» Fringe Blog – Writing on Film, Culture, and Things on the Fringe

If WWII Was An MMORPG

jelewis8 — Thu, 08 Dec 2005 01:24:03 +0000

In honour of the Pearl Harbor bombing anniversary, I thought I’d link this genius chat log, in which the combatants of World War II are given gamer-style chat capabilities.
For anyone who knows anything about game chats, this should prove a more than healthy dose of unrestrained laughter.

LebowskiFest 2005

jelewis8 — Wed, 20 Jul 2005 07:28:22 +0000

LebowskiFest 2005 is this weekend in Louisville, KY. It’s a shame I’m too tied up to attend, but I do plan on making next year’s Los Angeles festival.
In honour of and in lieu of attending, below are some inspirational quotes for you to ponder and repeat. Oh, and in case you are unfamiliar with The Big Lebowski, be forewarned, the following contains lots of swears.
The Dude: You thought Bunny’d been kidnapped and you could use it as a pretext to make some money disappear. All you needed was a sap to pin it on…you’d just met me. You thought, hey, here’s a deadbeat, a loser, someone the square community won’t give a shit about.
Lebowski: Well? Aren’t you?
The Dude: Well…yeah.
The Stranger: One a those days, huh. Wal, a wiser fella than m’self once said, sometimes you eat the bar and sometimes the bar, wal, he eats you.
The Dude: Uh-huh. That some kind of Eastern thing?
The Stranger: Far from it.
Walter: You want a toe? I can get you a toe, believe me. There are ways, Dude. You don’t wanna know about it, believe me.
The Dude: Yeah, but Walter–
Walter: Hell, I can get you a toe by 3 o’clock this afternoon–with nail polish.
Maude: What do you do for recreation?
The Dude: Oh, the usual. Bowl, drive around. The occasional acid flashback.
The Dude: Fuck sympathy! I don’t need your fuckin’ sympathy, man, I need my fucking johnson!
Donny: What do you need that for, Dude?
The Dude: Well, just take ‘t easy, man.
Walter: I’m perfectly calm, Dude.
The Dude: Yeah? Wavin’ a gun around?!
Walter: Calmer than you are.
The Dude: Just take it easy, man!
Walter: Calmer than you are.
Yeah well, that’s just, ya know, like, your opinion, man.
Walter: Nihilists! Fuck me. I mean, say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it’s an ethos.
The Dude: Fuckin’ Quintana…that creep can roll, man.
Walter: Yeah, but he’s a pervert, Dude.
The Dude: Yeah.
Walter: No, he’s a sex offender. With a record. He served 6 months in Chino for exposing himself to an eight year old.
The Dude: Oh!
Walter: When he moved to Hollywood he had to go door to door to tell everyone he was a pederast.
Donny: What’s a…pederast, Walter?
Walter: Shut the fuck up, Donny.
The Dude: I dropped off the money exactly as per – look… man, I’ve got certain information, all right? Certain things have come to light, and – y’know, has it ever occurred to you, that, instead of, uh, y’know, running around, uh, uh, blaming me, y’know, given the nature of all this new shit, y’know, this could be a-a-a-a lot more, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, complex, I mean, it’s not just, it might not be just such a simple… uh, y’know?

The Day After The Day After

jelewis8 — Tue, 29 Mar 2005 17:50:29 +0000

The day after Easter has always seemed like an anti-climactic day for most people, especially if they fail to realize the significance of the Resurrection. I suppose it’s why I didn’t post anything yesterday–just couldn’t get up the punchiness after such a joyous remembrance of our saving grace. It’s a bit like anticipating being in a massive automobile accident, only to realize that you didn’t have your glasses on, and the oncoming car was in the right lane after all.
Question is, were you in the left lane?
Most people don’t get sentimental about Easter. I certainly don’t. But it’s funny the people you see or hear about who celebrate, in their own ways. Like the lesbian who suggested drinking Rolling Rock beer at twelve midnight to my two compadres in honour of our Lord rising and encouraging the stone that closed off His tomb to gather no moss. That came out of left field, but it seems a fantastic way in. I mean, you’re at a bar, he or she’s at the same bar, you’re both drinking beer. To have the conversation turn on such a simple and mundane beer title…stranger things have happened, but not nearly as cool, or fraught with potential.
I spent Easter inside and finalizing Zero Sum, hitting the evening church service to avoid the crowds and extra parents, and generally being anxious about how ZS would turn out. I started noticing strange correlation between the part of the day I spent editing and how much antipathy or enthusiasm I felt for the film. Morning found me despondent and moody, disliking my choices of shots, grimacing in auditory agony over a perceived sound sync problem. Evening would roll around, and somehow, the doomed film from the morning turned into a near Rembrandt, where those same problems are justified by the tone of the story, the loving caress the soundtrack places at just the right moment to really punch the scene home. Who knows what it means…?
Now that it is officially “done”, I’m hoping life will return to a somewhat more normal state. Whatever that means. I’m a closet compulsive without the obsessive, so if there’s not one thing, it’s another. Most likely, it will entail getting my affairs “in order” in preparation for my move to Los Angeles in August. Scary stuff. It’s almost like death, in that I’m leaving behind all my friends here and going on to a bright and shiny place. Hmmm…but is it heaven or hell you refer to, you ask.
Good question.
I never offered up a recounting of my week-long trip out there. So tomorrow? Yes. Tomorrow. In the meantime, I’m actually going to get some work–legitimate, money-earning work done. Hey, someone’s gotta do it.