Trying to write a spoiler-free review of an M. Night Shyamalan movie is as difficult as trying to explain the difference between red and yellow to a blind person. There’s not enough I can tell you that will give you a clear picture.

Overall, I enjoyed his new movie, The Village. That’s impressive, considering that the surprise – there’s always a “surprise” in a Shyamalan movie – was inadvertently spoiled for me by my barely-literate Russian niece. She saw it on opening night and despite my body language communication to the contrary (I covered my ears and said “nyahnyahnyah!”) she still let slip three words. Three. Words. If you don’t think that’s enough to spoil a movie’s crucial plot twist, just think back to the Sixth Sense. How easy would it be to give that whole movie away?

Anyway, as I was saying. Good movie, despite what I consider to be some weaknesses in the script. M. Night Shyamalan is a great writer/director and he deserves every penny he makes off these movies, but I’ve noticed a disturbing trend. I think of it as a lack of faith in the audience. Whenever he divulges the big revelation, he almost always uses flashbacks, voiceovers, or some other crutch to guide the audience to their conclusion. Personally, I’d like to be given a little more credit than that; it’s only a two-hour movie, after all. My short term memory can take it, trust me.

In The Village, I thought there were some problems with the story telling that could have been worked out. For instance, there’s a short section of the movie where sequences are told out of chronological order. It was obvious that he chose to do it that way so that certain… things… would be hidden until he chose to reveal them at a suitably shocking point, but to me that indicates a weakness in the script. I believe that, try as he might, he just couldn’t manipulate the events of the story to uncover themselves chronologically without sacrificing the dramatic tension. I’m not saying I could do any better, but I still think it’s a weakness.

Bah! Without citing specific examples, it’s too hard to explain exactly what I mean. Tell you what: Go out and watch the movie and we’ll discuss it later. I can’t say any more without giving away the plot points whose names we do not speak.

Trivial Thought: While I thought the movie was good, I’m surprised that it wasn’t “FATASTINOMICAL!!1” like the Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, and Signs. Oh, well. I guess that if M. Night Shyamalan can hold out for four movies before his sophomore slump, he can still be my hero.
What did I find worthwhile about the movie? The background story. It was obviously well thought-out. Also, the acting was top notch all around.
Would I recommend the movie? Yes.
Will I buy it on DVD? Yes.

Overall Summer Movie Ranking
Spider-man 2
Shrek 2
The Village
I, Robot
The Day After Tomorrow
The Terminal
The Chronicles of Riddick
Troy
Fahrenheit 9/11
Van Helsing
The Stepford Wives

It’s early August and time to check out those Photoblog stats again. If you remember from last time, I opted not to do anything for the month of July that might increase the number of visits. As I suspected, I earned slightly fewer unique hits than the previous month, but the results were still educational.

Here’s the quick breakdown:

June = 83 unique visitors with 162 visits
July = 76 unique visitors with 174 visits

What’s interesting here is that the ‘blog indices in which I registered my Photoblog are still generating hits. Last month, I signed up in 20 or so indices. I’d say 15 hits on my site were from those same indices sending a ‘bot to check if the URL was valid. Since I didn’t submit to any new sites throughout the month of July, it’s arguable that I actually gained a few new visitors instead of losing 7 as the statistics indicate.

Looking over my list of referrers, I see a sprinkling of “globeofblogs,” “blogwise,” “linkexchange,” and “eatonweb portal.” Not a whole ton of hits, but at least they’re pointing some people my way.

I’m also noticing a few more keyword searches resulting in hits on the site. I¡¦ve got two each for “isabela de sagua” and “mendenhall glacier poster,” and one apiece for “nags head photo sunrise,” “isabela de sagua cuba,” “open-shutter photography,” and “pictures of el sano banano.” I know exactly which photos each of these point to — still no sales, but I hope they found what they were looking for. A couple people bookmarked my site this month, too — that’s a good omen for repeat visitors.
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For the month of August, I’ve already implemented the next step — an XML syndication feed. The only change to the site will be a tiny little orange XML button at the end of each page. Getting this up and running was actually pretty easy since I had already sweated out the hard work on the ‘blog you’re now reading. What does it do? Glad you asked.

RSS, RDF, and XML feeds all do pretty much the same thing: They’ll let you know as soon as a webpage is updated. In order to do that, though, you’re going to need a new piece of software. Don’t panic! I’ll point you to one that’s free and easy to use.

What you need is a “news aggregator.” An aggregator is a program that probably looks a lot like what you use to read your e-mail, but instead of checking your e-mail, an aggregator will check all the RSS feeds you’ve signed up for. That’s where that orange XML button on my Photoblog (and the blue RSS button on my ‘blog) comes in — those are my feeds.

RSS feeds have changed the way I surf the web. Instead of roaming across the same sites every day to check to see if there’s anything new posted, I now let those same sites come to me. Every hour my aggregator goes out and checks for new content from sites like Slashdot, Wired, C|net, and the SciFi channel. If there’s something new, I’ll see a popup appear (much like an MSN Messenger message) near my taskbar. When I have a spare moment, I can open up my aggregator — it stays active 24/7 in my system tray — and read the newest news.

Okay, let’s talk specifics. I’m using an aggregator called Feedreader. You can head on over to their site and download a free copy right now. Once you’ve got the downloaded file on your computer, you can double-click-install it just like any other program. After that, fire it up and take a look around.

(By the way, this is simply the aggregator I’m using. There are plenty of others out there: Feeddemon seems to be one of the best, but it’s $30 after a 20-day free trial. A friend of mine is using Pluck — an aggregator that works as a plug-in for Internet Explorer. There are also plug-ins for Outlook, as well, and even web-based aggregators like Bloglines. If you really want to get into RSS, Google is a great place to start!)

Now that you’ve got Feedreader (or some other aggregator) running, you’ll have to supply it with an RSS, RDF, or XML feed. Don’t be alarmed — all it’s really asking for is a URL. Take my ‘blog for example. See the blue RSS button on the front page? That little button has a link to the RSS feed that Feedreader needs. There are a lot of ways to get that information into your aggregator, but because each person’s setup can be different, I’ll give you the only sure-fire way I know of:

* Place your mouse cursor over the button, but don’t click.
* Look down in the status bar at the bottom of your browser — the URL to the feed will be displayed
* Open up Feedreader and click the “New Feed” button.
* Type in the URL and click Next, then Finish

That’s it! Do the same thing with the XML button on any of my Photoblog pages and you’ll already have two sites that will notify you whenever they are updated (as long as you keep Feedreader running in the system tray, that is!)

What other sites have RSS feeds? You’d be surprised! Many, many sites that have dynamically changing content already use RSS feeds. How can you tell? Easy. Surf on over to the site in question and search the page for either “RSS,” “RDF,” or “XML.” If that doesn’t turn up anything, scan the pages for a button much like the ones I’ve used. If you still find nothing… well, not everyone is as cool as I am.

Just to get you going, here are a few of the feeds I most enjoy:

‘Blogs
Wil Wheaton dot Net — The journal of an actor turned writer (My hero!)
Neil Gaiman’s Journal — The journal of a fantasy and comic book writer
A Midgett Blog (‘natch!) — The most important journal in the world… to me.
A Midgett Photoblog (double ‘natch!) — See the world through my viewfinder

Technology
Wired News — Breaking Technology news
Slashdot — News for Nerds, Stuff that Matters
Dan’s Data — This guy really knows his stuff
Gizmodo — News and reviews of tech gadgets, delivered in an irreverent style
Engadget — MORE news and reviews of tech gadgets, less irreverent
PhotographyBLOG — What’s new in the world of Photography
Digital Photography Review — Very detailed reviews of digital cameras
Dynamic Artwork — There are some great Photoshop tutorials here

Entertainment
Boing Boing — Interesting links around the Internet
Sci-fi Wire — Science Fiction news
Slashdot: Games — Computer games
Penny Arcade — Online web comic and discussion about video games

That should do it. I’m really impressed with this new way of getting information — so much so that I’ll be starting up whole new ‘blog soon (stay tuned!) In the meantime, if you have any trouble getting started with RSS — either in using an aggregator or in modifying Greymatter — please don’t hesitate to ask me for some help.

Oh, and one more thing. I want to apologize in advance for the extremely ugly subject lines in my Photoblog’s RSS feeds. When I originally set up the site, I wasn’t expecting anyone would be reading the raw HTML code. Asi es la vida… at least you should be able to see a nice little thumbnail of each week’s photos.

Who would have thought that replacing one sectional couch with another would be such a hassle?

Oksana and I have been looking for a fancy new couch for a while now. After researching prices online, at local furniture stores, and in the daily want-ads we rapidly came to the conclusion that we couldn’t yet afford a new one with all the most desirable features. It seems that things like recliners, cup holders, and hidden compartments for remotes add up to a healthy price tag. We never even got into the vibrating cushions and built-in mini-‘fridges.

Not that our old couch is all that bad off. In fact, for the $70 we paid for it a couple years ago, it’s outstanding! Unfortunately it only comfortably seats about 5 people and for the last year and a half we’ve had at least 8 people over every Friday evening. Good hosts don’t make their friends sit on the floor – or at least they feel guilty when they do.
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I’m apolitical. I don’t vote, and I try not to bitch. Politics have always been outside my realm of interest. They just seem to get people so worked up out about things that, often, they feel powerless to do anything about. I don’t need that kind of stress in my life.

It’s not that I don’t believe in this little democracy experiment that we call America – in fact, I trust it so completely that I’ve never seen the need to vote. I’m fully confident that, collectively, the voting population of our country has my best interest at heart. I’ve always told myself that I would register to vote if and when something important enough comes up on the ballot, but the truth of the matter is that I have yet to see any significant change to my lifestyle based on who’s holding office.

Despite having had a politically-motivated girlfriend years ago, I still managed to shy away from political discussions (much to her exasperation!) In retrospect, that was probably due more to my lack of information than anything else – in college I didn’t read the newspaper, listen to the radio, or even watch much TV (except for, of course, Star Trek, The Simpsons, and the X-Files!) Ignorance is bliss.

A few years ago, I realized how horrible our music stations are in Juneau and I began tuning my car radio to our local AM talk station, instead. My commute time is roughly 3 minutes, though, so this new window to the world of current events was relatively small. Each day I learned a little bit more about politics from the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Michael Regan, and Laura Ingram on longer drives to the store or on my lunch break. Eventually I discovered that talk radio is very heavily conservatively biased. I’m almost ashamed to say how long it took me to realize that – having had no political background to speak of, I wouldn’t have been able to tell you Conservative:Republican :: Liberal:Democrat. All I knew was that I didn’t often agree with the sentiments I heard on the AM band. (Yes, I’m aware of NPR. But both sources are strongly biased and I believe that an open mind can and will see through both sides. In that sense, I guess it doesn’t matter who you listen to.)

Crap. This was supposed to a short movie review for Fahrenheit 9/11.
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I have seen the future and it is gray. The buildings, the cars, the robots. All gray. In the future, everything will be faster, too. Freeways will be crowded with cars traveling at absurd speeds and elevators will actually propel themselves downward faster than gravity would otherwise let them descend. Baring some leap in psychological evolution, you would expect the average human to scream in abject terror when faced with the prospect of actually traveling somewhere. Or when standing next to the low, ineffectual glass railings of the buildings’ balconies, 40-or-so stories above the ground.

I’m talking, of course, about the world of I, Robot. Judging from the movie, Chicago will be a very different place just 31 years from now.

I went in to I, Robot expecting to hate it. I’ve got nothing against Will Smith (except, perhaps, Wild Wild West), but I rarely trust Hollywood to handle a science fiction book adaptation well. Either because I had such low expectations, or perhaps because I’ve never read the Asimov robot books, I found myself thoroughly this movie! (Not reading Asimov’s works ahead of time might be the only way to enjoy it – it was listed in the credits only as “Suggested by an Isaac Asimov book!”)

It took me awhile to warm up to it, though. At first I couldn’t get over Will Smith’s hat. Throughout the first third of the movie, he insisted on wearing a tight leather toque, pulled down to the eyebrows, consistently covering only one of his two ears. That sort of thing drives me nuts. Would you do that with a baseball cap? A 10-gallon hat? I don’t care how cool you think it makes you look, we’re symmetrical for Pete’s sake – Wearing your hat over only one ear is like getting an extended foot massage on only one of your feet; it’s bound to mess up your balance somehow!

Okay, admittedly that was a minor quibble. Trying to look past the protagonist’s hat, I began to evaluate the character himself. Police officer, hates robots, of course. I suppose that later, when the shit hits the fan and the robots start going crazy, no one’s going to believe him because of his well-known, bigoted viewpoint. How lame. I can’t imagine that the characters in the book were this shal… hey now, waitaminute. Could I be wrong?

That’s the thing that got me in I, Robot. The writer and/or director did a great job of leading me down the wrong path. At times (and certainly by the look of the previews), I believed that I was in for an action flick, but I was pleasantly surprised to discover a decent suspense movie instead. Once the story got rolling, I had a hard time guessing what kink would pop up next. I was surprised to learn the robots’ motivations, and I misjudged who the main antagonist was at several turns. Those are good things, by the way. Hollywood can be so formulaic sometimes that I enjoy the occasional, unexpected twist.

Besides the story unfolding to my enjoyment, I also loved watching the special effects. Alan Tudyk, who I knew from Firefly, was fun to watch as the robot, Sonny. In fact, all the robots in this particular movie looked pretty darn good. Although obviously CGI, they seemed very there. They were animated to walk very much like humans with realistic weight and balance, but when it was time to get their groove on, they took advantage of their superior speed and power to pump out superhuman jam. Well, all except for the older robot models. They plodded along jerkily, but that was also pretty cool in its contrast.

I’ll bet one of my favorite effects in the movie, though, was one that probably escaped most people’s attention. There’s a scene where Will Smith is trying to get out of a house being demolished by a huge robot. The hallway’s crumbling under his feet, walls and ceiling are being absolutely pulverized as he’s sprinting for the door. In the middle of all this mayhem, the camera view switches to his pumping feet as he reaches down to scoop up the housecat racing along beside him.

Can you imaging how difficult it must have been to get that shot?

Trivial Thought: Poor cat. Left to die in a car trunk. (UPDATE: I have been informed that Grandma got the cat. Hmm. Guess I missed that.)
What did I find worthwhile about the movie? Surprisingly, er, surprising plotline. Plus, with the exception of the very last pull-away, I thought that the SFX were quite good (if a little too high octane for the script.)
Would I recommend the movie? Yes, except maybe if you’re a big Asimov fan. I don’t know for sure, but I suspect that you’ll be disappointed.
Will I buy it on DVD? Tough one, but there’s a good chance, yeah. Especially if it comes with some good extras.

Overall Summer Movie Ranking
Spider-man 2
Shrek 2
I, Robot
The Day After Tomorrow
The Terminal
The Chronicles of Riddick
Troy
Van Helsing
The Stepford Wives

What’s up with me? The weather outside is stunning and I haven’t been aprovechandolo for my ‘blog writing. I’ve been respectfully busy since getting back from my vacation, but not that busy. I don’t know what it is. I really would rather be outside on days like this, but for some reason it just feels like it would be taxing…

Maybe it’s because of the smoky haze. Mike and I were talking about it the other day and he mentioned that even though it was sunny and warm, he was having a hard time thinking about it as such. Truthfully, at the height of the Yukon fires, it did seem rather overcast all day. Me? I kinda liked it. Funny that it took a firestorm to remind me how clear the air is up here, too. On a normal day in Southeast Alaska you can see all the way to the horizon (if you can find a view without a mountain in the way). Florida? Too humid/hazy. Los Angeles? Nice sunsets, but oh, so brown! During this brief week, the combination of sunny weather and ash-ridden air has shown us all how wonderfully depthful a mountain range can be when its distant peaks are desaturated into grey.

I heard on the news today that we could be in for another thunderstorm!
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What does RSS stand for? Hell if I know! Trying to figure that out may be harder than just explaining what it does. RSS or RDF links are syndication feeds for dynamic websites in the XML format. Sound complicated? Okay, well, yeah – it is a bit, I guess. Think of it this way: When I set up an RSS feed on my ‘blog, you can install that feed in your news aggregator so that you can be notified “ticker-style” whenever I add a new entry.

Who-za-whazzit?
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