Neon Genesis Evangelion is one of my favorite anime series, and so I’m a bit unhappy over how Gainax so readily whores exploits the characters in a never-ending array of merchandise, the bulk of which is unrelated to the original series.
Yes, I know it’s just business. But still.
And so I’m ambivalent about Rebuild of Evangelion— four new animated movies that will provide an alternate retelling of the original story.
I’m comforted by the fact that Anno Hideaki is chief director, and especially by his statement that GAINAX isn’t controlling this. More reasons to hope that the movies don’t turn out to be hollow commercial fluff.
Utada Hikaru sings the theme song for the first movie: Beautiful World. I don’t know if this is a good sign or a bad one.
Originally developed to resize images for different screens without losing important elements. Very cool demo. Gets freaky towards the end too when you watch people disappear from photos just from clicking-and-dragging.
(I suspect this will be one of the last I mooch. Many books I want aren’t available through the site. And of the ones that are, their owners often aren’t willing to ship them outside their countries. (Bookmooch members have set up a Bookmooch Angel Network to try and get around this, which is nice of them but still a clunky solution.) Simply, I’m unwilling to spend money on expensive postage to get points I can’t use.
Besides, there is no lack of good books in this country.)
Itasha are cars decorated with decals and paint jobs depicting anime, game and manga characters. The word itasha, which literally means “painful car,” is derived from the kanji for itai (”painful”) and sha (”car”). The word also appears to be a reference to the Italian sportscar, also known as itasha (although the ita for Italian is spelled with katakana instead of kanji), a conventional sort of chick magnet driven by a different sort of guy.
(via Pink Tentacle – which has more links to itasha pictures)
Watching Majid Majidi’s religious The Willow Tree again, I thought about this quote from Clive Barker’s Weaveworld:
She’d taken this harlot century she’d been born into for granted, knowing no other, but now — seeing it with his eyes, hearing it with his ears — she understood it afresh; saw just how dispossessed of pleasure; how crude, even as it claimed sophistication; and, despite its zeal to spellbind, how utterly unenchanting
The Magnum Photos and Slate collaboration began on Dec 1, 2005, and the first uploaded set begins with:
PARIS — Place de l’Europe, Gare Saint Lazare, 1932. Photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson writes, “There was a plank fence around some repairs behind the Gare Saint Lazare train station. I happened to be peeking through a gap in the fence with my camera at the moment the man jumped. The space between the planks was not entirely wide enough for my lens, which is the reason why the picture is cut off on the left.”
This year’s National Day Song, like its recent predecessors, is forgettable. (What’s it called? Uhh… “There’s No Place I’d Rather Be”). As if admitting its own absence of originality, the lyrics and arrangement both sound like a bowdlerised “Home“.The only thing that makes this year’s song a little more memorable is that two YES 93.3 DJs have parodied it:
Their version is more likely to resonate with the public.
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What happened to our National Day Songs?
Older songs like “Stand Up For Singapore”, “Five Stars Arising” and “We Are Singapore” are jingoistic, but they gave the distinct impression that they were written to be sung by a mass of people. They were meant to be jubilant and defiant at the same time, with simple language and frequently repeated choruses set to rousing arrangements.
This was expected, if you consider that National Day Songs were meant as rallying symbols for Singaporeans — avenues to celebrate our unity.
In recent years however National Day Songs have lost all flavour, sounding like the bland tinsel songs-of-the-hour that thrive on our pop radio stations.
Is this the unintended outcome of some initially well-intentioned move to make the songs more contemporary? 1998’s “Home” could probably be considered the first of this new wave of gentler, more sentimental National Day Songs. “Home” is a memorable work, but its successors have all failed to capture the imagination and memories of Singaporeans in comparison.
I’m particularly concerned with the content of the songs. Lyrics always suggest a singer in a particular context. Where previous National Day Song lyrics implied a community in Singapore celebrating its unity and togetherness, now they are sung as if by isolated individuals comparing Singapore with other countries.
It seems to me that the target audience for the older songs was broader, encompassing all Singaporeans. The new songs however, with their emphasis on individual belonging and staying in Singapore despite having experienced life abroad, appear to be geared towards a certain class of Singaporeans which constitute a minority here. Growing, perhaps, but still a minority. The majority of Singaporeans would probably not be able to identify with the globe-trotting personae of these songs.
I wonder if this isn’t detrimental to Singapore in the long run.
It’s depressing to think of how resilient that totalitarian regime is, despite its anguished millions.
There were times in Pyongyang when it felt like a strange horror movie, where everyone is stuck in a warped world from the past and you are the only person to realize it. Then you realize you have no mouth and you cannot scream.
What I like the most is the old-style nostalgia that the series unashamedly uses, especially in the title cards and the kanji. Another subversion there!
Try the first 8 minutes of the first episode on Youtube:
The reference to Osamu Dazai in the Episode 3 opening cracked me up.
The Episode 4 opening. NSFW (some disturbing bits), but graphically brilliant.
books – film – fountain pens – media – photography
writing without rhythm 