Category: Uncategorized
Movies Seen Recently: Dredd, Gamera: The Giant Monster, Ghost Town
Dredd (2012) – The comic book character “Judge Dredd” was created as a British exaggeration of the already hyperbolic American “Dirty Harry” cop who has to become as violent and ruthless as the criminals he hunts. As such, it’s over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek, and knowingly campy. When the Powers That Be produced the 1995 movie Judge Dredd…
Movies Seen Recently: The Road to Perdition, Torpedo: U-235, Night of the Demon
The Road to Perdition (2002) – I think every description I ever saw of this movie buried the lede. The usual summary is along the lines of “A young boy in ’30s Chicago finds out what his father actually does for a living.” Much better would be “A ’30s mob hitman and his 11-year-old son…
Movies Seen Recently: The Bunker, Samurai From Nowhere, Fido
The Bunker (2001) – The survivors of a German unit in WWII take refuge in a skeleton-crewed bunker, which has an opening at the other end to mysterious tunnels… The problem is that this is a British production. Like, very very British. The “Germans” don’t just speak with an English accent, they say things like…
The first Shumate ushabti!
Today I finally fulfilled a goal I’ve had for a couple of decades: I’ve got my very own Egyptian ushabti. (Nickel for scale.) An “ushabti” (or “shawabti”) was a funerary figure placed in tombs to serve the deceased in the afterlife. It’s long been thought that the original custom was to kill the servants of…
Sketch of the Day Omnibus Post
Two available in my Etsy shop… …and the rest from me sketchbook. (Missed a day because my computer refused to boot up on Monday.)
Movies Seen Recently: Heaven and Earth, Come and Find Me, Ator the Fighting Eagle
Heaven and Earth (aka Ten to Chi to) (1990) – I’ve been listening to this soundtrack for almost thirty years; I finally watched the movie. It’s beautifully shot, with massive 15th-century Japanese armies contending with each other (shot in Canada because there aren’t that many wide open spaces left in Japan). The story… well, it’s…
At last, something to pry from my cold, dead hands.
Three years after I joined the NRA, I finally own a gun. It’s a Rock Island Armory M200, one of the handguns that the mighty Brad Torgersen brought when he took me to the range a week ago. My hands are small and (ahem) delicate, so .38 Special was about the biggest round I felt…
Sketch of the Day Omnibus Post.
A day late because my desktop computer died yesterday morning (apparently it couldn’t handle the Windows update that it took it upon itself to install overnight).