Sunday 24 July 2016

TRAVELOGUE, Pantha Du Prince and Bojack Horseman

I sadly once again missed last week as Latitude slightly took over my weekend. It’s also to do with the weather being so lovely recently, making it harder and harder to write and actually produce meaningful work. A lot of the last two weeks has consisted of sitting outside, listening to podcasts and music whilst indulging in tv shows and films when the sun starts to go behind the clouds. It’s been a very relaxed time, so don’t expect much to have happened.

The one piece of work that I did manage to actually ‘finish’ was creating an online shop for myself. ‘Online shop’ being a loose term to describe the creation of a Redbubble account and uploading all my designs to the site. This is something that I’ve wanted to do for a while, with the designs being a combination of my work from Internet Relations alongside random Vaporwave designs that I create for my own personal t-shirt use. The beauty of Redbubble is that you can have these designs printed on all sorts of things, from t-shirts to iPhone cases, which fully embodies the ideas embedded within the original artwork. It also, in a purely capitalist sense, makes me some money if/when people do buy the products. The various designs can be accessed through my website here: http://www.bobbicknell-knight.com/#/double-dipping/ Each design can be put onto any piece of clothing, the images on my website are simply examples.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about new ideas alongside the concepts that I wanted to fabricate at the beginning of this summer period. Last weeks ‘tree’ idea; showing various real life trees being chopped down contrasted with video game trees living on for all eternity, hasn’t been created yet as I’ve slightly moved on from the initial concept. I’m currently considering creating a looping film with footage taken from a downhill mountain biking game from the PlayStation 1 era of videogames. These games, in contrast to newer video games on the market, were never updated, never ‘patched’, as the console couldn’t actually connect to the internet. This keeps the game ‘pure’, unable to be changed or distorted, with the original discs living forever with the same mountain biking man seemingly cycling down the same mountain for all eternity. I like the idea of using something from a bygone era, an era where it was impossible for a large company to access something of yours remotely, as it wasn’t connected to the internet. In the video that I’m envisioning the biker would go down a hill, with trees either side, with the path (seemingly) never ending, the loop continuing on until the television is ultimately unplugged. This makes me think of various works by Jon Rafman, one of which, titled Leviathan, shows the fastest Skyrim ‘speed run’ displayed on a silicone covered Alienware laptop. No one is going to stay and watch the whole thing, who knows if the game is actually completed or not?
I also like the idea of contrasting this with something, something that shows how changeable real life can be, how much ‘everything’ is ‘moving forward’. At first I thought that the tree being chopped down could embody this idea, or maybe various car crashes? Contrasting the endless mountain biking with horrific real life crashes? I later thought about displaying the film Samsara, a feature length movie that looks at the various aspects of the world, alongside the endless biking. For me, this film fully embodies ‘everything’ that’s occurring in this world, so there may be too much content embedded within the film to show as a piece of re-appropriated artwork. I still need to think about it, and actually start to make something. I think the sun is just way too inviting right now to do anything indoors, and that’s probably okay as it’s the holidays.
I still really want to write up a contract for no screen time. It’s slowly changed from writing it for me to writing it for the first world society that we’re living in. It’ll function as a downloadable document for anyone to use. This will have the look of a serious document, which can actually be used for said purpose, but in actuality it’ll be satirising people who make the comment that we should be living in a ‘screen-less’ society, whilst getting their ‘message’ across using YouTube or online forums. So this will have an outwardly serious tone, but an underlying note of cynicism and sarcasm. I just need to spend a few days researching these documents, or get one to repurpose as my own. I want to get this done.
In other news, I’ve been invited to take part in a group exhibition called TRAVELOGUE in Mantua, Italy. It’ll be the first time my work is exhibited outside of the UK, which is exciting within itself. The work that was ‘requested’ to be featured was Simulated Ignorance, a seemingly simple work that I created earlier in the year that features a 17-minute car journey occurring in first person mode in GTA5. In contrast to how you usually see the GTA games portrayed in ‘the media’, within this video the ‘player’ drives around ‘normally’, not crashing into anyone whilst conforming to traffic lights and speed limits. The video will be displayed alongside the controller pictured in the original ‘in situ’ photograph too, simulating some sort of control that the viewer of the work ultimately never has. I’m really excited for the show, and although I won’t actually be able to go, I look forward to seeing the documentation of the event. Oh and I’m also going to take part in a text interview for it too, which will be equally exciting.
I also heard back from an opportunity I had applied for ‘The Ten Human Years of Preta Eshana’. It sounded interesting and weird. I applied with my sound piece for the video Utopian Realism. I’m not entirely sure if I will have to create a new piece of work for this, or whether the piece of music I submitted will simply be part of the final project… I’m sure I’ll find out soon enough though, for now I got in and that’s just generally good to know.
In the past week my opportunity isthisit? finally got accepted to CuratorSpace after waiting for literally 3 months. I basically bought into the site rather than simply having the free version and heard back with two days. I doubt that’s any coincidence, but whatever. Now that it is viewable on the site I’ve been getting so many submissions, which is really exciting, allowing me to properly curate the different works, leading to more interesting micro exhibitions as well as better works created by established artists. I’m actually really excited about the continued expansion of the site and want to keep going for as long as possible, basically until I stop getting submissions.
I’ve been continuing to submit to lots of things recently too, it’s a very good way of procrastinating, as it’s still ‘working’, just admin work that can be done without really thinking. At some point I’ll either be incredibly disappointed with the amount of rejections I get or incredibly swamped by emails to reply to.

Last week’s isthisit? #12 only featured one artist, Jamie Rose, with various videos from a series titled Caine Comparisons; vaguely detailed breakdowns of Michael Caine’s acting performances. You can view last week’s exhibition here: http://isthis.wix.com/isthisit#!12/j9rzk
This week’s exhibition #13, had work from 3 artists, Ben Galyas, Marissa Wedenig and Aidan Johnson (Clerk 37). The works all revolved around Galyas’ video work, which was made up of various images flashing up on the screen. Mostly images from popular culture, pixelated slightly, making it seem like they’re clippings taken from newspapers. This creates a stream of consciousness which becomes even more chaotic with the addition of Clerk 37’s incredibly frenzied footwork/drum and bass soundscape. This is ‘topped off’ with Wedenig’s stylised painting that focuses on late night texts with newly formed relationships. I feel that each piece works well with one another, forming this fast paced environment to experience. Even though my curatorial instincts might not be that good, I’m still enjoying this process a lot, especially being submitted work that I would never really encounter by people that live in far off places. You can see this week’s here: http://isthis.wix.com/isthisit And if you are an artist and reading this, do submit by clicking on the ‘open call’ part of the website.
It was an ‘interesting’ experience to go to Latitude. It’s a festival that I used to go to about four or five years ago that I used to love, but now it’s kind of like I’ve ‘changed’ with age, but it’s stayed the same. It has the same crappy bands accompanied by a bunch of young teenagers jumping around and creating mosh pits to indie music. It doesn’t really work. Although it was nice to go and sit in the sun for a couple of days, overall it was a depressing nostalgia trip.
I did manage to see one or two interesting things however. One of my favourites, simply for the performance aspect, was Pantha Du Prince. A German producer of various genres of music. Although the music was interesting within itself accompanied by complex aesthetic visuals, throughout the performance the three artists would put on different hats and masks. They first appeared wearing these inverted dome shaped hats, somehow enabling the musicians to reflect the light and the smoke simultaneously. They then proceeded to wear different featureless masks. I really enjoyed this performative aspect and made me appreciate the music more. Definitely one of those times when it’s better to see it live.
Seeing Loyle Carner was good, although I couldn’t really relate to anything that he was singing/rapping about, so I kind of just relaxed into the sounds behind his voice. Probably a mistake, but does it matter?
I also saw Lapsely that day, alongside Beirut, music to lounge around to (in my opinion) rather than standing around, being crushed into a ball. So good, but bad because of the setting.
Seeing Sophie on Saturday was a huge let down. I’m a big fan of his work, alongside various artists coming under the PC Music label, but seeing it live just wasn’t that interesting; especially when incredibly young people are jumping around in front of you, making you feel incredibly inappropriate.
I had the same problem with various other acts throughout the weekend; Mura Masa, Roots Manuva and Jamie Woon. All interesting people to listen to when you’re sitting down having a beer, but not so great when teenagers are leaping around. I’m sure they’re having a good time, it’s just, I’m not. Maybe I’m being too pessimistic about the whole thing…
Other than Latitude, I’ve been going on a lot of walks by the beach recently, either alone or with others. It’s really nice to go from living in London to living so close to the beach and being able to simply go and experience it whenever you want. Maybe I want to make some work about the beach at some point, the serenity of it, the power… We will see.
Other than that I’ve watched a few things, I finished Seinfeld, which ended up being very funny. Although as I learned more about the characters, rather than liking them, I began to hate them. They’re actually terrible, selfish, self-obsessed people who you would not want to be associated with. I’m sure that’s the point of course.
I started to watch Lady Dynamite, an incredibly knowing and meta show centred around an actress getting over a mental breakdown. It’s surprisingly funny and sharp.
Alongside this I watched all of season 3 of Bojack Horseman; something that I’ve been waiting for since season 2 came out around this time last year. The whole thing is quite beautiful, depressing and incredibly heartfelt. If you haven’t watched the show because it’s an animation, you’re really restricting yourself. I can’t wait for season 4.
I’ve also started to watch Jessica Jones, which has its interesting moments. I like the idea of someone having very minimal super powers, something that can give you an edge over your opponent but not entirely. For some reason I want it to be darker, grittier, although it has a small element of that, I want more. By the time I finish it maybe that will have kicked in? Only time can tell.
On top of this I watched The Jinx, a short documentary series looking at the accused murderer Robert Durst. It was okay, although I wasn’t really that drawn in by the premise, I think I liked Making a Murderer more, although it is really hard to concentrate on anything in this heat, so maybe I should re-watch at some point?
Obviously I’ve also watched a bunch of films, not as many as I’d have liked as I was slightly Seinfeld obsessed for a while. One of the most enjoyable films of the past few weeks was The Nice Guys, just a really good action comedy. It made me think a lot of the Starsky and Hutch remake with Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson, with the aesthetic of Boogie Nights and the drug addled-nuss of Inherent Vice. I was just smiling throughout the whole thing, definitely an enjoyable light film that can be loved for what it is.
A very weird and kind of shit film was The Voices. Centred around Ryan Reynolds slowly going mental. You can enjoy it for what it is, a crap comedy crime film. You just have to relax into how not very good it is and you’ll have an ‘okay’ time. Definitely not worth your time.
A simply beautiful film that I’m incredibly surprised that I hadn’t seen before was Brokeback Mountain. It’s been on my list for so long, and is referenced in some many things, I’m just happy to have finally seen it. It’s incredibly saddening, lovingly filmed with quiet observations telling a heart-breaking story.
Black Dynamite was an interesting film, a B movie Blaxploitation action film about standing up to ‘The Man’ with kung fu and a thirst for revenge. I’ve been a fan of the animated series for a while, but had never really got around to watching the film that spawned said show. It’s a very weird film, one that I’m unsure if I’d recommend... It’s such a mix of various film genres that you just have to relax into and appreciate it for what it is. It’s fun and loose.
Exam is one of those ‘sci-fi but not overtly sci-fi’ films. Set entirely within one room, eight candidates have to answer one question which is on a piece of paper in front of them. It’s unfortunately not as clever as it thinks it is, which is kind of a shame, as I enjoy the premise.
I also watched Central Intelligence, which was kind of fun actually. I laughed at least six times, it had some fun characters… It was what it was, I didn’t expect anything more from it.
Another film that comes under the heading ‘enjoyable but forgetful’ was Keanu, an action comedy centred around a stolen cat that keeps changing hands. It was fun for a while and kept me entertained. I did enjoy how Keanu Reeves makes a brief voice acting appearance as the cat in question called Keanu, but apart from that nothing particularly special was occurring.
Unfortunately, I watched the terrible Man of Steel, which was just dull with a tedious plot.
I then went onto watch Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice which was even worse. The plot was dull and longwinded and the central premise didn’t really make sense to me; surely Batman is clever enough to realise that Superman wasn’t the route of all evil? That’s 3 hours of my life (it seems that I may have accidentally watched the extended cut) gone. The reason why I watched both of these terrible films was so that when I watch Suicide Squad at some point in the future I can understand the lore, but in reality, I probably shouldn’t have bothered.
The last film of the week, Platoon, was very good. I feel a little like once you’ve seen one of these war/army/Vietnam films you’ve seen them all; moments of monotony and idle chat interspersed with flashes of extreme violence and moral crises. However, all the films that come under that particular banner (Apocalypse Now, The Thin Red Line, Full Metal Jacket, etc) are all really good and worth watching.
I think that may be all the films I watched, pitiful considering I missed last week’s post, but never mind.

I’ve been slowly chipping away at The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, hardly making a dent in the epic masterpiece. The quests are already incredibly interesting, with every choice tinged with a murky grey that makes you feel uncomfortable, even though it’s ‘just a videogame’. That’s what I love about Role Playing videogames (and videogames in general); you’re actually making these terrible decisions. In film you’d be watching the characters making these awful decisions, but in a videogame you are the person making the decisions and you get to see those decisions change the world around you in various ways; creating your own unique experience.
I think that might be the end to the last two weeks, unless I think of anything else I’ve done. Lots of sitting around, lots of sun. That’s about it. I want to make some progress in the next week in my various projects, but I feel that does depend on how the weather is slightly, as the heat makes it quite impossible to actually think properly. So I guess I’ll see how it goes, keep applying for things and keep attempting to create.

Enjoi.

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Monday 11 July 2016

The British Art Show, Girlhood and Doom

So, after missing out last week, I now have two weeks to catch up on; mostly centering on watching films and indulging in tv shows whilst sitting in the sun. Surprisingly, some art was made, and even more surprisingly some art was actually seen.

Focusing in on the art making for a moment, a few works are now in development, some more promising than others; with most of them visualising simple ideas that have been had, cobbling together some sort of narrative in my head and simply putting something together.

I – sort of – combined both the copyright project together with the Vaporwave music idea. Taking all of the previously gathered footage from the top music videos on YouTube, I then proceeded to overlay a Muzak soundscape on top; basically elevator music, smooth jazz, etc. This is used to highlight how the music videos are basically all the same; incredibly generic, dull and catering to a mass audience, alongside the music that usually accompanies these videos. They’re songs that are subconsciously played at a party, as it’s something that everyone knows or turned up on the radio and isn’t turned off automatically.

Now that the piece is basically finished I need to consider how to install the video in an installation. This could manifest simply as a laptop on a bland desk; something that can be distorted and changed. A more interesting approach would be to imbed the video in a stereotypical person’s room who would listen to the original music. Ironically, this is probably everyone who has had access to a computer, due to the extortionate view count on the original YouTube clips. I’m currently envisioning the installation (or set) that Jon Rafman created for the video work Sticky Drama of the teenage boys’ room. Obviously minus all the weirdness, but a simple child’s room would work I think. Maybe I need to ask someone if I can use their room for an ‘in situ’ photograph; although I don’t want to be too stereotypical… I’ll look into it. For now, the video can be found here: https://vimeo.com/173250243 The title is ‘consume’ in Japanese, referencing the many links to Japanese culture within the Vaporwave genre.
Another work that’s manifested itself this week was due in part to the lack of good quality internet at my home. For some reason or another the 3G and signal completely cuts out every now and then, which ultimately leads to anarchy in the household. In order to gain signal on my phone, I went for a walk to see if I could find any ‘bars’. I discovered that about 100 metres into a field behind my house there was a small singular bar available. Throughout the day I returned to this spot every hour or so. During one of these trips I took a photograph which I uploaded to Instagram with the caption ‘the internet is down.’ This formed part of an installation that I created later that day whilst the internet was still down. It reminds me a lot of the work that Evan Roth’s been doing recently; getting closer to the internet by visiting the various sites where fiber optic cables come out of the ocean to connect to the land. The act of journeying out of my house in order to connect with people over the internet was really interesting to me, mixing the real with the virtual. I decided to display the original Instagram photograph on my iPhone, alongside a bundle of dying Rapeseed plants, which is included in the photograph. Combining the real and the virtual once again, the dying plant combined with the image which will never die; as long as the phone is kept on charge. I think it was a fun mini project. You can see the finished work on my website here: http://www.bobbicknell-knight.com/#/the-internet-is-down/
Another video based work that was made in the last few weeks looks at the continuing advances in AI technology. Instead of looking at that from ‘now’ however, the video takes the viewpoint from someone in the past, considering what’s to come. This is a slight extension of my video work from earlier on in the year Utopian Realism. Although it takes a different form, I feel that it has the same time stamp being put upon it, reflecting on the future to come from someone in the past. Although in saying that, this aspect of the work isn’t very apparent in either works, apart from being subtly hinted at by way of the software used/the films being referenced. I could take a very didactic approach to this work, creating a narrator among other things, but as of yet I don’t feel quite ‘up’ to that. For the moment this new video contains two clips, the backdrop contains footage from Videodrome; a film that considers the horrors of television and new media and how they corrupt the body and soul. The particular clip features James Woods as Max Renn seductively stroking a television screen. Overlaid on top is a found YouTube video, showing a man apparently having sex with a computer. For the moment there are two iterations of the video, one with Computer Love by Kraftwerk happening in the background, and one without. The videos can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrxjSHM2zn0 and here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pM5wzJigBa8 The title references the classic scene in Titanic, you know the one.
Yet again, I’m unsure of how to display this work. It would definitely work to show it on an old style television accompanied by David Cronenberg esque props. Or maybe that’s continuing on with that theme a little too much. I need to think about this a little and consider it some more. For now, the videos are there for anyone to view.

Another piece that’s currently in progress is going to be looking at the difference between the virtual and the real once again, considering the dying environment and the seemingly invincible nature of the virtual. For the moment, the plan is to harness two of my huge screens, with a video showing a tree being cut down on one whilst on the other a virtual tree, swaying in the wind. It would be interesting to add in a dialogue, considering the tree or the environment, maybe taking a passage from a book or something. I’m unsure as of yet, but it would be great to actually do something like that, as I’m yet to actually attempt it. This will develop as time goes on.

I’ve been continuing to apply for things regularly, with one such application requiring ‘abstract video work’. None of my video pieces are that abstract, so I decided to make a purely aesthetic video using various assets from the internet. You can see the video here, not my best work, but a submission nonetheless: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhaG-8UJSEI
Those are some of the things I’ve been working on alongside going to ‘British Art Show 8’ in Norwich, which actually had some fantastic work. It’s a huge show, spanning three different venues throughout the city, with about ten incredible works to see. One of my favourites was Yuri Pattinson’s installation that contained a video work alongside a bitcoin mining machine. The video showed these machines being made at a farm in China whilst the machine IRL continued to mine for coins in real time. It was a very good piece and made me very excited to go and see his solo show at Chisenhale Gallery.
Another favourite was Rachel Maclean’s long form film Feed Me. Like most of her films, it was political, distressing and incredibly well done with a sickly sheen of sparkles and saturation. The sheer amount of green screen involved in her works is astonishing and hugely impressive. Just the amount of work being put in is awe inspiring, not to mention the quality of the content involved in these complex masterpieces. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to watch the whole thing as it was an hour long and only teaser trailers are available online; maybe I should go back at some point to watch the whole thing. Is it worth it?
Other high quality works included various sculptures and creations by Ryan Gander. These were all very clever and ‘solid’ works as usual, with my favourites being a series of works titled The way things collide, familiar objects in seemingly random pairings protruding half-formed from wooden bases; very slick and refined.
Laure Prouvost had a really exciting installation which made participation non-negotiable. The room that you walked into acted like a living organism, with various appliances turning on and off to a steady rhythm accompanied by a ghostly voice confronting the viewer. I’m really enjoying her recent works, especially the installation A Way To Leak, Lick, Leek, with the floor distortions being a high point for me.
Melanie Gilligan’s series of video works coming under the banner of The Common Sense was kind of interesting, a drama set in a fictional future world where you wear a device called ‘the Patch’ that allows you to rate and review everything; showing your feelings with a click of a button. I enjoyed the premise, but it was badly put together, with the acting not as good as it should have been alongside some very weak special effects. It was made even more painful as these ideas have been looked into in high quality tv dramas like Black Mirror or any number of sci-fi films, with a lot better acting and a fully realised storyline. I enjoyed the premise but was disappointed by the outcome.
Benedict Drew’s crazed installation was visually impressive but didn’t give me any substance to hang on to. Lots of things but not a lot of ideas; saying that though, it was a very impressive thing to actually see.
That was the one and only art based show that I went to. Other than that I’ve been slowly working my way through some tv shows. After finishing Curb Your Enthusiasm (which I highly recommend) I went onto watch Seinfeld, which is not as good, but still funny. It feels like one of ‘those shows’ that everyone knows, like Friends but for a previous generation. The theme song is now my ringtone, which is also Jon Rafman’s. I’m eagerly awaiting the return of Bojack Horseman and Mr. Robot, so Seinfeld will do for the time being.
I also began watching Knight Rider, a combination of total shit and hilarity. I’m unsure if I can continue on or not... 
The past two weeks on isthisit? have been quite successful, with week #10 showing work by Kez Dearmer and Eden Mitsenmacher. I feel that Deamer’s simple pastel piece reflecting on life and the various colours that become prominent when summer occurs worked well with Mitsenmacher’s video, focusing in on the hand and how it’s used to dream, and escape ‘to the woods’. Check it out here: http://isthis.wix.com/isthisit#!10/e6o4j
This week, #11, has a soundscape by Mel Azevedo accompanying some images by William Dalton. The soundscape was created by recording the various sounds in Oxford Circus; capturing the highpoint of consumerism and capitalism. Dalton’s images show him touching the tallest buildings in London, bringing them down to a human level of interaction whilst kind of admiring their beautiful structural integrity. Both consider wealth and monetary value, so I thought they would work well together. Check this week out here: http://isthis.wix.com/isthisit
I’ve been watching many films too, mostly great with the rare instance of utter boredom. One of my favourites was A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence. It was just so absurd, making you constantly think ‘what the fuck is happening?’ and over analysing everything that’s going on. Anything I say at this point can’t do it any justice; just go and watch it, it’s so worth it.
One of the failures was Warcraft: The Beginning, a film that didn’t really give me anything. From what I can remember a battle happened, someone betrayed someone else and there was a baby, with no real explanation as to why it was so important. That is literally what I got from the film; the plot was terrible alongside some characters which weren’t really likeable or interesting. I know I’m not the target audience (having never played the MMO before) but you have to give something to non-players. The really annoying thing for me is that Duncan Jones could have been working on an original project during this time. I love Moon and Source Code so much that I just felt betrayed by this director. I think I was just disappointed…
Green Room was incredibly ‘visceral’ and ‘raw’, buzzwords that sum up Jeremy Saulnier’s previous film Blue Ruin alongside this newer, more dramatic release. The premise is basic, with a group of musicians being trapped in a green room, but the layers are slowly peeled back with amateur violence and some fairly good acting. I look forward to his next project.
Tom Hiddleston in I Saw the Light made the film for me. His acting is always incredible, really encompassing the various characters that he portrays. Elizabeth Olsen was also pretty great, but never really being able to surpass her role in Martha Marcy May Marlene, but still good nonetheless. It’s also always vaguely enjoyable to learn about things that I only know a little about, obviously this isn’t a ‘pure’ biography, but still…
I was surprised by the fact that I hadn’t seen Galaxy Quest, which was quite fun. It was a nice, family friendly film that slightly surprised me. It was fun and that’s about all I can ask for.
Repo Man was interesting to say the least. I don’t really know what I saw, be it a comedy, be it a sci-fi or a mixture of the two. It became slightly nonsensical as it continued on, but it wasn’t unwatchable. I just had no real idea as to what was actually happening; a weird 80s film.
I was kind of disappointed by Me Before You, all the controversy surrounding it made it seem a lot more interesting and ‘edgy’ than it actually was. It’s the fact that it’s a PG film, so it doesn’t actually confront any of the intricacies of being disabled. Obviously there are PG films out there which are interesting and have a very real message, but this was just kind of dull, with some really bad dialogue. Although I’m a fan of Emilia Clarke in Game of Thrones, in this her acting was just terrible. This may be because of the drastic tonal shift between the two characters that she’s known for, but bearing that in mind, I just couldn’t cope. To be honest, I didn’t really get the controversy surrounding it, but I’m not disabled in any way, so that may be just me being ignorant... Instead of the film saying that ‘every disabled person is better off dead’ it’s preaching that everyone is unique and is able to make their own decisions, rather than being forced to do something or be someone that you don’t actually want to be. That’s just my view of a below average film, that probably got more people going to see the it because of the controversy that was surrounding it.
Girlhood was very good, with really great performances by the main characters alongside a vaguely original story. You get to see a really interesting transformation of Marieme (the protagonist) over the course of the film, from shy teenager to a high class drug dealer. I was thoroughly captivated throughout the film, which would make a great accompaniment to Boyhood (an obvious statement but still worthwhile).
I’m disappointed in myself that I watched Marauders. I wanted something with guns, something with action. Basically, I wanted Jason Bourne to be released a month earlier. I don’t know what I was expecting, Bruce Willis being one of the leads should have hinted at how bad the film was going to be. There’s two hours I won’t be getting back…
Sing Street was lovely, a PG film that actually took the young people who would be watching it seriously. It all just made you smile, the 80s music, the situations, the yearning to get away from your childhood home. It was a good, solid film.
Z for Zachariah was kind of basic, some basic acting alongside a slightly simple plot line. It was maybe too simple for its own good; I understand what it was trying to do, I just didn’t like what it was trying to do. It was okay, it passed the time, but is that really a compliment?
Cold Souls was another weird one, a nice premise stretched to 100 minutes with a very confused plot. I wasn’t fully convinced. I wanted it to be more Being John Malkovich than it was, I just wanted it to be more overtly something. It was missing that something that I can’t quite comprehend, but it was missing it nonetheless.
The Lawnmower Man was more interesting idea wise than anything (virtual reality, etc). It felt a lot like Hackers; film makers exploring aspects of life with either not enough knowledge or just too soon in various technologies life spans. It was fun, obviously slightly dated (1992) but I appreciated it for what it was at the time.
The final film was Elvis & Nixon. A film whose main actors acceded the quite basic premise and plot line. It felt like they’d been paid a lot of money to be there. That’s not to say the acting was bad, just the idea. Based on a photograph of Elvis shaking Nixon’s hand, the movie poses the question of what happened when these two ‘super powers’ met in 1970. It was light and enjoyable, just not what you really want from the two incredible leads.
Now, onto video games. A fair few have been played in the past two weeks and although I don’t like to ‘overload’ on these things, the interactive medium is really great sometimes; with amazing interactive stories and moments of pure enjoyment.

The first game on the list coming under the banner of ‘pure dumb enjoyment’ is the rebooted version of Doom. The combat is so fun and fluid that there’s never a dull moment, accompanied by a bare bones story that attempts to keep out of the players’ way. Highly recommended.
Another game that’s ‘just for fun’ was OlliOlli2: Welcome to Olliwood. An incredibly technical game that’s extremely intuitive and very satisfying to complete. It requires nimble hands and quick thinking, with similarities to Hotline Miami in terms of how frustrated one can get in the lead up to the completion of a level. The moment of euphoria that you encounter when you finally finish a level that you’ve repeated countless times is a satisfying pay off and the soundtrack that accompanies these various failures is also brilliant, tying everything together perfectly.
Returning to a younger self, I played the rebooted version of the first Ratchet and Clank game. The whole thing is kind of a love letter to the original, which I’m completely happy with. It was like I was transported back to a 10-year-old version of myself, which is just a lovely feeling altogether. The visuals are great alongside a new-ish story. I think I still prefer the original, which will always be a favourite of mine.
I also played the single player of Battlefield Hardline. It was just dull and kind of unimaginative, yet again I wanted more from it, but it’s hard to expect anything from a First Person Shooter focused on multiplayer as its main draw…
The final game that I’m continuing to play is The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. I’m yet to fully get into it, but if it’s anything like the first two games in the series I know I’m in for a good time, alongside all the 5 star reviews that adorn the various trailers for the game.
I think that’s my two weeks; mostly spent doing nothing at all, slowly melting into various rugs in the garden, but I feel like that’s okay sometimes. It’s nice to relax and not think about things sometimes. Not all the time, but sometimes… In the coming week I hope to continue the video works that I’m thinking about, as well as finally starting on the video game creation maybe, if it’s not too sunny outside. I’m also going to Latitude Festival, so hopefully some art will be seen then, alongside listening to some good music, although the majority of the music is about 5 years out of date for me. I guess I’ll wait and see…

Enjoi.

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