NIGHTHOOD WRITES A REVIEW!

This is posted by me, but is all Nighthood's work:

Once, I decided I would make a film. It was a re-enactment of Ben-Hur, but all I had were 3 friends and a cheese sandwich. I gave up, but later discovered that if I had persevered, I could become a cult hero with an unhealthy obsession for Fats Waller. Ok, so this story is fictional, but so is “Be kind, Rewind”, a sweet movie about a couple of guys put into a bad position. Mos Def plays Mike, who is tasked with tending to Mr Fletcher’s (Danny Glover) video store, “Be kind, Rewind”. Mike is given special orders not to allow Jerry (Jack Black), Mike’s friend, and an absolute conspiracy nut, into the shop. Of course, this law is breached, and after getting his whole body magnetised, Jerry proceeds to wipe every single film in the shop. Struck with the dilemma of how they are going to get “Ghostbusters” to a customer, they decide to re-enact the whole film in a scrap yard and library, leaving out special effects in favour of good, old fashioned camera cutting. This continues when a customer wants “Rush Hour 2” by the end of the day. This results in an absolutely hilarious remake of the iconic(ish) bamboo scaffolding scene, as Jerry sends small children flying from a climbing frame. At this point, the 2 guys are a little worried of quite what the people will think of the film, and, without going too much into the plot of the movie, the consensus is good, and eventually ends with a small film studio. However, due to some interesting copyright laws, all the tapes have to be destroyed. Well, that’s about as much as I can be bothered to write, so now all I need to do is get myself allowed onto the blog. Tsk.

Rundown -

Shooting: Not with this budget!

Characterization: 7

Soundtrack: 5

Plot: 9

Effects: Do tinfoil, tinsel and caps count as effects?

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Bear wrestling: 9

Overall J-score: 8.5/10. As likeable as a film about 2 men with absolutely no sex life and a video camera can be...

Very good eh? I would also like to say that if nay of you haventread my J-filosophy below (as this was posted like straight after) please read it, it was made of effort, my back is sweating...

J-filosophy - 'an exclusive look at the nature of humanity, life and everything'

I had an epiphany today, and it was a realization that I don't like anything, I hate everyone apart from Java and the whole nature of the universe infuriates me, to the degree of near suicide and as i write this, I would like you to realize this post may not be joke filled as my usual.

humans are designed by nature and evolution to exploit everything, to exploit food sources, to exploit land and to exploit energy, we are also made to hate everything that is not us, we are designed to be wary of other cultures and their influences and be wary of change, but this sort of extreme fear mixed with out intelligence gives us our dominance, we strive to destroy everything but ourselves, we desire for wealth greater than ourselves and we wish not for peace, but for whatever situation will benefit us as the individual the most.

You see we are made to break the rules of nature - which is rather ironic - and thus our primitive instincts have developed throughout history, as our technology and understanding has greatened so has our capacity to override instinct and ascend out of our animalistic ways, so, great you are thinking, yes, wonderful, but what happened if this trend ends? What happens when we stagnate? Wars, lots of wars, wars over nothing wars which destroy everything we know and love. Truly that is our nature.

“Destruction cometh; and they shall seek peace, and there shall be none.” Says the bible, and that is right, on small fronts and on a global scale; you see if humans do not have a greater agenda, if they do not have wealth to obtain through peaceful means and if they do not have technological hopes, then we fall to war, an end to peace in all forms and the apocalypse, now, this may not happen, it is not certainty, but as we continue to face obstacles in our economic and intellectual expansion, and the population becomes ignorant and they produce babies of evil, the probability of this end to our species rises, as global warming threatens our security, wars in the middle east over oil and the Americans seek to enforce the rapture, we become conceited imperialistic and racist.

Now, this is nothing new, for eternity empires have struggled for dominance, but never before with such power and with such at stake, nuclear arms capable of eradicating the planet, sit passively in myriad silos waiting for the button to be pressed which shall single the end of everything we know and allot we don't. As technology develops, so does destruction, thus, if we stop developing new technologies we signal the end to everything and if we do we signal the end to everything, but, there is a way out...

“Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. (Psalms 30:5)” The end is never really the end, despite what I have said, humanity matters not on a universal scale, but its brief existence raises some questions. Why did nature develop its destruction? why did our planet Seal it's doom? Why did evolution see fit to make us, when simpler creatures could create a worthy ecosystem independently? and Why, does anything exist anyway?! I know none of the answers to any of these questions, and only speculation exists, but that drive keeps us motivated and moving along as an intelligent civilization, there is a small gap in the mesh of Life, we can beat nature, we can beat the universe, we are God's.

First of all, we need to defeat global warming, then we need to form one massive global country with shared wealth and capitalistic ideals, then we need to perfect renewable energy, and finally we need to develop deep space travel. Just watch the original series of Star Trek, such a perfect society, such a hippy show, but thats what we need to achieve, and more. You see the planet we live on and nature will keep trying to destroy us, with ice ages, global warming, resources shortages and our own crude nature; to survive we must seize our nature and bend it into an unrecognizable but wonderful state, we need to destroy instinct, we need to spread our culture and people so far that the death of a whole galaxy would not even phase us. however the basic form of humanity will alter greatly, with different forms of human adapting in different ways across the the universe, we will cease to be one species and will ascend to become something greater, something unimaginable, something great. In short we need to force ourselves to evolve in a way that defies nature, we need to cease to be human.

“I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. (Jeremiah 29:11)” The Lord is nature and nature is the Lord, they wish to destroy us for they have created their doom, of course they are fictional, they do not exist other than in the very forces of the universe, maybe our creation was an inevitable accident spun in the insecurities of the very laws of the universe, we could except our fate as martyrs, or we could struggle on in spite of everything and spit in the face of the universe, our nature is to exploit, so let us bring an end to the exploitation of each other and exploit the universe, to live, to ascend , to realize our potential we need to kill God.

“Everything is possible for him who believes.” Mark 9:23 - Take heart from the words of God my friends for ironically we shall need them to destroy him, for the only way to live is to change and the only way to change is to destroy nature and become our own force, and until that day, which shall probably never happen, I will continue to hate everything and everyone, but Java for “He only is my rock and my salvation: he is my defense; I shall not be moved.”

Rundown (of the Universe, God, Nature and Evolution) -

Shooting: 0

Characterization: 10

Soundtrack: 0

Plot: 0

Effects: 10

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Common sense: 0

Overall J-score: 1/10

“Without wood a fire goes out; without gossip a quarrel dies down”

J-Film #4 - 'Semi-pro'

I am in an angry mood lately and i shall not say G'evenang to you, i shall just say "why the holy fucktarded chicken licking savage do Americans pronounce semi, Sem-I, seriously are they that broken in the head that as well as itching to nuke every oil wielding country this hemisphere, they have to spell wrong and mutilate the language in which my glorious reviews are written in!?!?!"

With that out of the way however, I can now actually review something, and that something is, namely, 'Semeeeeee-pro'. Now as my Fingers caress the keyboard with inhuman grace only developed through eons of shooting head-crabs, and i spell almost every word wrong, a question is in my head and that question my loyal simpletons is "What is the nature of a comedy? What is its purpose? and What does it need to make it effective?" and now i shall answer those three questions respectively.

The nature of a comedy is to make fun of occurrences everyday or otherwise, its purpose is to use this 'piss-taking' to make people laugh; and after all laughing is a form of entertainment. Thus a genre is born, so, i know what you are thinking, oh well any laymen who only had 15 GCSE's an A level in philosophy and a masters in ponciness from Oxford with a sandwich working in Harvard's Gay wing could work that out and you would be right. You see, the problem arises with the third question, here you have to take into account myriad genres, how they function and what aspects they use to brand them as entertainment, and ultimately art. Thus Effectively you are asking the first two questions for every possible genre and sub-genre just to work out the answer to the third question. I also know what you are thinking at this point "Oh dear, thats far too poncey for me, ill just pretend I understand"

So after several hard minutes of my Fagmosexual brain whirring and a complete second without taking the piss out of Clover field, I now have the answer, but be warned its not a short one. You see Every film needs a story, and every joke within a comedy needs a context that can be easily and quickly applied to it, in other words the bear eating the commissioner of the NBA needs to make sense. Okay, so a comedy needs a story to make it funny, what does it also need? Relativity, thats an easy one, if you cant relate to the joke and if it means nothing to you it's not funny, do i need to explain that further? Good. One more thing is essential however and is the most important thing EVER; even when A joke has a basis in story, is relative to your experiences and knowledge, it still needs to be Funny. I will not go any further on this, as I am now 519 words in and haven't discussed the film at all, but I will point out, at this point you need to work out what funny actually means, anyways on with the J-film.

Where the above ponceyness fits in with the actual film, is thats its a comedy and yes I do realize I could have told you that in one sentence but i thought i would confuse you first.

First of all this Will Ferrel comedy is not as good as 'Talledaga (fuck the spelling) nights' but is the typical light hearted comedy, with a straight forward plot consisting of Team needs to win big game, team wins big game elements, which are averagely orchestrated with an average cast of actors, excluding Will Ferrel, who I rather like.

The film is fun, full of basket balls and has a brilliant LOL moment involving a bear, but it just simply cannot compete with the 'running over the race car finish line in slow motion moment' in 'TD' there isn't much more to say really, its enjoyably funny, th acting is slightly sub par the effects are rather lovely, the story is average, 'meh' its all right. But it is fair to say, when I'm the editor to 'Art Gay Monthly' in a big pink building with 'PONCE' scribbled over the door in a supposedly artistic manner, this film will not be in my top 10. On another final note, i would also like to express the fact that if you wanted to know how good the film actually was you could skip down to the rundown, but i wasn't about to tell you that at the beginning was I?

Next time I shall be reviewing 'Diary of the Dead' (I mean if they let me into Rambo ill have no trouble with this) and that should be, how do you say? "FUCKING AWESOME YOU CUNT"


Rundown -

Shooting: 7

Characterization: 4

Soundtrack: 5

Plot: 5

Effects: 8

Variable field dependent on context and genre - Bear wrestling: 9

Overall J-score: 5.5/10 J-FILM MEH SEE

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com

*as you could probably tell I'm feeling in a particularly Poncarrogant (yay i invented an adjective!) mood

Crackdown Review (X360)

For years the love that gamers have for Rocket Launchers has rested uneasily with the love that I have for being the good guy. For some reason, whatever it is, the good guys never have the really cool guns. It's always the terrorists with the RPGs and really big machine guns, never the police.

Fortunately Crackdown sees things differently. You play a genetically enhanced super cop wearing something very much like a Nanosuit tasked with cleaning up the streets. The key feature of the game is that you are essentially a superhero, by the end of the game capable of causing biblical amounts of damage.

This certainly seems like a fun premise for a game, and usually in a review I would now go on to say how this links in with the story. The main problem with crackdown is there isn't one. You're simply chucked out into the city with 10 gang bosses per area to take down and once you've done that the game is pretty much over. The city has no crime, your skills will all be full and you will quickly become very, very bored. It's a pity that the game is so insubstantial in this way but it is, in part, offset by the skill advancement mechanics, which replace the story as the main hook of the game.

You start the game with your core abilities (strength, agility, explosives, firearms and driving) at 0. This means that your lock on aim is slow, your explosives do little damage, your jumping is unimpressive and cars handle quite badly. To improve each of your skills (apart from agility which I'll get to later) you kill gang members using the skill, for example running gang members over increases driving, shooting gang members increases firearms etc. As your skills increase you become more powerful, able to lock on faster, drive better and cause more damage with explosives. It's surprisingly compelling and I've wasted many a happy hour grinding to improve my skills. Well, I say grinding; it's a lot more amusing than killing endless goblins on WoW due to the alarming speed with which fights build up, especially in the later stages of the game. You'll soon find yourself surrounded by armies of hit squads trying to take you down and the thrill of seeing 20 of them flying up into the air thanks to a well placed grenade is amazing.

As I mentioned before the exception to the skill mechanic is agility. Rather than increasing that through combat you pick up agility orbs scattered in hard to reach places around the city. They're graded according to difficulty and, as with the rest of the skill system, very fun to try and seek out/get to. There are also hidden orbs which increase all of your skills around the city and finding them takes some doing. If all of this "finding things" in tedious then fear not, as the city is so chock full of pickups it's impossible not to find them, at least at first.

Ah, that city. Crackdown is set in Pacific City, the usual anonymous American fare we're used to seeing in games such as GTA except for one key difference: it's vertical. Most buildings can be scaled even at a low agility level and the rooftops of all the buildings are very intricately put together. You'll spend quite a lot of time at roof level and it really does feel like a whole different game once you're up there, watching the traffic snaking by below. The attention to detail throughout the city is just amazing and gets better with every new district you go to. Apparently the city is divided into individually modeled "blocks" and it shows. I've yet to find a building that isn't interesting in some way, be it the rubber duck hidden on the rooftop or the challenging climb to an agility orb.

For all the fun it is, there are a fair few problems that do spoil Crackdown slightly, aside from the lack of a story. For a start you get punished for killing civilians by losing skill points. I don't mind this system particularly but later in the game when your grenades have a hit radius akin to a nuke it's impossible not to end up killing innocents along with gang members and being punished for this can sometimes be very irritating. If they'd altered the system so it ignored the death of innocents when gang members were also killed it would be much better, as constantly losing skill points makes upgrading that extra bit harder. Another minor irritation is the commentator for the game, a disembodied voice who gives you guidance as you go along. At first he seems awesome, giving you tips as you progress like a tutorial. After a while, however, you realise that he goes on giving you the same tips constantly thoughout the game, whether you're a raw recruit or a seasoned player. It's quite annoying being told in the middle of a firefight that the bar in the top left shows your health, when you've known that for the past 5 hours. He's also quite often wrong, telling me I'm about to die when I've actually got full health.

Still, these few problems are nothing more than minor irritations which you soon forget as you 'splode gang members with grenades, kick them far into the air with super strength and then leap away over a tall building, cackling with glee. It's also of note that the game features online co-op, allowing it to be played all the way through with a friend- a nice side effect of having no story. In conclusion then this is simply one of the most joyous experiences on the X360 right now and it's great whether you want a casual 10 minute laugh or a proper 2 hour playing session.

I give the game 83%

New Iron Man Trailer

So we get an extra day this month, this being a leap year and all. To celebrate we get a new Iron Man Trailer to watch. Woooo!

First, let us get the pessimism out of the way. Superhero movies have consistently let me down. Take X3, amazing trailer with a disappointing final product. Last summer let me down. Look at Spiderman 3, amazing potential with a disappointing final product. There are so many ways in which this could go wrong. The first Act could suck, for almost all origin stories do. The Final act could suck, because almost all final fights are anticlimactic. The middle could suck, due to a vagueness of baddies and motive. The direction could suck, the acting could suck, the special effects could suck. This could fail in so many ways.

Now for the hope. The idea of Iron man is awesome. The most important feature of a superhero is their heroics. Think what you will of Superman, is I was about to die, I believe that he could, and would, save me. A certain level of ability needs to be reached. The second most important feature is fragility. A hero needs to have problems, some moral choice or reason behind their actions. This is why Spiderman 2 was so brilliant, it was about Peter Parker. Robert Downey Junior can pull this off. If he can be unstoppable and troubled, then this film should be brilliant.

Secondly - have you seen how awesome that suit looks! It flies! I believe it flies! It has rockets that come out of his forearms! If they can pull this off, then it will be amazing!

Here is the link I used to see the trailer - http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=22092

This is a great trailer. I want to see this film, and it is coming very soon - May 2nd. I. Cannot. Wait.

me dancing, one for the scrap book

J-Film #3 - 'Rambo'

Well, hello guys, before I start digging into the lovely meat of the film I would like to commend Javaguy on such a witty piece of satirical literature, Everything he says about me is true, he indeed knows me very well, so congratulations Java, very, very well done. With that out the way time for 'Rambo'.

'Rambo' is a gory film, in-fact it borders on genocide and the kill rate could be compared to the holocaust and this makes it highly unsuitable for children, wimps and people who don't like people being shot, also it has allot of murder, torture and rape with the added bonus of footage of real Burmese atrocities. so, lovely you are thinking sarcastically and you would probably be thinking right, DO NOT SEE THIS IF THE IDEA OF RAMBO DEALING VERY STRICT REVENGE ON SAVAGES, WITH THEIR SAVAGERY BEING DEPICTED IN DETAIL. On the other hand, if like me, you are a sick demented bastard who likes to watch chavs be stabbed in the kidneys repeatedly while screaming in in-human agony, this my friend, is the film for you.

The story is basic Rambo, set in Burma and thats about it, the most important thing about this film has been its superior action. The first thing worth pointing out on this front, would be that of the ballistics and the way they blow stuff apart. Now, i was fortunate enough to have an ex-soldier sitting next to me in the cinema, who upon the first scene was amazed at just how realistic bullet sounds, effects and wounds were, and this is an actual quote "Wow, I'm gonna start ducking in a minute!" 'Nuff said.

Now, don't get me wrong the very idea of Rambo is corny, but this film has NO cheesy lines that make you grimace and the few breaks in the action take nothing away from this short but tense piece of art, the pace is fast visually eloquent and elegant, and the visceral adrenaline rush you feel as yet another cardboard cut out rapist is blown to pieces with a 50. cal machine gun, is nothing but truly awe inspiring and when i say blown to pieces i mean blown to pieces. assorted anatomical components fly thick and furiously in this utterly amazing chunk of brilliant cinema, the music blares out as AK47's churn out slug after slug and a barrette 50. cal blows Burmese soldiers 50 feet down the road and there really is nothing to fault, seriously, this is like Yahtzee's review of portal, this is a mute review, 'Rambo' is good, very, very good.

The structure is wonderful as well, The Burmese are built up so evilly it's in-human AND THIS JUST EXACERBATES YOU INSATIABLE BLOOD-LUST, YOU WANT THESE PEOPLE KILLED SO BADLY YOU ARE WILLING TO DISMEMBER GHANDI TO GET JUSTICE!!!! Sorry i shouldn't have go t so pumped there, my legs are still shaking from the adrenaline thats how good this film really is, shame there was only two flamethrowers though...

If you can be bothered to look however there are small American allegories popping up everywhere, but i didn't eve notice till my hate fulled Dad pointed them out, so, the best way to think of the film upon entering is a 90 minute chunk of American action and the American's are great and just appreciate this superb rage filled adventure for what it is; and thats why this small negative paragraph is stuck right on the bottom, it is insignificant, to a very great degree. see this film NOW.

Rundown -

Shooting: 8

Characterization: 9

Soundtrack: 7

Plot: 7

Effects: 10

Variable field dependent on context and genre - YES, YES KILL THE MOTHERFUCKER NOW!!!!!! NOW!!!!!!!! YEEEEEEEEES! - 10

Overall J-score: 9/10 J-FILM MUST SEE

If there is anything you would like little Johnny to know or would like to subscribe to my mass mailing alert service do not hesitate to email me at Johnny.neicho@sky.com