Rankin – Bass “Mad Monster Party?” Review – 2 Stars

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I was looking through the classic holiday claymation videos for my traditional Rudolph and Frosty flicks when I stumbled across “Mad Monster Party?” by Rankin Bass. I didn’t know this existed, and was excited to see their take on Halloween/Monster Movies. It started off well enough, with a James Bond-esque theme song and a tropical scene, rather than snow. I watched the opening credits and saw that Phillis Diller was in this as well, so that made it even more interesting!

This is an hour and a half long and I have only gotten a third of the way through this and already have started doing other things-like writing this review. I am going to try to tough it out and sit through the whole thing, but at this point…

Phyllis Diller is Frankenstein’s bride, I gather. Her song, “You’re Different” (I assume that’s the tile), was so degrading, but with an uplifting message. Something like “you stink and you’re different, but that’s what I like about you…” That’s the general feel to the song.

The soundtrack sounds like a pink panther cartoon and I think they tried to drag out the storyline to make this an hour and a half.

Oh, the storyline-Dr. Frankenstein has now invented a solution that, instead of creating life, destroys life. He invites monsters from all over the world to unveil his new potion, and his nephew, whom he wants to hand over the reigns to. Obviously, the nephew doesn’t know where he’s going or that he has an uncle, so he thinks he’s going to a vacation spot.

60’s reference jokes, like Dracula saying that he was the original “Bat Man”. Ha.

The problem with all these 60’s claymation shows now is that watching them in HD shows all the flaws and fingerprints in the clay.

It’s funny to watch these because now, with the jerky motion, it looks like streaming video from the early 20 hundreds.

I… am… forcing… myself… to… continue… watching…. ugh…

The good things about the movie… the claymation monsters are nice to look at. If you like jazzy soundtracks, it’s a constant jam session.

sigh…

I have to stop this. Maybe I will come back to it around october. I have Rudolph to watch.

So, I would give this maybe around 2 stars out of 5, giving credit for the amount of work it took to do this and nostalgia.

The Heart, She Holler…. weirdly funny show!

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I decided to watch all the episodes of The Heart, She Holler back to back and about halfway through the series so far, I started laughing at the utter absurdity of it! It was so politically incorrect, gross and filmed so well that the combination was hilarious!

This show is obviously not for everyone. Probably not for anyone except me. 🙂

If this had a musical number in it, it would have made me explode!

One of the stars is the girl who does one of the voices for a show I also like, Bob’s Burgers.

Check out the 15 minute episodes on Cartoon Network!

The Muppets 2011 – FANTASTIC!!!

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I was almost afraid to watch this movie due to my expectations being very high. I had read many positive reviews, but one said that it was more man than muppets and after the Muppets From Space being a let down, I was wary.

So I have to just say up front that it was fantastic!

If you’re from my generation, you grew up with the muppets and they address that fact throughout the movie. If you were a little different and felt out of place, your safe place was muppet shows and movies. This movie had the typical musical numbers, some of which were updated enough to feel current without making it ghetto. One in particular was very touching-Man or Muppet…

The storyline seemed very familiar, but having such nostalgic feelings, I overlooked it. The muppets weren’t about always being original-they were there to give you an unconditional friend.

So, when this comes out on blu-ray, I am all over it!

Near – Another Earth… Very Similar… Did They Steal My Idea?

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I read that a movie (that got a D from Entertainment Weekly) was being released on video soon called “Another Earth”. Years ago, there was a contest online where you submit movie ideas and I submitted mine, called “Near”. It was about a life-sustainable planet from another galaxy that was going to come so close to earth that we would be able to go over to it as it passed by. People who were dissatisfied with this planet lined up to move to that planet, but when it came near, they saw all the people lined up to move to this one because of their dissatisfaction with their own planet.

The synopsis of Another Earth sounded A LOT like my idea. I will watch this movie and pray I don’t have to go off. 🙂

Android Kylin Mid China Tablet Q709

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Recently something happened to my tablet and it wouldn’t boot past the android skateboarder screen (never got to the eye). The /system/bin folder had been deleted, so I couldn’t get into the adb shell. I could get to adb and see the device, though. After pulling what little bit of hair I had left out, I finally found an UPDATE.ZIP file that restored everything.

http://www.reachgoodsoft.com/view/53.html#edown

Click the small blue download link (it took two tries to finish downloading this.

If the link goes down, let me know. I have a copy of the file.

Eyes Art Photography And Focus

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The one thing that is the most difficult thing to accomplish in art and photography is to emulate HOW the eyes see. If you adjust the aperture on a camera to blur the objects in front of and beyond the subject, you are getting a simulated perspective of the eye view only.

What the eye actually sees is EVERYTHING in focus, but concentrating on the subject at hand.

If you stare at an object, but remove the object from your mind’s focus, you will see the things in the background aren’t out of focus, but merely reduced in detail. Also, they are separated into two images, coming from each eye. One eye cannot adjust focus. The point where the eye direction meets brings the two images together at that point.

Imagine looking at a 3D movie without glasses. (the kind that separates the red and blue colors) That’s what the foreground and background looks like, but the colors are correct. The focus is on the middle-the subject, which is lined up by the eyes.

For an artist, a painting or photograph should be in focus totally, because the viewer’s eye will actually make the “other objects” “out of focus”. The realistic paintings from centuries ago are very detailed, even with the background items. Your brain knows where to look and knows what the subject is, due to lighting, placement, etc. That’s why these paintings are so enduring.

For a camera to capture what the eye sees, it would need 6 lenses to take 3 pictures at once. Two for foreground, two for subject and two for background.