Lord of the Ringworms

[cereko]

I checked out the following from the library:

-The Hobbit (VHS)
-Fellowship of the Ring (DVD)
-Two Towers (DVD)
-Return of the King (VHS)

The funny thing is that both The Hobbit and Return of the King are both animated versions, while Fellowship of the Ring and Two Towers are both the recent film versions. I plan on watching them consecutively,

Comments

Re: fellowship of the ring

[cereko]

"you often write about things that just don't measure up in your estimation. i'd be curious as to a few examples of what books/movies/whatever you consider superlative. wanna share?"

I really liked the first Matrix movie. When I first saw it, it was almost a life changing experience. It's still my favorite movie despite how much I dislike its two sequels.

Most other movies I don't like. There's a couple here and there, but for the most part, the character motivation of Hollywood characters is selfish, or centered around love as something mystic, so my suspension of disbelief goes right in the crapper. Comedies are the exception. I'm like most anything I find funny, whether or not there are other flaws.

As for books, probably 60-70% annoy me, which is at least a better percentage. It's also the same thing with comedic books - I'm much more lenient. Everything by Douglas Adams I like.

I also liked the first three Foundation books by Isaac Asimov. Those weren't humorous books, but they were taking on large issues like constructing a desirable future and cause and effect vs. fatalism. This year my favorite book was also a non-comedy that took on large issues. It was called All of an Instant by Richard Garfinkle and it was set in a wonderfully brilliant dimension of time, where humans can break into, and when they do, they are imparted with a tail that is made up of their past. They then jump in and out of time, constructing it to their desire and basically ravaging it of its resources to fight other humans in the ocean of time, everyone battling to control history.

That was absolutely brilliant.

I also greatly enjoyed another book called The School of Night by Alan Wall. It wasn't that great of a read most of the way through it, but the ending, if I interpreted right, was absolutely shocking. But it was shocking in a subtle way, that I can see many people missing, and that was rewarding.

One of my other favorite books is David Copperfield by Dickens. I think the reason I liked that one so much was that I was able to become emotionally attached to the title character. I was rooting for him since he really had some bad breaks. I remember after I finished reading it, I was in Los Alamos doing an internship at the time, and I went outside to grab a cigarette and as I did I visualized David walking down the street with his family, out of my life, since the book was now over.

Selfish, love-obsessed characters don't do that for me. They walk out of my life before the story even starts since I find them obvious and icky.

Re: fellowship of the ring

[cereko]

"hey,thanks. interesting stuff. you read a lot of sci fi?"

No more than anything else, really. If they were all like All of an Instant, that would be all I'd read. Unfortunately, a lot of it is like those cheesy star trek novels.

13 of which I've read : )

I think maybe I should read more sci fi though. When done right, they take on the big issues, which I dig.

"at the time i saw it i was really interested in gnosticism and saw much of that in it."

What is gnosticism exactly? I've heard it mentioned a lot, but whenever I find a definition of it, it's always a fuzzy type of thing that doesn't tell you much. Kind of like looking for a concrete definition of postmodernism, I suppose.