Dane Cook has a lot of myspace friends but none of them will stop him from making bad movie choices. I guess real friends are better than cyber friends.I have to commend Dane Cook on his script picking ability. For those of you who don’t know who Dane Cook is (i.e. most of the world), he is an American stand-up comic who is currently the new may be the next “it” boy. This means he has a bucket load of offers flying around him and the world will see a whole bunch of Dane Cook movies in a short period of time which will determine whether he will be a regular star or not. Think Sean William Scott after American Pie (1999), he followed that up with a barrage of leading roles: Road Trip (2000), Dude, Where’s My Car? (2000), Evolution (2001), American Pie 2 (2001), Stark Raving Mad (2002), Bulletproof Monk (2003), The Rundown (2003).
So now it’s Dane Cook’s turn, it began with Employee of the Month (2006) and will continue with Good Luck Chuck (2007) with Jessica Alba. Here’s the synopsis:
Poor Charlie! He gets with all these foxy ladies, and then they marry the next guy they meet! Why? Because a demented Goth girl put a curse on him when he was 10, naturally! But instead of feeling sorry for himself, Charlie realizes he's a good luck charm and helps out a long line of marriage-hungry women by sleeping with them and sending them on their merry, married way. Then one day he meets Cam, an accident-prone penguin specialist. He doesn't want her to marry some other schmuck - she's super-foxy! How will he break this "good luck curse?"
Now compare that to the synopsis of the new movie he’s just signed up for Batchelor No. 2:
Written by Jordan B. Cahan, the script focuses on a man named Tank, known for being hired to take girls out on absolutely terrible dates so they will crawl back to the boyfriends they dumped. When his best friend needs his help with the girl who dumped him, Tank struggles with his raging libido and the meaning of friendship.
Mr. Cook obviously isn’t afraid of being type cast or he just really believes in the phrase “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”. Good luck Dane.Read It...
This very special public service announcement is brought to you by Deon Malan. You have been warned. They march towards the battleground. Their heads held high with a feeling of pride, as they glance towards the west and the setting sun. These clones are a unique army guided by a strict code of conduct. Clone soldiers for the most look and think alike, and one can always recognize them by their unique coat of arms, their pink shirts. This could be the opening paragraph of a sci-fi novel or the like, but alas it is not.
One might have noticed that I referred to pink shirts a few lines ago, just to clarify, clones call it salmon. For most people salmon is not just a bad t-shirt colour but also a fish, and that is exactly what this pink trend is, fishy. There have been many questionable trends in the last couple of decades, with some recently coming back in to fashion. These include the ever-popular trailer park special mullet, and 80’s style tights. I'll be the first to admit that those tights can look incredibly attractive on a girl, and I do like it. What pisses me off is that people are losing their individualism, and that every second person I come across looks like the fourth last one before them.
Philosophers and scientists have for years argued about the dangers of cloning, yet cloning of another form has occurred. People think that the first cloned being was a sheep, and they are not far off in believing that. There are many cloned sheep moving around us every day, and you don’t have to go far to find them either. Take a walk around your town or city and have a look. If you are not afraid, you should be, because the clones are here.Read It...
Do you have problems? Of course you do. But hey Tiger, don’t feel bad cause Prof. Jambo can help you. Take a look at our exclusive look at the amazing Prof. Jambo’s first killer ad. Thought I'd share this with everyone since Prof. Jambo really helped me (especially with the problem I had with thieves attacking my gun).Read It...
The scandal behind the father of structuralism revealed. Prepared to be shocked, or maybe not so much. The Just: Ferdinand de Saussure should be as well known as Freud but unfortunately he lacked the iconic facial hair and obsession with cocaine. Saussure, the third useful thing to come out of Switzerland (after chocolate and pocket knives), was a linguist and is widely recognized as the father of structuralism (a theoretical movement that seeks to find the underlying structure of everything).
Born on November 26, 1857, to a family with a long tradition in the physical sciences, Saussure was set to continue this tradition but after his first year of university settled into linguistics. In 1880 he received his doctorate and spent the rest of his life working as an academic.
Saussure was terrified of publishing his work until he felt that it was 100% accurate. Thus for an extraordinarily respected scholar he had a rather dismal portfolio. In fact in 1906 he almost never took the position that would lead to his greatest work.
From 1906 till 1911 Saussure taught a course in general linguistics at the University of Geneva. Shortly after this he died from cancer in 1913. Fortunately for Saussure two of his students would turn his final course into a book with the very original title of A Course in General Linguistics. The book became an instant classic and Saussure became a household name (provided a linguist lived in the household).
The Scandal: Nothing, the man couldn’t even publish his own work, with the majority of his writings being published posthumously. Maybe he’s tearing up the afterlife.
Probably Not True: Reportedly started every lecture with the phrase, “It’s hammer time!” Good steal, MC.
Key Concepts: Saussure’s concepts are vital for anyone seriously considering analyzing cultural phenomena, such as Eminem’s homoerotic obsession with Moby.
For Saussure humans are creatures that use, generate and interpret signs in order to find meaning and just generally function. For example the alphabet is a group of 27 signs, which can be rearranged in different combinations to form further signs called words. But it doesn’t end there; if you draw a stick man you’ve also just drawn a sign. If you take a photograph you’ve just created a sign. In short, “Everything is a sign!” The glass you drink your beer out of, the tissue you just used to blow your nose, the peanut you dropped behind the couch. They are all signs because everything is a sign and Saussure believed in a science of signs where we could figure out how they work and how we interpret them. He called this semiology.
In Short:
· Everything is a sign. · Semiology is the science of signs.
No 2. Dissecting the Sign:
In his attempts to work out how meaning was generated and communicated Saussure suggested that a sign is made up of two parts, a signifier and a signified. A signifier is a sound, an image or an object (1); for example a signifier for a cat could be the spoken word “cat” (sound), a picture of a cat (image) or an actual cat (object). Now on seeing or hearing a signifier a concept is generated in the human brain this concept is the signified. The signified is not static it can change over time. For example when you are three and you see a cat you may think, “cute, fluffy, plaything” but when you are twelve you may think, “feline, mammal, domestic animal” and if you’ve had a bad experience maybe, “Satan’s minion!”
What has just been illustrated is the changing of signifiers on a personal level but signifiers also change for the whole of society. Take Mark Wahlberg for example. In the early 90’s he was Marky Mark a bad ass model/rapper but now he is Mark Wahlberg respected A-list actor. This is because the concept of Mark Wahlberg generally changed in societies opinion. For all intensive purposes the signifier is the same but the signified has changed. This brings us to the next point the relationship between the signifier and the signified is arbitrary and based on cultural agreement. There is no logical reason why a cat is called a “cat” and not a “maggot”, if there were why are there so many languages in the world that call cats completely different things? So in order to be able to function in a given culture or society we need to share the same sign system.
In Short:
· A sign is made up of two parts, a signifier and a signified. · A signifier is a sound, an object or an image. · A signified is a concept generated by the signifier. · This concept can change over time. · The connection between the two is arbitrary and based on cultural agreement.
No 3. What the Hell is a Sign System?
You really should’ve worked that out by now especially since we are dealing with a linguist here. That’s right language is a sign system. According to Sassure language is a self contained sign system within which everything obtains its meaning from being part of that system and their relationship to that system.
Whew! That was a mouthful but it basically means that nothing has meaning by itself. We know what a cat is through its relation to other things. E.g. It moves - unlike an apple but so does a dog, but it doesn’t bark like a dog etc… Our minds work in terms of relationships and it is through relationships that we create concepts. Clearly from the above example we mainly define concepts from negative relationships – what the others are not.
These negative relationships are known as binary (fancy talk for two) oppositions and they are the reason we try to see everything in “black and white”. If we see ourselves as “good” and we know that they are unlike ourselves then we see them as “bad”. All of the worst bigotry and hate seeps from this fear of difference that we learn from language.
Language forces us to think in certain ways as well as how we see things. Take for instance the concept of snow. In the English language there is only one word for snow, whereas in the Inuit culture there is over 50 words for different types of snow. Hence, an Inuit looking at a field of snow is bound to see something very different from an English language speaker.
In Short:
· Language is a self-contained sign system. · Everything in this system obtains its meaning from being part of that system and their relationship to that system. · We define things through negative relationships – what the others are not. · The most important of these are binary oppositions. · Language/Sign Systems structure how we think and how we see things.
Next… Saussure’s ideas about Semiology are taken up and used to study culture by a Frenchman named Roland Barthes.
(1)In fact a signifier can be anything that provokes one of our five senses but to keep things simple this information has been left till the end for you diligent footnote readers. Read It...
It's an article that psychoanalyses Pac-Man... that can't be good… but then again what can? Oh, and you can also play it.
Pac-Man was originally released in Japan in 1979 with mixed reception. In 1980 it was released in America and became an instant social phenomena. This surprised everyone in the industry. In fact the game was completely overlooked at a trade show prior to its release. So what exactly was it about this game that made 1980’s culture latch onto it. Here’s a summary of Arthur Asa Bergers’s analysis:
It’s a Maze:
Space Invaders was set against the infinite background of outer space, whereas Pac-Man is set in an isolated maze. At the time the American economy was in recession and this suggests that people felt trapped with few possibilities.
Childish Violence:
Before the Pac, game violence was dominated by masculine shooting style violence (Space Invaders, Asteroids). But the Pac chose to bite his opponents, clearly real men don’t bite – that’s something kids do – hence, Pac-Man utilized a feminine/childish form of violence.
Berger suggests that this reflected a fear of growing up and mature interpersonal sexuality. And guess what the 80’s are known as the most hedonistic period of recent history.
Dog-Eat-Dog:
Berger sees Pac-Man, which he calls “a game in which a dot eats dots”, as a metaphor for capitalist society. The world has become very small and there are no new frontiers to discover. Society is captive in a maze; in this situation we can either work towards the collective good or try to maximize things for ourselves.
Berger believes that Pac-Man reflects a change in the American psyche to a dog-eat-dog mentality. People are focusing upon themselves and “how many dots they can gobble”.
So in conclusion the popularity of Pac-Man came at a time when economic recession was causing many people to feel trapped due to a lack of opportunities, and fortunately Pac-Man was a game that offered a metaphorical escape for two of the most prominent solutions to this problem: 1) Remain a child 2) Go out into the world and crush your opposition.
Note: Arthur Asa Berger is a Professor at San Francisco State University. Clearly not a moron, the preceding summary, however, was written by one. So before complaining to Berger check his argument out for yourself in Making Sense of Media.Read It...
The low down on the differences between Hulk 1 and 2. And check out the cool Edward Norton as the Hulk pic. I made it! What do you mean it’s not good? Go to hell…It was announced on Friday that Liv Tyler will be playing Betty Ross in The Incredible Hulk, the semi-sequel to 2003’s Hulk. This is yet another announcement that moves the series further away from the disappointing Hulk. So for those of you who haven’t been paying attention, here is a brief comparison of what’s different.
Ang Lee went into the Hulk with an impressive resume of dramatic work (The Ice Storm, Sense and Sensibility) and delivered a film criticised for being too dramatic and lacking action. Leterrier couldn’t be any more different. Coming from an action background (The Transporter Movies, Unleashed), Leterrier has an eye for the visual and his movies have always looked bigger than their budgets.
Schamus has almost exclusively written movies for Lee and his Hulk screenplay offered a father/son conflict, angry poodles and a cut-and-paste villain. Penn on the other hand is preaching a script with more action, featuring Bruce Banner on the run from the authorities and his darker persona. However, this is the guy who cooked up Elektra.
Bana was relatively unknown (and generally still is) when he played the Hulk. Some criticised his performance for being to wooden, but many wanted him to return for the sequel. Norton on the other hand is a much bigger name and generally has a good record with script selection. Plus, he will often put his foot down when he thinks a director is taking a project in the wrong direction, which could be helpful here.
The casting of Tyler definitely reflects Marvel’s desire to make this into more of a popcorn film. Connelly is better known for her dramatic work and there is a definite melancholy in her performances, which is pretty much the opposite of Tyler.
The Villain: Hulk - David Banner Incredible Hulk – The Abomination
Nick Nolte played one of the most irrelevant villains in film history in Hulk (which in my opinion was what was wrong with the movie – and of course the poodles). Instead of taking an actual villain from the comics they took bits from here and there (mainly, Zzzax and Absorbing Man) to create Hulk’s father. The sequel will pit Hulk against The Abomination, a giant radiation freak similar to the Hulk, who in the comics was originally from the KGB.Read It...
Naomi Campbell will never win an Oscar but that’s ok because she’s won a place on our list of the 10 angriest people.We all get angry sometimes, for example when our digs-mate drinks the last of the milk, or when your best friend runs over your beloved Siberian hamster, Snowy. Throughout history the world has seen its fair share of extremely angry and violent people. Here are a few.
1. Mrs Bobbitt
The most infamous crime of passion has to be the one committed by Lorena Bobbitt. When she found out her husband was having an affair (combined with a side-order of domestic abuse) she snuck into their bedroom, where Mr Bobbitt was sleeping, and cut off more than half his penis with a kitchen knife.
She got in her car and went for a drive to clear her thoughts, but eventually realised she was still clutching his severed penis in her hand. She freaked out and threw it out the car window onto the highway.
Luckily, police inspectors found the ‘evidence’ and surgeons were able to successfully reunite little Bobbitt with his master. John Wayne Bobbitt didn’t let the traumatic experience of almost losing his skin chimney keep him down for long, and he even began a new career starring in several porn movies including “John Wayne Bobbitt: Uncut” and “Frankenpenis”. But performing a 'penectomy' must go down as a really fiery act indeed.
2. Mary Bell
In 1968 Mary Bell was found guilty of murder. She strangled a 3 year old boy to death, and then went back to carve an “M” into his stomach with a razor blade. She also used scissors to chop bits of his hair off and cut into his genitals. This is pretty sick stuff for a ten-year old.
The psychiatrist who examined her testified that she had all the classic symptoms of a psychopath; Mary felt no remorse, and her only regret was that she was going to get into trouble. The courts were lenient on her because of her young age and dropped the murder charge to manslaughter.
In 1980, she was released from prison at the age of 23, and fell pregnant soon afterwards. Since then, she has become a caring mother who tries to live a normal life, because even psychopathic killers love family.
Bell made several appeals for her true identity to remain anonymous because she claimed it interfered with her life, and the way people behaved towards her. In May 2003 the British High Courts decided that the true identities, and location, of Mary Bell and her daughter would be kept a secret in order to protect the two from unwanted attention. Bell is still alive to this day.
3. Naomi Campbell
Another celebrity who seems to have a fair bit of rage inside her, the glamorous supermodel has been in trouble for assaulting her ‘hired help’ several times. She has been nabbed for slapping her domestic worker as well as head butting her personal assistant, and was ordered to attend anger management classes.
Apparently they weren’t very effective and Naomi has recently been in the headlines again for allegedly beating her new domestic worker with her mobile phone. I’m not that surprised actually: she’s 35 years old now, which is 147 in model years, and who wouldn’t get pissed off surviving only on coffee and cigarettes and having to hang out with the worlds most pretentious.
4. Susan Smith
Some women will do anything to please a man; some change their haircuts, or the way they dress. Twenty-three year old Susan Smith murdered her two sons.
In October 1994, Susan received a break-up letter from her wealthy lover Tom Findlay in which Findlay told her that he could never be with her because he didn’t want to have to care for another man’s children. The letter seemed to suggest that the only thing keeping them apart were her children, "Susan, I could really fall for you. You have some endearing qualities about you, and I think that you are a terrific person. But like I have told you before, there are some things about you that aren’t suited for me, and yes, I am speaking about your children." Susan was furious about being rejected and wanted to commit suicide. She drove to a nearby lake with her two children, aged 3 and 1, in the car, and stopped in the middle of the large, wooden boat ramp. She decided that it would be better for her children if they died first, rather than carry on living without a mother. But she didn’t really want to kill herself she just wanted her problems to disappear, so she released the handbrake of the car and watched as it slid into the lake with her two small boys sleeping inside it.
Susan then went to work on her alibi and concocted the story that she was hijacked and that “whoever did this is a sick emotionally unstable person”. Her story gained her a lot of sympathy from her entire community of Union, South Carolina and people from all over the world heard her pleas that her children get returned safely, until the police found several holes in her story. She eventually confessed and was sentenced to life in prison.
5. Bjork
Great voice, cool music, really bad temper! In 1996 Bjork assaulted a journalist who kept following her around Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok. Julie Kaufman allegedly turned to Bjork’s son Sindri and said, “Welcome to Bangkok”, which made the Icelandic singer snap. Bjork claims that Kaufman lied in her account, and that she was harassing the star and her son with inappropriate questions. Either way if you haven’t seen the video clip of Bjork’s incident yet do yourself a favour and get it off the net. She doesn’t just hit the woman, she beats the crap out of her.
6. Mike Tyson
Just a quick look at Iron Mike’s timeline will explain why he’s here (there wasn’t nearly enough space to mention all the crazy stuff he’s done):
June 17, 1988 – Tyson’s wife, Robin Givens, accuses Tyson of domestic violence. April 9, 1989- Tyson accused of hitting a parking attendant three times in the face after he asked Tyson to move his car out of a reserved parking space. March 26, 1992 - Tyson is found guilty of raping Desiree Washington, and two other counts of deviant sexual conduct. He is sentenced to 10 years in prison. May 8, 1992 – While in prison, Tyson is found guilty of threatening a guard, and has 15 days added to his sentence. July 9, 1997 – Tyson is fined $3 million and has his boxing licence revoked for biting off a chunk of Evander Holyfield’s ear. Feb. 5, 1999 – Tyson sentenced to a year in jail for assault. He beat up two motorists after they caused an accident. May 28, 2003- In an interview Tyson refers to Desiree Washington as "just a lying, reptilian, monstrous, young lady. I just hate her guts. She put me in that state where, I don't know, I really wish I did now. Now I really do want to rape her."
I guess its no surprise that he hits people for a living. What I really admire about the man is that he doesn’t just do it for the money; he really loves his job and even spends most of his free time practicing. If Tyson’s record of violence isn’t enough to impress you, he also says stuff like: "I think I'll take a bath in his blood”, and "I wish that you guys had children so I could kick them in the fucking head or stomp on their testicles so you could feel my pain because that's the pain I have waking up every day." Poetic!
7. John Wayne Gacy
Respected democrat who ran a successful business as a contractor, he even dressed up as Pogo the clown at local children’s birthday parties, and lastly: one of the world’s most abominable serial killers.
But even his closest friends had no idea what he got up to in his spare time. Except for the clue that his house always smelt like there was something rotting inside it, which Gacy dismissed as probably the body of a dead animal under the house. The smell was in fact the decaying corpses of 29 young boys who Gacy stored in the crawlspace of his house. Police discovered the bodies while investigating Gacy for the disappearance of 15-year-old Robert Piest. Gacy confessed to all the murders and explained how he killed each boy: he used to trick the boys into being handcuffed by asking them if they would like to see a ‘magic trick’. He would then put a sock in their mouths to stop them screaming as he raped and strangled them to death with a piece of metal wire. He sometimes killed them first before having his way with the dead bodies. Gacy was sentenced to death by lethal injection, and was sent to Joliet Prison to await his execution. Moral: never trust people who dress up as clowns and want to show you a ‘magic trick’ which involves handcuffs.
According to a forensic psychiatrist, Gacy did not fit any psychological profile normally associated with serial killers, and his brain seemed to function just as a normal person’s would. The hit TV show Prison Break is filmed at the old Joliet Prison where Gacy was detained, and some scenes are filmed in Gacy’s old cell.
8. Russell Crowe
“Making movies, making songs, and fighting round the world” Russell Crowe has earned a notorious reputation for handing out beatings, which he puts down as a weird conspiracy against him created by the media. Here’s an idea: if you want the papers to stop telling everyone that you are violent, then stop beating people up. He’s pushed a BBC producer, head butted a fellow actor, threw a telephone at a hotel employees face, and even had a tussle with Moby. That’s like beating up Gandhi. However, in Russell’s defense it is rumoured that Moby gives off special pheromones, which make people want to kick his ass. I think what really upsets people about Russell Crowe is that he’s not committed enough to go the whole way. He’s got the talent to be among these greats he just needs to work harder on his beaten to death ratio.
9. John Wayne Bobbitt
The guy had his penis chopped off of course he is angry.
10. Paul McCartney
Ok, so he doesn’t exactly fit in with the other candidates, he doesn’t have a violent history, or any public misdemeanors, and always has a cheesy grin on his face. But he should be angry! After years of riding Lennon’s coattails the Beatles split-up, Paul grew the hugest mullet and started writing what would be remembered as some of the cheesiest pop songs in history. And if this wasn’t enough to make the man angry he is now getting divorced from his wife of four years and she’s taking half.
The man is worth 800 million pounds! With the pound equal to R12, 6 that comes to about R10080000000. That’s enough to buy shoes, from Pep at R40 a pair, for 252 000 000 people. I think we can comfortably say that Heather Mills did one better than Anna Nicole Smith (and she didn’t have to sleep with an old guy). Her effective salary was around 10 million pounds a month, so if Sir Paul isn’t a little bit pissed off I’d be pretty surprised. Remember kids: It’s called a pre-nup! Never leave home without one.
Who doesn’t love celebrities? This guy apparently. Deon Malan expresses his contempt for celebrity culture. Read it and weep, but please not too much.Modern society has brought us many things, some good, some bad. A recent invention allows doctors to keep the heart of a deceased person alive and beating by connecting it to a complicated heart-lung machine, which keeps the heart alive for about 12 hours after a person has died. If kept on ice, which is the case now, the heart only remains useful for about four hours, and thus the chances of finding a donor decreases significantly when comparing it to the 12 hour window created by this new invention. This is a positive and useful contribution to society. The following is not.
Celebrity Obsession is another product of society and is perpetuated by awesome publications such as Heat Magazine, and People Magazine to name but two. Once a week one can go down to the corner shop and purchase the latest issue of HEAT Magazine in which one can find a plethora of interesting facts on ones favourite celebrity’s, e.g. “Paris Hilton eats two hotdogs, read about it inside Heat pg 10. Last Thursday night Paris Hilton, famous heiress, home porn star, and regular alcoholic was spotted outside a famous club scoffing down two hot dogs. She was accompanied by famous fashion designer Tamagotchi Imakepuppetsfuckparis. Witnesses say that after she finished the hotdogs she disappeared around the corner, and when she returned had stain marks on her dress” or, "Paris Hilton faces Mike Tyson in a telekinetic showdown and loses” or, “Tom Cruise jumps off the top of the Empire State building and dies” (he believed he was going to fly). “Madonna buys a new leotard”, or “People finally realise The Osbournes are retarded and that’s why they’re on TV”, “James Blunt voted the most irritating voice ever heard on the planet”, “Puffy changes his name to PeeeDoodoo”, "Newsflash: Eminem divorces ex wife again and declares, : “ I hate my mother”", or , “ David Beckham gets a new hair style and Posh gains 10gms”, “Excess Magazine voted best magazine in the galaxy”, and other ridiculous stories!
What do these individuals offer us one might ask? In the case of Paris Hilton she is famous for being rich; she does not have anything useful to offer society except for a crappy porno, and the subliminal encouragement of teenage bulimia. As mentioned in the opening paragraph there have been some awesome inventions, some of which can save lives, unlike the lives of celebrities who don’t even have hearts or souls. So next time you pick up a tabloid magazine, remember that celebrities are not people, they are pictures in magazines.
UPDATE on today’s Facehack
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Things have escalated since this mornings post about the Facebook
confusion. It seems like Facebook has been scrambled to the extent that
people are receiv...
Bamboo Blitz: The Next Generation
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So it has been exactly one year and eight days since my last post. A lazy
Saturday and possibly one too many episodes of Sex and the City have
inspired me...
I have to commend Dane Cook on his script picking ability. For those of you who don’t know who Dane Cook is (i.e. most of the world), he is an American stand-up comic who is currently the new may be the next “it” boy. This means he has a bucket load of offers flying around him and the world will see a whole bunch of Dane Cook movies in a short period of time which will determine whether he will be a regular star or not. Think Sean William Scott after American Pie (1999), he followed that up with a barrage of leading roles: Road Trip (2000), Dude, Where’s My Car? (2000), Evolution (2001), American Pie 2 (2001), Stark Raving Mad (2002), Bulletproof Monk (2003), The Rundown (2003).
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