Nearly four months after moving in, we’re nearing the end of our broadband saga. Smart sent us our modem and login details. So, I plugged the phone into the wall socket in our bedroom - no dialtone. There’s another wire coming up through the wall in our living room, presenting Cat 5 - I wired together a socket using the usual combination of blue -> red, white/blue -> green, but to no avail. In desperation, I yanked the face-plate off the wall socket in the bedroom and found that it wasn’t actually connected to anything.
Smart were very nice about the whole thing, merely remarking that the whole situation was “very unusual” (a very diplomatic way of saying “My word, you’re a moron for not checking this earlier”).
Either way, Eircom engineers are on their way out to us and we should be hooked up by next week.
Some spoilers included here. But since The Island is Michael Bay’s latest Big Dumb Action Movie, am I really spoiling much?
I don’t see how I could possibly run a blog called “low brow culture” and not like Michael Bay movies. Sure, he’s got all the subtlety of a jackhammer. And sure, his movies are based around explosive set-pieces, but you know what? I don’t care. He packs more visceral flourishes into two hours than most directors have managed in their entire careers. And since this is exactly what he’s going for, I say fair balls to him.
So, the Island.
I wanted to see this since I first read about it a few months ago. I mean, what’s not to love? It’s directly lifting pieces from a shedload of movies I love. Logan’s Run, THX-1138, the Matrix… Surely, with a bunch of explosions and car chases, The Island would be better than the sum of its parts.
It is. Barely. But what struck me more than anything else was the unrelenting stream of product placement in this movie. Now, I’ll be the first to admit I’m not the brightest spark in the fire, and product placement typically whizzes over my head like a jet plane. So, the fact that I’m dedicating an entire blog entry to this just makes me think: Jesus, Michael. Couldn’t you have toned it down just a little?
These are all in roughly chronological order. If you spot any more, let me know and I’ll add them up here.
Puma
Barely three minutes into the movie, we’re greeted with an entire tray of Puma footwear. Lincoln Three-Echo appears to be missing a shoe. Now, this begs a couple of questions.
In a perfect society, where they can detect two people touching, how does a shoe go missing?
In a hermetically sealed world, why bother with branding at all?
Aquafina
Oh, how very droll. But this just brings up the issue of Question 2 again.
Xbox
Now, this is just baffling.
The movie is set in 2017 (or so). And yet they use the old Xbox logo. The one that got retired in 2004, and is being replaced by the new Xbox 360 one.
Within the story - Sean Bean proclaims how he keeps the products docile and without emotion. What possible purpose could there be for a game room that encourages fighting between fully 3D holographic representations of the characters? Don’t they know videogames are bad for you?
MSN
The nerd in me just wants to snort at the idea of MSN Search powering a city’s telephone system.
Microsoft
For me, this makes the least sense. If you look carefully, you can probably make out the Microsoft logo on the building in the background. I’m not sure if this building exists or not (I’m doubting it does), but either way, this is most certainly a deliberate inclusion. But it only appears on the screen for a fraction of a second - whizzing by far too fast for most people to notice.
Except those poring over every frame, looking for product placement, of course.
Johnny Rockets
Calvin Klien
This is either the most galling of the lot: having an actual ad play within the movie, or a really nifty post-modern idea using an actual Scarlett Johansson in a movie where she plays her clone. I’ll give the filmmakers the benefit of the doubt and say it’s the latter.
Michelob Light
Michelob recently launched “Michelob Light in an Aluminium Bottle.” Here it is. In the movie, it looks even more like a straight-out advertisment. The bottle provides the only colour in the scenes it’s featured in, as the camera reverentially zooms and pans its way around the bottle.
Samuel L. Jackson is one of the heroes of lowbrowculture, for the simple reason that he’s not too proud to take an awful job to pay some bills, or simply because he likes the sound of it.
In the next couple of years, he’s got two movies coming out that have grabbed my attention. The first is “Afrosamurai”, which tells the story of a Samurai who “seeks revenge on those who murdered hiss father in front of him when he was just a boy.” The other is “Pacific Air Flight 121.” Don’t let the dull title scare you off, it’s soon to be changed back to its much more impressive title of “Snakes on a Plane.” The plot outline reads “On board a flight over the Pacific Ocean, an assassin, bent on killing a passenger who’s a witness in protective custody, let loose a crate full of deadly snakes.”
Beaks: One of those films that you’re working on right now is… well, it’s called “Pacific Air 121” Jackson: Snakes on a Plane, man! Beaks: Exactly. Jackson: We’re totally changing that back. That’s the only reason I took the job: I read the title. Beaks: Snakes on a Plane! That’s everything! Jackson: You either want to see that, or you don’t. Beaks: And how are those snakes? Besides being on a plane? Jackson: Some of them are aggressive, some of them are cool. They’re interesting to watch, and interesting to interact with. It depends on what kind of snake it is. One day, it took, like, four guys to bring in this 350 lb. Burmese Python. We were all like, “Where’s that goin’?“ And I watched an Albino Cobra strike airplane seats the other day. I watched it from another studio. It’s actually been a fun show. But we’re taking the name back!
In just under an hour, I’m leaving Dublin and heading to sunny Sligo for a weekend’s surfing and camping. According to Met Eireann, it’s going to be rainy and windy (42km/h). Perfect for the surfing part of the weekend, not so great for the camping part.
For the rain-delay parts, I’m bringing a few things to read:
Of course, there’s a very good chance I could die out there. Whether it’s from exposure, or at the hands of a crazed, knife-wielding maniac. Or maybe even in a really nonsensical, over-hyped way, Blair Witch-style. Or perhaps just from embarassment as I make a complete ass of myself on a surfboard.
Either way, if I don’t make it back, avenge my death.
Just wanted to throw a little Google-juice in the direction of GamesAreArt.com. Needlessly fussy site design and current lack of content aside, it’s an important site. The games industry has just entered an extremely difficult time, with critics discounting video games as a medium of entertainment, never mind expression, and it’s important that we, as games players and games enthusiasts, have some way of showing non-games players just how far the games industry has come.
johnke.me
