Death Note

I am not quite sure exactly how I found out about this anime show. It is possible that I was just randomly searching on amazon for anime shows and then looked into the reviews for the show and took a chance. What a fantastic freaking show! The premise is that God's of death are real and that they each possess a Death Note which is essentially a notebook that allows whoever has possession of it to kill anybody that they want simply by writing a persons name it and by picturing that person their mind at the same time. Usually I do not watch things dubbed in another language as aI prefer to watch films from other countries in their own language but the english language version of Death Note works great! I do not want to say too much about the show because the show has a lot of twists and turns that make this show highly addictive and compelling. It is also refreshing that it tells a complete story that has a definite ending, thank you Brittney! The premise is unique and wonderfully put together. The characters are exceptional including the character of L and Light Yagami. Very quickly the show turns into a cat and mouse game between the shows two major characters and it unfolds tremendously well. It may lag a little bit towards the end but the conclusion is satisfying in my opinion. The show although a cartoon should never be shown to young children as the themes are exceptionally dark. The show still has a lot of humor to it and this carries through almost the entire series. I highly recommend checking this show out. It is now one of my favorite shows ever! Great show.

Film Camera Innovation!

Great read about a technical achievement that will hopefully end the shaky handheld camera style!
http://gizmodo.com/5993678/this-new-camera-stabilizer-could-change-cinematography-forever

Roger Ebert

Unfortunately, the world has lost a truly great human being today. Roger Ebert arguably the most famous movie critic in the world or at least certainly the most famous American film critic has passed away after a long battle with cancer. He was 70 years old and those in the know probably saw this coming as he has not posted movie reviews on his website in quite some time. Still even expecting something like this I have to say that this is a really sad day for the world. What Roger has meant to the film industry cannot be understated and the studios knew that his "thumbs up" of a movie very often added a touch of credibility to a film that often in many cases helped these films to make more money and be seen by a much wider array of people. He did an excellent job at being able to bridge the gap between the academic and the general film going public. His reviews often touched upon film craft and structure as well as on the films ideology. In recent years he had taken to writing op ed pieces on his website that focused on his view of life and often he would comment on world events. He was a Catholic and his faith was a very important part of his life. He adored his wife Chaz the way that men are supposed to adore their wife and in a cynical age with divorce rates being sky high it was refreshing to see how devoted he and his wife were to each other. Additionally, his wife was African American and with all the recent talk about who has the "right" to get married it is worth mentioning that at one time not too long ago in America interracial marriage was seen as something that was abominable. Roger and Chaz are an inspiration because they were a constant reminder of how love is the only key for a marriage to be meaningful and successful. Roger was also very much liberal on many political issues and his opinion pieces about world events were often accurate. More then being labeled as a simple "liberal" Roger was a free thinker who was not afraid to express his thoughts about films and the world at large based on his life experiences, his Catholic faith and his desire to see us all try to be decent towards each other. Roger was the only film critic who's reviews I would respect without question even if I did not agree with them. This was a man that I realize as I am writing this that I deeply admired and respected. The word "hero" is a loaded term that is thrown around way too easily in our society today. In many respects Roger Ebert is absolutely a hero of mine! As a film professor Roger's thoughts and writings on film have been hugely influential on me and he would have been one of the people that I would have most wanted to meet in the world today. I am saddened by this loss and can only be grateful that Roger changed the way that people look at the film critic. In short thank you Roger.
http://www.imdb.com/news/ni50555553/?ref_=hm_nw_tp_t1

Disney Sucks!

http://games.yahoo.com/blogs/plugged-in/disney-shuts-down-lucasarts-194516133.html

Disney has decided to essentially eliminate Lucas Arts and use the name as a way to allow other gamemakers to make games for them while using the LucasArts title to sell those games. This is a massive side effect that George Lucas is 100% responsible for! This time thanks to the sale to Disney he cost a lot of people their job and essentially let an excellent company be destroyed. This is a terible day for video games. I am livid at Disney for doing this becuase they took the easy way out from a business persepctive. Ratehr then use this compnay and reinvent it to make moeny off of it they took the cheap fix. Essentialy lay off everybody and license it out. Absolute disgrace. They did the same thing with The Clone Wars series! Thanks George for allwoign Disney to essentially steal your franchise for a pultry amount of money and then let itcost a lot of hardworking people their jobs. Is Industrail Light and Magic next?

HOLLYWOOD BLOCKBUSTER CLASS PLEASE READ

NO CLASS TOMORROW NIGHT FOR MY WEDNESDAY NIGHT HOLLYWOOD BLOCKBUSTER CLASS. Tomorrow night April 3 Monday classes are meeting and as such we have no class until Wednesday April 10. See you all then and the paper will be due on that day and not tomorrow!

Greatest Drama Television Shows

http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/03/best-tv-dramas-of-all-time/the-sopranos

Night At The Museum

For some reason I just never got around to watching Night at the Museum. I am a Ben Stiller fan thinking that this film was going to be exclusively for children I kind of held off on watching it. Normally I watch all kinds of movies and this being a"kid" movie would not normally be a deterrent but nevertheless I finally watched this movie over the weekend and I have to say that this was an excellent family film! The humor was good, the story worked well enough and this film had all the makings of a classic family film. It is easy to take the special effects in a film like this for granted but they were done exceptionally well. The T-Rex was flawless as was the miniaturization of Owen Wilson and Steve Coogan. The cast of characters in the movie was great and it was nice to see so many familiar faces in the movie. In it's own cooky way this film touched upon a lot of very important historical and scientific concepts. It also seem to encourage children to further explore these concepts which as a teacher made me smile. I am also a massive fan of the museum of Natural History and as a kid the place filled me with awe. This film hopefully was able to inspire that same feeling in children and being able to make history come alive is a great thing. Ben Stiller is probably the most consistent mainstream comedic movie star and I was very impressed with this film. It was certainly fun in every respect and in many ways was similar to another family film called "Jumanji." I really liked this film!