Patrick R

Yup! Representation matters. And the example of the guy changing Penelope to the protagonist in Donkey Kong doesn't even fit with "I don't want to play this specific game because I can't play as [whomever]", because it wasn't a daughter refusing to play, it was a father seeing problems in representation and trying to correct them.

For real!

Speaking of historical fiction though, I just finished reading Ragtime for the first time and holy shit Ragtime. I'd love to hear your take on Ragtime.

Happy day!

This has always been my favorite part of all the MGS games. The "here is stock footage while we explain the history of war and the arms race to you" aspect has such tension with the "here's a vampire and robot ninja and also a billion easter eggs that highlight what a gamey game game this is" and I find the result totally compelling, in the same way that something like Twin Peaks mixes ridiculous melodrama with truly disturbing creepy stuff like Bob. It's why the campier approach of MGS3 wasn't as appealing to me (even if I still loved the hell out of it) as the po-faced bugfuck conspiracy theory stuff of MGS2. Alas, I'm guess 5 is going to be Sony exclusive like 4 was, so my time with the series has come to an end.

I was at a bar last night that had a DJ doing an exclusively 60's pop and garage rock set, where I heard this gem: Really fantastic.

...there was a Dizzy kickstarter?

Yeah Thunderpeel, I realize I'm not explaining it a well as I could, because for me it's as much in the intangibles of his direction that make characters feel more like symbols to me. There is no doubt in my mind that Freddie represents the Id and Dodd the Ego but like I said, if you just want to read it as a straight-ahead character study, that's valid too. It's just that there are too many scenes that feel abstracted and counter-intuitive to exploring the characters (the final scene between the two, the motorcycle in the desert scene, etc.) for me to read it as the film's primary mode of operation. It's just too impressionistic for me to read literally. That said, I only saw the film once and I'm sure my understanding of the film would benefit from multiple viewings, even if the conclusion I come to is that there isn't actually a working thesis at it's center (which is how I feel about TWBB). As for Cujo, so much of the story that isn't the dog attacking the car doesn't really translate cinematically (it's been a while since I read the book, but I recall the backstory of the serial killer from The Dead Zone and the dog's inner monologue being very prominent), but all the actual meat of the film is actually really well made. Jan de Bont's cinematography is excellent.

For There Will Be Blood I'd have to watch it again as it's been at least a year, but off the top of my head there's HW being annointed with oil and there's the way the oil fire is played for maximum Hades imagery. Things that mix around the religious with capitalism. And the way he utilizes Johnny Greenwood's score to create a sense of dread bubbling just under the surface of the whole thing imbues the entire film with an eerie quality that I feel is separate from the character work at hand. I feel if PTA was only concerned with Daniel the man, the film as a whole would feel entirely different. Which is maybe not a great answer because I think a lot of it has to do with intangible qualities of PTA's direction, but as I said it's been at least a year since I watched it. As for the Master, the film doesn't even make sense taken literally. People's eyes change color and two men regularly drink poison. If PTA is only attempting to make character study, he chooses the least efficient way to do it. His films definitely work as that, but I think what keeps people debating films like TWBB and The Master are their other less tangible qualities. PTA chooses to obfuscate a LOT in The Master, from the opaqueness of Pheonix's character to even basic things like plot and story. If you watch and love his films purely as character studies that's totally valid, but I have to disagree that that is all that is at work there.

While watching TWBB I definitely find points where I agree with you (the silent opening couldn't be more pointed in establishing Daniel as a very specific kind of man, and I love what Tarantino said about the elliptical cut that is made after he crawls out of the well), but him being empty from the word go makes several scenes in the film (the way he's concerned about HW when he goes deaf, the whole sub-plot with the brother, the "I've abandoned my boy" moment) not really make much sense. He feels like a single minded character who rides his only desire to his grave, but moments like that tend to complicate things quite a bit, which is what makes it such an interesting film that people are still debating 5 years later. Ambiguity. And again, for me, TWBB and (especially) The Master are just too evocative and rife with symbolic imagery that reading them as straight character studies seems to miss a lot of what PTA is setting out to do. Back to the thread topic (and a wildly different kind of film), Jackass Number Two is on Netflix and is still a masterpiece and I am not even kidding. One of the best comedies ever made, easy.

DO THEY.

Nick casually mentioning that he does in fact have a flight stick was the absolute best.

I obviously can't judge your interpretation of TWBB without knowing the details, but in my experience that film has been fascinating to talk about with others because it's such a strong example of (in my opinion) really great use of ambiguity and a not so great use of it as well. My favorite ambiguity in the film is about how everyone seems to have a different idea of what Daniel Plainview's arc is. At what point does he lose his soul? Did he already lose it before it even started? Did he ever love his child, or was his child just a tool? I love how any given moment of Day-Lewis' performance could read in multiple ways (the pinnacle of this of course being the "I've abandoned my boy!" scene, where he fades in and out of sincerity so fluidly it almost feels like a magic trick). Then again, there's the larger meaning of the film. Is it just a character piece? That apocalyptic, very Kubrickian ending seems to suggest to me a larger metaphor being drawn. Is it about the relationship between Eli and Daniel? Not really, because so much of the film (the whole section with Daniel's brother) isn't about Eli at all. So is it an allegory? For what? It's easy to draw Daniel and Eli as symbols of capitalism and religion, but what is it actually saying about that? That they're the same and/or equals? Because the characters are not. That capitalism killed/replaced religion? It hasn't. The problem with most interpretations I've heard is that the film is that the plot is actually more lackadaisical and roundabout than it feels, and to claim that it has a single defining thesis, people often have willfully ignore big chunks of the film. Maybe you have the perfect interpretation that sees TWBB as a thematically tight and cohesive film (not that TWBB not being thematically tight and cohesive is a bad thing, necessarily) but in my opinion PTA the director far outshines PTA the screenwriter. I am interested in what exactly you mean by him being a "slave to his characters". It's not necessarily a thought that's ever occurred to me.

I actually got to that exact screenshot and was so overwhelmed by indecisiveness that I haven't gone back to it.

Joaquin has kind of a unique history with the subject matter, as his family were all members of the Children of God cult. And that's a good way to put it, Rodi. He's so uncomfortable in his own skin. I think in general Paul Thomas Anderson is an incredible filmmaker, so much so that his films often evoke some kind of deeper meaning that is rarely backed up by the screenplays. I've never seen two people agree on what There Will Be Blood is really "about", or seen something that explains how the stories in Magnolia are connected thematically (except in the vaguest of ways). I think his strength with TWBB and The Master has been to create these incredible evocative experiences, that could really be metaphors for anything and everything. You make weird impressionistic films about diametrically opposing forces, there's a lot of blanks for people to fill in themselves.

This looks much better than Home, the horror-adventure game I accidentally impulse bought on Steam, thinking it was this.

I was under the impression that this was never released? Was there some other Eidos/Ion Storm game that died on the vine or am I just making things up?

Holy cow. I think about SkiFree about once a week (I remember I assumed that the main character's name was SkiFree) but I haven't thought about Rodent's Revenge in AGES. This whole page is full of locked away gaming memories. Rattler's Race! Chip's Challenge!

I could have worded it better.

And all I could think of while comparing Captain Comic to Micro Man was how much shareware gaming changed when things left DOS. EDIT: Also, this was the first episode I listened to on my computer instead of on my iPod as I drove around delivering pizzas, and I was able to look up everything the Thumbs talked about in real time on muted YouTube videos. It was amazing to see Indiana Jones Desktop Adventures play out as they talked about it. Highly recommend this listening technique.

I use Chrome exclusively, and have no trouble posting.

All I could think of during the talk about early casual gaming was . Micro Man never came on my computer and I was always jealous of my cousin for having it.

Yeah, I tend to think Gondry is at his best directing music videos. None of his features have exploded my brain the way something like Around the World or do. But I do think Science of Sleep is criminally underrated. I kind of hated it at first, but upon rewatching it last year I began to realize how heartfelt it is. Eternal Sunshine is a great film, but every time I see it I find Kate Winslet's character a little more underwritten and unsuccessful at subverting the manic pixie dream girl trope. To say nothing of Jim Carey's miscasting. Science of Sleep, on the other hand feels incredibly personal to me. Michel Gondry is probably one of the most quirky and whimsical artists in any medium, and that film is actually about what a nightmare that can be. In making the manic pixie dream girl (or, in this case, the manic pixie dream guy) the main character of the film, he's able to better explore the problems someone who is so weird and manic could face. But because he's played by Gael Garcia Bernal, the most beautiful man on the planet, it's able to come across as equally charming, creepy, fun and childish. I think it's a pretty remarkable film. And Adaptation was directed by Spike Jonze. Easy mistake.

It's way less ingrained in film language than video game language but yeah, , while moving right to left can be used . I actually learned a lot about that sort of thing recently when I watched a bunch of Buster Keaton movies. His films (especially his shorts) tend to have an incredible focus on establishing large spaces and telling a story by the way the main character physically traverses that space. His films often pull the camera way back to emphasize that space, and the result often looks like a side-scroller. (though maybe the super racist scene where the black family is all "g-g-g-ghost!" should be omitted). I imagine it's just easier to keep making games that go left to right. Once it became standard, a developer would have to have a pretty good reason to confuse their audience by asking them to go right to left. Similar to how higher pitched sound effects like chimes and bells mean good things in many games (points in Donkey Kong, coins in Mario). Once an audience accepts it as part of game grammar you have to accept it, whether that means you just go with it or you decide to subvert it. Especially in those later platformers of the 16-bit era that had a lot more exploration and verticality. Just knowing that goal = right makes exploring a maze-like platforming level a lot easier.