Jul 26, 2009

Cultural Attack

They attack our liberty and demand we justify freedom.
MIFF's website is hacked amid demands from the Chinese consular that MIFF remove the film about Kadeer. Read for more.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/07/26/2636571.htm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8169123.stm

Jul 24, 2009

China is Moving In

Two issues have led me to this post today:
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,25814479-913,00.html
which details the investment of a large Chinese company in two South Australian mines, and
http://www.theage.com.au/national/china-pulls-films-out-of-festival-20090721-ds2a.html
which describes the pulling out of three Chinese films from the Melbourne International Film Festival because of the inclusion of a fourth film about Uyghur leader Rebiya Kadeer.
Supplementary to these is another issue that's been floating around,
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2009-07/13/content_8421122.htm
a Chinese businessman's full purchase of a British satellite TV station.

What we're seeing, and have been seeing for a few years now is China's expansion into the world. The Chinese government's foreign policies certainly stand out against European and Western ways. Some might say they are very sensitive, often demanding apologies or changes to events and schedules outside of their own country. There have always been certain naming demands placed upon organisers of the Olympics, forcing competitor countries' names to be changed to reflect the deigning of the PRC. Awards given to celebrated figures are often rebuffed and complained about if their achievements conflict with China's values. And then there's Tibet. I personally applaud countries and organisations that ignore China's outcries and do what's right for those being honoured, because even though our planet is becoming more of a global community, thus giving everyone the right to speak up, it still means that individual states play a major role in fostering and protecting their own cultures. Those cultures and the values inherent therein cannot be forced onto other nations.

It's this belief that has me alarmed when I see the Chinese pulling their films out of MIFF. It shows an ugly lack of tolerance and reveals a rather forceful agenda that can only end in confrontation. As Chinese interests start to expand out of their country due to the fervent embrace of capitalism (at the expense of an increasingly enslaved populace), Australia in particular welcome our neighbour's larger role in trade. However, there is an obvious concern that the Chinese way may be channelled through these trading avenues, in a way that more conspiratorial minds might see as subversive cultural attack.

The Onion have demonstrated their concerns with their rather vicious satirical attack on the expansion of Chinese business into western media, and while there are hints of an alarmist response, the point is not lost on those who watch with a keen interest as the last great Red state starts to play a greater role in the world and rises as the new superpower. Rivalries are imminent and if the early indicators are the sign of a trend, I fear that confrontation (most likely with the United States) is inevitable. It's a scary, interesting, but maybe hopeful time.

Jul 22, 2009

Review: A Private Function

A Python without a monty and a dame trying to be funny.

With the Queen getting married, the upstanding civic leaders of Yorkshire decide to put on a lavish dinner in her honour. Unfortunately, it's post WW2 and food is very scarce. A prize illegal pig is going to make up the banquet, but a desperate podiatrist wrecks it all.

Michael Palin and Maggie Smith star in this ancient British comedy that fails to bring the laughs but makes for odd, awkward viewing. Pork out on my review here.


http://www.dvdbits.com/reviews.asp?id=3551

Jul 17, 2009

Gay Rights


Why does our Prime Minister not speak on such issues? When was the last progressive leader of our nation? When was progression considered more than only the slow rise in interest rates and the ever more likely chance for a white couple to buy a house? Medicine, technology and the already established safe life of our already established safe white straight people dominate the agenda. This country, Australia, is subsisting on the status quo. This country's leaders and the media that so actively sets the passive audience's agenda worry and fuss about issues that bother us, but they miss one that should bother us the most.

The way a gay person is treated and spoken about under the breath of the majority demonstrates that issue. Gay discrimination is what we need to get rid of. Gay rights is the civil rights movement of our time and space. While America pushes towards new levels of racial harmony, why don't we make our mark on the world by being the first to legislate that people can love whoever they want and not be treated differently because of it? This is a serious issue our country can take seriously. This is a serious issue that can make our country be taken seriously. This is something that will happen one day, maybe long in the future, hopefully soon in the present. Gay civil rights will break as a massive issue that will see us eventually, finally understand that who a person loves does not and should not put them outside of financial systems; should not put them outside of the the law; should not put them outside of our hearts.

Australia could be the country to start this movement. To stand up with our bigger brothers and sisters and yell loudest the speech of fairness. To spark alight the smouldering hope in our nation and cause a fire that could race across the face of the west.  The hope that because a person is gay, their rights in this world are not less than those of a straight person. Australia, our agenda is empty. With what more noble and greater thing could we fill it?

Jul 3, 2009

Episode VI

I just watched the original trilogy. Star Wars Episodes IV through VI. I downloaded them, hoping I'd get the real original trilogy. I did not. So Lisa and I sat through the films, enjoying most of it and cringing at the forced in 'modern' scenes. The scenes and elements added to the film that added zero to the story. That bore no relevance to the film. That sucked. We sat through them patiently, complained when they occurred, but overall we enjoyed the flicks again (Episode V is my favourite). But the last straw was broken, forced into my anus and set alight so that my intestines exploded with expanding methane and bile and rage surged from my mouth. Both Lisa and I screamed with horror when, at the very end of the film, the ghost of Anakin Skywalker appears next to Yoda and Obi Wan...AND IT'S HAYDEN FUCKING CHRISTENSEN!

I had fucking forgot about this! In fact, I don't think I'd even realised it when I watched the butchered re-cuts. I felt emotion as Darth Vader died and then eagerly awaiting seeing Anakin in his full glory, outside of the terrifying machine armour. What I got was a slap int he face with the shrivelled, cum moistened cock of a sad little fat CUNT named George Lucas. How dispicable. How horrendous. How disrespectful - disrespectful tot he fans, but worse, disrespectful to Sebastian Shaw, the man who actually played Darth Vader out of the mask.

You're a pathetic man George Lucas. You are pathetic and I hope you die after a thousand years in the belly of a sarlacc.

THE REAL ENDING, as it should be. As it IS.

Review: Howling III: The Marsupials

My first review for DVDBits.com! Unfortunately, it's a crappy movie,
but they always make for the most fun reviews.

http://www.dvdbits.com/reviews.asp?id=3541