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Category Archives: Media
Cinequest 2016: Catch-up Reviews
Reviews from Cinequest 2016: Demimonde, Eye in the Sky, Friends Effing Friends Effing Friends, Lost In Munich, Parabellium, The Phoenix Incident Continue reading
Cinequest 2016: Embers
It’s a quiet armageddon. Every day you wake with a limited knowledge of the world, of yourself, and of those around you. Some smaller things do stick, but the cohesiveness of what we were, of who we were, is gone. Waking experience teases some of this out to consciousness, but we still see a stranger in the mirror. Continue reading
Posted in Cinequest, Film, Media, Movies, Review, Uncategorized
Tagged Cinequest, degenerative, Embers, End of the World, Film, loss, memory, quiet, Review, Virus
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Cinequest 2016: Sight Unseen Recommendations
Now that Cinequest is fully upon us, I need to touch on a small subject of interest to those of you going to the festival. There are WAY too many great films to see everything. Way too many. And some are terribly hard to review for reasons that will be obvious in a few paragraphs. But luckily those same programs are very easy to recommend, and do fall on my “Don’t Miss” list.
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Posted in Cinequest, Entertainment, Film, Media, Movies, Review, SciFi Fantasy, Thoughts
Tagged Animation, art, Cinequest, comedy, documentary, Film, foreign, High school, international, mindbenders, recommendations, short films, shorts
1 Comment
Cinequest 2016: The Brainwashing of My Dad
A longer commute, talk radio, a loving father turns into an angry, bitter, obsessive… brainwashed by a poisonous media. Continue reading
Posted in Cinequest, Film, Media, Movies, Review, Thoughts, Uncategorized
Tagged brainwashing, conservatism, documentary, family, fox news, hate radio, personality change, politics
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Cinequest 2016: Friends Effing Friends Effing Friends
My first must-see entry from the Cinequest film festival is a sexy story that takes the “friends with benefits” motif to the next level. Continue reading
Posted in Cinequest, Entertainment, Film, Media, Movies, Review
Tagged breakups, Christina Gooding, Cinequest, couples, Friends Effing, Graham Skipper, Jillian Leigh, lies, Quincy Rose, Relationships, secrets, Sex, Tyler Dawson, Vanessa Dubasso
1 Comment
A Favorite from Cinequest 2014: Nothing in Los Angeles
Cinequest never fails to bring in a ton of innovative, inspiring, thought-provoking, and amazing films to San Jose. Here’s one I missed reviewing in 2014…
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Posted in Cinequest, Entertainment, Film, Media, Personal, Review
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PowerPoint Tip: Stacking Artistic Effects
Normally your photos can only have one Artistic Effect at a time, but with this very simple process, you can combine them to create whole new effects in your PowerPoint presentations. Continue reading
Posted in Geeking around, Media, PowerPoint, Presentations, Presenting, Technology
Tagged artistic effects, image editing, images, Microsoft, photographs, PowerPoint, tips
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What does Bill Gates read?
I find Bill Gates fascinating because he’s always surprising me with some new way to think about something we all think we already know. Continue reading
Posted in Books, Geeking around, Health and wellness, History, Media, PowerPoint, Presentations, Presenting, Technology, Thoughts, Writing
Tagged “Being Nixon” by Evan Thomas, “Eradication” by Nancy Leys Stepan, “Mindset” by Carol Dweck, “Sustainable Materials With Both Eyes Open” by Julian Allwood and Jonathan Cullen, “The Road to Character” by David Brooks, “Thing Explainer” by Randall Munroe, Bill Gates, Reading, Surprise
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Star Wars VII trailer: Storytelling & the invisible structure
Storytelling and structure from Presentation Zen master Garr Reynolds by way of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and a priest named Father Roderick… Continue reading
Posted in Entertainment, Film, Geeking around, Media, Movies, PowerPoint, Presentations, Presenting, SciFi Fantasy, Technology
Tagged Garr Reynolds, Star Wars, Storytelling, Structure, The Force Awakens, Trailer
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Pebble Time Unboxing
I love the unboxing experience, even when it’s simply unzipping a package and unfolding the cover… Continue reading
Posted in Business, Design, Geeking around, Hardware, Media, Personal, Technology, Thoughts
Tagged demo, pebble, pebble time, sample, setup, smartwatch, technology, Unboxing, unzipped, user experience, watch
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Is GMC In on the Joke?
Allow me to digress. Have to admit that I will listen to a song whose lyrics I don’t necessarily like if it’s got a good beat and I can dance to it. Well, maybe just a good beat, kicky riff, … Continue reading
Posted in Commercials, Entertainment, Media, Music, Organizations, Personal, Random thoughts, Thoughts
Tagged Denali, Eminence Front, GMC, Hillary, Hypnotizing Chickens, Iggy Pop, Noblesse Oblige, Royal Caribbean, The Who
7 Comments
Cinequest 2015: Short Catch-Up Reviews
Although I’ve written up a good many of the films I’ve seen at Cinequest, there are several I just hadn’t gotten to yet. Given this is the closing weekend and we have a day of encore showings on Sunday, I wanted to get some notes out to you and hopefully help your viewing decisions. Continue reading
Cinequest 2015: Bad Exorcists
In the end this film delivers a lot of laughs, mixed with just enough shocks and scares. And that’s exactly what I was looking for. Continue reading
Posted in Cinequest, Entertainment, Film, Media, Movies, Personal, Review, SciFi Fantasy
Tagged Cinequest, Film, Movies, Review
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Cinequest 2015: The House On Pine Street
The House on Pine Street is both a well-crafted traditional horror story, and a modern exploration of what haunting and haunted actually mean. More than a little is left up to your interpretation at the end. But that’s cool, because a film like this should haunt you long after you leave the theater. Continue reading
Posted in Cinequest, Entertainment, Media, Movies, Personal, Review, SciFi Fantasy
Tagged Cinequest, Film, movie, Review
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Cinequest 2015: Clew
If you like puzzles, especially those that expose a new puzzle when you’ve gotten past the first answer, Clew is for you. Continue reading
Cinequest 2015: Astraea
In a market where every post-apocalyptic movie has it’s heart in an alien invasion or zombie uprising, we’re faced in Astraea with an all-too-possible scenario where a disease quickly and efficiently wiped out most of the population. The few survivors are crafty and cautious, knowing that men are far worse danger than any rotting corpse. And that making connections with the few remaining good folks is probably the most precious thing to pursue. Continue reading
Cinequest 2015: Aspie Seeks Love
Bringing this picture of a different form of coping, admittedly still full of personal frustration and failures, is the real gift of this movie. Continue reading
They Called Me Spock
I admired Nimoy for this, and followed his career unflinchingly through everything from Mission Impossible to Fringe. And of course I enjoyed all his characters, as well as whatever speaking engagements I was able to attend, and his writing. But it they never spoke to me like Spock. Continue reading
Posted in Entertainment, Film, Geeking around, History, Home and Family, Media, Movies, Personal, Random thoughts, SciFi Fantasy, Thoughts
Tagged Childhood, Leonard Nimoy, Star Trek
2 Comments
Cinequest 2015: Beast Of Cardo (Bestia de Cardo)
The answer is either ethereal or blunt, depending on your interpretation of metaphor or perhaps a truly disturbing potential ramification of their actions. You can have it both ways I suppose, but like Moira and Hermes I just want to escape Cardo.
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Cinequest 2015: Afterlife (Utoelet)
So, not exactly Ghostbusters in its scope or plot, but this film does deliver a lot of fun and charm as we watch the dour Mozes struggle through afterlife with father. Continue reading