Robert Forster'ın oynadığı filmler "Cleaner”, “Rise”, ve “D-War”. Ayrıca Desperate Housewives ve Numbers dizilerinde konuk oyuncu olarakda yer almış.

Stunning computer-generated special effects are the main selling point of Dragon Wars: D-War, a Korean-made fantasy about ancient monsters wreaking havoc in modern Los Angeles. The complex plot, based on legend, pits an evil serpent and its demonic army against a young woman (Amanda Brooks) who is the reincarnation of a young woman imbued with the heaven-sent power to transform the creature into an all-powerful dragon. Jason Behr (The Grudge) is the reporter who discovers that he too is a reincarnated warrior bound to prevent Brooks and her power from falling into the wrong hands. The elaborate premise isn't helped by the script, which delivers absurd dialogue and situations with child-like naivete; thankfully, the presence of Robert Forster (as another reincarnated hero) and solid actors like Elizabeth Pena, The Office's Craig Robinson, and Chris Mulkey, help smooth over the frequent moments of unintentional humor. But this won't matter much to fantasy fans and (especially) younger viewers, who will tune in for the film's riot of special effects; director Shim Hyung-rae and his talented team offer scene after scene of exceptional CGI creations, most notably a aerial dogfight between helicopters and winged lizards in the skies above downtown L.A., and a climactic battle which makes good on the title's promise. The DVD includes a making-of featurette which outlines Shim's four-year struggle to complete the project, as well as storyboard galleries and an animatics display. -- Paul Gaita

Meet Buraki the vicious 200-meter long Imoogi serpent from ancient Korea. His army includes giant lizards with missile launchers flying dragons soldiers bred for evil and mega-intelligent dinosaurs. Together they will destroy Los Angeles and possibly the world unless reincarnated warriors Ethan and Sarah can outrun them and resurrect the Good Imoogi Buraki s ancient nemesis. Dragon Wars reveals every last detail of Earth s greatest battle a war you ll only believe when you see it for yourself.

Dragon Wars - D-War is available at Amazon for $16.49. To Order click here
Amazon Product Pages contain a lot of other details on this product as Customer Reviews, Sales Ranking, Special Offers, Alternate products that customers are going for and much more.Want to read these details? click here

Want to get some other Format / Binding / Version? You can search for them from here

Other Products of Interest

• Resident Evil - Extinction (Widescreen Special Edition)
• Beowulf
• War (Widescreen Edition)
• Hitman
• Aliens vs. Predator - Requiem (Unrated Edition)

Michael Ausiello ha annunciato sulle pagine online di Entertainment Weekly che l'attore Rober Forster (Desperate Housewives, Huff, Numb3rs) è stato chiamato sul set della terza stagione di Heroes per interpretare un ruolo molto importante, Arthur Petrelli, il padre apparentemente morto di Peter e Nathan. Vista la capacità di alcuni eroi di viaggiare nel tempo, in questo momento non è ancora chiaro se vedremo Arthur nel presente o nel passato, così come non è stato precisato se l'uomo userà dei poteri.

www.tvguide.com

www.cartoonmag.org

]]> http://pantry.wordpress.com/?p=77 Fri, 11 Jul 2008 09:22:17 +0000 awildslimalien http://pantry.wordpress.com/?p=77 In the spirit of the fifty word fictions currently being posted by Chan over at A wild slim alien, here are some reviews of exactly that length – tips of the hat to my long-player listening so far this year.  With the odd hand gesture or wrinkled nose thrown in.

The Shortwave Set – Replica sun machine

Seduced by the alethiometeresque cover, but disappointed by the frequency with which the wan, characterless vocals of Andrew Pettitt displace the considerably more elegant singing of Ulrika Bjornse.  Danger Mouse production?  Check.  Van Dyke Parks string arrangements?  Check.  Tunes?  Mostly.  ‘Glitches ‘n’ bugs’, ‘Distant daze’ and ‘No social’ stand out.

Elbow – The seldom seen kid

In the last couple of years Elbow’s records have been surreptitiously stealing their way to the centre of my listening world.  This confirms their place there with its high musicality and wry humour.  Guy Garvey’s songs are lugubrious and beautiful, even managing to reanimate the corny image of the mirrorball.

DeVotchKa – A mad and faithful telling

Romany Mexican indie with Greek or Klezmer undertones, anyone?  Not forgetting occasional forays into chamber and oompah band territories?  Singer Nick Urata looks like a roughed-up cross between Clooney and Morrissey.  One song – ‘The clockwise witness’ – is truly great, throwing off excessive stylistic colouring for an affecting shade of blue.

Carl Craig – Sessions

How long it’s been since I was lost in niteklub rhythm.  For all that Craig is a master of dancefloor dynamics, Sessions ultimately feels relentless, at home or in car.  It’s a relief when the end is near and the unpredictable rhythms of ‘Bug in the bass bin’ take hold.

Four Tet – Ringer

A river whose flow is as relentless as Sessions, but out of the current more is going on.  I wish I had more time to relax into ‘Swimmer’’s patterns; fretted less about the time Kieran Hebden takes to develop his swirls and eddies.  Moments of life that won’t come again.

Neon Neon – Stainless style

After the Rhys-Boom Bip collaboration on Blue eyed in the red room, and Gruff’s loveable Candylion, a disappointment.  In evoking the worst aspects of the eighties, it’s loud, shiny, and as attractive as the boxy lines of the De Lorean car.  But ‘I lust u’ achieves a  Depeche Mode-esque melancholy.

Colin Meloy – Colin Meloy sings live

Just occasionally in these solo performances, Colin Meloy is one note short of a melody.  Otherwise he conveys the best of the Decemberists – as well as Shirley Collins and the Smiths – with songwriter’s conviction, stand-up comedy and helpings of the ‘campfire singalong’ spirit that he declares he is aiming for.

The Last Shadow Puppets – The age of the understatement

The chief northern monkey and his best mate perform a Dukes of Stratosphearic take on Scott Walker (and indeed Brel through Scott’s distorting mirror); in their turtleneck sweaters they’re photo-fit go-getters.  The result is a noirish existential beat group and the second of many reinventions Alex Turner may yet perform.

Goldfrapp – Seventh tree

I lost interest between Black cherry and the insistently decadent electro of Supernature.  Fortunately the duo are aware of the benefits of reinvention and return; Seventh tree is closest in spirit to Felt mountain but with added folk sensibility and pop nous.  ‘Little bird’ floats and ‘Caravan girl’ drives along.

British Sea Power – Do you like rock music?

Like Open season, this is eight-tenths of the way to greatness; if I were eighteen and at my first Glastonbury, I would wave my flag to it.  But it’s as rock as the substance you’d mine were you to tunnel into Mount Blanc, and for me that remains a problem.

Paul Weller – 22 dreams

Press would have you believe that Weller has suddenly emerged from a lengthy spell in rock purgatory.  Truth is he rediscovered his touch over the two preceding sets; you could not get more pastoral than ‘Pan’ on As is now.  22 dreams expands the lightness in familiar and fresh directions.

Portishead – Third

Top bombing from Barrow, Gibbons and Utley.  The avant-garde attack of the electronics is reminiscent of New Order discovering synthesisers.  Next time Portishead can worry less about making it impossible for anyone to countenance putting them on as dinner party listening; this is music with which to greet the apocalypse.

Robert Forster – The evangelist

The healing power of song – I’m so glad RF rediscovered it.  But how could the tone be anything other than elegiac, with fragments of Grant’s last songs among Robert’s lyrical responses to his death.  As we hear those last tunes, Robert sings ‘it was melody he loved most of all’.

Sleater-Kinney – Far Away (from ‘One Beat’) [Buy the CD] [Download it]

I’d no sooner purchased their last LP than S/K inconsiderately split up. At least I have the back catalogue to explore and ‘One Beat’ is pretty good stuff, a league above the likes of Be Your Own Pet.

Robert Forster – The Evangelist (from ‘The Evangelist’) [Buy the CD] [Download it]

The ex-Go-Between’s first solo LP since the death of bandmate Grant McLennan has been covered on here in the last fortnight. Here’s the title track, another example of how good the record is.

dEUS – Oh Your God (from ‘Vantage Point’) [Buy the CD] [Download it]

Unfortunately ‘Vantage Point’ hasn’t grabbed me to the same extent as previous dEUS LPs. Which isn’t to say that there isn’t plenty of good stuff on it, just that it perhaps lacks stand-outs like ‘Suds & Soda’ or even ‘Sun Ra’. ‘Oh Your God’ is the liveliest track on the record.

R.E.M. – Until The Day Is Done (from ‘Accelerate’) [Buy the CD] [Download it]

For whatever reason ‘Accelerate’ didn’t fully convince. The stodgy production led to more than one person saying that the whole thing sounded like one long song and that’s maybe part of it. But as a way of blasting away the cobwebs of the recent records, it did just fine.

The Triffids – Too Hot To Move, Too Hot To Think (from 'The Black Swan') [Buy the CD] [Download it]

The main Triffids' LPs have now been covered in the Domino reissue programme following (deep breath) the simultaneous releases of ‘The Black Swan’, ‘Treeless Plain’ and ‘Beautiful Waste and Other Stories’. This is the opening track, which was actually an old song that featured on one of the earlier Triffids cassette LPs.

Back to live shows next post.

If It Rains: Robert Forster
Heretics (early version): Andrew Bird
Bacative: Tricky
Daisies, Cats And Spacemen (with Roya Arab): Leila
Brace Bulging Buoyant Clairvoyants: Wild Beasts
Love Like Semtex: Infadels
Gobbledigook: Sigur Rós
While the City Sleeps: Jeremy Jay
Lump Sum: Bon Iver
Moon Lake: Scout Niblett
Volcano: Beck
Comfy In Nautica: Panda Bear
Tonight The Streets Are Ours: Richard Hawley

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Lista de temas:

01 Love Goes On!
02 Quiet Heart
03 Love is a Sign
04 You Can't Say No Forever
05 The Devil's Eye
06 Streets of Your Town
07 Clouds
08 Was There Anything I Could Do?
09 I'm All Right
10 Dive for Your Memory

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"Was There Anything I Could Do?"

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"Streets of Your Town"

]]> http://osaldalingua.wordpress.com/?p=622 Fri, 04 Jul 2008 19:39:03 +0000 nunoromano http://osaldalingua.wordpress.com/?p=622

A lista dos grandes trovadores dos tempos modernos parece não ter fim. Há muito saído dos The Go-Betweens, Robert Forster construiu uma carreira calma e sólida que chega agora a The Evangelist. Este novo registo está repleto de uma simplicidade e beleza difíceis de explicar. Os arranjos não são extraordinários. As letras não são embasbacantes. O virtuosismo técnico ou a capacidade vocal não impressionam. O problema é o conjunto de todos estes elementos: tudo está tão organizado e no lugar certo que cada audição de The Evangelist soa sempre a "era mesmo isto que estava a precisar de ouvir".

Mas atenção que há músicas realmente extraordinárias, que ficam no ouvido dias e dias. Em caso de dúvida, tentar If It Rains ou Demon Days. Não falha. Altamente recomendado.

Nota de Sal: 8,5/10

I’m going to postpone my half yearly round-up again to ensure that an LP that had kind of slipped off the radar in the last couple of weeks makes it into that review.

Robert Forster’s ‘The Evangelist’ is the former Go-Between’s first solo LP since the death of song writing partner Grant McLennan. The odd thing is that I’ve never bought a solo Forster (or McLennan, for that matter) LP before this one. Which means that this purchase is undoubtedly down in part to the record’s tragic origins (as well as my emusic subscription).

‘The Evangelist’ fits nicely into the Go-Betweens legacy with some lovely tunes featuring plenty of acoustic guitars but also varied instrumentation. It maybe doesn’t rock quite as hard as ‘Oceans Apart’ did in places but as with every Go-Betweens release the quality of the song writing is indisputable.

It’s not of course a Go-Betweens record, as Forster tells that he knew that his band were over when McLennan died. But it does feature 3 songs that Grant had written before he died that Robert has since completed. And in the best Go-Betweens tradition it is a fine, mature pop record. Check it out.

Here’s one of the Grant songs that Robert  reckons is in the best handful he ever wrote:

Robert Forster – Demon Days (from ‘The Evangelist’) [Buy it] [Download it]

Robert plays a solo gig at Glasgow's Oran Mor on 20th September [Tickets]

(tratto da Nuovo Oggi di domenica 1 giugno 2008) - Ingrediente fondamentale per qualsiasi film horror che si rispetti: la paura. Mettere paura allo spettatore è l’ingrediente fondamentale, come il basilico nel pesto, o l’uovo nella carbonara. Un horror che non riesce a creare alcun tipo di tensione nello spettatore, è un fallimento. Peccato perchè ‘La setta delle tenebre’ aveva tanti motivi per essere un buon prodotto di genere. Un regista giovane e talentuoso come Sebastian Gutierrez, una protagonista giovane e brava come Lucy Liu (Kill Bill 1 e 2), un attore fuori dagli schemi come Michael Chiklis (The Shield, I Fantastici 4) e la partecipazione speciale della rockstar Marilyn Manson.
Tutto questo non è bastato ai produttori di ‘The Grudge’ per tirare fuori dal cilindro un prodotto perlomeno passabile. Gutierrez si ispira ai film di Rob Zombie, dove le scene hanno il dinamismo e l’azione dei videoclip musicali. Il risultato è però quanto di più lontano esista da Zombie. ‘La setta delle tenebre’ è scontato, prevedibile, pieno di sparatorie e privo di qualsiasi suspance. Non ci si spaventa in alcun modo, neppure nel finale. L’unica nota positiva sono forse quei pochi minui in cui compare Marilyn Manson, se non altro perchè appare irriconoscibile ai più (vi sfidiamo a trovarlo da voi), senza la minima ombra di trucco.
Il resto è la classica storia di vampiri o presunti tali. Senza alcuno spunto originale che la distingua dalla massa. La stessa Lucy Liu, non ci convince più di tanto in questo ruolo di bella e dannata. La sceneggiatura è debole, i personaggi vengono utilizzati malissimo, comparendo e sparendo senza un’apparente logica.
La giornalista Sadie (Lucy Liu) scopre l’esistenza di una setta segreta che sta diventando una moda fra i giovani di Los Angeles. Ma quando questi ragazzi iniziano a sparire, per poi venire ritrovati morti, Sadie inizia a indagare. Tuttavia, nel corso delle indagini, lei stessa diventa la preda del "guru" che manipola gli adepti e che ha ordito i violenti omicidi. Un giorno Sadie si risveglia nel buio e scopre di non essere più viva, ma di non essere ancora neanche completamente morta. Vagando nel sordido mondo metropolitano di Los Angeles, i suoi sensi si risvegliano: ha bisogno di calmare la sua sete, e il sangue è l’unico nutrimento che desidera. Ma come farà a uccidere gente innocente per soddisfare la sua brama? E perché è ancora viva quando dovrebbe essere morta? Il detective Rawlins (Michael Chiklis) ha perso la sua unica figlia a causa della stessa setta. Distrutto dal dolore, intende rintracciare l’omicida e farsi giustizia. Quando incontra Sadie, inizialmente la scambia per un’assassina, ma presto si renderà conto che la donna potrà condurlo sulle tracce dei responsabili di questi odiosi delitti. Lui e Sadie si uniscono in questa missione, spinti dallo stesso desiderio: scovare il responsabile della setta e ucciderlo. Uniranno le proprie forze nonostante Sadie sia tecnicamente morta, come sua figlia. Sadie e Rawlins stringono un accordo: uccideranno tutti i membri della setta nella speranza di trovare il loro leader, in modo da fermare il massacro di tanti innocenti.

Trailer Ufficiale del film

'Goin' No Place' Photograph by Soffia Gisladottir

''Its real theme is loss and the idea that things happen in life that you have no explanation for. The story is made up of memories and fragments of memories, and the feeling I got from it is that you can never figure out what they all mean until you stop trying, and then you just remember the essences of people -- and of the time when they were suddenly gone and how it changed everything.''

Sofia Coppola talking about her movie adaptation of The Virgin Suicides

While Grant McLennan's family was packing up his possessions, after his death, Robert Forster asked if he could have Grant's song-writing notebook. "We had started on our 10th album," Robert wrote in The Times of London. "It had begun the same way as all the others. I went over to his place during the day and we'd play the songs each of us had written. I'd find him in either of two locations: pottering around the kitchen or lying on his bed, reading. The first 10 minutes would always be a little tetchy. Although we'd known each other for almost 30 years and worked closely together for a good half of that time, he'd be a little gruff; it was as if, each time I saw him, he had to get to know me again. So, he'd make coffee and I'd sit in a chair in the kitchen and pepper him with questions in an attempt to bring him around to good humour. This is where having known him for such a long time helped, because I knew the buttons to push, the silly things to say, the cheeky remark about an album he liked, the films of a certain actor I'd know he'd trash, a bit of local rock-scene gossip. Anything really, and after 10 minutes, he'd be the person I'd always known. Then we'd play guitar together: his new songs and mine, which built a world we'd then shape, record and send out to those who loved or liked what we did. It was the 10th album we were shooting for. We were just two months into it, eight songs written, when he died."

Robert found fragments for ‘Demon Days', ‘Let Your Light In, Babe' and ‘It Ain't Easy' in the notebook, and he finished and recorded them for his new solo album, The Evangelist. "The reason The Evangelist exists is partly due to my determination to record ‘Demon Days' and bring it to the world," Robert wrote. "There were other great songs he had, two of which I took for the album. Our collaboration went on after his passing in that he had not finished the lyrics to any of those three songs. ‘Demon Days' was the most complete, with a chorus and five lines written of the first verse; the other two songs, ‘Let Your Light In, Babe' and ‘It Ain't Easy‘, had chorus lyrics only. ‘For Let Your Light In‘, I constructed a narrative that had come to me after reading a 19th-century poem of erotic romance set in a church. ‘It Ain't Easy' was harder to write. I settled on a portrait of him, something detailed that played off against the quick pop feel of the melody. I wrote eight verses before I hit one that started ‘And a river ran, and a train ran, and a dream ran through everything that he did‘. I liked this. So I started the song with it."

Robert went to London with Glenn Thompson and Adele Pickvance, who'd been in the last line-up of the Go Betweens, and recorded The Evangelist in the same studio where their previous album, Oceans Away, had been recorded in 2005. "That decision worked," wrote Robert. "We recorded together knowing a piece was missing, but that we were all happy working together on the thing that happened after the piece went missing. Grant's ghost was there, but there weren't too many sad moments. Process, and the day-to-day work that goes into making an album, robbed us of too much reflection. His amp was set up and a guitar of his stood on a stand. We all had to work a bit faster because Grant's turn to sing or play never came around. Through it all, though, we knew we were honouring him by making a great record in a place that he knew."

When Grant had first played 'Demon Days' to Robert he mentioned asking Audrey Riley, who'd done the string arrangements for the fourth Go Betweens album, Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond Express, recorded in 1985. "Three of the quartet (including Audrey) had played on Liberty Belle 22 years ago. Circles were being completed. Grant had been close and then far away through the recording. As we heard the gorgeous flowing lines that Audrey had written, at that moment, bows on strings, strings on wood, he was right there in the room."

I first heard The Evangelist last weekend, while I was cooking dinner at the house of my writer friend Clinton Walker, and his wife Debbie. Robert had sent them the album. When I'd lived in Sydney fifteen years ago Clinton and Debbie's house in Darlinghurst had been the gathering place for our group of friends, who were mostly musicians and mostly from Brisbane. They're mentioned in Robert's song ‘Darlinghurst Nights' on the Oceans Away album. I steeled myself, expecting to be affected more by Grant's absence than anything present on Robert's album. The last time I'd been at Clinton and Debbie's we'd watched a film of their wedding, that they'd just had transferred to DVD, which I'd missed as I was living in America at the time. Grant had been the best man. But Robert's album was looking forward in a gloriously calm way. I was particularly captivated by the title song and went and bought the album the next day.

Clinton and I had been music writers during the punk rock era in Australia. I can't recall that I ever wrote about the Go Betweens. I admired, appreciated and enjoyed their music and performances but I had different points of reference and different tastes in music: I felt unqualified to write about their music. From reading Robert's column in The Monthly I see that our musical tastes still diverge, but I've gradually acquired an appreciation of the books and movies and perspective that colours his world.

In a remembrance of Grant written for The Monthly, Robert wrote of the beginning of their friendship. "He told me about French new wave cinema and film noir. I told him about the greatness of the Velvet Underground. He told me about auteur theory and the genius of Preston Sturges. I told him about Dylan in the mid-'60s. He mentioned Godard and Truffaut. We became Godard and Truffaut. Brisbane didn't know it at the time, but there were two 19-year-olds driving around in a car who thought they were French film directors." 

Elsewhere in the essay Robert recalls that Grant seemed to know everything: had seen every movie, read every book, heard every piece of music. "I'd drive over to his place to play guitar and he'd be lying on a bed reading a book," Robert wrote. "Grant never felt guilt about this. The world turned and worked; he read. That was the first message. He'd offer to make coffee, and I knew - and here's one of the great luxuries of my life - I knew I could ask him anything, on any artistic frontier, and he'd have an answer. He had an encyclopaedic mind of the arts, with his own personal twist. So, as he worked on the coffee, I could toss in anything I liked - something that had popped up in my life that I needed his angle on. I'd say, "Tell me about Goya," or, "What do you know about Elizabeth Bishop's poetry?" or, "Is the Youth Group CD any good?" And, his head over the kitchen table, he'd arch an eyebrow just to ascertain that I was serious, which I always was. Then he'd start. Erudite, logical, authoritative and never condescending - not one ounce of superiority came with the dispensing of his opinion. God. I'm going to miss that."

In the astonishing outpouring of admiration and affection for Grant after his death, from all over the world, it seems that everyone he encountered had this experience, of Grant opening up worlds for them. I think that instead of going to University I had the good fortune to be able to ask Grant, and the late Tracy Pew, questions about books.

There's a transcript of a conversation between Grant and Nick Cave in 1993 on the Go Betweens website that captures the quality of sitting around with Grant, talking about books.

Grant McLennan : That's interesting, because Dostoyevsky's language is hallucinatory and violent and complete in its depiction of a sad world. I see similar concerns in your lyrics, especially for the Birthday Party, and also in your novel.

Nick Cave : Well, my father showed me two pieces of literature and tried to drum them into my head. The first was the opening paragraph of Lolita and the other was the murder scene in Crime and Punishment. He considered them to be exceptional pieces of writing. He actually read them both to me several times at an early age. I loved the senselessness and brutality of the murder, the double murder, in Dostoyevsky.

This transcript reminds me how funny Grant, and Robert could be, and that's carried over into their lyrics. In Robert's song, Here Comes A City, from Oceans Away, he asks: "And why do people who read Dostoyevsky, look like Dostoyevsky?"

While I was living in America I didn't write about music but I caught up with Australian musician friends who'd play in Los Angeles and New York. It was Robert I talked to intermittently during those years and Robert's solo albums I heard -- they were on the radio in Los Angeles -- and not Grant's. It was through life in Los Angeles, through Buddhism, and a growing awareness of the mythological references in Nick's songs which became, and remain, my compass and ballast, that I developed an appreciation of the value of sadness -- that it helps us more deeply appreciate how fleeting happiness is, and to value it all the more. Grasping sadness has helped me more deeply appreciate the Go Betweens records, and Robert's.

"I can remember being hit by the lyrics [Grant] put to his first songs," Robert wrote. "I was shocked by their melancholy and the struggle for joy. I'd known the happy-go-lucky university student. As soon as he wrote, there it was. Any appreciation or remembrance of Grant has to take this into account. He didn't parade it, but it's all over his work, and it was in his eye. His refuge was art and a romantic nature that made him very lovable, even if he did take it to ridiculous degrees. Here was a man who, in 2006, didn't drive; who owned no wallet or watch, no credit card, no computer. He would only have to hand in his mobile phone and bankcard to be able to step back into the gas-lit Paris of 1875, his natural home. I admired this side of him a great deal, and it came to be part of the dynamic of our pairing. He called me "the strategist". He was the dreamer. We both realised, and came to relish, the perversity of the fact that this was an exact reversal of the perception people had of us as artists and personalities in the band - that I was the flamboyant man out of time and Grant the sensible rock. In reality, the opposite was true."

My arrival back in Australia coincided with the re-release of Clinton Walker's chronicle of the punk rock years, Inner City Sound. I'd written a piece for it, and helped him edit it in the early 1980's. On the soundtrack album that had been pulled together around it the Go Betweens song was Darlinghurst Nights. It's a subtly beautiful evocation of a place and time. The floating quality of being amongst the lights and traffic at the top of William Street, on the border between Kings Cross and Darlinghurst, echoes of the Laughing Clowns music, friends named. The notebook the song refers to records the yearning of the time, to be somewhere grand, romantic and poetic -- Caracas, perhaps. And to do something meaningfully creative, write a movie, appear in a play. But the luminous beauty in the song is in the society it describes. The punk rock world was a community, small and cohesive, and remains so. It's the richness of the ephemeral details that bring a time and a world alive. I've been reading Arthur C. Clarke's personal history of the communications revolution, and he includes glorious ephemera -- that his parents courted one another using Morse code, why Lord Kelvin's monocle revolutionised electrical measurements, and what "unlikely articles the Victorians made from gutta-percha". He is unapologetic about including these details. "It is precisely such trivia that make history three dimensional," he wrote. 

There were remnants of The Saints in this social group, and in a review in The Monthly of the coming together of the original Saints lineup for a show in Brisbane last year, Robert describes the punk rock era in Brisbane, when the Go Betweens were formed.

Punk hit Brisbane like no other city in Australia. The tentacles that grew out of New York and London from the musical explosion of 1976 affected the receptive waiting enclaves in each major city around the globe in varying ways. As the music and images of the Ramones, Patti Smith and early Pere Ubu, Television and the Sex Pistols were heard and seen, bands formed, systems started and the word spread. Brisbane was different, for two main reasons: we had Bjelke-Petersen and The Saints. Bjelke-Petersen represented the kind of crypto-fascist, bird-brained conservatism that every punk lead singer in the world could only dream of railing against. His use of a blatantly corrupt police force, and its heavy-handed response to punk, gave the scene a political edge largely absent in the other states. And The Saints were the musical revolutionaries in the city's evil heart.  

The joy in getting to know Robert's music is in its relaxed combining of comedy and melancholy and the underlining of the value of community.The Evangelist has a settled quality, an energising calm: it has the relaxed and open quality of being fragments from a notebook, that evoke and open up worlds by describing them. The title song seems to be reading back through many volumes of notebooks. It's complete, but loose and lyrica, too, a set of notes pulled from a notebook.  The explorer, his head full of dreams, searching for gold, pulling along behind him the people he loves ends up in a spiritual dsert, sere, blank, and dry and realizes that the promised land, paradise, is right where he is, and he recognised this in the dreams of others, smaller dreams that are more heartwarming and sustaining.

And now I see, baby - I put distance into your own life

Let's sail away, baby - Let's sail into this life

She drove a Golf white diesel, she drove me through the streets

She took me into her world of parks and wooden seats

And I remember, baby - I remember it all

Yes, I remember, baby - I remember it all

Let's sail away, baby - I thought it was better for us

And I believe, baby - I believe in us.

The best stories I've read about Robert's newer records have been written by Robert. I can grab a copy of The Monthly, or print out something from online, and sit at a table with coffee and it's like reading his side of a conversation. The subtleties of detail and insights and descriptions that are in his records are in his essays. I'm now beginning to appreciate some of the music that he does and it's good to have him as a guide. He wrote this about age, and wisdom, in reference to Bob Dylan.

Old age suits him. It suits him the way being young did. It's a natural fit, for both are the traditional places where wisdom can flower: the fired minds of the young and the dusty, wily utterances of the old. It's all the time in between that's the trouble. Dylan, though, survived all the crashes and the madness of his years, and survived well enough to leave himself fully stocked for a fruitful and significant late period. Time Out of Mind remains the masterpiece; ‘Chronicles: Volume Two', whenever that comes out, may be the next great thing he does. But he's putting three or four fantastic songs on each album, and smiling as the band runs through the ancient changes of the songs of his youth.

Directed by: Hyung-rae Shim

Starring: Jason Behr, Amanda Brooks, Robert Forster

Don't let the kick ass movie poster nor the half decent cg from the trailer fool you. D-War is not a good film. The story revolves around a young reporter in Los Angeles named Ethan, who happens to be a reincarnated Korean warrior who's fate is to protect a reincarnated woman who happens to have the power to change an imoogi into a celestial dragon. Immogi are mythical Korean creatures who resemble dragons but are cursed to not become dragons unless they survive for a thousand years (none of this is told in the film, by the way). This plays out into a battle with an evil immogi and his forces of bad Power Ranger influenced warriors and armored dinosaurs in the streets of downtown LA.

So where do we begin? First off, the movie had some potential. The flashback scenes in ancient Korea where decent and I felt the movie should have just stuck with those characters. Instead, they flash forwarded to present day and had the Korean characters reincarnated into whiny white young adults who look like they should be playing to the CW/WB young teen crowd rather than the intended audience who would go for this kind of movie. Battle sequences are ok with some decent CG that doesn't seem out of place when composted against the Los Angeles streets. Making matters worse, however, is the horrendous acting, bad story, and random sequences that brings the film crashing down. The ending looking like it was taken straight out of Mortal Kombat 2 will leave the viewer with a big plot hole and wondering WTF?

Apparently this movie was a big deal over in Korea, taking several years to complete as it ballooned over budget. Making matters worse, this film is also the highest grossing Korean-made film to be released theatrically in North America. If you are in the mood for a bad movie night with your friends, it may be worth viewing. If you are looking for something a little better as a representative of good Korean film-making, then I'd highly suggest you check out The Host or Old Boy instead. Both movies are far superior and leave the immogi to be slain.

-Dantasia

In uscita il 23 Maggio il film vede come regista Sebastian Gutierrez, una piccola curiosità: durante tutto il film non si sente mai dire la parola vampiro. Di seguito potete visionare il trailer in italiano uscito qualche giorno fa.

• Robert Forster's The Evangelist is unsurprisingly a lovely album, emotional and moving almost by default but in a way that suits both his style and honors the memory of his Go-Betweens partner Grant McLennan. An album that shouldn't've existed in a better world, but which in this imperfect one is a welcome addition.
• I will be quite glad to not hear about a certain president's daughter's intimate wedding again. In fact I'll be quite glad to not hear about any of that family again, really.
• Couple of updates on blog links -- my friend Andrea Reyna's got her blog up as she's posting from Serbia, and doubtless will have things to say about today's election, while a question from a friend prompted me to think of Laina Dawes's great blog, Writing is Fighting.
• And for Mother's Day mom got Dorothy Dunnett's exquisite The Game of Kings, which I recommend to anyone who loves historical novels, mysteries and entertaining novels in general. In these days of extremely elaborate TV series as extended movies in miniature I see no reason why Dunnett's works in general couldn't result in something spectacular.

All for now. More sleep and listening and zoning calls.

Pam Grier stars as 'Jackie Brown' in Quentin Tarantino's film adaptation of the now famous novel 'Rum Punch'.

The film has an all-star cast including not only Pam Grier, but Samuel L. Jackson, Robert Forster, Robert De Niro, Michael Keaton, and Bridget Fonda as well.

Jackie works as a flight attendant for a small Mexican airline. However, the pay is minimal, so she is involved in bringing illegal money into the country for a ruthless, low-life weapons dealer, Ordell Robbie (Jackson). As the police begin to crack down on Ordell, they take various people into custody, including Jackie Brown. Fearing his employees may snitch, Ordell begins to find ways to 'silence' them.

Max Cherry (Robert Forster) a bail bondsmen, comes to Jackie's rescue and begins to fall deeply for her. Together the two plan an elaborate scheme to get Ordell's cash money, ditch the cops, and leave their dead end lives behind. This proves difficult as the police are watching their every move. Not only that, but Ordell has his own movers and shakers including Louis Gara (Robert De Niro) and Melanie Ralston (Bridget Fonda) to put the squeeze on them.

I find this movie to be one of the most solid movies available. The script is tight, the acting is the best around, and the story telling is fantastic! They really found a diamond in the rough with Pam Grier. Other than her skin color, you would never guess she got her start in Blaxploitation films. She carries herself with such a presence, you would swear she studied at Juilliard. Not only that, she look amazing for 48 (at the time of the films release). Another star that shines perhaps more than it was intended to, was Robert Forster as Max. Forster does a terrific job as a gentle, reliable, and tough when necessary aging man. His performance is defiantly reminiscent of the leading roles in classic western movies. And when this old 'square' white guy falls in love with a slick sista, he preforms it innocently and makes it more than realistic.

On the villain side, Samuel L. Jackson does a terrific job in what I think is one of his best roles ever. He perfectly walks the fine line between too cool for school and paranoid. If you had your own personal Samuel L. Jackson, you could throw out your microwave, because his stone cold gazes would heat your food up in a jiffy. As usual, you can count on Bobby De Niro to bring his A game. People thinking acting dumb is easy. I find it to be one of the most challenging roles an actor can take on. Like Sylvester Stallone in Cop Land, Robert De Niro plays it second nature. Trust me, its much harder than it looks. Both together seem harmless, but the danger is real when you cross them.

The story is awesome, and much like Scorsese's Casino or Goodfellas, you are taken for a ride by the seat of your pants, with every factor explained to you in detail. The only thing I could find wrong with this movie, was Jackie gets off the hook a little too easy, and Ordell's last scene has no real satisfaction.

But overall, it was so well done, it effortlessly deserves 4 stars. Its very close to a 5 star, but I just don't see it as a movie you would love to show off to all your friends when they come over. It being over 2 and 1/2 hours makes it hard to pop in over and over.

Robert Forster, junto con Grant McLennan (que murió hace dos años) eran el alma de  The Go-Betweens, una de las mejores bandas de pop de las últimas décadas.

Acaba de publicar disco -The Evangelist- y en una sola escucha, ya les digo que merece mucho la pena. Lo pueden oír integro en esta web: http://store.yeproc.com/album.php?id=13323

Augustana - Can't Love, Can't Hurt
The Cab - Whisper War
Brian Culbertson - Bringing Back the Funk
Def Leppard - Songs From the Sparkle Lounge
Melissa Errico - Lullabies and Wildflowers
Estelle - Shine
Newton Faulkner - Hand Built by Robots
Robert Forster - The Evangelist
Griffin House - Flying Upside Down
Lyfe Jennings - Lyfe Change
Earl Klugh - The Spice of Life
Jamie Lidell - Jim
Lil' Mama - VYP: Voice of the Young People
Madonna - Hard Candy
Mana - Arde el Cielo
Martina McBride - Live in Concert (CD/DVD set)
Mindless Self Indulgence - If
Mudcrutch - Mudcrutch
Nerf Herder - IV
Portishead - Third
Robyn - Robyn
The Roots - Rising Down
Run Kid Run - Love at the Core
Santogold - Santogold
Carly Simon - This Kind of Love
Phil Stacey - Phil Stacey
Walls of Jericho - Redemption
We Shot the Moon - Fear and Love
Steve Winwood - Nine Lives
Your Vegas - A Town and Two Cities

In his song Nothing on My Mind, Paul Kelly (53) said, "I never did one damn good thing 'til I was over thirty." Well, everyone in this post is well over thirty and doing some pretty damn good things. Dedicated to the old guys that have still got it, believe it or not there are a few of us still around. Maybe I've taken notice of these older guys because I just had a birthday and I'm feeling mortal (unlike when I was in my 20's and was immortal), but it seems like there are a number of artists, as they have aged have remained relevant and engaging with their music.

Wire (Colin Newman: 54,Graham Lewis: 55,Bruce Gilbert: 61,Robert Gotobed:57) comes to mind, these guys are all pushing 60 and are making music that is nearly as good as what they made in their 20's and just as good as what they made in their 30's. If you didn't pick up Read & Burn 3 last year it's well worth it, 23 Years Too Late from that ep was my favorite song of last year. The band will be releasing their 11th album on 7 July, it's called Object 47, because it's the 47th record in their discography, of course.

Mark E. Smith (50) is another of these guys that just keep ticking, the guy just does not let up. He's got a new Fall album and an autobiography to boot. The new Fall album is called Imperial Wax Solvent and it's out next week. He's got a new set of musicians (surprise), as the Americans who backed him on Reformation Post TLC are gone. I don't think they were sacked, they just had other things going on, as in their own band. Imperial Wax Solvent is decent as far as Fall albums go, but it looks like the real entertainment lies in MES's autobiography. The Guardian published an article of excerpts that had me laughing out loud more than a few times. Here's his take on foodies:

It's a strange phenomenon, people discussing their lunches. Kids used to do that at school. But now I'll get on the bus, or I'll be sat in the pub, and all I can hear is people discussing the contents of their guts or the meal that they've got in their heads: "I had some nice tomato sauce last night with chips." I don't know why they're telling you this.

mp3: The Fall - Wolf Kidult Man (from Imperial Wax Solvent)
[audio http://home.comcast.net/~finestkiss2/chansons/theFall-WolfKidultMan.mp3]
Excerpts from the autobiography: Guardian Article (Extracted from Renegade: The Lives and Tales of Mark E Smith)

The next gentleman is Robert Forster (50) who I recently wrote about so I won't go into much detail about his new record. Except to say that it's out next week on Yep Rock. I came across this really good article written by, non other than the man himself. In it he goes into depth about the creative process he and Grant McLennan had fallen into at the start of writing songs for the next Go-Betweens album, how it drastically changed and how the solo album came about.

The Times article: Former Go-Between Robert Forster pays tribute to his mate with Evangelist

Another older gentleman Jarvis Cocker, (44) has recently said he's gonna have another record out by the end of the year. Apparently he's got a few songs written. I'm guessing he's gonna have Richard Hawley (40) on it again, but only time will tell. In the meantime you can check out this video of one of the new songs

Video: Jarvis Cocker - Girls Like It Too (live in Argentina)

Edwyn Collins (48.) has been recovering from a cerebral hemorrhage he suffered back in 2005. Last year he put out his sixth solo album, Home Again which was recorded before the hemorrhage. He's back to the point where he can play live again, and from the reviews I've seen he's quite capable. Roddy Frame (44) of Aztec Camera has been accompanying him, which makes these shows even more enticing. The Vinyl Villain has an excellent review of a recent gig in Edinburgh. I'm resigned to the fact that Edwyn will not likely cross the Atlantic again to play, but reading this review makes me want to splurge on a plane ticket. Here are the rest of dates for you lucky people in L'Angleterre.

04-24 Newcastle, England - Northumbria University
04-25 Manchester, England - Manchester University
04-26 Leeds, England - The Cockpit
04-29 London, England - Shepherds Bush Empire

The last bunch of old guys are Sloan (Chris: 39, Andrew: 40, Patrick: 38, Jay: 39), who surprised a lot of people recently by announcing the release of their brand new record Parallel Play. I thought that their last one, which contained no less than 30 songs, might have cleared the vaults, but that is not the case. The new record is shorter, but from the sounds of it just as good ans Never Hear the End of it. Since everyone in the band writes songs, they split it up pretty evenly here, everyone contributes 3 with the exception of overachiever Andrew who has 4. He's the oldest, so that's probably why he got the most.

mp3: Sloan - I'm Not a Kid Anymore (from Parallel Play and quite appropriate for this post)
[audio http://home.comcast.net/~finestkiss2/chansons/Sloan-Im_Not__A_Kid_Anymore.mp3]
buy: Sloan - Parallel Play

The Measure for Measure blog on the art of songwriting continues with Darrell Brown.

The Guardian interviews the premium baller currently playing and maybe, just maybe, the new Michael Jordan, LeBron James.

Acid-house survivors relay their tales.

Andrew Kuo creates a chart to explain his enjoyment of The Boredoms.

Here's an interview with Gervais.

The Boss came out for Barack this week.

Bob Forster donates a loving tribute to his songwriting soulmate, the late Grant McLennan.

Pitchfork highlights a few new indie hip hop records that almost escaped its radar.

Robert Greenwald portrays the attack being made on Iran by, who else, Fox News.

Colbert serenades Mrs Obama.

Metal fandom with John Darnielle.

Also from PopMatters the post-masterpiece malaise which impaced The Jesus and Mary Chain.

Sasha Frere-Jones shows the love for Portishead's Third.

I also want to point you folks to Pitchfork TV which really is darn tootin' good.

Formed in Brisbane, Australia in the late 70s, The Go-Betweens eventually became one of the great, unheralded bands of the 80s. The focal point of the band was always the singing/guitar-playing/songwriting duo of Robert Forster and Grant McLennan (pictured above; Forster on the left). They recorded six albums between 1981 and 1988, and then disbanded for a decade. Forster and McLennan reunited in 2000 and recorded three more albums before McLennan's untimely death in 2006.

Send Me a Lullaby (1981)


Their only album I don't own, I've had a hell of a time tracking it down in digital form. Everything I've read about it sounds very similar to the frequent criticism of first albums recorded by bands that eventually become great: the potential is there, but they haven't found their voice yet.

Before Hollywood (1983)


The latent promise in their debut came to fruition on their second album. Forster and McLennan write songs that are highly melodic but structurally intricate, with unusual shifts in tempo and unconventional progressions from verse to chorus. There's also a heavy post-punk influence on this album, with an emphasis on bass, ominous keyboard, and spiky guitar (as on the impressive opener "A Bad Debt Follows You"). The catchy melodies are often juxtaposed with an air of melancholy and nostalgia, marking out The Go-Betweens as a band with more on its mind than simply crafting memorable tunes. "Two Steps Step Out," with its jerky tempo and optimistic chorus, and the delicate, piano-flecked "Dusty in Here" are particular standouts, but the undisputed classic on this album is "Cattle and Cane," an acoustic/electric masterwork that single-handedly establishes the band as a force to be reckoned with. Grade: A-

Spring Hill Fair (1984)


On the surface, Spring Hill Fair seems to have cast off some of the quirks that made Before Hollywood such a compelling listen. Sporting occasional string and brass accompaniment, it initially seems as though the band is going for conventional, middle-of-the-road pop. Repeated listens, though, reveal the same depths as its predecessor, only on a much broader palette. The chiming guitars are still at the forefront, and the McLennan-sung opener, "Bachelor Kisses," is a prime example of the melodic cleverness at work in the songwriting: the traditional-sounding arrangement is interrupted by a jarring break mid-song that mirrors a shift in the tone of the lyrics. The strongest tunes, though, are Forster's: "Draining the Pool for You" (a snide kiss-off by a maintenance man to the star he works for) and "Man O' Sand to Girl O' Sea" (an insistent and desperate song of lost love). An album that grows on you. Grade: B+

Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond Express (1986)


A warmer record than their previous efforts, Liberty Belle sees the band striking a more realized balance between Forster's anxiety and McLennan's romanticism. This can be heard immediately in the album's first two songs: Forster's jaunty and urgent "Spring Rain" and McLennan's yearning "The Ghost and the Black Hat." Musically, this album has more in common with Before Hollywood – their old edge appears on several songs, most notably "In the Core of a Flame" – but the band continues to expand their sound, exploring unusual texture and instrumentation. This is a top-flight collection of songs that sees the band continuing to grow by leaps and bounds. Grade: A-

Tallulah (1987)


Opening with McLennan's soaring "Right Here," Tallulah marks the point where The Go-Betweens wholeheartedly embrace the fuller sound hinted at in their last two albums. Jam-packed with beautiful, instantly memorable melodies, and released at the flashpoint where independent music was joining the mainstream, it's mind-boggling that this album didn't elevate the band to contender status. The gorgeous chorus of "You Tell Me"; the pulsing, organ-driven "Cut it Out"; "The House That Jack Kerouac Built," with its insistent tempo; the magesterial "I Just Get Caught Out" – this is an album of riches, to be savored again and again. Grade: A

16 Lovers Lane (1988)


All roads, to use a lame pun, lead to 16 Lovers Lane. Lyrically somber but musically glorious, the album is an unofficial song cycle about love gone wrong, and features the strongest, most consistent songwriting Forster and McLennan ever commited to record. "Love Goes On!" is McLennan's melodically euphoric yet lyrically downbeat opener, Forster sings the bittersweet "Love Is a Sign," and "Streets of Your Town" is the closest the band ever got to a hit single. The album moves from strength to strength, seamlessly incorporating brass and strings to augment and flesh out the never-stronger guitars; if I were to attempt to list the album's best tracks, it would be easier to simply list all the songs on the album. 16 Lovers Lane ends with McLennan's devastating "Dive for Your Memory." The song proved to be the band's last recorded work for over a decade. Essential listening. Grade: A+

The Friends of Rachel Worth (2000)


Forster and McLennan returned a dozen years later with this album. While it doesn't scale the heights of their earlier work, it's a worthy return, recorded, curiously enough, with the members of Sleater-Kinney. While the album features a handful of songs that wouldn't have sounded out of place on some of their earlier albums ("Magic in Here," "Spirit," and "Going Blind," especially), The Friends of Rachel Worth sounds like an album recorded by two old friends who haven't quite gotten used to working together again. Not a failure, but not an overwhelming success. Grade: B

Bright Yellow Bright Orange (2003)


Altogether more satisfying than The Friends of Rachel Worth, this album sees Forster and McLennan more confident in their partnership, and the resulting songs are more worthy of inclusion to the Go-Betweens' canon. The early tension between the somber lyrics and the sprightly tunes is largely absent, but the songs are as melodic as ever; "Caroline and I" and "Poison in the Walls" are especially strong, and "Old Mexico" is the rare song where Forster and McLennan share vocal duties, the lush chorus an intriguing counterpoint to the staccato verses. Even though Bright Yellow Bright Orange doesn't break any new ground, Forster and McLennan now seem content to simply write some great pop songs. Grade: B+

Oceans Apart (2005)


The death of McLennan in 2006 is all the sadder considering how strong The Go-Betweens' final album proved to be. Oceans Apart features Forster and McLennan's strongest collection of songs since 16 Lovers Lane, and seemed to promise that their career renaissance would continue unabated. Both writers offer up some of their best work: Forster gives us opening track "Here Comes a City" (perhaps the most insistent song in the band's career) and the poignant "Darlinghurst Nights," while McLennan's "Finding You" features one of his characteristically beautiful melodies. As strong as this album is, the net effect is one of loss. Listening to it now, it's hard not to mourn McLennan's passing, and wonder what the band would have done next. Grade: A

Both Forster and McLennan recorded several solo albums throughout the 90s. McLennan's best is Horsebreaker Star (1995), a double album with nary a bad track. A year later, Forster released his best, Warm Nights (1996).

I've divided their work into two compilations. The first covers Send Me a Lullaby through Tallulah; the second picks up with 16 Lovers Lane and continues through highlights from their 21st century reunion. Click the title of each to download.

The Go-Betweens, 1981-1987
1. A Bad Debt Follows You
2. Two Steps Step Out
3. Cattle and Cane
4. Bachelor Kisses
5. Draining the Pool for You
6. Man o' Sand to Girl o' Sea
7. Spring Rain
8. In the Core of a Flame
9. Head Full of Steam
10. Right Here
11. You Tell Me
12. I Just Get Caught Out
13. The House That Jack Kerouac Built

The Go-Betweens, 1988-2005
1. Love Goes On!
2. Love Is a Sign
3. Streets of Your Town
4. Dive for Your Memory
5. Magic in Here
6. Spirit
7. Going Blind
8. Caroline and I
9. Poison in the Walls
10. Old Mexico
11. Here Comes a City
12. Finding You
13. Darlinghurst Nights

Current listening: Beirut – The Flying Club Cup
Current reading: Chuck Klosterman – IV
Last movie seen: Vantage Point (Pete Travis, dir.)