Category — Movies-TV

While many of you know this, I thought I would write a note to officially ”announce” that I’ve started a new job as a Solutions Architect for Artesia, the Digital Media Group of Open Text, Inc.

This change concludes a total of almost 8 years at Mainsoft, my previous employer.  Leaving Mainsoft was a tough decision, as the people there are some of the brightest and hardest working folks I’ve ever known.  Their products are rock solid and fit a real need in the market.  I’m truly thankful for my time there.  Eight years is a long time though.  I was looking for something with less cross country travel and something that was more indigenous to my home city of Los Angeles.  Enter Artesia!

Artesia focuses on solutions for the digital media ecosystem, meaning primarily providing Digital Asset Management software for companies who work with digital files.  A mouth full, I know…  In a nutshell, Artesia helps companies with huge amounts of digital content (images, video, Photoshop files, InDesign files, etc…) store, index and categorize that content and then provide for easy searching and distribution of it throughout the enterprise and to their partners.

The usage spans across most industries and verticals.  Companies like Major League Baseball use Artesia as the repository and workflow manager for creating their “Condensed Games” on MLB.TV.  A company like Molson Coors uses Artesia to help them manage brand consistency.  Getty Images uses Artesia to underpin their entire editorial division.  Many uses, but a single architecture.  Very flexible, and very neat!

Headquartered out of Rockville, MD (just outside of D.C.), Artesia is the leading company in the Digital Asset Management space.  Their customer list is hugely impressive, and the people have a lot of vision.  Its exciting to move to a new space and start fresh.  Mainsoft will be a tough act to follow, but Artesia seems to be up to the task.

Artesia, Digital Asset Management, DAM

An interesting article on FoxNews.com reports that the absence of an official Trek property may actually be good for the franchise as a whole. It’s an interesting position:

The consensus was they should give the franchise a rest, overwhelmingly. They’d been wringing it out for so long, the ideas were getting less fresh, they needed a period of time to rejuvenate. Everyone expects it to come back, but in 10 years, eight years, giving it time to clean house and let some new ideas be generated.

Indeed, this may not be a bad thing for the franchise, but what about for the fans? The real question is, with Trek out of the picture, Star Wars finshed and the Matrix over, where will SciFi go from here? Battlestar Galactica suddenly seems on center stage - and, it is arguably the best show on television right now. Well, next season, actually.

Topic:
FOXNews.com - Foxlife: Entertainment and Lifestyle News - Fox Features - Star Trek: The Lost Generation

Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Science Fiction

An article at Ars Technica reports on a Chicago TV station’s claims that video games are like drugs - the station cites a social worker who says that as a result children are behaving worse than they did historically.

The Ars article pretty quickly dismisses the possibility, throwing it in with a pile of other emergent social phenomena that simply rubbed mainstream society the wrong way.  It then goes on to discuss if gaming can be truly addictive, discusses how addition itself is a poor word in general and ultimately finds that gaming is more on the order of an eating disorder or compulsive gambling than it is with heroine.

Its an interesting article to be sure, and outside of that, you can weigh many good and bad points relating to video games, but I’d like to take a quick step back and revisit the original claim made by the station.

Personally, I think that this is the drug manufacturer calling the dealer evil.  The average American watches more than 4 hours of TV each day, compared to roughly 7.5 hours spent gaming all week.  Over 98% of all American homes have a television, yet only 50% of American’s play video games.  Are you seeing a trend here?

This TV station is really saying - “Hey, don’t let your fat-ass bratty kids play too many video games!  Polluting their brains is OUR job!”

Now, don’t get me wrong.  I like TV and I like video games - you don’t have to read my blog for long to know that about me.  But it can be appalling the content that is available in both mediums - allowing your kids to be exposed to some of this stuff, when it is questionable if you should be exposed to it is simple lunacy.

But, I think we all know that.  A kid shouldn’t be playing a game like Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas in the first place - if you disagree, then you deserve how your children turn out.

My first point is more along the lines of what TV can put into the mind of a child.  There are very few cartoons out there where the parents are even somewhat helpful, let alone play the part of the heroes.  Usually, parents are the bumbling, can’t-be-trusted type that everything needs to be hidden from - be it a secret lab, or a failed test.  “Keep it away from Mom and Dad!”  The parents in many shows are downright stupid, with the kids being the ones who always have to set them straight.  “Thank goodness for that upstart 7 year old!  She’s so spunky!  HAHA!  Good stuff!”  No, not good stuff.  Fathers tend to fare the worst - they’re almost always stupid or angry or petty or square or…  You get the picture.

What does this do to our children?  It programs them for 4 hours every day that Mom and Dad don’t have the answers, aren’t worthy of their respect and certainly don’t require obedience.  Then they turn around and look at us and realize that the TV is probably right! We don’t have our crap together - 50% of us are divorced, of those that aren’t, large percentages are fighting, cheating or working too much.  Kids come from broken homes, have no father or no mother, or even worse, have 2 mommies or 2 daddies.  Even us Christians don’t fare well in these areas - we’re all messed up too!

Raising kids isn’t easy, especially in a two income family - but don’t blame anything or anyone else for how your children turn out.  To be sure, there are a few extenuating circumstances, but the overwhelming majority of disobedient, disrespectful and ill-adjusted children are directly because of a lack of interactive parenting not because of a presence of interactive gaming or crappy television.

While most people would agree with that statement, we still have the social trends to prove that they don’t act on it.  Why? Because it’s HARD work.  It’s longsuffering work.  And for many in society, there are no clear guidelines to follow.  We do what sounds good… Sorta.  Really, we do what feels good, which usually equates with what’s easiest and gives the least amount of friction.

Isn’t taking the “easy” way out practically synonymous with not doing the right thing?  Why then, do we parent that way?  I believe it is a lack of wisdom.

In the greatest book of wisdom ever gathered, Proverbs, there is a passage that has long caused uproar and consternation among many more “enlightened” parents - “spare the rod, spoil the child”, or more correctly:

He who spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is careful to discipline him. (Proverbs, 13:24)

This is often misunderstood and used by weirdoes on both sides to prove completely dissimilar points, neither of which are correct.

In ancient times, a Hebrew man would keep a “rod” or a walking stick.  As he aged, he would carve memories and stories from his life into the wood, creating a repository of everything that he had lived that was worthy of regard.  In a sense, the rod was a container for his wisdom - that which his life had taught him. It would indeed also be used for more mundane things, as any walking stick or staff would be, discipline included.

The point is this - don’t beat your children indiscriminately, but discipline them with careful wisdom, love and understanding.

This doesn’t just mean corporal punishment, but giving them true discipline, in every sense of the word.  Discipline to do things like NOT watch 4 hours of disrespectful television every day.

So, how do we get the wisdom necessary to properly discipline our children?  I believe it starts with God.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. (Proverbs 9:10)

And he said to man,
       ‘The fear of the Lord—that is wisdom, and to shun evil is understanding.’ (Job 28:28)

This isn’t a fear that invokes cringing terror, but rather a spirit of awe, humility and dependence upon our creator.  We learn wisdom by acknowledging that God is who He is - GOD.  By accepting His divine authority and working to understand Him, we gain more wisdom.  Doesn’t this make sense?  The more we acknowledge and understand the creator of the universe, the more we understand how to interact with His creation?

Wisdom is then used to properly discipline our kids so that they aren’t the disobedient, disrespectful and ill-adjusted little children that we all can’t stand and are terrified of raising.

Am I saying I have this all figured out?  Heck no!  I’m learning every day, mess up often, and seek counsel from two different friends that I deeply trust, who have already raised their children in a Godly manner and who have the RESULTS that I would like to see with mine.

So, who is more to blame for the breakdown of juvenile society? The people that cram our children full of disobedient, violent, “kids always know better” images for 2 full months out of every year, or the people who make games that give you more points for screwing hookers and shooting police officers in the head for only half a month out of every year?

Obviously neither - it’s the parents.

gaming, parenting, Christianity, TV

Don’t forget that the new season of The Sopranos starts March 12th.  I’ll be watching all its usual grittiness in HD splendor.

I know - its not exactly a family show, but I’m an Italian that grew up in NJ, and some of the characters in the show remind me of characters from my childhood.  I swear Paulie Walnuts is my “Uncle” Vic and I don’t even want to talk about the flashbacks that Livia gave me…  

My Dad, who is 100% of Italian descent, won’t watch the show.  I, being more of a mutt of Western Europe, have no such challenges.  Honestly, what I enjoy about the show is how it is about the characters more than anything else.  For a good outline of why that’s important, read these two articles from my brother’s blog.  You’ll never look at entertainment the same way…

Anyway, The Sopranos only USED to be the darkest show on television - that title now belongs to Deadwood.

Sopranos, HBO, character development

Yow.

“Muslim pop singer Deeyah has irked the Muslim world with her provocative new music video that shows her stripping off a burka to reveal her bikini-clad body.”

See the full report here. Oddly enough, the song words themselves should garner more controversy than the video, but somehow I doubt that they will.

via Michelle Malkin

Deeyah, controversy, Muslim Madonna

On one of the Sci-Fi boards that I frequent (I know, I’m a geek…), someone asked this question:

• Should they just make Trek movies
• Should they restart Enterprise
• Should a new series be made
• Should they leave it as it is and move on

Now, I’ve waxed dramatic on this topic before, but I’ve nailed down some more supporting evidence for my postulations. I posted this to the forum where the question was asked, so some apologies are in order for the stream-of conscience-esq nature of the following post.

Anyway, here you go:

IMHO, Star Trek itself rocks… But it also has the distinction of being the best (and worst) handled show in sci fi history - again IMHO.

I believe that in order for another ST series to be popular, they have to come out with a movie again first - kick in a new generation of fans, so to speak. This point could be argued quite a bit, but in they days of the DVR, our TV ratings system is imploding in on itself and I don’t think that the industry has ANY clue what people actually like to watch anymore… But, I digress. Agree with this point or not, I’m moving on…

Unfortunately, a popular movie today is much different than the historical ST movie - they have to make it more “epic” than your traditional ST movie. People want BIG - don’t believe that? Well, let me prove it…

First of all, look at how many of the top 20 grossing films in history for the US are “greater sci fi” - I know some of you will argue with me that something like Spider Man is Sci Fi, but bear with me… (all info from IMDB, btw)

2. Star Wars (1977) $460,935,665
4. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) $434,949,459
5. Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) $431,065,444
6. Spider-Man (2002) $403,706,375
7. Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005) $380,262,555
8. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) $377,019,252
9. Spider-Man 2 (2004) $373,377,893
11. Jurassic Park (1993) $356,784,000
12. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002) $340,478,898
16. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001) $317,557,891
17. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) $313,837,577
18. Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones (2002) $310,675,583
19. Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983) $309,125,409
20. Independence Day (1996) $306,124,059

14 of the top 20!!! Man, people love this stuff… But look at the pictures and how they break down:

EPIC films:
2. Star Wars (1977)
5. Star Wars: Episode
I - The Phantom Menace
7. Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith
8.The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
12. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
17. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
18. Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones
19. Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi
20. Independence Day

Good “Story” Films:
4. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
11. Jurassic Park (1993)

Existing Franchise Films:
6. Spider-Man (2002)
9. Spider-Man 2 (2004)
16. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001)

Now, a couple of disclaimers - just ’cause I classified a film as epic, doesn’t mean it isn’t a good story, or doesn’t come from an existing franchise. And, you could say that these don’t really add up to anything, because really we are talking about primarily 2 really good franchises - StarWars and LOTR. Well, I would argue those with you as well - in fact, independence day being there makes my point for me. But anyway…

My REAL point is this - to have a REALLY successful film, the best idea is to do an Epic Sci-Fi film. Probably not a lot of argument for this statement.

So the real question is, why hasn’t this been done with Star Trek? Why is it that the franchise that is arguably the most RICH in story and potential doesn’t ever seem to come up with a plot that is sweeping in nature? I mean, there are complete sectors, dozens of races, hundreds of ships, politics galore, etc and in Nemesis, we get 2 ships in a standoff as the climax. IT’S ALWAYS 2 DAMN SHIPS!

Compare to the opening scene of Revenge of the Sith to see the drastic difference I’m talking about…

Now, I liked Nemesis, but that’s ’cause I’m a die-hard trek fan, or more correctly, a complete Starfleet whore - I’ll watch ANYTHING from these series, and probably like it. But the hard fact of the matter is that the economics of what gets made today has changed drastically from even the days of DS9 and CERTAINLY from the days of TNG. Enterprise would have been fine 10 years ago, but it doesn’t cut it in the economics of today. To me, that is a shame, but it is what it is…

If we want to see our beloved show continue to be a blip on main stream media radar, it has to change with the times and give the people what they want.

Even Shakespeare always put a parade in his plays - why? To appeal the masses, so he could keep his theater open and put on more plays. Masterpieces can STILL be written that appeal to the masses, and I can’t think of a better “universe” to do it with than the ST universe.

The question is will the “powers that be” ever remove their heads from their rears long enough to take a glimpse at reality.

And that my friends, is a question for the ages…

There has been a bit of controversy going on about new NBC show “The Book of Daniel” that chronicles the life of an Episcopalian Priest and his less than traditional family.

In an interview with the AP, Star Aidan Quinn (Rev. Daniel Webster) says the show is a “wholesome show. … It just has the courage to deal with some of the real issues that go on in people’s lives.”

My response, is “Really? Hmm - go on…”

Quinn continues, “I’m an Episcopalian priest who struggles with a little self-medication problem, and I have a 23-year-old son who’s gay, and a 16-year-old daughter who’s caught dealing pot, and another son who’s jumping on every high school girl he sees, and a wife who’s very loving but also likes her martinis.”

Many folks embroiled in the controversy, such as the American Family Association are trying to petition NBC to remove the show. Others believe that the show is a positive influence and that the AFA is over-reacting. ” ‘This is an offbeat, inclusive series — inclusive of people of faith and inclusive of gay and bisexual people,’ Damon Romine, GLAAD’s entertainment media director, told the PlanetOut Network. ‘It doesn’t surprise me that the AFA would be afraid of this series — it shows a family that’s both deeply religious and loving and accepting of their gay son.’ ”

OK, time out! Lets take a minute and look at this. What’s wrong with this picture?

Now, I haven’t seen this show, and I haven’t made up my mind if I will watch an episode or two. In general I don’t like to monetarily support items that I don’t agree with, but then I already pay for cable every month and with a DVR I don’t watch commercials anyway - so I’m up in the air on it.

This aside though, I’d like to attempt to put forth a reasonable argument for why many Christians are upset and worried about this type of show - hopefully an argument that non-Christians will understand. I know that to many non-believers, Christians can look like an odd bunch, getting our panties in a wad about the slightest little thing. I’d like to at least explain the anger that “The Book of Daniel” has fanned, and why we don’t necessarily even need to see it to know what we are up against.

On the one hand, self-medication, homosexuality, drugs, fornication and alcoholism are topics that many people deal with on a daily basis. On the other hand, I’m sorry but who the hell can say that this is “wholesome”?

Merriam-Webster defines “wholesome” as “promoting health or well-being of mind or spirit”. Now, which of those show twists, exactly, were the wholesome ones? Oh, being the Episcopalian priest maybe?

As C.S. Lewis so eloquently describes in his book Mere Christianity it is very important to guard the meaning of words, for otherwise they end up having no use at all. He describes the slide of the word “Gentleman” from meaning a man who had a coat of arms and some landed property into a term of praise targeting his behavior. Originally, there was no conflict with being a Gentleman and a liar, but with today’s meaning that would be impossible - maybe. See, the problem is that not everyone agrees on what the behavior of a gentleman should be, so the word is now useless for the task of accurate description. It is a nebulous idea whose meaning though likely similar, can differ for each person in profound ways. While there were plenty of words to praise or chastise behavior already, we now have nothing save full explanations to refer to the original Gentleman.

We see this same issue with Quinn’s reference to “wholesome” - the etymology of it is from the old English “whole”, in the healthy sense and is circa 1200. Originally this meant in a moral sense, with the physical sense being first attested to circa 1374. For an English word at those times in history, saying morality would mean talking about a Christian morality and then the flow of this morality into the body in a physical sense. So, this was a distinct word - if something was “wholesome” it displayed the distinct characteristics of a physically and spiritually sound Christian foundation. I have severe doubt that “The Book of Daniel” will stand up to this definition, regardless of what Quinn says.

How can I say that without even seeing the show? Because of the creators and their world view. Forgive me if I’d rather not take my direction of what is wholesome from the mainstream media and Jack Kenny. The AFA says this of Kenny: “a practicing homosexual who describes himself as being ‘in Catholic recovery,’ and is interested in Buddhist teachings about reincarnation and isn’t sure exactly how he defines God and/or Jesus. ‘I don’t necessarily know that all the myth surrounding him (Jesus) is true,’ he said.”

Its OK to be questioning things - God gave us a free will for a purpose - but don’t take your questions and put our label on them. This is the crux of the issue. Being a Christian means a SPECIFIC thing, and we object to those who are not Christians telling the nation what it means to be one of us.

It would be like me putting a show on NBC entitled “The Lesbian” - just because I like women, doesn’t make me a lesbian. Right now, it means something pretty specific and I just don’t qualify. Portraying a Christian priest who acts in very unchristian manner is the same thing. They just don’t qualify to showcase the subject. How do I know he acts in a very unchristian manner? Because doing otherwise would never make it on NBC.

Romine says that its OK for a “deeply religious” family to be “loving and accepting of their gay son” - I would agree, but I doubt it is in the manner that Romine is talking about. In general, I believe that with only a few exceptions (Exodus International and Love Won Out for example) the Christian community at large has lost a huge opportunity to minister to homosexuals. As a Church, we seem to be OK helping adulterers and drunks overcome their sin, but gays have to have completely healed themselves before they can be among us? That’s not right. I say hate the sin, love the sinner.

The real issue is that I don’t think Romine, OR “The Book of Daniel” will sign up to the gay son being in sin. I don’t mean to focus only on the homosexual aspect - I’m sure that most of these other unwholesome things will be portrayed simply as foibles that make for drama in the life of Daniel. I would wager a large sum that “The Book of Daniel” is all about how the family despite its problems, despite its differences and despite the challenges of life are able to overcome through love and togetherness. Well, that is very sweet, and a nice message, but it isn’t Christian. Its secular humanism, and as a Christian, I object to it wearing a Christian cloak.

If my guess is correct, then the fact that Daniel talks directly to Jesus only makes matters worse. With this type of direct give and take relationship, Daniel’s actions will implicitly carry Jesus’ approval. I find it hard to believe that NBC, Quinn or Kenny have gone through the Biblical scholarship necessary to answer these questions, especially when their goal is ratings not sound theology. If the response to these culture-defining issues isn’t based on solid Christian teaching, then what is it based on? Given the source, I’d again say secular humanism. So, what about this is Christian?

Non-Christians say we are over-reacting. Christians say this type of show chips away at what it means to be a follower of Christ, and that’s something we will ALWAYS be upset about.