WeatherGirl’s Station

The 2006 World Cup opened today and I must say the opening match between Germany and Costa Rica was most enjoyable. The score was 4-2 in favour of the Germans.

Tomorrow is England’s first game. Keep your fingers crossed!

Current temperature 57F/14C

Sorting through my ‘to finish’ posts I discovered this review that for some reason I never posted. So it’s a year late but, what the heck, here it is any way.

Best of the prequels. I’m sad though, because it (as well as the other prequels) had so much potential and it wasn’t realised. Mr Lucas really should have given his outline to a scriptwriter with a list of ‘this has to happen’ and then hung out with the ILM guys while someone else wrote and directed this puppy. The script once again sucks. It’s so bad I’ll say that again, the script sucks. Much of the positive response to this movie, I suspect is the fans ‘filling in’ from their own imaginations.

I did enjoy seeing Anakin become Darth Vader. Ian McDiamond just rocked as the Chancellor. Liked the Anakin/Obi Wan dynamic, ObiWan’s disappointment was palpable. And yes the visual effects just rocked.

After watching RotS I went back and watched Attack of the Clones and part 2 definitely improved with part 3 being around. There was a lot more resonance in part 2, without part 3 it just hung there incomplete. I also checked out the deleted scenes section on AotC and discovered that the producers and GL clearly have no clue about what you need to tell a great story. There were a number of scenes they had cut ‘because they didn’t move the story along’. BOLLOCKS. They were getting rid of anything that might help the audience believe in the Anakin/Padme relationship and anything that established Padme as a strong independent character. Watching them talk about deleting these particular scenes made me want to slap them upside the head. I don’t get these guys, having a strong female character alongside the strong male character does not castrate the male character. Sheesh.

Enough ranting, I suspect the fanfiction writers will fix it all up and give us the fully fleshed out and well written story of Anakin’s descent to the darkside.

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Tasty. I don’t know how this will play on rewatching but for a first viewing it was great. There are lots of twists and turns so you have to pay attention and if you engage your brain you will be well rewarded. The film has a great visual style and a wonderful cast. There was one off-note in how things resolved but given how much I had enjoyed the ride to that point I was willing to forgive the misstep.

Current temperature 70F/21C

? The boys really enjoyed this movie and laughed all the way through. Me, I didn’t get into it until the last third. The voices didn’t work for me. Just because you’ve got big name actors doesn’t mean they can do great voice work. Voice acting is a skill in its own right and I didn’t find this cast to be very interesting vocally. YMMV.

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Disappointing. After parts one and two I was really looking forward to this film but then disaster struck, Bryan Singer abandoned ship for Superman and Brett Ratner took over. It shows, the directing is abysmal. This is the weakest of all the movies, plot holes abound and way to many new X-Men are introduced in a perfunctory manner.

Check out what Pharyngula had to say about the whole debacle.

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From Article 2 of the United Nations Convention Against Torture:

No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat or war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.

Perhaps Shrub should demonstrate he’s not illiterate and read the Convention for himself. It’s not difficult and is quite straightforward.

He might pay particular attention to Article 11 since he seems to be having a problem with that one.

For those who think American’s should just ignore anything generated by the United Nations (c/o Amnesty International USA)

The United States ratified the Convention against Torture in October 1994. The Convention entered into force for the United States on November 20, 1994.

If signatories to such an important document can’t be bothered to respect it where is the higher moral ground?

UN International Day in Support of Victims of Torture is 26th June and will be celebrated in Minnesota at 11.30 am at the State Capitol Rotunda, St. Paul. (Information curtesy of The Center for Victims of Torture.)

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