Savage Popcorn

Lost in Transatlantic

You scored 8 out of a possible 10
Overachieving and over here. We sympathise with your pain; not only do you know the European classics, but you know the Hollywood maulings too.

But with all that physical horror going on, there really wasn’t much space for spirituality, was there?

- Mark Kermode’s Mum on the slightly sanitised Passion of the Christ.

You’ve heard of the Shaw Brothers, haven’t you?

So you’ll appreciate this rather nice gallery of their movie posters.

(via Bad Movies dot net)

Japanese horror is scarier than American horror. Japanese films show ghosts coming into people’s everyday lives. When the audience goes home, in the elevator, in the bath, wherever they are, they will still feel afraid. That eerie feeling lasts.

- Takashige Ichise

Tonight seems to be turning into a bit of a ‘bash Singapore night,’ but what the hell…

Reuters reports that Singapore has rejected an application by a local AIDS support group because it’s… um… “against the public interest.”

Presumably, the Media Authority of Singapore believes it’s better to sweep everything under the carpet and hope that the disease will go away rather than try to promote a more responsible attitude to sex.

Tellingly…

Gay activists say many the remaining two-thirds [of new HIV infections in Singapore] appeared to be heterosexual men who caught the illness from prostitutes in nearby Southeast Asian regions such as Indonesia’s Batam island just an hour’s boat ride from Singapore.

Singapore would like to promote itself as a centre for Asian arts, with it’s international film festival one of the city state’s cultural highlights. But this story from the Guardian suggests that they still have a long way to go.

Film-maker, Martyn See has withdrawn his short film from the film festival after being warned that its subject matter - opposition leader Chee Soon Juan - could land him with either a fine or a jail sentence.

According to Singapore’s Straits Times, local films will always be banned if they “contain wholly or partly either partisan or biased references to or comments on any political matter.”

Strict media control and support for the arts do not sit well together. In fact, they don’t sit together at all.

Satan’s Playground director, Dante Tomaselli has been kind enough to send me a look at the official poster for the film, which is also up at the official site.

And doesn’t it look good?

The devilish doorknocker has already made an appearance in the postcards for the film, but now you get a glimpse of the woods faded into the door.

In other Tomaselli news, word on the net is that he has landed Judith O’Dea (Barbara from Romero Classic, Night of the Living Dead) in his next film The Ocean as a diver who runs into a bit of supernatural mayhem.

Not surprisngly, Tomaselli is promising a few nods to Night of the Living Dead and, I have to admit, that the idea of corpses rising from the ocean sounds quite delightful.

You get these young, over-hyped stars with very little experience, pitched into big-budget movies in major roles and they can’t handle them.

- Christopher Lee

Creationists take their fight to the really big screen

They are the epitome of safe family entertainment, renowned for lavish animations, exquisitely filmed scenes of natural grandeur and utterly tame scripts. But Imax films have suddenly found themselves catapulted into controversy, thanks to their occasional use of the dreaded E-word: evolution.

In several US states, Imax cinemas - including some at science museums - are refusing to show movies that mention the subject or suggest that Earth’s origins do not conform with biblical descriptions.

I’m reminded of something Bill Hicks said:

You ever notice how people who believe in creationism look really unevolved?

Blair acts on Jamie’s plan for schools

Tony Blair is to bow to the increasing clamour from parents for better school meals for their children and announce a series of plans to swap junk food for ‘organic and local’ fresh meals.

In a response to the plea from TV chef Jamie Oliver for a ’school dinner revolution’, the Prime Minister will say that school kitchens will be rebuilt and equipped so dishes can be cooked from scratch, while dinner ladies are given ‘culinary skills’ to help them create appetising menus.

So kudos to Jamie Oliver for highlighting the dire state of much of Britain’s school dinners. Good food is tasty and, unless you want to make a meal of it, doesn’t take an excessive amount of time to prepare. It’s also true that school is where a lot of children learn their nutrition habits and that schools can - and should - be able to guarantee that kids get at least one decent meal every weekday.

Healthy eating is for life, but it needs to start somewhere. And the school canteen sounds like an excellent place for this.