Life in the Empire

Movies

Thought it was time to create a thread dedicated to the cinema.

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by pan on March 18, 2012 at 6:38pm

The Troll Hunter. When it started with a cinema verité - college students/documentary filmers stalking an alleged bear poacher - I was a little worried that it was just going to be another Blair Witch Project imitation...not too worry.They play it straight but allow that wonderfully droll Norwegian sense of humor to come through. I grinned pretty much the whole way through it.

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Permalink Reply by pan on April 4, 2012 at 9:18am

Two delightful Asian movies, both highly recommended:

From Korea Castaway on the Moon. Opens on a man on a cell phone hearing how interest on his payday loans have exploded to a mountain of debt that he will never be able to repay. He hangs up and flings himself off a bridge. Unsuccessful in his suicide, he discovers that he has been castaway on an island in the middle of the river, just a short distance from the city. The other character is an agoraphobic young women who hasn't left her room in 3 years, lives out a fantasy life on the internet and sleeps in a bubble-wrap cocoon in the closet. Don't want to give too many details.

Fish Story connects a pre-Sex Pistols Japanese Punk Band in 1975, childhood fans of the Go Rangers, a doomsday cult disappointed that Nostradamus' predictions weren't correct, and the impending end of the world when a comet will coliide with the earth in 2012.

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Permalink Reply by Cal on April 5, 2012 at 12:01pm

Bubble wrap cocoon in my closet .... now why didn't I think of that! I'm going to have to watch that one for sure. I love the movie feedback here - I always head off to find it for downloading. Thanks.

And happy easter weekend to you all.

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Permalink Reply by pan on April 7, 2012 at 1:27pm

Waste Land Documentary about art photographer Vik Muniz and his collaborations with the Pickers of the Jardim Gramacho - who eke out an existence by gathering recyclables from the largest landfill in the world located in Rio de Janeiro .

Surprisingly uplifting. Although it made me wish that I was fabulously successful so, like Muniz, my collaborative works could actually lead to sizable sums of money......

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Permalink Reply by Cal on April 7, 2012 at 5:56pm

Yes - Waste Land was pretty awe inspiring.

A while ago I decided that my measure of living lightly on the land would be inversely proportional to the weight of my garbage bags. Been doing pretty well - I'm now down to a small mountain of chewed nicorettes (shape into small bricks for retaining walls?) & a huge mountain of dog poo. The 4 large dogs are aou little more than an eccentric indulgence - they're a biodegradable security system & they work way better than the alarm systems in my neighbourhood. Project I just got started on - to see if I can buy a biodigester to produce exterior night lighting using dog poo with a reed bed for waste water treatment & a fertilizer producing facility.

If you can think of a lucrative collaboration there let me know ... I suspect I may need lots of filthy lucre to buy the little contraption I've found on the web & get the engineers up so far north to do the installation.

I also have a media-inspired interest (Paulo Coelho) in the Camino de Santiago. But I'll stick to downloading the movie while I get my shit together here first.

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Permalink Reply by BO on April 7, 2012 at 8:25pm

12 volt LED lighting connected to a bank of car batteries. If the dog poo don't work out, you could charge 'em with solar panels. Or just bury the poo and wait 300 million years for it to turn to oil. ;-) OR...put LED lighting in your house and use the energy savings to charge your batteries.

Been thinking about getting a little Honda generator for emergency power and camping trips. But it don't take poo.

As always...let us know whatcha come up with. And don't forget the pictures. We looooove pictures.

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Permalink Reply by BO on April 14, 2012 at 1:13am

Racking my brain trying decide between the Honda or a solar powered system for my off-grid adventures...

http://www.perigeepower.com/products.html

Just need to power an iPad and a few LED lights. Maybe a fan. Ideally, I would get the Honda and a big marine battery, but then there's gas an oil and smell and noise. Having a thousand watts would open up new possibilities for more energy sucking comforts. and I'm old. I need comforts.

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Permalink Reply by Cal on April 14, 2012 at 1:32am

It's the gas/smell/noise I'm aiming to avoid.

I got this little setup for starters. The power gorilla worked really well keeping my laptop/ipod/cellphones going during a power outage recently. But I haven't got the hang of the solar gorilla - either I got a dud or I don't know how to use it properly because I couldn't get my iPod charged a whole 10 hours out in the sun. And Zululand sun is not to be sneezed at.

https://powertraveller.com/iwanta/solargorilla/

For travelling I found a nice kit that fits on the vehicle roof & powers up deep cycle battery which also charges up from the vehicle battery when you're driving. I've got the battery ... saving up for next phase.

For the house the biogas generator guy is coming to see me next week ... this thing looks it could set my dog poop pile alight.

http://www.biogaspro.com/products/manufacture-a-installation.html

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Permalink Reply by Mouse on April 14, 2012 at 5:01am

Just for contrast, have been to town twice this year. My bicycle awaits, but do I dare. The thought of it makes me cry. Last summer tried so hard to get to the monthly market, but suddenly cut my hair very short indeed on the way out the door, and that was that for a while. Took it as a subtle communication from my inner self.

Have run out of French coffee. Think my last trip this year, when I actually had coffee somewhere and talked to one or two people, might have cost my daughter her job.

You can talk if you don't say anything. The big silences are the ones that follow in clouds. Never mention you know what. Or that either. No. So. What to do today about the coffee situation. Never did master small talk or get over that sense of words mounting upwards and spilling out like fireworks on a frosty night.