April 19/03                                                                            More in weblog archive
	Forest footage and filming "Returning" I finally looked at the forest footage I recorded on my trip to the UBC Demonstration forest last week. Nothing artistic to look at but it certainly showed what kind of setting it could provide. Lovely depth with lots of trees in the background at different distances away. Problem could be lighting, however, as well as other problems related to filming in the rain. I've arranged to shoot tomorrow and over the course of today hacked together a script. Read it here >> Canucks stay alive The Canucks had a gut-check game last night in a chippy, desperate game that went all their direction until the very end when the Blues made it close. It seemed that the Blues were missing a few key players with the flu which Vancouver took advantage of by scoring five goals at critical moments, winning 5-3. Finally, all three of the 'big line' scored. Bertuzzi had a beautiful between the legs shot from in close, Morrison was fed an awesome pass on the rush by Marek Malik, and the Naslund scored on a difficult angle on the powerplay. Would it be too much to ask the hockey gods to give the Blues the flu for Sunday as well?

	April 18/03                                                                            More in weblog archive
	That amazing Honda Accord ad This will be making the rounds in the emails all week. It's an ad for the Honda Accord which features an amazing Rube Goldberg set up made all with parts of the new Accord. A ball is set off at the beginning which starts a chain reaction. The ad took 606 takes to get it right and uses no computer graphics. See it here >>. Also read about the making of the ad >>

	April 17/03                                                                            More in weblog archive
	More on "28 Days Later" In discussing that zombie film with others today I learned that it was made on a Canon XL1S PAL edition with manual lens. I'm amazed at the quality achieved by that set up (though others point out that I saw it on a smaller screen and that blown up it would have looked fairly crappy). Still, a lot can be done in front of the camera for the $15m budget. Not a DV budget at all! Canucks on the brink; Red Wings toasted I didn't get a chance to see the entire game last night as I was at my screenwriting course. So I did not get to see the pain of the Canucks being scored on four times in succession to lose to the Blues 4-1. Those that saw it said that they played well but couldn't get it done. The same explanation, but to an extreme, explains the Red Wings being swept by the lowly Might Ducks of Anaheim in four straight. While I get some satisfaction in seeing a major upset such as this, it doesn't look long until Vancouver is also golfing.

	April 16/03                                                                            More in weblog archive
	FRESH ROTTING FLESH 28 Days Later IMDB | Official Site dir. Danny Boyle starring: Cillian Murphy, Naomie Harris, Megan Burns, Brendan Gleeson, Christopher Eccleston The director of "Trainspotting" and "Shallow Grave" Danny Boyle has made an innovative and entertaining submission to the post-apocalyptic zombie-fighting genre but takes a U-turn into moralizing just when it starts getting good. A familiar premise, executed in a fresh way Proving again that there is always another way to remake a shopworn genre, Danny Boyle and writer Alex Garland have infused the zombie mythology with plenty of style and energy, which makes "28 Days Later" genuinely fresh. If there was ever an 'art film' zombie picture, this is it. Set in near future England, the film begins with a series of violent images from documentary footage of conflicts around the world, shocking pieces of real horror that are a foreboding of what is to come. This barrage of violent images (Riots, shootings, Saddam Hussein) are impressed upon chimpanzees in a secret laboratory which is soon broken into by a group of radicals with predictable results. Unfortunately, none of them seem to have seen horror films recently as the first thing they do is release a chimpanzee which promptly attacks them. As they soon discover, the chimpanzees have been infected with 'rage', a virus that causes the afflicted to puke blood horribly and act homicidally towards other humans, spreading the disease in their wounds. The protagonist of the movie, a bicycle courier (Cillian Murphy) convalescing in a hospital, wakes up 28 days after the chimp attack to find London deserted. He soon learns that an epidemic has struck the city, causing it to be evacuated. Since we know that it is only a matter of time before he meets with the murderous undead, the time he spends poking around London is an excercise is restrained suspense. After his first harrowing encounter with the Londoners the courier falls in with two other uninfected humans, who give him the low down on the events that lead to London's evacuation and teach him how to survive. Here Boyle and Garland begin to develop their thesis further, that rage is endemic to humans, not just the infected, and that the solution might be for humans to reject each other, not to pull together. In another nice twist to the genre, the stupid one in the band of survivors is the male protagonist, not the girl. Naomie Harris as the hard bitten survivor with a meat cleaver is not eager to team up with other humans who might slow her down, and is suitably vicious when circumstances call for her to act. Also refreshing is that there are no rapidfire solutions to their zombie problem. Americans might look down on the gunless weakness of the British in the face of post-apocalyptic chaos but dramatically, having to face the undead hand-to-hand makes for surprising thrills. More reason to fear tunnels. Zombies. Learning that there might be a potential cure through an automated radio broadcast, the growing band of survivors decide to take their chances making their way across an uncertain country. It is when they finally meet the band of soldiers behind the broadcasts that the film begins to give way to heavy-handedness that frankly takes the joy out of the journey. The squad of soldiers lead by stalwart Christopher Eccleston are the inevitable humans who act as poorly as the savage monsters they are fortified against. A bit of a zombie cliche already, the soldiers gone wild represent a bit of a bitter pill that Boyle makes you swallow as if to make you guilty you were having fun for rooting for the humans. This is the only negative in what is otherwise a fresh turn to an undying genre. Coming to DVD. Take a look at some great makeup I was engaged in an online discussion about 'soft' actors who became 'hard' and I raised Matthew McCoughnahey's transformance from sensitive guy to hard man in "Reign of Fire". To illustrate my point, I found this picture of McCoughnahey and was surprised to learn that it was a really good makeup job to give him the skinhead look. The movie is not bad, by the way, just a let down at the end. Mixed results in my hockey pool I am now 6th in my pool with my players earning 22 points. My performance could get decidedly worse if the Red Wings are upset by the much improved Anaheim Mighty Ducks who lead their series 3-0. I have three Red Wings in my pool team.

	April 15/03                                                                            More in weblog archive
	Udai Hussein's mansion This is an amusing story about what Marines have found in Udai Hussein's sprawling mansion which seems to resemble a Playboy mansion complete with private zoo and loads of porn. The article is rather light-hearted but actually Udai was also a serial rapist. Obviously the Baathist elites were living the high life and were not bothered at all by the UN sanctions, unlike their people. Read it here >> The Canucks stymied by stingy defense And the series swung back to the Blues' favour again after they beat the Canucks last night 3-1. The score belied an otherwise one-sided affair as the Blues came out hitting just as the Canucks did in the last game and shut down Vancouver from almost every angle. Offensively, the Blues outchanced the Canucks by a wide margin and were extremely dangerous on their powerplays. The Canucks, on the other hand, were tepid on their own numerous powerplays, managing to score on a shot from the point by Marek Malik but otherwise did not pressure at all. The big question throughout the series is how will the big line of Naslund-Morrison-Bertuzzi ever find a way to score. Naslund especially seems quite frustrated, having taken poor penalties in each game.

	April 13/03                                                                            More in weblog archive
	At the UBC Demonstration forest Yesterday, friends Adri and Cory and I explored the UBC demonstration forest, a woodland 20 minutes out of Vancouver which is used by forestry students to study various harvesting and care disciplines. As well as providing an enjoyable hike away from civilization, the forest also was inspirational creatively. I know if I need a forest location for filming, its wide variety of wood types are available. The Canucks remember what brought them After getting back from the forest I plunked down on a couch to watch the Canucks, to see whether or not they would be able to turn the series around after their drubbing by the Blues. To my extreme pleasure I watched them refocus and act like the elite team they had become this season. Firstly, the return of Mattias Ohlund appeared to stabilize the wily nily defense of the first game. Ohlund played just as many minutes as he usually does despite coming off an injury. Secondly, the Canucks as a whole played very tough, taking the body at every opportunity. This paid dividends when Todd Bertuzzi rocked the Blues future hall of famer defenseman and captain Al Macinnis, knocking him out of the game with an unspecified injury. Thirdly, Dan Cloutier was amazing, making many key saves that could have given the game a different result otherwise. Finally, the Canucks' powerplay returned to its form. They were able to set up on the periphery and scored twice to win 2-1.