From allmovie by Rovi website: "Based on a manga by Masamune Shirow and directed by Mamoru Oshii, Ghost in the Shell marries the best aspects of both creators' styles. As in Appleseed, Shirow's tale is set in a near-future that should, by rights, be a utopia, yet still has a need for specialized police and military. Once again, Shirow uses his characters to pose questions about the nature of humanity -- how we regard each other, how societies form, and how we can expect to cope when technology pervades every aspect of life to the point where the line between man and machine blurs. Oshii, who has turned even the most popular of properties into personal, pensive films (Urusei Yatsura, Patlabor 2), runs with Shirow's world of high-tech thrills and armchair philosophy and makes it his own. He adds layers of luscious, CGI-enhanced visuals and a dark, moody soundtrack, and paces it all in a way that makes even the most pulse-pounding action scenes seem dreamlike."
From allmovie by Rovi website: "This highly ambitious adaptation of the sci-fi novel by Robert A. Heinlein exhibits director Paul Verhoeven's signature flashes of mordant wit, satire, and strong violence. The rare action picture that tries to operate on several levels at once, Troopers uses elements of fascism, Nazi imagery, and World War II propaganda to illustrate its central story: the takeover of futuristic civilization by deadly, ravaging insects. A singular piece of science fiction that achieves its goals -- especially in the notable casting of good-looking, bland performers to underline the army's Aryan-ness -- Verhoeven's film simultaneously parodies and satisfies the public's fascination with media and mass destruction. Troopers is very much a companion to the director's 1987 hit RoboCop, which dealt with similar issues in a comparably cheeky tone, without losing its ability to be a grand entertainment. Though it was a mid-level success, Troopers failed to achieve blockbuster status, considering its $100 million budget. Encouragingly, though, the film is widely recognized in cult circles as a telling critique of the absurdity of wartime values."
From allmovie by Rovi website: "Often cited as an homage to the infamous films of Hammer Studios, upon deeper investigation into the influences of director Tim Burton, it becomes increasingly clear that, while the film does indeed have much in common with the British horror classics, the majority of visual influence is instead derived from the lush, gothic films of Mario Bava. Bearing a striking resemblance to 1960s Black Sunday in particular, Burton's muted color palate, vividly splashed with abundant amounts of blood so unnaturally red it seems to drip from the screen, represents a masterful command of color scheme rarely seen since Bava's color-era heyday. While Sleepy Hollow may not retain the masterful balance of a striking visuals and solid characterization as skillfully as Burton's early efforts, Sleepy Hollow remains a remarkably beautiful film which offers both dark humor and some breathtaking set pieces. Burton's cast does as much as humanly possible to bring scribe Andrew Kevin Walker's characters to life, though without the proper foundation, the means to define the characters much further beyond the occasional meaningful gesture or enduring quirk are unfortunately absent. Despite this minor flaw, those willing to judge Sleepy Hollow on its own terms and forego the stratospheric expectations with which Burton films are generally greeted will find themselves in for a sumptuously visual and giddily macabre interpretation of an enduring tale that has chilled the bones of children for generations."
Excellent article on the recent situation in Egypt from ROAR here: The movement for 'real democracy' centred on Tahrir Sq is an inspiration for all those struggling against corrupt power and neoliberalism, a genuine network 'counterpower' outside state structures as such, made up of the various organisations of the people (these organisations of course include liberal parties merely representing the interests of the Egyptian middle classes, calling for political change but ignoring the demands for economic justice, but they do not have a dominant role in the movement).
The latest news is that Morsi has backed away from his power grab; a victory for Tahrir Sq. The lesson here for us in depressingly passive austerity hit Britain with our own corrupt government of bankers, the rich, tax dodging corporations etc, is that all of us must somehow be part of creating our own 'counterpower' of the people. We can not rely on Labour and trade union leaders, certainly not the LIb-Dems to change anything. The pressure must come from below; resistance must be total. What was once seen as utopian has now become a necessity, giving a whole new meaning to the old May '68 slogan-Be Practical, Demand the Impossible!
Imagine elaborate alternate histories where characters and creatures from hundreds of years of fantasy literature and cinema co-exist with real historical figures and events. Kim Newman's 'Anno Dracula: The Bloody Red Baron' is a continuation of his 'Anno Dracula', which imagines a universe where the infamous vampire wins at the conclusion of Bram Stoker's novel. Here WW1 is fought with the undead as the dominant force in Europe, although it's Germany and Austria-Hungary with Dracula as commander-in-chief of its armies and Manfred von Richthofen as a monsterious bat, that has embraced the true gothic vampire aesthetic. A mash up of ripping yarn, steampunk, pulp horror and 'All Quiet On The Western Front," this is a highley entertaining read.
Black Dossier and Century: 2009, part of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen series of 'graphic novels' by Alan Moore, creates an even more complex mythos, where almost every imaginary character and land (lost worlds, imaginary kingdoms) from earth bound fantastic and pulp fiction co-habitate in an alternate timeline. Some of the authors drawn upon are Shakespeare, H.Rider Haggard, Verne, Wells, Stoker, Lovecraft, Orwell and countless others including even Gerry Anderson and J.K. Rowling! Behind the elaborate pulp fantasy is a celebration of the transformative power of the human imagination.
Read a review of The Bloody Red Baron from Kirkus Review here
Read Wiki entry for Black Dossier and a review from The Independent for Century: 2009 here and here
From allmovie by Rovi: 'Shock Corridor represents filmmaker Samuel Fuller at his most excessive, but few would have it otherwise. Peter Breck plays a ruthless journalist who believes that the quickest way to a Pulitzer Prize is to uncover the facts behind a murder at a mental hospital. To glean first-hand information, Breck pretends to go insane and is locked up in the institution. While pursuing his investigation, Breck is sidetracked by the loopy behavior of his fellow inmates. During a hospital riot, Breck is straightjacketed and subjected to shock treatment. By now almost as crazy as he's previously pretended to be, Breck begins imagining that his exotic-dancer girlfriend Constance Towers (a Samuel Fuller "regular") is actually his sister! Typical of the Fuller ouevre, the characters in Shock Corridor are either saved or destroyed by their individual obsessions.'
From BFI Screenonline: 'Released onto a market dominated by science fiction 'creature features', the success of Terence Fisher's The Curse of Frankenstein (1957) revitalised and reinvented the ailing horror genre. Critics were horrified by the colourful blend of blood and sex, but the film was a huge commercial and artistic success.
Despite the success of Hammer's The Quatermass Xperiment (d. Val Guest, 1955) and X - The Unknown (d. Leslie Norman, 1956), and other studios' efforts like Devil Girl From Mars (d. David MacDonald, 1954) and Fiend Without A Face (d. Arthur Crabtree, 1958), the science fiction genre belonged firmly to the Americans. Fisher's retelling of Mary Shelley's classic (which could itself be classed as science fiction) would prove to be Hammer's first successful foray into the closely related but temporarily stalled horror film market.
Fearing litigation by Universal, owners of the 'classic' 1930s and '40s films, Fisher had to rethink certain elements of the Frankenstein story. Universal were particularly protective of the Monster's image - the flat topped head, the electrodes (or bolts, as many people mistakenly assume) on the sides of the neck - and refused to allow its likeness to appear in other films. Make-up artist Phil Leakey returned to Mary Shelley's novel for inspiration, avoiding any resemblance to Jack Pierce's design for the Universal films. The Monster's new appearance was suitably gruesome. Played by Christopher Lee, it now seemed recognisably stitched together from assorted body parts.
Shot in colour, The Curse of Frankenstein proved a visceral retelling of Mary Shelley's story. Eyeballs, severed hands and surgical procedures are presented in a relatively unflinching style. At one point, the Monster is shot in the head and blood gushes from its wound. This approach distanced the film from Universal's monochrome, more suggestive horrors. The film was met with great enthusiasm by paying audiences, but alienated and horrified critics.
Another important departure from the established pattern of Frankenstein films was the emphasis on the Baron, played with cool, calculating brilliance by Peter Cushing, rather than his creation. It was Cushing who would return in subsequent films, not his ill-fated first attempt at creating life.
The Curse of Frankenstein was also the first horror film to feature Cushing and Christopher Lee together. This successful partnership would be repeated in Fisher's Dracula (1958), and soon became a regular feature of many British horror films.'
From allmovie by Rovi: 'The Company of Wolves is Little Red Riding Hood for the Alien generation. Sheltered 13-year-old Sarah Patterson, living on the edge of a foreboding woods, is visited by her grandmother Angela Lansbury. The old lady delights in telling Sarah the most horrific stories, usually involving what happens to little girls if they trust wolves--the actual, rather than symbolic kind. Later on, Sarah sets out through the woods to visit her grandmother. She makes the acquaintance of a seductive young huntsman (Micha Bergese), who turns out to be.....well, what big teeth he's got. The ads for Company of Wolves, showing a wolf springing from the open mouth of poor little Sarah Patterson, were warning enough for the faint of heart. Actually, the horror is secondary to the remarkable Grimms-Fairy-Tale ambience which the film successfully sustains from beginning to end. And, in keeping with the original unexpurgated versions of most fairy tales, the sexual subtext is never far from the surface. Director Neil Jordan would further develop some of the subliminal themes in Company of Wolves in his 1994 production Interview with the Vampire.'
Fantastic day in Europe on Wednesday! It's a thing of beauty when people find solidarity and fight back against the acceptable and state sanctioned violence of capitalism and austerity. Shame once again that the UK was as a lifeless as the grave but that can all change...
"And so Southern Europe continues to tremble on its very foundations. As smoke rises from the streets of Madrid, Lisbon, Rome and Athens, one thing is becoming ever more apparent: the question is no longer if but when the social explosion will hit. The outrage is building up, and with unemployment rising, austerity deepening, and a generation of Europeans increasingly disillusioned by state intransigence and outraged by police violence, such an outburst of popular rebellion seems ever more inevitable. All it will take is a spark."
Postscript: An unintentionally interesting article from usually boring Blairite hack, Martin Kettle here.
"But we are going to have to get used to austerity. Because relative scarcity, and the need to do more with less, are not going to go away in a hurry. Austerity is remaking our world. The point is to make the best of it. Welcome to 21st-century Europe."
"Today's quarterly inflation review by the Bank of England is merely the latest in a series of indicators that remind governments and peoples across Europe and beyond that the old days are simply over, done, finished. Recovery would be sustained but slow, said the Bank. The economy was sluggish. The environment unfavourable. Things might be weaker for longer."
"The message is hard to miss. Times have changed. The only thing that is certain is further uncertainty. We may have come out of recession again, but the idea that Britain, let alone the countries of the eurozone, can expect to see any resumption of the kind of growth rates to which we have all been accustomed since the second world war, is increasingly fanciful. We are living through not a downturn but an epochal change, and we need to make a more consistent effort to understand what this implies"
But I have news for you Mr Kettle. As things go from bad to worse for the working class and the rich are visibly seen to get even richer, flaunting their obscene wealth and power; strikes, occupations, blockades, riots and other types of resistance combined with regrettable but understandable social collapse will intensify throughout Europe, eventually spreading to these shores. Your system based on profit and power for the minuscule minority and utter misery for the vast majority, including the degradation of the planet, is reaching an end-point. There are no guarantees this will end in a better society but there is one thing I'm sure of-we are fucking well not going to get used to it!
This has to be my album of the year. An epic 2 CD masterpiece of droning but pounding avant-rock minimalism (Faust and Can spring to mind) enthused with stark but visionary Americana. Dark but beautiful.
A collection of essays from the distinguished Marxist theorist David Harvey on the theme of urbanisation and the class struggles arising out of city environments. For those who want to prioritise class struggle based on urban communities rather then the workplace or who see the centrality of community in workplace struggle, it is worth reading. It is a difficult read at times as much of the book is a detailed analysis of the vital importance to capitalism (its drive for the accumulation of profit and absorption of surplus value) of the built environment and the processes of urbanisation. The impact of this on the broad mass of city dwellers and the environment is in the dispossession of the poor and working class of their homes and communities to make way for gated communities, gentrified zones and CCTV monitored private spaces such as shopping malls-linked brutally to the extraction of wealth of both the people and the planet via methods of high rent and sub-prime mortgages. David Harvey is no anarchist and is mildly dismissive of vague horizontalism but has some admiring words for eco-anarchist Murry Bookchin. He formulates a new urban anti-capitalist movement based somewhere between Bookchin's municipal libertarianism, the Paris Commune and larger global state forms.
I've been on many demo's in my time and I'm sorry to report that the much hyped TUC March Against Austerity, The Sequel was a bit of a damp squib. The numbers were down on last year's half a million and also unlike last year lacked anger and passion. I did not see any lively young activists from Occupy or UKUncut, students, or pissed off anarchists (other then the syndicalist IWW) to inject a bit of life into my jaded middle aged lefty self, not even a decent Samba band-although they were probably all on this. And certainly the working class outside the public sector or London's unemployed were only noticeable by their absence. On the whole it was a comfort zone for the Trade Union leadership to spout empty rhetoric about fighting back against the evil Tories while waiting for Miliband to seize power. Of course there is still time for a movement that combines rank and file workplace resistance with anti poll-tax style community action to catch fire, as the massive social and economic re-structuring of this country continues on relentlessly-see Richard Seymour's interesting analysis here. Meanwhile I came away from the demonstration not with the will to take things further but to retreat into a gloomy Sunday morning negativity.
PS: Infantile Disorder's account is well worth a read here
Reading Tolkien's The Lord Of The Rings saga when I was 13 had a major impact on my imaginative life no doubt, but by the time of my mid teens I had moved away from epic fantasy with all of its genre conventions. Gene Wolfe is one of the great fantasy and SF writers (that nobody has ever heard off) and can be read as literature of the highest order. The two books comprising The Wizard Knight (read my short review of The Knight here) is his attempt at straight down the line Fantasy, with all the tropes-knightly heroes, elfin races, dragons, giants, even talking animals. But as this is Gene Wolfe there is added complexity and depth belied by its bog-standard cover. It has all the pleasures of fantasy (escape into a mythical imaginary world being one of them) as well as a satisfying obliqueness and sophistication that makes you wonder what actually is going on under the surface.
Just when you thought it could not get worse... sneering public school bully and ultimate filthy rich shitbag Osbourne announces a £10 billion extra cut in Welfare at Tory conference and brings in a scheme where workers throw away their employment rights for a tiny amount of shares. But as a low grade civil servant a leaked document from the Cabinet Office was like a punch in the face! I had to read it again to make sure it was not an elaborate hoax so as to get more public sector workers on the TUC March next Saturday. Not only the savage cuts, a pay freeze and paying more for a pension for less, but now on top of all that they want to rip up our terms and conditions within a year!
"Detailed plans to cut holidays, lengthen working weeks and reduce flexible working for 450,000 public employees have been disclosed for the first time in leaked Cabinet Office documents.
A letter sent to every human resources director across the civil service, and seen by the Guardian, outlines the scope and speed of the coalition government's planned reforms and how they would affect staff.
By the end of this year, directors in every Whitehall department are expected to have examined the terms and conditions of their workforce and outlined plans to make their jobs more like those in the private sector.
The documents reveal several aspects of working life as susceptible to radical change, including employees' annual leave, occasional days' leave, sick pay, hours of work, the ability of employees to move from one job to another and probationary periods.
Managers have also been ordered to review policies including the family-friendly scheme of flexitime, travel and expenses, disciplinary procedures and performance management. The letter applies to staff below the level of senior civil servants."
Issues and debates surrounding a working class political organisation are extremly important. How else are we to start a movement of radical change, that at the moment just does not exist. Thurrock Heckler takes up these issues here from a hard line class struggle anarchist position but there is a lot here that I like. Well worth a read.
"We know we're not alone in wanting a broad based, radical / revolutionary proletarian movement that's an attractive proposition to ordinary working class people – we've met a few very sound comrades who share this aspiration and more importantly, recognise the urgency of the situation. The sickening thing is that we are in all probability too late to make a start in realising our vision before the economic, political, social and geo-political crises that we face all converge to create a horrific, extremely turbulent situation where the basic aim will be mere survival. However, the realisation that we may indeed be too late should act as the spur for that one last push to break through a toxic mix of complacency and inertia and kickstart the movement we need into being."
Good article here from Infantile Disorder on the practicalities of a general strike and the dead weight of union leaders and the bureaucracy. A nice attack on outgoing TUC boss Brendan Barber:
"That's why - for all their talk of working class struggle - the material interests of the bureaucracy very closely align with those of the capitalist class. Perhaps the most blatant embodiment of these contradictions is outgoing TUC general secretary Brendan Barber. While making occasional and relatively criticisms of the government for its anti-worker measures, he has sat on the Bank of England board since 2003. He is fully integrated into the ruling class apparatus. So when he talks - as he did at the TUC conference - of an "Olympic-style crusade" to build up the UK "industrial strength", he does so knowing full well this would necessarily mean an enormous attack on wages in an era of global competition. But so long as these poorly paid jobs were unionised, Barber and his parasitic layer would be happy."
Are we heading towards an anti poll tax moment? When Universal Credit is introduced next year it is estimated that 1.2 million low waged workers will lose benefits and also come under the strict surveillance and rules of conditionality similar to the unemployed-see The Guardian here. In 1989/1990 resistance exploded against the dreaded Poll Tax, seemingly coming out of nowhere, scuppering the tax and bringing Thatcher to her knees. Liberals and politicians say the British working class does not fight back against injustice-the anti-poll tax movement is one example of large scale grass-roots struggle that disproves them big time. Will it happen again?
An almost unbelievable example of the delusion at the rotting heart of the liberal establishment. Top Guardian journalist and writer witnesses the second coming at the Labour conference. While nearly everyone hears the same pointless soundbites and catch phrases (not Old Labour, not New Labour but One Nation Labour) signifying absolutely fuck-all, poor old Polly sees the face of Christ in the dregs.
Ed Miliband brings inspiration and vision to the suffering and increasingly angry majority being hit by ruthless austerity.
"He admitted that a Labour government would not "spend another" £3bn reversing the coalition's controversial NHS reforms – despite having opposed their passage through parliament"
"Seeking to address those concerns, he said there were elements of government policy with which he agreed – but many with which he did not. Many of the coalition's changes to the welfare system were acceptable, although Labour would show "more compassion and offer more support" to those affected, including the disabled."
"Miliband said he wished to create an economy that delivered growth now but which would also be more fair in the future."
Over the last thirty years the utterly defeated social democratic left has abandoned the working class in favour of identity politics-a stew of single issue politics based on anti-racism, anti-sexism and environmentalism, devoid of any overarching class analysis which was characteristic of the old left, reformist and revolutionary alike. Owen Jones' book arrives on the bookshelves at just the right time, when all the nostrums of 'we are all middle-class now' are demolished by rampant austerity and recession. Chavs exposes this acceptable form of hatred in popular culture, directed at the working class and the poor, as the result of Thatcherism's savage attack on working class living standards and trade union organisation in the 80's and does an excellent job of busting the myths that have accumulated around the chav stereotype. For instance rather then filled with bigoted BNP supporters, working class communities are more racially mixed then middle-class ones with a higher percentage of inter-racial marriages. Likewise during the Iraq invasion it was those on the lower income scale who opposed the war.
The limitations of Chavs though lies in its nostalgia for the 'good old' working-class Labour Party of times past and its almost complete reliance on parliamentary politics to bring working class representation-for a fuller critique read Clifford Biddulph from The Commune here
Informative article from Reflections on a Revolution (ROAR) on the protest outside the Spanish parliament brutally attacked by riot cops. We need to bring this sort of action over here as one way to kick-start our quasi stagnant anti-austerity movement. We have the big TUC march on the 20th October but it ends at Hyde Park where yet again we will listen to a lot of hot air from Union leaders. We need to be daring because our predicament is absolutely desperate. We cannot appeal to mainstream politicians, wait around for Labour to win the next general election (as if that will do any good) and be reasonable any longer-as in Spain, social democracy, the NHS and the Welfare State is being dismantled before our very eyes to make the rich richer and the poor poorer and virtually no one in the House of Commons have come out against it. This is no extreme left exaggeration-it is happening now. So how do powerless ordinary working class people in the UK to respond? My answer is extra-parliamentary resistance and mass civil disobedience-strikes, occupations and confrontational protests linking into the everyday lives of the majority. We have to fight back otherwise the future is bleak indeed.
As Greece and Spain explode once again in fury as they see their lives being destroyed to pay for the crisis caused by the bankers and other assorted criminals going under the name of global capitalism, we here in the UK have the political party conference session. Watching the Lib-Dem conference (which I have never done-I'm not a masochist) is like being kettled-a horrible combination of frustrated anger and crippling boredom. Here is a party supposedly representing liberal values and everything nice and cuddly collaborating in the most brutal and nasty right wing government in Britain ever! The bearded and 'hippy' middle-class delegates sit there and cheer on the biggest attack on the working class and the poor since Thatcher, plunging thousands into misery, poverty and homelessness. Clegg supports a further cut of £10 billion from welfare and they sit on their useless backsides and cheer!? The last nail has been driven into the coffin of social democracy, liberalism and representative democracy by the very people who seemingly hold these values in their heart. The only logical response is utter rage-see post from the Void here, but we also desperately need a movement of resistance from below of the working class and the poor to stop this ongoing nightmare at least and usher in an alternative system at the most.
The Queen Is The Biggest Benefits Scrounger Of The Lot!
Already the free at the point of delivery of the NHS is being eroded as this worrying post from Dr Eoin Clarke attests. Note that 'nice' hippy capitalist Richard Branson of Virgin will be making even more money through the destruction of this British institution, celebrated in the opening ceremony of the Olympic games, proof positive that there is no such thing as a nice capitalist. Once not so long ago it was unthinkable that a public service like the railways would be used to make profit for big business at the expense of passangers-now it is the time for NHS to be turned over to the profiteering sharks like Virgin Care. Literally sickening!
I've read many a heavy tome to try to understand capitalism and what it all means for the working class but the American comedian, George Carlin (who I have never heard of up to now) gets right to the point.
Hi, I'm back. Here are what I've read and watched since I've been away.
I'm a working-class philosophy of the London suburbs and an armchair rebel-an introvert and a full time dreamer. Imaginative fiction, writing, cinema, music, dreams and class struggle are my reasons for living.
On Fetish
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God creates Adam and immediately—sooner than we thought—He speaks to him.
This first address, according to the midrash, is a seduction:
*“And the Lord ...
BORED WITH THIS MEDIUM
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Yes I am, it promotes a shallowness,, that, for the moment at least, I
cannot condone or participate in. Go read a fucking book, in depth, a
physical one, ...
Three events this week ...
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1. Wednesday, 13 March at Waterstone's Trafalgar Square: Capitalist
Realism: What is it and how to fight it With Mark Fisher, Peter Fleming and
Alex Niven....
