Beating Dragons

Valentine's

2010-02-14T12:51:00.001-08:00

Kick Ass New Trailer

2010-01-10T12:19:00.000-08:00

Kick Ass is not a typical Super Heroes comic books. Mainly because it’s setted in “our world” a world where super heroes only exist in comic books, at least until someone decides to wear a costume and get out to kick some asses.

Here is the new trailer of the movie adaptation. And as it shows, Kick Ass is such a funny story, but also it is critical, violent and brutal. Just see this cover…

And remember that it’s written by Mark Miller. Who got famous for Wanted (for the most of the people, off course I know The Authority was before) , that is much more violent, brutal and less moral than it's film adaptation.

So, here is the trailer.

Oscars Predictions

2010-01-08T22:40:00.000-08:00

Here are my predictions for the Academy Awards nominations of 2010. Nothing but guesses based on other awards and my own taste. My main doubts are about the absence of A Serious Man in Best Picture, and A Single Man in some categories. Also I marked my favourites candidates (not necessary the ones I think will win) with a “+”. So, here it is.

Best Picture
1. An Education
2. Avatar
3. Inglorious Basterds
4. Invictus
5. The Last Station
6. Nine
7. Precious
8. The Hurt Locker
9. Up
10. Up in the Air +

Best Director
1. James Cameron – Avatar
2. Jason Reitman – Up in the Air
3. Kathryn Bigelow – The Hurt Locker
4. Lee Daniels – Precious
5. Quentin Tarantino – Inglorious Basterds +

Best Actor in a Leading Role
1. Colin Firth – A Single Man
2. George Clooney – Up in The Air +
3. Jeff Bridges – Crazy Heart
4. Morgan Freeman – Invictus
5. Viggo Mortensen – The Road

Best Actress in a Leading Role
1. Carey Mulligan – An Education +
2. Gabourey Sidibe - Precious
3. Helen Mirren – The Last Station
4. Meryl Streep – Julie & Julia
5. Sandra Bullock – The Blind Side

Best Actor in a Supporting Role
1. Christoph Waltz – Inglorious Basterds +
2. Christopher Plummer – The Last Station
3. Matt Damon – Invictus
4. Stanley Tucci – The Lovely Bones
5. Woody Harrelson – The Messenger

Best Actress in a Supporting Role
1. Anna Kendrick – Up in the Air
2. Mo’Nique – Precious
3. Penelope Cruz – Nine
4. Samantha Morton – The Messenger
5. Vera Farmiga – Up in the Air +

Best Original Screenplay
1. (500) Days of Summer
2. A Serious Man
3. Inglorious Basterds +
4. The Hurt Locker
5. Up

Best Adapted Screenplay
1. An Education
2. District 9
3. Fantastic Mr. Fox
4. Precious
5. Up in the Air +

Best Animated Feature
1. Coraline +
2. Fantastic Mr. Fox
3. Up

Best Cinematography
1. Barry Ackroyd - The Hurt Locker
2. Dion Beebe - Nine
3. Mauro Fiore - Avatar
4. Robert Richardson - Inglorious Basterds +
5. Roger Deakins - A Serious Man

Best Art Direction
1. David Wasco - Inglorious Basterds
2. Jess Gonchor - A Serious Man
3. Rick Carter, Robert Stromberg – Avatar +
4. Sarah Greenwood - Sherlock Holmes
5. Scott Chamblis - Star Trek

Best Visual Effects
1. Avatar +
2. District 9
3. Star Trek

What I want for Christmas (A little bit late)

2010-01-05T22:57:00.000-08:00

Around the world children receive gifts from Santa. Here in Mexico the tradition is to receive them from the Three Wise Kings (who we call The Wizard Kings, isn’t that cool?). In the January 5^th’s evening we left a list of the presents we want in a shoe beneath the Christmas tree. And although I’m a little bit old for receiving presents from them, here is my list.

Santa Jack & Sleigh

4.5” PVC figure, of the pumicing king dressed like Santa. Besides the sleigh it includes three skeleton reindeers (that glows in the dark!), Zero and Sally. Just amazing!

Price: $79.99

Link: http://www.sideshowtoy.com/?page_id=4489&sku=900757&utm_source=listing-900757&utm_campaign=listing&utm_source=online

Twilight Zone: The Complete Definitive Collection

Twilight Zone, the original series, complete. 156 episodes. That’s all.

Price: $151.99

Link: http://www.amazon.com/Twilight-Zone-Complete-Definitive-Collection/dp/B000H5U5EE

Dharma Swan Logo T-Shirt

Does it need any explanation? Actually I don’t know why I don’t have one of those yet. The Swan is my favourite Dharma station and looks like the most important one.

Price: $24.95

Link: http://abctvstore.seenon.com/detail.php?p=100778&v=abctvstore_lost

The Beatles Stereo Box Set

The best band of all the time. Their 13 studio albums. Remasterised.

Price: $175.49

Link: http://www.amazon.com/Beatles-Stereo-Box-Set/dp/B002BSHWUU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1262760036&sr=8-1-catcorr

The Samaritan Replica

I doubted between this and the Big Boy. I choose the Samaritan not only because it’s the original Hellboy’s gun, but also because the amazing detail it has. Its chamber could be opened and the bullets removed. Nice.

Price: $339.99

Link: https://www.sideshowtoy.com/?page_id=4489&sku=8931

Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? Delux Edition

The best comic of the year, and the best way to finish the story of Batman. An extraordinary requiem for the Dark Knight written by one of the greatest writers of our days.

Price: $16.49

Link: http://www.amazon.com/Batman-Whatever-Happened-Crusader-Deluxe/dp/1401223036/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262759605&sr=1-1

True Blood

Ok, I’m far to be a fan of the series, nevertheless who could resist the opportunity to drink the artificial blood that made the vampires capable to live among us. Well, it’s only a orange soda, but the bottle is cool.

Price: $16.00 (4 – pack)

Link: https://securestore.hbo.com/cart.php?p=105736&ecid=PRF-TV2-800761&PA=PRF-TV2-800761

Futurama Mini Figures

I really love the kind of figures Kid Robot made; vinyl, simple and round shaped. And Futurama is just one of the most amazing cartoons that have ever existed. Every figure is so nice, but Bender is my favourite one, because… well because Bender is amazing, haha.

Price: $8.95

Link: http://www.kidrobot.com/Toys/MiniFigures/FuturamaMiniFigures3Inch.html

Who Killed Amanda Palmer: A Collection of Photographic Evidence

Who Killed Amanda Palmer is my favourite disc of the year. This books collects photographs that shows Amanda dead in many ways, in some way related with her songs, and also a small story written by Neil Gaiman.

Price: $40.00

Link: http://www.amazon.com/Who-Killed-Amanda-Palmer-Photographic/dp/B002KQPQGK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262759233&sr=8-1-catcorr

Coraline Doll Replica

Hennry Selick did well giving his adaptation of Gaiman’s book a dark and weird visual aspect. This 10 inch doll has that weird look. The clothes looks just great and the button eyes, well nothing to else to said.

Price: $24.99

Link: http://www.entertainmentearth.com/prodinfo.asp?number=NC49501

Well maybe none of those will be down my tree tomorrow morning, but wishing doesn’t cost anything.

10 Years, 100 Movies

2009-12-03T19:18:00.000-08:00

I’m not so pretentious (well, I’m not being right now) to tell those are the best movies of the decade, but at least they are my favourite ones from each year of this finishing decade. I’m pretty sure it’s eclectic enough to make everyone agree with some movies and hate many others. But, what can I said, I’m an eclectic guy.

2000

O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Requiem for a Dream
Dancer in the Dark
Billy Elliot
Chicken Run
Shadow of the Vampire
X-Men
Gladiator
Unbreakable
Wonder Boys

2001

The Royal Tenenbaums
Mullholland Drive
El Espinazo del Diablo
The Lord Of The Rings
Amelie
Waking Life
Memento
Moulin Rouge
Ghost World
The Others

2002

Punch Drunk Love
LOTR 2
Spirited away
28 Days Later
The Hours
Gangs of New York
The Bourne Identity
Cidade de Deus
Adaptation
Nueve Reinas

2003

Big Fish
Lost in Translation
Kill Bill Vol. 1
The Lord of The Rings: The Return of the King
21 Grams
Mystic River
Love Actually
Spider
Finding Nemo
The Triplets of Belleville

2004

Hellboy
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
The Incredibles
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
Dogville
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Lemony Snicket’s a Series of Unfortunate Events
Shaun of the Dead
Garden State
Good Bye, Lenin!

2005

Corpse Bride
Sin City
Match Point
Crimen Ferpecto
Broken Flowers
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Star Wars Episode III: The Revenge of the Sith
Palindromes
Howl’s Moving Castle
The Squid and the Whale

2006

Pan’s Labyrinth
The Fountain
Stranger than Fiction
Little Miss Sunshine
The Life of the Others
Casino Royale
Children of Man
Flushed Away
The Departed
V for Vendetta

2007

Ratatouille
There Will be Blood
Sweeney Todd
No Country for Old Man
Juno
Grindhouse
The Darjeeling Limited
Hot Fuzz
Eastern Promises
Away From Her

2008

Let the Right One In
The Dark Knight
In Bruges
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Wrestler
Hellboy II; The Golden Army
Burn After Reading
Vicky, Christina, Barcelona
Wall-E
The Reader

2009 (so far)

Inglorious Basterds
500 Days of Summer
Drag me to Hell
Moon
Coraline
Up
District 9
The Informant
Star Trek
Zombieland

2009 that I haven’t seen and could become part of the top 10

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Lovely Bones
Up in the Air
The Princess and the Frog
Nine
Avatar
The Road
Thirst
Invictus

A Serious Man

2009-11-18T21:01:00.001-08:00

I believe the passivity is the worst sin. There are people that never live, that just stay wile the life pass trough them. And Michel Stuhlbarg is that kind of person, doing nothing, no maters he crash into life he avoids it, he runs away from every opportunity to do something, to enjoy, to get angry, to request a title respect, to live. He lives in an eternal stay of just because, that he tries to understand, and off course can’t do it. He stays still, freeze by the fear, and only escapes to an active life I his dreams but even those always ends with fatal endings that deters him to do something in once awaken. At the end his real life ends, as his dreams, with the promise of a fatal ending, but without the refreshing vital acts he dare to perform in dreams. Life ends no matter what, that’s a fact, so while we stay here is better to really use it. For me that’s A Serious Man about, and despite that’s one of my favourite themes, I really can’t stand the movie, it make me feel even physically bad, my wish that Michel reacted, and did something drove into a horrible frustration that made the movie really irritating and annoying for me. Nevertheless for anybody who can don’t feel empathy for the main character and let, and even enjoy, him getting destroyed by his passivity it could be a really good movie.

(500) Days of Summer

2009-11-18T20:25:00.000-08:00

There are many--too many--movies about people finding their soul mates, about how they fall in love in the first instant they met, and how they get through a bunch of fun troubles to finally get together and live happily ever after. Luckily (500) Days of Summer is not one of those movies.
Tom and Summer are not soul mates, they are not destined to be together, and they won’t, despites Tom’s efforts. He is a hopeless romantic that believes in the romantic ideas he writes in greeting cards. He wants to fall in love and the new girl in the office, Summer, has everything to fall in love with her.
Summer is intelligent, beautiful, funny, nice and many other qualities that captivate Tom. A coincidence in music tastes is enough for him to believe she could be his soul mate, and a kiss next to the copy machine ratifies it. But before we start sharing Tom’s opinion the movie remembers us that it won’t finish with them together happy forever.
After the promising start on the firsts days we jump to the last days when Tom is cracked by the finish of the relationship (what remembers me Jim Carrey in the credits sequence of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind). And we will continue the ride across those 500 days jumping from the exciting beginning to the nostalgic later days to the happy but ephemeral middle. This fragmented not chronological order makes us see these 500 days as a whole.
The moments we witness are small and could look ordinary, but first of all they are honest, like the kind of events you remember when recall a relationship, and as a part of the whole they become meaningful.
But that fragmented chronology is not the only formal cinematography recourse that enrich the movie, actually it is full of recourses that maybe are only possible thanks to the background in video clips the director have. He builds with freedom the movie, using so different things that goes form a Disney’s like musical to reinterpretations to Bergman’s most famous scenes, passing by a wonderful use of split screen, that shows the difference between reality and expectation.
And maybe that is the main issue in the movie, that difference, the expectation created by Tom about Summer, and the painful acceptance of the fact that sometimes love is not as we want. And that’s something we all has passed trough.

Requiem for The Dark Knight

2009-05-13T17:03:00.000-07:00

In my fourth birthday I dress up like Batman. Then I knew him just by the 60s TV show, whose constant repetitions I watched religiously. Although by then the Burton’s film was already in cinemas, I don’t remember watching it until they star showing it on TV. My next memory about the dark knight, and maybe the strongest one, was also from TV. I must have been around seven years old when I stared watching Batman: The Animated Series. It instantly became my favourite cartoon, but also my principal referent about what Batman is, or must be. Even now I can’t stop relating Batman with that kind of noir 50s ambiguous era. I love everything about that series. The stories were amazing; smart, deep and amusing at the same time. Then I met many of Batman’s enemies, even the ones I knew from the 60s series were so different. The Riddler became my favourite, he was so smart and all their plans were too… well planned. But all they were great; many had those tragic origins that make them unforgettable and heartrending; Mr. Freeze, Two-Face, Man-Bat, Clayface.

Ironically in the last media I approached Batman was in his original one. I started reading Batman comics when was around eleven or twelve. I read Batman form Contagion to just before No Man’s Land begins. And besides the regular series (here all the Batman and Batman related comics was published under one single title), I started reading many specials, and old issues. On that time I read, The Dark Knights Return, Killing Joke, A Death in the Family, and the whole Knightfall to KnightsEnd arc. I get intrigued by all those darker stories, many of them brutal, and thrilling. I met then his most obscure enemies, Mr. Zsasz, Tally Man, Abattoir, and also watch the most brutal side of the night crusader in Azrael and in the future Frank Miller’s Batman.

But the most shocking thing was sawing the perfect personification of madness, of anarchic chaos, in the Alan Moore’s Joker. Then I really understand the real darker side of the dark knight. So I started hating everything that felt like a diluted version of Batman, starting with the 60s show, and continuing with the, well disserved to be despised, Schumacher’s films.

I rediscovered Burton’s films then, maybe more for Burton than for Batman. But I watched them in a different way, and loved them more than ever. Specially Returns, which brought us the greatest Penguin I have ever seen in any media. Burton Batman films’ are remarkable, their gothic ambience, dark and fantastic. Like a Poe’s tale, like a Gorey’s illustration. That’s why I love them and for being all the opposite I hated Batman Begins. It’s a good film, that’s impossible to be denied, nevertheless I just can’t love it because it’s so realistic, so urban, so modern. And for me Batman is nothing of that. On the other hand, The Dark Knight it’s impossible to don’t be loved, despite all the things I didn’t like about Begins stayed. But I guess that worked for the story, is a story of our days, a post 9/11 film, that must happened in a world closer to ours.

The Dark Knight was almost the last thing I have read or watched about Batman. I hadn’t read a new Batman comic for almost five years, mainly because I don’t have the time nor the money to read a monthly comic. But I more or less knew what Morrison was doing with his R.I.P. And then the big a heard the big news, Batman was death, so I ran to buy that Final Crisis issue and read it. It was kind of disappointing; Darkside, gods killing bullet, Super holding the body. It just didn’t feel like the right ending. Luckily it wasn’t, the final Batman comic was coming, and it would be written by the greatest comic book writer (and one of my favourite writers in general) Mr. Neil Gaiman. When I finished reading the first part of Whatever Happened to the Night Crusader, I wasn’t sure what I thought about it. It was absolutely interesting, with a changing tone between comedy and tragedy. The Alfred’s tale was mind blowing. And the fact of Batman being “off screen” like a watcher, just as us, but also as an omnipresent being, it’s wonderful.

After I finished reading the second part I had no doubt, it was amazing. The first page with three panels each one showing a different Batman on his coffin. And then the stories about his death begins again, everybody tells a different story of a different Batman. They varies in tone, style and shape, but are the same in essence, in all of them Batman dies being Batman, sacrificing himself to save the other, don’t giving up, don’t turning back. Batman finished in the only way he could, because just the death could stop he being Batman. And then Batman It’s over, every Batman, and each Batman, that are really all the same one. Doesn’t matter if his fights are illustrated by onomatopoeic signs, or if he lives in a 50s noir Gotham, nor if he loves Thalia or Selina or it’s too busy to love anyone. Nor if is Burton’s, Miller’s, Moore’s or Nolan’s. Nor if he’s the one a four years old kid dress like or if he’s the one a college student saws Kierkegaard philosophy on his pages. all of them are the same, all of them are a hero, all of them are Batman.

Rube Goldberg suicide machine

2009-04-22T19:39:00.000-07:00

Unlike Oedipus who after realizing what he has done decides to “punish himself” there are tragic characters that never reach such anagnorisis. Characters that finish as ignorant (or as knowledgeable) as they begin. And whose self-destruction doesn’t arise from the recognition, but has always been a constant of their behaviour. They are suicidal that, consciously or unconsciously, contrive a series of events that will finish on their destruction. Their Thanatos impulse makes they choose an unnecessary euthanasia instead of an obvious and reachable cure. And then an anagnorisis happens, not for the character, but for the audience, they realized the character has done nothing but design a complex Rube Goldberg suicide machine that has been activated since the beginning, and now it’s fatal ending results inexorable. All this taken ad absurdum recalls what Borges though about Donne’s Biathantaos; that contains a theory about God making the whole world just to be capable of dying in the Cross. It also remembers me many movies, the first that comes to my mind is The Wrestler. But what brought me to this reflection was The Kindly Ones, or more exactly The Wake (the last story arcs of The Sandman). After Morpheus death Matthew the raven asks, “why did he let it happened?” and Lucien answers, “I think he did a little more than let it happened”.

At Midnight all the Agents

2009-02-28T15:11:00.000-08:00

I have just heard the new cover by My Chemical Romance of the magnificent Bob Dylan’s song Desolation Row. It is horrible.

It has been made as part of the Watchmen movie soundtrack, and I’m afraid it could be an example of what the movie will be. Desolation Row is a calm and almost mesmerizing song, with a beautiful melodic and nostalgic guitar chords and, off course, with the mellow voice of Dylan. It lasts more than eleven minutes and is full of literary and cultural meaningful references. On the other hand, the new cover is a little more than three minutes song that takes three and a half of the ten verses of the original (and do it with such a stupid criteria; the first two, then the one cited by Moore at the end of chapter one, and ends with… the end) and the music sounds just as any other song by a new-punk-emo-rock band (a lot of power chords played as frenetically as they can).

The deepness of the song has been totally diluted to make it more accessible to the big audience, especially to the average teenagers who are the target of the song, and I’m afraid, of the movie. Because of what, there’s a chance that it will be diluted too, turned into a superficial super-hero action movie, make the amazing characters, and their complex psychology into just superhero cartoons. Just as a great song has been turned into a noisy emo song.

Don't Trust in Siren's Songs

2009-02-27T22:58:00.000-08:00

Looks like reading The Odyssey hasn’t teach me a thing. Well maybe it did, but after five years probably I have forget it. And I’m not talking about any literary or moral knowledge, that surely it could teach, but about the most important life lesson that lays in its pages; don’t trust in siren’s songs.

It’s such a good lesson, and I should know it (come on, I love mythology, I must knew it). But no, I completely forget that their songs work not different than the attractive colours of a carnivorous plant, or than the luminous esca of an anglerfish. So, just like a innocent bug or as a goofy deep-sea fish, I was attracted by the sweet melody of Habanera (I blame you Bizet) just as a little Hamalin’s mouse, I was mesmerized by the notes, and felt into the deep of her eyes.

At The New House

2009-02-27T22:22:00.000-08:00

No, I haven’t write in a month not because I was moving into a new house. It was because I have been working in my short film; At The New House.

Finally after more than a year of work; writing the scrip, finding the location, the actresses, even building some props. It’s finally filmed, developed and transferred into my computer ready to be edited.

It has been a really nice process, full of stress, off course, with days in which I felt in the deepest despair and cursed the gods for make me wanted to make films. Nevertheless it has been really satisfying. Actually the filming days was very calm (excepting for a really awful day) and the cast and crew (with few exceptions) was really cool people, very professionals and really good in their jobs. I’m really happy about the results; I’m in love with almost every single take of it. The dark atmosphere David (the cinematographer) reaches it’s great, and the amazing sets Daniela create was, well, amazing. And I believed I found the best actress I could have for my leading role, she is so natural and really easy going.

So at last the stress is over, there’s nothing left but the post production, what is extremely more comfortable and relaxed. Just me and my computer.

I hope the film will be finished in May. Until then here is a little preview.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxojZhjg6tk

I'm done with 2008

2009-01-05T19:10:00.001-08:00

I guess I’m done with “the Best of 2008” posts. Actually I’m not sure which other categories I could write about, I’m not a big music fan, so I didn’t really hear many new discs this year. Maybe my favourite one was Eusebio by Giulia and the Tellarini, known by their song Barcelona featured in Woody Allen’s Vicky, Christina Barcelona. Nevertheless I doubt I could write a complete post about it. A subject I really want to talk about is books, but, although I try to read a book weakly, I don’t really read many new books. I think this year I have just read a couple. Nevertheless, I really think The Graveyard Book is going to be my favourite 2008 book, I have just read two chapters, so it’s kind of precipitated to name it the best 2008s book (however I’m surely going to write about it as soon as I finish it). So I guess this list has gone with the 2008. And now it’s time to live this new year and everything that is waiting for us in it. I hope the 2009 have many dreams, joys, nice surprises, knew things to learn, and people who love you, for you.

Best of 2008; Best TV Series; Lost Season Four

2009-01-04T21:48:00.000-08:00

I have heard many people who liked (or they said they liked) the first season of LOST, saying they hated the second and third seasons. I don’t know why. For me every single season, excepting for some few episodes, is amazing. For me, Lost is the best TV show of this century. It has been completely consequent and I really believe Lindelof know perfectly, since the beginning, how everything will finish (yes Lindelof; who for me is the real mastermind behind LOST, who cares J.J.).

But if there’s something I agree with almost everyone who watch Lost, is that fourth season was totally amazing. There are many cool things in it. First, the flash forwards. The end of season three was shocking thanks to the flask forward, this recourse changes completely the way we look at the show. And suddenly the show is no more about getting out of the island, but about getting back. Well, just in a superficial way, because we know it’s about much more. And taking about what is Lost about, I guess this season, more than any other, shows us the TIME is one of the main issues in it. And then, the flash backs and forwards, aren’t just a narrative recourse, but a symbol of the subjective and bending perception of time. This perfectly exposed in the absolutely best episode of the season, The Constant. In it, doesn’t exist flash forwards nor flash backs, they aren’t necessary and wouldn’t be enough to show us the brilliantly complex time relations. It is an amazing time paradox where the future affects the past making it affects the present. It reminds me the best works of Phillip K. Dick. Just amazing.

This and many other things (including the participation of Brian K. Vaughn.) makes Lost the best TV show of 2008.

PD: maybe I would write other post of the best of TV, maybe best new show, which by the way is The Mentalist, but I’m not sure, because nothing is even close to the greatness of Lost.

Best of 2008; Best Movie; Let the Right One In

2009-01-02T22:03:00.001-08:00

Vampires are, or must be, deep grim, and dark creatures. For me they are closer to Mahler than to a heavy metal song. They aren’t wild animal and absolutely they are not beauty teens that shine in the daylight. They are a metaphor of us, of our darker side, which maybe is the most human one. Vampires are melancholic, sad and introspective.

Swedish films are beautiful and poetic. They, or at least the Swedish films I like, are intimate approaches to our deepest emotions, deeper fears and questions; memories, death and the infinite and apparently senseless search of happiness. Swedish films are melancholic, sad and introspective.

Adolescence is a hard age. Everything looks pointless; you can understand neither the world nor even yourself. Having twelve isn’t the happier stage in people’s life (Or maybe it just wasn’t for me), and having twelve for many years, shouldn’t be funny at all. Adolescence is melancholic, sad, an introspective.

And that’s why everything fits so well in Let the Right One In to make it a beautiful and poetic film. A melancholic tale about: loneliness, innocence, friendship, love, brutality, and off course, vampires.

With a cold city covered with snow as backcloth, which resembles the cold of the human relationships of its inhabitants. The human contact practically doesn’t exist, besides the brutality by action or by omission. There the young Oskar suffers the loneliness and the hostility of the world. The Indifference of his mother, and the abuse of the local bullies. But all this change when Eli enters his life, and so, two solitudes turn into a friendship. And the movie show us how we can survive the grimmer world, if we have someone at our side.

Let the Right One In is melancholic, sad and introspective. As any good fantasy story, it’s a beautiful metaphor that show us the deeper sides of the human nature, that reality sometimes can’t show.

Best of 2008; Best Comic Book; Y: The Last Man #60

2009-01-01T22:10:00.001-08:00

There are few stories that really catch you since the start and doesn’t let you stop reading or watching them until you know how everything finishes. Some stories that are so exciting that you consume them in a quasi-obsessive way. I remember I watched the first season of Lost on DVD in about three days, and that I read the first four Harry Potter’s books in no more than a month.

As with them my approach to Y: the Last Man was late, actually I start reading it when the last number had already some months out. Thanks to this, I shouldn’t wait, as the people who read it since it first begin publishing, five long years to know how the journey of the last man ends. In spite of my wait wasn’t too long, I doubt’ it was less exciting. I doubt my interest and expectation for the 60th issue was smaller than the one of any other fan. And all my expectation wasn’t just fulfilled, but exceeded.

Y #60 could be an end or an epilogue, but for me is more like a good bye. It’s nostalgic, even sad, and the use of flashbacks remarks this. They make you feel that everything you knew has gone. Nevertheless in the other hand it shows that life continue beyond us. And this is what gives to Y, not just a happy but poetic ending. Six panels which show us nothing but life. The Eros defeating the Thanatos. And finally, Y as any good story about Death, was really a great story about life.

“Alas poor Yorick, I knew him…”

Stories in Pictures

2008-12-16T21:17:00.000-08:00

I’m a big fan of the Cambridge Dictionary, but I had just read a definition I really hated.

Comic: a magazine, especially for children, which contains a set of stories told in pictures with a small amount of writing

And yeah, you could said that is a comic, and other thing is a Graphic Novel, but I don't really like the differentiation, because, after all, a cheap and silly Hollywood teen comedy is a movie just as Fellini's 8 1/2. And in the same way, Watchmen is a comic, just as some that fits that definition.

I spent many years of my childhood and adolescence reading comics, most of them bought when I was between nine and sixteen. And besides a few ones of the Simpsons, they are all superheroes' comics. Lots of X-Men, lots of Spiderman, and off course lots of Batman. Even some Superman, although I really hate Superman. Nevertheless I stopped reading them for almost seven years. I don't really know why, maybe I just didn't find them interesting anymore. In similar way I'm not sure how I started reading comics again, but I know that Neil Gaiman's work was the start. One book uses to bring me to another one, and thus, Coraline brought me to American Gods, and American Gods guided me to Sandman. And suddenly I was reading comics again. Since the first number I get totally fascinated by Sandman, by its deep story, by all its magic, by its many multicultural references. I read Nocturnes and Preludes in no more than three days. And again one thing brought me to another, and I looked for my old copy of Killing Joke, and then I buy Watchmen, and V of Vendetta, and Maus, and Books of Magic, and more, and more, and more. Today I started reading Y the Last Man, and it's so bloody thrilling, I think it could become one of my favorites. After all this, now I'm much more a comic fan than when I was a kid. Now, I appreciate them in a deeper way, I discovered the comic books have their own language, very rich and very complex. And I discovered, why it is the 8th art. I'm writing this in a kind of hurry, but soon I will write about this again sooner, more deeply. Now I just wanted to say, comics are a genuine form of art, a beautiful and full of potential way to tell stories, and an amazingly interesting juxtaposition of images and text. And I totally love it.

Almighty

2008-11-12T20:26:00.000-08:00

In this moment I’m feeling completely and absolutely almighty. Why? Because I have spent my whole life being scared about rejection. And in this moment, I have just been rejected, by a girl who didn’t even give me a chance, but that doesn’t matter, what is important is that I feel great. I don’t really care. And it, feels so great.

Right now

2008-11-12T20:17:00.000-08:00

When you ask a girl if she wants to be your girlfriend and you don’t have an idea about what is she going to answer. You, or at least me, feel a strange mix between emotion and fear. It is some kind of expectation, as if you have made a big bet. You could lose everything and go directly to the deepest hell, or win and be in a state of pure joy. And no, all this isn’t about a girl. But is the same feeling. I‘m feeling like that about my next short film project. I really love the screenplay, I love my characters, I love the art design and the photography style we are looking for. If everything goes according to the plan, I really, really, going to love my short film. Nevertheless, I’m so bloody scared, because the single little detail that, I don’t have the film location, a creepy old house. And if I don’t have it… well you could read the hell part again. So, this is my situation tight now, it’s a strange feeling, as joyful as horrible. But I would change it for nothing… I lie, I happily change it for a full joy feeling.

Apple Pie

2008-11-08T20:56:00.000-08:00

When I was about seventeen, I started believing fear is the main enemy of freedom. Biologically fear is used for surviving, it keeps you away from danger. For instance, as a gazelle looks not just helpful but logical to be afraid of lions. Nevertheless, fear has been designed for surviving, not for living. "There's more to living than only surviving" says Starting at the Sun by The Offspring. Off course you could just grab an apple and eat it, or you could use it to made a pie. The pie sounds tasty, but there's a problem about it, you need to make it, and no, the problem isn't the work it involves, but the responsibility. Everything would be in your hands, it would be your responsibility, and no one's else. And if that pie finishes as a complete mess, it would be all your fault. And suddenly you are afraid about it. You don't want your pie finishes as a mess, and you know there's a chance it would happen, specially if you haven't ever made a pie before. So, you have two options, take the risk, or not. Your primal fear tells you don't make the pie, just eat the apple, it's safer. It doesn't mean that make the pie is psychically dangerous, but there's an emotional and psychological danger in it, you don't really understand it, but you now it exists.

Every day I try to remember myself to make pies, I must admit many times I finish eating the bloody apple. But as also says the Starting at the Sun; "maybe I'm not there, but I'm still trying".

Once Again

2008-10-02T19:29:00.000-07:00

Ok, the second time is the good one. The first time I created a blog it just didn't work, it was kind of so pretentious. This time I decided to be more relaxed, more me. And now I don't have a bloody idea about what I will write. I guess I will figure it out while I'm writing, or at lest I hope so.