity columnist here at TFG, we cannot be held responsible for any unorthodox spelling, punctuation, or syntax on Governor Palin’s part. As she has proven since her arrival on the national stage, the governor has a very—-unique grammatical style, and she agreed to appear in our humble little corner of the internets (whoops, that was the other intellectually challenged Republican’s phrase) only under the condition that we agree to let her communicate directly with you, the American public, without any editing or “mainstream media filtering,” as she put it, on our part. Here, then, is the governor of Alaska —

Howdy friends, it sure is good ta be able to sit down and have a little chat with all a you good people even without the filter of the main stream media gettin in the way of me communicating my message directly with you, the people of our great country that I love so much and thank the troops for all their hard work and sacrifice for our freedom for.

Now, when my good friend Trash Film Gooroo first asked me ta maybe think about writin a column for his blog, I admit I was kinda nervous. Sure, I’ve spoken in front of thousands, and delivered speeches, and even kicked some butt in that VP’s debate last year that I don’t care what anybody in the main stream media says, you and I know I won. Big. But a movie review? That was new ta me. So I gues what I’m tryin to say here is, this may not be the kinda review you would expect to read or I may not talk as directly about one little topic as people might be thinkin, but I’m just gonna talk about this my own way, directly to the suck— err, voters, without the filter of the liberal main stream media.

So as ya all know, last Friday was a busy day for me and Todd and the kids, what with that little announcement that everybody’s makin such a big fuss about, but by Saturday things had calmed down a little bit, and it was the 4th of July and I just wanna thank our troops for all their hard work and sacrifice for God and country and our freedom. So while other people were out seein fireworks or watchin parades, I thought a myself—what would a maverick do on the 4th of July holiday? No politics as usual, somethin really different, because I’m just not wired that way to do the politics as usual stuff. I’m wired different. Like a maverick.

So we thought, hey, why not go ta the movies? We could take the whole family . Except Bristol, who was out speakin at a conference on teen abstinence. I don’t know what else was goin on at that conference, but they had a great lineup, including Keith Richards lecturing on the benefits of drug-free living, John Goodman talking about the importance of a healthy diet, and Pete Rose talking to our youth about the dangers of gambling. I think I heard something about maybe even Mike Tyson showin up to talk a little bit on how to treat women with respect. So it sounds like quite a lineup of experts on their various topics. I think it was called the annual conference of HA, which stands for Hypocrit—-err, I ferget the name.? But hey. The rest of us had the day off, though, so I thought, hey, what would a maver—sorry, I’m repeatin myself, we decided ta go ta the movies.

Now, in our household, we try ta decide things as a family, and when I said “hey, should I work hard to fight for all our children’s future from outside government after we go see a movie?,” the answers were four “yes”s and one “hell yeah!” And the “hell yeah!” sealed it.

So, what kinda movies do we like? Okay, yeah, sometimes I like a romance or a “chick flick,” and of course the kids love comedy, but Todd, the “first dude,” is an action guy, and ya know, I admit it, I love action too, and so when he suggested we see the new “Transformers” movie, I just couldn’t resist. All that tranformin and changin reminded me of how I fight every day to tranform and change our state and our country that I love so much. I knew I wouldn’t be doin my duty as a maverick if I didn’t see “Transformers,” since I’m in the business of transformin this county for all our children’s future.

Anyhoo — we took the whole family except Bristol, even my eldest grands—-err,youngest son, Trig, who’s a special needs child, not that I’d ever mention that just to score cheap political points by exploitin my family situation. That would be so politics as usual. And I’m just not wired that way. I’m a fighter and politics as usual just wouldn’t be what a good point guard does. A good point guard knows when ta pass the ball to secure her team a victory, like I just did the day before when I did what was best for my state and the country I love so much and celebrate our freedom this July 4th and I just want to thank God for our troops one more time, they all sacrifice so much for our freedom. They’re our real heroes.

So anyway, Trig is a special needs child, and the reason I mention that is not because I want ta sound grand and special or anything like that or use him like some political prop. The world needs more Trigs, not fewer. And Trig needs ta see more movies, not fewer.? So we took him ta see “Transformers” with us, not fewer.

So my family’s been through a lot, what with the liberal main stream media constantly investigatin these spurious ethics violations and unfounded allegations and just plain crazy rumors flyin around, so I figured we deserved ta go all out — large tubs a popcorn, hot dogs, Twizzlers, and large sodas for all of us. The total bill for our afternoon at the movies was $84.50 charged to the Alaska taxpa—-err, my Visa card.? And if anyone says I didn’t pay for this myself they’ll be hearin from my lawyer.

So anyway, we sat down and the movie was a lotta fun, there was good old Optimus Prime and those two fun-lovin, abstinence-practicin teenagers and it was just so nice ta see a movie as a family because family is the most important gift God gives us in this life and I just thank God every day for my family and of course for this great country and all our troops who sacrifice so much ta keep us safe and free.

Now, I don’t wanna give away too darn much about the plot, that’s no fun! You wanna see all the suprises fer yerself, don’cha? And not have some crazy no-fun reviewer give it all away. But I gotta say two things that bothered me —

1. The movie seemed ta imply that the Transformers had been on Earth many thousands a years ago. Now, I get it. They need a neat plot twist ta make things interesting. But anyone who’s read the Bible knows the Earth is only about 6,000 years old. And man and dinosaurs were here at the same time. So this movies seems ta contradict the Bible by sayin the Earth is older than it really is. So we kinda had a little conflict there.

2. A lotta people are makin a big stink about these sapposedly black “hip-hop” kinda Trasformers with gold teeth who can’t read. All I gotta say is, lighten up, people. I got in touch with the black voters who love America who voted for me and John McCain last year, just a little kinda informal chit-chat, and? ya know what? They both said it was a lotta brew-ha-ha about nothin. We got a little laugh and little chuckle outta it I gotta admit, all this politically correct main stream media bias. It all seems so silly. And anyone who’s read the GOP platform knows that white people are the victims of alla the world’s racism and discrimination, not black people. Even today our President is black but we won’t talk about who he beat because we don’t like ta dwell on the past in my household. It’s all about our future. And our children’s future. And fighting for all our children’s future from outside government.

So anyway. We had fun. How did it all end up in the end? Well, I couldn’t tell ya. I did the maverick thing to do—I left the movie with 30 minutes to go. Sticking around to find out how things end? That would be easy. That’s the quitter’s way out. This way I can fight for the best ending possible from outside of the movie.

Anyway, thanks so much for readin what I had to say and for carin about this country. I’ll just take this opportunity ta say how much I love this country and all our children and love ya all even more from outside government than I did when I was in there and it’s just so great to be a point uard on this winning team fightin for all our children and our troops who I’m so thankful for who sacrifice so much and are our real heroes. Never forget that, no matter what the main stream media tells ya, I’m here every day to fight for God, county, all our children’s future, our troops, and our sacred American way of life.

This is Sarah Palin signin off from Alaska, be sure? ta catch me on my book tour when I come through your town, it sure would be a heck of a thrill ta see ya.

“life during wartime” proves we all mellow with age

So, anyway, Todd Solondz is back with a new film, and not too many people seem to care.

I caught his latest, Life During Wartime, a sorta-sequel/sorta-variation on his 1998 breakout hit Happiness,? at a Saturday matinee showing at the Uptown Theater here in Minneapolis, essentially indie film central of the upper midwest, the day after it opened — and there were exactly seven people in the auditorium, myself included.

Talking briefly with a couple of moviegoers after the show, they essentially had the same reaction I did — it wasn’t bad by any means, but we all felt, I dunno — kind of underwhelmed by the whole thing. Todd Solondz has grown up and learned to divorce himself from his characters a bit, but I think I preferred the less-analytical, more directly-involved (for good or bad) style of his previous efforts. Hold tight and all will (hopefully) be explained —

First off, if you haven’t seen Happiness, don’t bother with this at all. Solondz assumes the audience is all familiar with the characters,? even though each and every one is portrayed by a different actor than last time around (Solondz seems hooked on the idea of changing our perception of his characters based on changing who’s playing them, and uses those changes as a way of questioning the fundamental nature of identity itself — an interesting and challenging move, to be sure, but frankly one that he used to much better effect is his last (and for my money best) film, Palindromes, where the actress (and in one case actor) playing the lead role of Aviva changed several times within the film itself), and he doesn’t bother to really provide much of a point of entry for anyone late to the party.

Fair enough, I guess, it’s his call to make, but certainly the effect on any new viewer is going to be alienating to say the least. But given that alienation is a central? concern in all of Solondz’ work, maybe that’s intentional. It’s certainly carried over into his overall approach approach as a filmmaker.

And that’s where my main beef with Life During Wartime lies — in his previous efforts, Solondz has either treated his characters with outright disdain (Happiness, Storytelling) or something approaching a sort of genuine level of sympathy and human concern (Welcome to the Dollhouse, Palindromes). In this flick, though, he approaches his subjects with a kind of detached, almost journalistic eye that works decently enough in conjunction with the minimalist production design and straightforward scripting in creating a sort of bare-bones, take-it-or-leave-it environment for his characters to function in, but it never really directly involves the viewer in any sort of way with the events unfolding onscreen.

I’m assuming all of this is quite intentional on his part (Solondz is too talented to assume anything else), and furthermore I can see why he’s chosen to go down this road — as with Happiness, the themes he’s dealing with here are intensely painful and harrowing, and viewing them through a kind of cold, clinical lens produces a juxtaposition, and a tension, between storytelling style and subject that’s interesting, to be sure, but in the end not entirely rewarding.

It’s been a full decade since everything went to hell for the Jordan family in the first film, and the three sisters who were the focal point of the first film have moved on — eternally depressed optimist (I know that sounds like a contradiction, but it’s not) Joy (Shirley Henderson) has settled down and married former (or so she thinks)?obscene phone caller Allen (Michael K. Williams), but things aren’t going so well and she’s haunted by visions of her ex-boyfriend who committed suicide, Andy (Paul Reubens —one of the truly great things about this film is seeing Pee Wee Herman himself back in action). Uptight-and-always-in-denial Trish (Allison Janney) has moved to Florida and told her kids that their pedophile father Bill, who’s actually due to be released from prison any day, was a? great and heroic sort of guy who died a tragic death.? She’s met an older guy named Harvey (Michael Lerner) whose staunch support for Israel and sexual — well, normalcy — have made her fall instantly in love with him. And uber-successful sister Trish (Ally Sheedy) has given up poetry for screenwriting, moved to Hollywood, cut off ties with her family, and started dating Keanu Reeves. Yes, really.

Things start to go south for the family pretty much from the word go, though — Joy (who gives this film its title with one her corny musical compositions, as was the case with?Happiness)?learns that Allen hasn’t been able to give up his X-rated prank call habit and flees to Florida, then Hollywood, hoping to find solace with her family (good luck with that). Cracks start to form in Trish’s carefully-constructed dam when her 12-year-old son Timmy (Dylan Riley Snyder) learns the truth about his dad. Things only get worse when the old man gets out of? jail and seeks out his their eldest son,? Billy (Chris Marquette) at college. And Helen is — well, Helen, and essentially completely divorced from basic concepts of human empathy and understanding, wrapped up in a completely self-absorbed cocoon of pure selfishness.

At this point I may as well admit that I find some of the casting choices a little bit disappointing in relation to the earlier film — the sisters are all well-chosen, but Jon Lovitz was a lot more interesting as Andy than Reubens is (painful as it is for me to say that), Philip Seymour Hoffman was a much more memorable Allen than Williams is, Dylan Baker was a much more terrifyingly real Bill than the detached and damaged figure Hinds portrays, and geez, Renee Taylor as family matriarch Mona can’t hold a candle to Louise Lasser (the ladies’ father, played with his usual consummate professionalism in Happiness by Ben Gazzara, is missing and presumed dead).

I have no doubt that a lot of the differences between how the characters came across the last time around and how they come across here can be more than adequately rationalized as being a realistic portrayal of where they are in their lives now versus where they were then, and represent a natural evolution of the kid of people they would become given the events that have transpired in their lives. I’m cool with that. But that doesn’t mean the actors, and the director, necessarily chose the best way to try to make this phase of their respective stories as interesting as the last was.

Sure, each character’s “arc” (God how I hate that term) is interesting enough in and of itself, but again, Solondz’ detached approach never makes any of the various plotlines as genuinely involving as it could be, and that makes all the difference here. And I’ll state again, while I have no doubt this artistic decision was made quite deliberately, it still doesn’t make for as satisfying a viewing experience as we got the first time around.

I guess a lot of folks are going to say that our guy Todd has simply matured as a filmmaker, but it seems like some of the fire in his belly has gone out a bit. Happiness was as genuinely disturbing to this reviewer on first viewing as films like Salo and Cannibal Holocaust (and no animals — or humans — were harmed in the process), but Life During Wartime feels less like a sequel, or even a variation, and more like an addendum. It’s central theme of forgiveness for the unforgivable feels heavy-handed and frankly shoehorned in, as if to prove there was more of a point here than just saying “oh, by the way, here’s what happened to these people in case you were wondering.”

I don’t to bitch too much here, this is still a more interesting and challenging film than 99% of what’s out there. But given the high level at which Solondz set the bar with Happiness, it has to be said that his folow-up feels like something of a missed opportunity.

“dead space” is deja vu all over again

Let me know if the following setup sounds at all familiar to you —

Somewhere in deep space, Commander (of what we’re not exactly sure) Steve Krieger (the always-trying-too-hard-but-still-never-quite-understanding-that-he’s-just-not-leading-man-material Beastmaster himself, Marc Singer) is involved in a pointless shoot-out with a couple of other ships that won’t have anything to do with the rest of the story and is cribbed together from footage borrowed/swiped from an earlier production (in this case Battle Beyond The Stars). He and his robot buddy, Tinpan, survive the “ordeal,” but their craft is damaged in the process, so when they make an emergency landing in response to a distress signal issued from a top-secret scientific research lab on the isolated and remote planet of Phaebon, they’re pretty much gonna be stuck there until they can get the parts or whatever to get up and running and go “command” outer space again.

Once they’ve arrived at the lab, they find the assembled brainpower there is seeking a cure for the deadly Delta 5 virus that’s currently the scourge of the galaxy/universe (take your pick), but the eggheads start playing coy and insisting that everything’s under control and gosh they just didn’t really mean to send that distress signal after all. It’s not like they’re doing anything that could be potentially dangerous here, no sir — they just figured that they’d combat the virus by genetically engineering an even more destructive counter-virus (is that what they’re called? I honestly have no idea) and then maybe these two super-viruses can, I dunno, battle it out for viral supremacy or something. Basic logic might dictate to the average viewer at this point that any virus strong enough to kill another virus that’s already in the business of decimating the galactic (or, again, maybe it’s universal) population might pose not just a threat, but an even greater threat to us pesky humans than? the original Delta-5 bug itself, but hey, you’re thinking a little too hard there, friend.

In any case, that’s not really the problem here at all — the problem is that the new virus has mutated into an honest-to-goodness alien life form (hey, shit happens),and it’s escaped (rather forcefully, I might add) from one of the dumb suckers —- err, test subjects — it was implanted into, and now it’s changing its shape, growing in size, and stalking the humans at the base as its prey from its new home in the ventilation ducts.

Oh, and a few of the scientists are women who seem to have the hots for Krieger to one degree or another, and one is a youthful Bryan Cranston, who would of course go on to huge television success with Breaking Bad.

I’m not sure what we’re supposed to call a rip-off of a rip-off, folks, but this (admittedly snarky) synposis for first-time director Fred Gallo’s 1991 straight-to-video , Roger Corman-produced (okay, executive-produced — and to be perfectly fair, calling this film an SOV job isn’t technically accurate, as Corman still pulled together nominal theatrical runs (think one theater for one week in six or eight cities) for most of his Concorde releases, including this one, at this point — but he knew that home video was where the action was gonna be, so to speak, for this type of project, and put the whole thing together with an eye toward that market) shot-on- one-set, super-low-budgeter, Dead Space (no relation to the apparently-quite-popular video game or anime thing or whatever it is that came about quite a bit later) sure sounds a lot like another, admittedly much better, Corman production, namely Forbidden World, doesn’t it? And Forbidden World was pretty much just a straight cash-in attempt on the success of Alien. So what we’ve got here is, to put it kindly, pretty damn derivative in the extreme.

Of course, around these parts being derivative — hell, even being doubly-derivative — is hardly a cinematic crime. Some of my favorite films are obvious rip-off jobs. But let’s be honest — when you take Forbidden World and remove about 75% of the gore, 99% of the nudity, replace the hot women in the base with average-looking middle-aged ladies (no offense to any who may be reading this, I’m an average-looking middle-aged guy, after all), swap out Jesse Vint for Marc fucking Singer fer chrissakes!, and take the talented-and-inventive-on-a-budget Allan Holzman out from behind the camera and insert a kid right out of film school who you’re paying $7,000 (by Gallo’s own recollection, according to the commentary track?on the DVD that we’ll get to in a second here — he also didn’t get to see the script until the morning they started shooting!) who’s just going with a strict “point-and-shoot” approach, the results are going to be both a)short (let’s not forget that Forbidden World itself was only 77 minutes long — this flick clocks in at a merciful 71) and b)anemic, because you’re taking out pretty much all the cool shit. The fact that the monster itself isn’t all that terrifically impressive doesn’t help matters much, either, given that this is supposed to be, ya know, a monster movie.

These days, with this production far in the past, Corman and company aren’t at all shy about admitting where this whole project originated from, although I still think the terminology they use is letting themselves off the hook a bit too easily — the “Roger Corman’s Cult Classics” DVD from Shout! Factory that I caught this on (told you I’d get back to it in a second — it’s double-billed with another early-90s Corman DTV feature, the somewhat better The Terror Within, features the above-mentioned commentary with director Gallo that’s actually pretty interesting and some other Corman trailers as extras, and is presented full-frame with 2.0 stereo sound for serviceable if unspectacular visual and audio quality) even says right on the back-cover blurb that it’s “a loose remake of Forbidden World,” and I’ve seen it referenced on IMDB and elsewhere as “an uncredited remake of Forbidden World.”

Well, piss on that. I know it’s hardly the most rigidly-definable line to draw, but I’m sorry — there’s a big difference (although, frankly, I’m not entirely sure what the difference?is — I just know it when I see it) between a “loose remake,” or even an “uncredited remake,” and Roger Corman saying “look, I’ve got this old script laying around, we can just tinker with it at the margins, re-shoot it with a different cast, put it out right on video under another title, and presto, we’ve got ourselves a whole new movie that won’t even cost us $100,000.”? I think calling it a “remake” of any sort is frankly being a little too generous — it’s more a recycling.

Look, the late 80s and early 90s probably weren’t the easiest time to be Roger Corman. The kind of stuff he cranked out was too cheap for then-contemporary theatrical audiences, but it was a little too expensive, for the most part, for the then-nascent straight-to-video market,? and Saturday night SyFy network movies were still well over a decade away. I’ll give the man credit for figuring out some angle, any angle, by which he could still survive financially in Hollywood. But when you’ve hit the point when you can’t even come up with a new idea for a blatant rip-off anymore and just start re-shooting scripts you’ve done previously and done better, then you’ve really hit rock bottom in the creativity department, not that creativity in anything apart from marketing was ever a Corman strong suit. In short, Roger should have to stuck to stealing other people’s ideas, rather than his own. Even if they weren’t his own to begin with. Does that make sense?