Home » Open thread 3/20/23

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Open thread 3/20/23 — 22 Comments

  1. Hmmm. Fifth plane on 9/11?
    “9/11 terrorists foiled in plot to blow up fifth United Airlines jet: Report”—
    https://torontosun.com/news/crime/9-11-terrorists-foiled-in-plot-to-blow-up-fifth-united-airlines-jet-report

    Looks like bin-Laden’s JFK ground crew put the boxcutters on the wrong plane…
    ‘…“The chief pilot reported to me that they had found two box cutters in the seat pockets in first class in the plane next to it, which had a tail number one digit off,” [the plane’s captain] told the documentary….’

    Well, we all make mistakes, I guess…

    Meanwhile, Monday hath arrived:
    Switzerland terrorizes bondholders….
    ‘ “This Just Makes No Sense”: European Regulators Rush To Calm AT1 Investors After Credit Suisse Wipeout Shock ‘—
    https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/just-makes-no-sense-european-regulators-rush-calm-at1-investors-after-credit-suisse-coco

    “Biden”-style betrayal seems to be the latest international fad (with Schwab/Soros pulling the strings?)

    What—or rather, who—is next?

  2. Interesting. I find the effects used in early films more fun than CGI. We know it wasn’t real, but they mostly did a great job on making you think it was real.

  3. There was a second wave of planes out of the west coast but its striking how few details nearly 22 years later

  4. Meanwhile, on the Left coast… SF supervisor (that’s what they call the governing body in SF, Supervisors) complains that there is not sufficient police coverage for her district in the face of a rising crime rate, and gets reminded that she supported the defunding of the police back in 2020… the same election that brought in the crime-supporting DA.

    https://www.foxnews.com/politics/san-francisco-supervisor-hillary-ronen-begs-more-police-district-voting-defund-2020

    Another example of the inmates running the mental hospital.

  5. https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2023/03/miss-iraq-runs-for-office.php

    This is really curious. She says she is liberal and a Democrat, but she is adamantly against the woke, anti-American socialism of the Democrats.

    I am really curious what she thinks Republicans are for. I suspect that she has fallen prey to the nasty, vicious, vile slanders that Democrats relentlessly hurl at the GOP.

    Democrats/news media/education complex have been successful in smearing the GOP. I believe there is a significant subset of Democrat voters who disagree with Dems about most everything but refuse to identify with hate-filled people who are racist, sexist, fascist Nazis desirous of destroying the environment, killing seniors and starving children.

    In the early days of Instapundit, Glenn Reynolds wrote that he was a libertarian-leaning independent, but he could never be a Republican.

    [or perhaps she realizes that winning office as an R is impossible in her Cal district]

  6. I think I memtioned this film technique before, but now I found the clip.

    Brian De Palma sometimes used what he called a split diopter lens to achieve an otherwise impossible depth of field in a shot. I think it something like a lens filter attached to the end of a regular camera lens, except it is an actual converging lens split down the middle. So half converging, and half not.

    You can see the effect at the time 1:20 here,
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIzRr3im4Cc

  7. Kathryn Bigelow’s people had to invent a mini steadicam with a wire rectangle mounted above the camera for rough aiming and framing of the camera in this foot chase scene in Point Break.

    The running camera work starts at 2:48,
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiseBAaQmYs

    De Palma liked long steadicam shots, but none of it is fast.

  8. The contrast between Buster Keaton’s “madness” trusting in the math to get the shot and make his art and Alec Baldwin’s carelessness (?) taking a shot that killed his cinematographer and wounded his director.

  9. (that’s what they call the governing body in SF, Supervisors)
    ==
    About 5% of New York’s population lives in counties with an old school conciliar body called a ‘board of supervisors’.

  10. The original King Kong from 1933. Even though the stop-motion special effects are not as smooth as CGI the creators gave Kong a life and personality you rarely see even in “real” human actors today. The fight between Kong and the T-Rex is one of the two most riveting scenes ever in films (the other being the “mad as hell” scene in Network). The end, where Kong jiggles the dinosaur’s jaw to make sure it is dead, is priceless.

  11. FOAF:

    Agree about King Kong. Wonderful expressiveness that modern films don’t convey.

    That scene with the T-Rex scared me tremendously as a little child, though.

  12. I much prefer special effects like these, and the stop motion already mentioned, to CGI. The modern movie “Elf” made great use of camera angles and perspective.

  13. Re: King Kong

    FOAF, neo:

    Agree about the greatness of the original.

    The Peter Jackson 2005 remake has grown on me as a worthy successor. Jackson worked hard and generously to live up to Merian C. Cooper’s 1933 film.

    In particular Jackson got Kong as a 3-D character in love with Fay Wray (as I always think of the woman).

  14. Re: Jodie Foster speaking French

    I mentioned it a few weeks ago and got around to googling her interview of a few years ago on French TV.

    My goodness. I’m no authority, but I am impressed. There are several “reaction videos” from native French speakers and they are all WTF.
    _________________________

    OK. I’ve always heard she was good at French. I didn’t know she was bilingual.

    –“Reacting to Jodie Foster Speaking French – StreetFrench.org”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUCOAIWpnNo&t=56s

    _________________________

    This isn’t an American speaking passable (and more power to them) French. Jodie nailed it.

    Sure, she got some gender stuff wrong (I am informed) and some verb tenses were debatable. But I suspect her pronunciation, confidence, nice little touches, and content would win over any audience in the heart of Paris. Not to mention her beauty.

    Foster did attend a French school as a child in LA. That can definitely work.

  15. Dmitry Medvedev:

    The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant against Vladimir Putin. No need to explain WHERE this paper should be used.

    Frankly, I wouldn’t dirty myself by touching it.

  16. @Banned Lizard

    I have little respect for the ICC, but even less for Putin and the bitch lieutenant of his that got indicted. Are you seriously trying to argue that what they shouldn’t be charged for forcibly relocating children in occupied territory with the intent or forcibly assimilating them?

    That’s a war crime and has been acknowledged as such for decades, since it is a method of genocide. It’s what the Lebensborn Bigwigs got in trouble for even though most of them had never killed anyone, and had the WWI war crimes trials gone through like they would have it would’ve been subject.

    There’s a lot wrong with the ICC and a lot of their proclamations I wouldn’t touch, but this isn’t one of them.

  17. Turtler:

    It’s okay to not have an opinion on every piece of news that floats by, which I will illustrate. I agree with the first seven words of your above note, but have no position on the rest. If I was substantially compensated to opine on all that, I would compose something thoughtful. You’ve done a serviceable job of that yourself. Thanks for sharing.

  18. @Banned Lizard

    It’s okay to not have an opinion on every piece of news that floats by, which I will illustrate.

    Oh I agree, and there’s a reason a lot of news flows past me without making an impact. It’s also why I find people acting like gadflies and unceasing bothers to be annoying, which is why I’ve had harsh words with om in terms of their approach, among others.

    I agree with the first seven words of your above note, but have no position on the rest. If I was substantially compensated to opine on all that, I would compose something thoughtful. You’ve done a serviceable job of that yourself. Thanks for sharing.

    No worries, and thanks for providing thoughtful and civil replies, as well as providing useful sources. We may not agree with everything, but then why should we?

    In any case, take care BL.

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