Goddamn Space Tourists

Galactic Suite, the first hotel planned in space, expects to open for business in 2012 and would allow guests to travel around the world in 80 minutes. Its Barcelona-based architects say it will be the most expensive in the galaxy, costing $4 million for a three-day stay.

During that time guests would see the sun rise 15 times a day and use Velcro suits to crawl around their pod rooms by sticking themselves to the walls like Spider-Man. Project director Xavier Claramunt says the three-bedroom boutique hotel's joined up pod structure, which makes it look like a model of molecules, was dictated by the fact that each pod room had to fit inside a rocket to be taken into space.

Galactic Suite began as a hobby for former aerospace engineer Claramunt, until a space enthusiast decided to front most of the $3 billion needed to build the hotel. An US company intent on colonising Mars, which sees Galaxy Suite as a first step, has since come on board, and private investors from Japan, the United States and the United Arab Emirates are in talks.

"We have calculated that there are 40,000 people in the world who could afford to stay at the hotel. Whether they will want to spend money on going into space, we just don't know."

Galactic Suite said the price included not only three nights in space. Guests also get eight weeks of intensive training at a James Bond-style space camp on a tropical island.

Lt. Colonel Creedon, Special Operations Director for UNETIDA, the United Nations body charged with protecting the Earth against Extra-Terrestrial attacks said: "Space is no place for tourists. Can we imagine what would happen if some middle-eastern oil-rich wog makes first-contact with an enemy alien aggressor? Yeah, I don't think I need to spell it out for you."

Source: Yahoo

Bourne Goes Out With A Bang!

Sorry this review is so late. I saw this last week when it came out, but I've been really busy and was unable to get the time to post.

Jason Bourne is back on the big screen for (what should be) the last time. In the excellent The Bourne Supremacy our hero found out more about himself including his real name David Webb and he achieves some measure of peace as he apologises to the daugher of his first victims.

However, in a bizarre, yet ingenious move by the creators of The Bourne Ultimatum- They start the film just after Supremacy's frenetic car chase before Bourne goes the US at all. While we do know some elements of what will happen there apparently there was quite a lot between Moscow and the time the was in New York. In fact we don't have Bourne set foot in the US until the last act of Ultimatum. Confusing? Until you see it perhaps, but it means that the movie is an adrenalin-fueled intercontinental thrill ride with all the staple Bourne action in interesting locales, this time round our amnesic hero clocks up air miles to Paris, London, Madrid, Tangier and finally New York.

Matt Damon was dubious about doing a sequel to The Bourne Identity. He had never done a sequel before, but he was wooed back to do Supremacy when he discovered that what the producers had in mind was bigger than Identity. I daresay that it was easier to get him back on board for the final time for Ultimatum as that too is even better than Supremacy. Damon is now quite comfortable with his character and it shows, needles to say he still practically the same emotionless brainwashed assassin in the field but in this one we see his barrier finally come down as he comes to terms with is past.

As this is more or less "The Bourne Supremacy 2", it was perfect to have Paul Greengrass return as director. Naturally as with all directors who do sequels to movies they originally directed, he tried to raise the bar - and suceeded. Joan Allen and Julia Styles' (right) return too and their characters are almost given the same development as Bourne which is a good thing. David Strathairn is brought on as the CIA deputy director who thinks he's going to eliminate Bourne this time and we also get cameos from Albert Finney and a now ancient Scott Glen. John Powell returns to score the final part of his inspired musical trilogy along with yet another new recording of Extreme Ways by Moby.

All in all it's impressive and well polished. A perfect book-end to a remarkable action-thriller trilogy. (Please Universal Pictures - Don't screw it up by even thinking of trying to make The Bourne Legacy)

Colonel Creedon Rating: *****+

SHUT IT! Sweeney movie coming

When I was a lad watching telly, I understood that whenever people were talking like President Reagan it was exciting, but when people were taking like Maggie Thatcher (or even Uncle Andy) it was boring. My point is that by comparison US TV was brilliant but UK TV was boring. I crept down the stairs late at night peeking through the open door to watch William Shatner take down another "Scuzzball" in T.J. Hooker. If I did the same thing while John Thaw was doing something similar on The Sweeney I'd have been either frightened or would have fallen asleep.

Things change when you get older and you learn to appreciate the fact that Hooker was childish nonescence compared with the raw grittiness of The Sweeney, a series way ahead of it's time. In it's day, far tougher and grittier than something like The Shield now. Jack Regan (John Inspector Morse Thaw) and the Metropolitan Police Flying Squad (named as their high speed pursuit vehicles were post-war RAF cars) tackled the worst and most mobile organised crime across London with no compunction about whose toes they step on while doing so.

While we're not going to get an updated television series of The Sweeney, I can say that currently in production is a movie remake, starring Ray The Departed Winstone (who actually had a guest role in the original series) as Jack Regan and directed by Nick Outlaw Love and written by Ian Kennedy Martin actually one of the original series creators!

I'd take this over a T.J. Hooker movie any day!

2IGTV Episode 47

In this exciting 47th installment: We first deal with our colossal mailbag (which increases with each passing episode). We have movie news in the form of Avatar, World Of Warcraft, Wolverine, The Hobbit, Postal, Thor and Conan. Hot TV news comes in the form of Stargate Atlantis and Heroes.
Hear The Colonel's initial thoughts on pilots for The Sarah Connor Chronicles (right), Bionic Woman and Flash Gordon plus Mark reviews demos of Stranglehold and Heavenly Sword and he gives us word from the HD-DVD / Blu-Ray battlefront.

It's all here now.

Leaked Dark Knight Images

Some relatively unknown website in Brazil got these images from The Dark Knight first apparently. They've been removed from AICN at the suggestion of Warner Bros. lawyers. See them here while you can. There's obviously no explanation as to what the fuck is going on in these shots so take them as they are. One things for sure I need to get some more monitors to catch up to Bruce Wayne, I've only half what he has at the moment.

Source: judao

Blacksite: Area 51 - There WERE WMDs!

Blacksite Area 51 is still currently in development at Midway Austin, time to give you an update on what's happening with this intriguing game.

As I posted previously: Blacksite: Area 51 is a first-person shooter that's predominantly set in and around the "secret" military research facility in Nevada. While only the small town of Rachel, was revealed previously, I now know that only to be one of five distinct areas that gamers will be doing battle in. Another location which I'm thrilled to detail is the Iraqi village of Ad Dawr (where Saddam Hussein was captured in 2003), this is apparently where the opening of the game will be set, a couple of years before the events that take place in subsequent levels.

Your mission, which takes place during the current real-world conflict, is to enter the village of Ad Dawr, locate an underground bunker where weapons of mass destruction are being researched (yes the WMDs were there - I saw them too dammit) and assassinate the guy running the operation. What is interesting to note is that the environment features more destructible elements than previously seen partly due to the addition of the Massive-D technology from Stranglehold - as the publisher of Stranglehold is also Midway there's obviously some sharing of code that will only serve to benefit the gamer in the long run.

AI has been heavily worked on too. In Iraq you have squadmates, each with quite different personalities. These will become evident through conversations, but also in the ways that they will react when orders didn't meet with their approval (sending them into an exposed area during a gunfight, for example) and the game's morale system kicked in. One team member may be quiet but another may be quick to voice displeasure and make sarcastic comments. In addition to affecting how your colleagues interact with you vocally, the morale system will have an impact on how effectively they follow your orders. If you keep your squad in cover and make sure you get involved in firefights at least as much as they do, they'll make very effective allies, but if you make a habit of endangering them while hanging back yourself they'll be less interested in risking their lives for you and might become preoccupied with self-preservation rather than killing the enemy. Basically I think this will teach people how to be as an effective small-unit commander as I am.

During Iraq you'll not only be equipped with a pistol, an assault rifle, and grenades, but some time with a powerful sniper rifle and a couple of machine gun turrets as well. The latter will prove very effective when should one want to make a mess of sandbag walls and other objects that enemies may use for cover, while the former is able to kill most enemies with a single, well-placed shot. Later in the game you'll be able to use weapons taken from fallen Alien enemies, including a gun that can fire through solid objects and a shotgun-style weapon with ricocheting projectiles.

Much like Half-Life 2, BlackSite: Area 51 will let you maintain control of your character during cinematics, which comes in very handy when conversations are interrupted abruptly. Midway has promiced that BlackSite: Area 51 will run at a steady 30 frames per second when it's finished.

The game should be arriving between October 26th and November 5th worldwide (US and EU).

Source: Gamespot

People should feel safer already!

The House handed President Bush a victory, voting to expand the government's abilities to eavesdrop without warrants on foreign suspects whose communications pass through the United States.

The 227-183 vote recently, followed the Senate's approval and sends the bill to Bush for his signature. He had urged Congress to approve it, saying "Protecting America is our most solemn obligation."

The administration said the measure is needed to speed the NSA's ability to intercept phone calls, e-mails and other communications involving foreign nationals "reasonably believed to be outside the United States." Namby-pamby Civil liberties groups and the idiotic Democrats naturally said it goes too far, possibly enabling the government to wiretap U.S. residents communicating with overseas parties without adequate oversight from courts or Congress.

The bill updates the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, known as FISA. It gives the US government leeway to intercept, without warrants, communications between foreigners that are routed through equipment in United States, provided that "foreign intelligence information" is at stake. Bush describes the effort as an anti-terrorist program, but the bill is not limited to terror suspects and could have wider applications, some lawmakers said.

Source: Fox News

ACTION MAN HAS NO FUCKING PLACE IN G.I.JOE MOVIE GODDAMMIT!!!

Word has leaked out about who will direct the live-action feature film version of G.I. Joe.

Stephen Sommers, the director behind Deep Rising, the first two Mummy films as well as Van Helsing, has been hired to helm the Lorenzo di Bonaventura production for Paramount-DreamWorks. The project will start immediately as studios are rushing many projects into production in advance of an expected industry strike that could last indefinitely. The filmmakers will mesh together two existing drafts by different screenwriters (Skip Woods' version and an earlier draft by the Four Brothers team of David Elliot & Paul Lovett).

The Mummy was a gem of a movie and Van Helsing while deeply flawed is acceptable nonsense are both proud members of my DVD collection, Deep Rising is something I enjoyed in the cinema and enjoy on TV when ever it's shown but The Mummy Returns was a turd. So unlike the flawless catalogue of Mike Bay, I'm not terribly excited Sommers.

What also upsets me is that they're still pushing the existing draft of Skip Woods script- the one with Action Man. ACTION MAN HAS NO FUCKING PLACE IN A G.I.JOE MOVIE GODDAMMIT!!! It appears Skip Wood’s origin aspects will be used alongside the Elliott/Lovett character storylines.

It's reported that: The producers are apparently keen on keeping the Action Man character in the film to make marketing of the film easier abroad including using that name for international territories to avoid any potential negative reactions that some parts of the world may have with the name G.I.Joe. The new GI Joe/Action Man team is expected to be made up of various individuals from around the world and will not be exclusively American or British. The characters will still be based from the original cartoons, toys and comics but with a globe-trotting flavor.

Okay, I understand the G.I.Joe name/issue, but back in the 1990's Hasbro renamed the Action Force brand to G.I.Joe because people were now completely familiar with G.I.Joe. So why the fuck don't they just call the bloody thing ACTION FORCE and leave Action Man alone. ACTION MAN HAS NO FUCKING PLACE IN G.I.JOE OR ACTION FORCE MOVIE GODDAMMIT!!!

The only good thing is that it appears at the moment that Jason Stratham is rumoured to appear as Action Man alongside Mark Wahlberg as Duke, but that's not enough to escape the fact that ACTION MAN HAS NO FUCKING PLACE IN G.I.JOE OR ACTION FORCE MOVIE GODDAMMIT!!!

Source: IGN, ISEB

Seraphim Falls: Almost Classic Cowboy Movie

In difference to a previous entry in the genre, there wasn't a faggot in sight for this little Cowboy Movie movie staring the cream of this island's acting talent, two lads born "up the road a bit" from me, Pierce Brosnan and Liam Neeson.

The movie takes place following the American Civil War. Brosnan's character Gideon, a former Union Army Captain is hiding out in the American Rockies hunted by Neeson as Colonel Morsman Carver, a former Confederate officer with an Ahab-like determination to apprehend Gideon. The settings of this chase-movie are breathtaking; snowy peaks, bountiful savannas and the barren deserts. The characters encountered are a cross section of the usual cliched evil ones you'd expects to find in such a dark movie as this; traders, railway foremen and Mormons.

Neeson and Brosnan don't let you down and thankfully the one-dimensional Richard Gere passed on the role of Gideon- I doubt I'd have enjoyed a scene where Gideon removes a bullet and cauterises his wound if it was Gere doing it. Ah hellshit- I probably wouldn't have bothered with this movie if it was Gere in it. Neeson plays a man who has lost almost every shred of humanity and his character sees the most growth from the two of them.

A fantastic first-effort from David Von Ancken one of the movies writers who keeps the pace a pretty standard fare for a good movie like this right up until about 15-20 minutes before the end- then everyone involved takes some acid and it almost falls apart. It doesn't ruin the movie, but I don't think that the ending they went with (complete with cameos from Wes Studi and Angelica Huston) suited such an otherwise finely crafted movie.

Final word: A breathtaking, well crafted and well acted classic revenge-western with an LSD induced ending.

Colonel Creedon Rating: ****

Goodbye Pam, we'll miss you. Not!

The pneumatic Pamela Anderson has consigned her acting "career" to history - because she prefers her new job as a magician's assistant.

The former Baywatch babe voiced her plans to quit Hollywood in a recent posting on her website, revealing she loves her "glamorous" role alongside illusionist Hans Klok so much, she's signed to stay on at his Las Vegas magic show until the end of the year.

She says, "I love theatre. My entrance broke on stage tonight. Crazy. But those are the moments. I'm having the best time. I want to be in Vegas forever. So glamorous.

"I'm rehearsing another illusion tonight. I'm definitely staying till December. Then who knows? No more TV or film. This is what I love doing. It's so over the top."

I know folks; it's been a slow news week...

Source: Yahoo News

Could Tom Cruise be Captain Pike?

I hope not. The latest Star Trek casting rumour was that J.J. Abrams wants Tom to play Captain Kirk's predecessor in a cameo as Captain Christopher Pike. Pike's appearence would be central to the Spock-centric storyline that Abrams appears to be following with the casting of both Zachary Quinto AND Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock. He's most certainly out for an A-List actor for the cameo as Spock's original C.O. and I guess time will tell if it's Cruise.

A Cruise spokesman was quick to deny the rumors, which already seemed unlikely due to the public feud between Cruise and Sumner Redstone but in recent months the Viacom honcho who ousted Cruise, has softened his rhetoric, leaving the door open for reconciliation. A cameo in Trek, however, would be a favor to Abrams and not to Paramount.

That said: Star Trek didn't succeed on being the most famous Television show in the world by casting real aliens :P

The liberal media need to realise that the campaign in Iraq is a success

The US presence in Iraq is still a hot issue. It is seen by many as a colossal mistake, that's been going on too long. How natural for the idiotic liberal media to take this stance. Naturally they ignore all the good done, and that now the tide is beginning to turn in Iraq and there is much success.

Here are the latest words from Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North on the subject...

* * * * *

“We’re in a generation-long battle against terrorism, against Al Qaeda-inspired terrorism, and this is a battle for which we can give no quarter. It’s a battle that’s got to be fought in military, diplomatic, intelligence, security, policing and ideological terms.”

That’s pretty strong stuff — and since those remarks were made this week at Camp David, one might think they were uttered by President Bush. However, they were spoken by Britain’s new prime minister, Gordon Brown, who the international media believe has reservations about the war in Iraq. “He gets it,” President Bush said of the Prime Minister’s stance on terrorism. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for the masters of the media.

For nearly two years, the press have been slavishly following liberal dogma and telling us that the war in Iraq is all but lost; that the region will never embrace democracy and that young Americans serving there are dying needlessly. Even before the “troop surge”, they were telling us that it wouldn’t work. And since the final contingent of additional troops arrived in theater most tried to convince us that it has failed. Some of them may even believe it, but that doesn’t make it true.

From my experience in eight trips to Iraq for FOX News since March 2003, reality in Iraq is rarely found on the front pages of our newspapers or in the lead stories in most broadcast news. There are but two principal reasons for the paucity of reality in what we’re seeing in print and on the air:

First, there is enormous antipathy in U.S. and European press rooms toward George W. Bush and his administration. It’s been that way since his first term and it isn’t going to go away. This predisposition — and the media’s congenital animus toward the American military — colors reporting on everything the president does or says to include the war coverage. Opposition politicians have taken advantage of this bias and its effect on the polls to reap political advantage. They saw the efficacy of this stratagem in the last two congressional elections and they intend to pursue it to capture the White House regardless of the damage done to our national security.

Second, despite the importance of the war to the American people, there are relatively few western — particularly American — journalists outside Baghdad’s “Green Zone.” Much of what we see on television is videotape bought from Arab cameramen, many of whom spend most of their time with their favorite Al Qaeda terror cell or Shia militia unit. My media “colleagues” then cut this tape — usually the aftermath of a heinous terror act — stand on the balcony of an air conditioned hotel room and tell us the “latest news” from the war. Lead stories rarely mention the courage and perseverance of American troops or their Iraqi counterparts, how many new schools, hospitals and police stations have been opened, or the clean water and sanitation that’s now available to the people of Mesopotamia.

Both of these factors have significantly altered Americans’ perceptions of what’s happening on the ground in Iraq. But that doesn’t change the fact that the “surge strategy” is working. The goals — announced by General Petraeus before he departed for Iraq, are being achieved: Add sufficient U.S. troops to give the Iraqi police and security forces time to recruit, train, arm and deploy; Seize and hold Al Qaeda and militia strongholds — and assure the people in those areas that the security forces are there to stay and prevent both acts of terror and sectarian violence;
Begin the process of political reform so that the people of Iraq have an equitable distribution of the nation’s oil wealth and rule of law so that disputes can be resolved without resorting to bullets and IEDs.

Last December — even before the additional troops arrived in Iraq — I reported how the “awakening” in violent Al Anbar Province had created conditions where, for the first time, Sunni police, Shia soldiers and American troops were working together against Al Qaeda.

Now, even The New York Times has had to acknowledge that the surge strategy is working by running an op-ed this week in which it was noted how strategic Al Anbar is now a model for the rest of the country, that “many of the corrupt and sectarian Iraqi commanders who once infested the [Iraqi Army] have been removed,” and that the delivery of basic services, such as electricity and clean water, are underway. They point to challenges ahead — but it’s a step in the right direction.

* * * * *

Thank you Colonel North, now it's time the rest of the world discovered the truth: The campaign in Iraq is a success and Bush should be praised.

Source: Fox News

2IGTV Episode 46

Comic-Con is the big event we cover tonight, with all it's exciting news on the Iron Man movie, Star Trek XI, Flash Gordon, DC Movies and more! Also, find out what we think of Transformers and The Simpsons Movie. We let you know who the new Punisher is and inform you about new movies Traitor and John Hancock. And yes, even though we obviously have much more than that lot, we do still have time to cover E3 and dip into our mail-bag!

Download it here.

Favreau knocks it out of the park (just with a trailer)!

Comic-Con, basically a convention for comic-book loving weirdos has just been held in San-Diego. And for the first time, I really wished I had been there. Not to see, The Dark Knight trailer, or to see Zach Quinto and Leonard Nimoy address the Trekkies. No it would be to see the first ever showing of footage from Iron Man.

Jon Favreau himself was on hand with some of the cast to present a short feature. "I think we worked the room really well. The thing is, get on get off… Show them something. Hit them in the face, and then just get out of there" he said in a later interview.

The footage features Stark, his accident, his excape from captivity in the Mk1 armour and ariel acrobatics of the more familiar red & gold design. "We did a mad scramble to get a couple shots going with ILM and they’ve been very cooperative, but if we were relying completely on the CG we wouldn’t have had anything; it would have been a little PowerPoint show and tell. Here we could actually begin to tell a story, because all that stuff… that’s all in camera…" Fav said.

See it for yourself here (please understand this was taken with a camcorder off to the side but you get the idea).

What I do want you all to hear is the cheer. The cheer when Iron Man is revealed. The cheers when he does some fantastic shit on screen. Captain America will never get a cheer like that, he's just not cool enough. Stark comes accross as a complete asshole in this. And it's right, Stark is an asshole, he's real. He's more real than any comic-book character in existence. And he supports the government that protects you. He's a patriot, not a traitor.

Simpsons Movie is fun, but sadly lacking

A fantastic score from Hans Zimmer and nifty new shadows on the animation couldn't change the fact that this was just an extended episode of the TV series. As Homer himself suggested to us before the excellent title sequence: "You're all mugs who've paid good money to sit there and watch something we do on TV for free." I thought it was funny at the time but now I see that Homer was being deeply prophetic.

That said, even though it was an "epic" episode and not the revolutionary extravaganza promised for the last four years, it was still a rather amusing "epic" episode. The laughs didn't not really let up and some of the gags were gems including an appearance from Tom Hanks, a suicidal bomb disposal robot and Fox advertising during the movie. My favourite was the fleet of a thousand Ospreys carrying a dome to encase the pollution-ridden Springfield!

I wasn't as disappointed in this as I was with the Mr. Bean movie. Mr. Bean was, is and will be the funniest thing on Television for all time. But he only works in half-hour doses, any more than two episodes at a time and you want to see something else. They tried something new with Bean by Americanising his adventure and failed miserably- but they tried something new! There was no such effort injected into this film and that's what's really disappointing.

However, this is still The Simpson's, it's fun, watch it on DVD at Christmas.

Colonel Creedon Rating: ***1/2

Quinto is Spock!

It has been rumoured for some time, but it was just confirmed that Zachary Quinto (Sylar on Heroes / Kaufman on 24: Day 3) is the new Mr. Spock.

I'm very pleased. Quinto is perfect for the role.

I can also tell you that Leonard Nimoy himself will also appear. As who is unknown at this point. Kirk and Bones have yet to be cast.

More soon.

.

The Iron Gauntlet

Thanks to my old college buddy Declan who sent me a link to this picture of Robert Tony Stark Downey Jnr. with a first look at Iron Man's armoured gauntlet.

Cool eh?

Source: Gizmondo, Declan

Transformers: The Greatest Movie of the Decade

I had no idea it was going to be this good. Seriously. I mean what did we have? Giant robots that looked vaguely like some plastic toys I had from about '84 to '88 that had a tie-in comic book and cartoon series? Alright- so there was some nostalgic value there much like the upcoming G.I.Joe, I bit. Then Mike Bay comes along, fair enough he's already cemented himself as one of the greatest motion picture directors of of the past 20 years, if not all time. But even I was sceptical, even of the wondrous talent of Bay that he could pull this off. The Island did not achieve the status of The Rock, Armageddon or Con Air and Bad Boys 2 was pale in comparison to it's predecessor so I'll admit that I was beginning to think that Mr. Bay may have started to loose it.

Never in my entire life have I been so wrong.

I said it in the title: Transformers is the Greatest Movie of the Decade, I offer Spider-Man, Mission: Impossible 2, 300, Underworld, Gladiator and The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King as examples of previous movies which I would assume would be contenders for that title (there are others but not many) certainly there are not as many between 2000 and 2007 as there were between 1990 and 1997, but for now Transformers is king.

Michael Bay returns to Armageddon form (he even ingeniously includes a character line "This is better than Armageddon" as the Autobots land on earth). There is more military hardware on show here than Pearl Harbor, Bay runs the camera almost sexually over aircraft, artillery and modern weapons that gave me an instant hard-on. His obligatory silhouetted Black helicopters in slow-motion and his almost homo-erotic framing of a group of military-types walking towards the camera in slo-mo as well made their welcome return. I think there was more military tech-geek-talk in this movie than any of his previous projects a credit to the advisers I posted about earlier.

The Comic-Book had Buster, and the TV show had Spike so when Shia LeBeouf was cast I wasn't as concerned as others as it was plainly obvious that the producers were following the adventure of young Sam Witwiky which was more in keeping with the source material than just following the military response to the Transformers, not that we had a shortage of that however. LeBeouf had a good part in Constantine and after seeing how good he was in Transformers, I have no problem with his appearance in Indy 4.

Josh Duhamel (Danny in Las Vegas) who reminds me as a sort of cross between Johnny Knoxville and Timothy Olyphant is Captain Lennox, our human "Hero" character who is pivotal in the human's fight against that which they thought impossible. Other juicy parts are dished out to John Voight, Kevin Dunn, John Turturro, Tyrese Gibson and even the excellent Glenn (Aaron Pierce in 24) Morshower gets to play a Marine Colonel :) However even though the movie has all these well known names/faces, I'm compelled by some strange force to post only this picture of the aptly named Megan Fox.

But enough about the "fleshlings", what about the giant, transformin' fuckin' robots???! Well if you remember that advertisement for... was it a Citroen?- who gives a shit? You know the one I'm on about with the transforming car. Well the transformations in this film are pretty much like that, but in a larger scale and much faster but with guns and weapons. They don't hold hand-weapons like they did in other incarnations, now the weapons are built in and like pop out of their arms or their arms transform into weapons which makes a lot of sense. Voice acting was top notch with the much hyped appearence of both Peter Cullen - the original voice for Optimus Prime and Hugo Weaving himself as the evil Megatron. Explaining anything else would lessen the impact of what you will see on screen but safe to say that these guys ain't those toys you had as kids. In many ways they're better.

The script was a gem, the perfect pace, balance of humour, action and drama, a credit to writers Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman, their faithfulness to the "essence" of Transformers while updating it for the 21st century has filled me with hope for their next effort - Star Trek. Steve The Island Jablonsky, through his magnificent music makes no secret that he's one of Hans Zimmer's trained composers and it's as if he channelled the Prince of Film Music himself to create a rich, multi-textured musical adventure of his own behind the action, yet accompanying it perfectly. The pyrotechnics on show here are pretty much what you'd expect from the director of The Rock, Armageddon, The Island, Bad Boys, Pearl Harbor etc. and it surprises most folk that Bay's budget was only $147m compared with $210m for the woeful X-Men: The Last Stand or even an insane $258m for the piece of shit Spider-Man 3, considering the flawless quality of and the sheer amount of CGI!! It just goes to show what you can do without an A-list actor inflating the budget beyond insanity.

The only possible problem I've scraped from the bottom of the barrel from this movie is that Voight as SECDEF Keller tries to use a mobile in the National Military Command Center. I can guarantee that mobiles are prohibited (even to the likes of me and even the SECDEF) inside such a facility. That aside, the analyst smuggling a memory card out of the NMCC was a bit far-fetched but I'll forgive it as a) it advanced the plot and b) The theft was discovered and an appropriate response was issued.

Finally, if you see only one movie this decade - I order you to go now and witness a true masterwork of motion picture presentation, and join Michael Bay on a virtual roller coaster ride the like of which you have never experienced.

Colonel Creedon Rating: STARS ARE MEANINGLESS IF A MOVIE REACHES THIS LEVEL!

Special Note: Star Wars Revenge of the Sith is deliberatly omitted from the lists that appear here as it's not a film, it's a religion.

2IGTV Episode 45

In episode 45, we deal with our comments first and then have some news on the Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek and Flash Gordon (right) front. Germany so enraged by cultist Tom Cruise's desire to film in Berlin they give him $6.5m! Zemeckis' Beowulf may be something to see. Guess who wants to remake Bullitt? The Man of Steel's sequel is a go and Alec Baldwin demands you boycott his terrible movie.

Also, Mark reveals why he's so enamoured with the Disney business model and why ditching their substandard direct-to-DVD line could bring the Mouse House crashing down. Also The Colonel mentions Bruce Campbell's new show Burn Notice one too many times.

All this and much more here.

Military was heavilly involved in Transformers

Naturally I'm excited about the Transformers movie which opens here on Friday 27th. After seeing what I've posted below on Military.com recently, my mind was at rest that the military aspects at least were being overseen by the military liaison office. You see, Hollywood’s depiction of the U.S. military is often laughably inaccurate to those who wear the uniform, including myself who gets quite irate when I see a military-mistake on screen. This however is not for lack of effort on the part of the military services and the Defense Department. Bay has gathered a lot of respect from people in the military since his geek-like attention to historical detail in Pearl Harbor and it seems like the liaison offices will bend over backwards for him now and not just because he's one of the greatest motion-picture directors ever, but because Bay's movies generate a shitload of dough for military coffers to fund the necessary campaign against terror around the world. Read on:

To achieve maximum accuracy in movies and on television, the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard and DoD have liaison offices to help guide filmmakers through the process. The services operate independently of each other in this endeavor but share office space on the same floor of a Los Angeles building. The Defense Department’s entertainment media division is run from the Pentagon.

“If we decide to cooperate on a project, we stay with them throughout all the scenes that have military or DoD depictions,” said Army Lt. Col Paul Sinor, a public affairs officer with that service’s Office of the Chief of Public Affairs. This task covers a broad spectrum, from making sure uniforms and equipment are correct to coordinating filming on military bases, said Air Force Capt. Christian Hodge, a project officer with the Air Force Entertainment Liaison Office. Both Sinor and Hodge worked on Transformers, directed by Michael Bay.

Military involvement with a film project normally begins with script review. All projects must ultimately get DoD approval to move forward. “The first thing we look at in the screenplay is the portrayal of the military to make sure it’s realistic, obviously within the parameters of the script,” Sinor said. “Transformers is obviously science fiction. The Army has never fought giant robots, but if we did, this is probably how we’d do it.”

After reviewing the script, military liaison officers meet with producers or writers to make suggestions about how to ensure the military portrayal is as accurate as possible. “Sometimes the writer or producer really want those suggestions, other times there are creative differences and they want to keep it the way it was originally written,” Hodge said.

Sometimes filmmakers will get permission to film military ships and aircraft as they perform their regular missions. “But more often, the director wants specific shots, so then we go through the process of billing the production company,” he said. For example, aircraft are billed at an hourly rate, and each comes with a different price tag. “We’ve got F-22s that run about $25,000 an hour to T-38s that are about $3,500,” Hodge said. "We make lots of money, but we spend lots of money too.”

Sinor stressed that no expense is ever incurred by the government or taxpayers. Servicemembers who serve as extras are on leave and are paid by the production company, as are crews who fly the aircraft. He also said military participation in films takes a back seat to mission responsibilities. A National Guard unit that was supposed to participate in the filming of Transformers pulled out at the last minute because of a mission requirement, he said.

Another aspect of Sinor’s job is ensuring that actors look and act like the real deal. He took a group of actors from Transformers to Fort Irwin, in the California desert, to get up to speed on how to properly handle a weapon, move across open areas, and clear buildings. “The kinds of things the script called for,” he said. Actor Josh Duhamel, said this was a valuable part of the preparation process. “We wanted to look as realistic as possible and do the military proud. That was our main focus,” he said. “I have a lot of respect for the people in the military.”

Ian Bryce, one of the producers of Transformers, said DoD and the services have been good at providing what the filmmakers need to make the movie work.

“Without the superb military support we’ve gotten on this film, it would be an entirely different-looking film,” Bryce said. “Once you get Pentagon approval, you’ve created a win-win situation. We want to cooperate with the Pentagon to show them off in the most positive light, and the Pentagon likewise wants to give us the resources to be able to do that.”

Hodge agreed and said it’s been great working with both director Bay and producer Bryce. “They’ve been very receptive to a lot of our suggestions,” he said. “They took into consideration several of our suggestions and added some lines to the script to make it more accurate. That’s pretty cool.”

Source: Military.com