books, Uncategorized

0848 – New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future by James Bridle (2018 book)

As the world around us increases in technological complexity, our understanding of it diminishes. Underlying this trend is a single idea: the belief that our existence is understandable through computation, and more data is enough to help us build a better world.
In reality, we are lost in a sea of information, increasingly divided by fundamentalism, simplistic narratives, conspiracy theories, and post-factual politics. Meanwhile, those in power use our lack of understanding to further their own interests. Despite the apparent accessibility of information, we’re living in a new Dark Age.

new dark age

From rogue financial systems to shopping algorithms, from artificial intelligence to state secrecy, we no longer understand how our world is governed or presented to us. The media is filled with unverifiable speculation, much of it generated by anonymous software, while companies dominate their employees through surveillance and the threat of automation.
In his brilliant new work, leading artist and writer James Bridle surveys the history of art, technology, and information systems, and reveals the dark clouds that gather over our dreams of the digital sublime. (VERSO)

James Bridle on New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future



man always makes it clear to himself: “You are using things which have the intention of not being penetrable.” 1180

movies, Uncategorized

0839 – Gauguin – Voyage de Tahiti (2017)

timespace coordinates: 1891 – 1893 France – Tahiti / French Polynesia

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Gauguin – Voyage de Tahiti is a 2017 biopic / period drama directed by Edouard Deluc  The film stars  Vincent Cassel and Tuheï Adams,

In 1891 Gauguin settles down in Tahiti, where he hopes to find inspiration for his work as an artist and live as a free man in the wild, far from all the moral, political and aesthetic codes of civilized Europe. In the jungle, he faces loneliness, poverty and disease, and he meets Tehura. She eventually becomes his wife and the main subject of his greatest paintings.

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movies

0833 – The Wicker Man (1973)

timespace coordinates: 1973  remote Hebridean island Summerisle

THE WICKER MAN - Australian Poster 1

The Wicker Man is a 1973 British mystery horror film directed by Robin Hardy. It stars Edward WoodwardBritt EklandDiane CilentoIngrid Pitt, and Christopher Lee. The screenplay by Anthony Shaffer, inspired by David Pinner‘s 1967 novel Ritual, centres on the visit of Police Sergeant Neil Howie to the isolated island of Summerisle, in search of a missing girl. Howie, a devout Christian, is appalled to find that the inhabitants of the island have abandoned Christianity and now practise a form of Celtic paganism.

In 2011, a spiritual sequel entitled The Wicker Tree was released to mixed reviews. This film was also directed by Hardy, and featured Lee in a cameo appearance. (wiki)

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Potential graphic novel and third film   /   Wicker man   /   imdb

movies

0753 – Death Wish (2018)

timespace coordinates: 2016 Chicago

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Death Wish is a 2018 American vigilante action thriller film directed by Eli Roth and written by Joe Carnahan. It is the sixth installment of the Death Wish series and a remake of the 1974 film of the same name starring Charles Bronson, based on Brian Garfield‘s 1972 novel. The film stars Bruce Willis as Paul Kersey, a Chicago doctor who sets out to get revenge on the men who attacked his family. Vincent D’OnofrioElisabeth ShueDean Norris, and Kimberly Elise also star.

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music, Uncategorized

727 – The Dead Texan – The Dead Texan (2004)

“I like to think that my time toiling under buzzing fluorescent lighting in a giant sporting goods warehouse superstore during my teenage years helped me to understand pain and boredom a little better. I spent about a year at that particular pit stop, but it’s the summer days I remember most vividly—standing at my perch in the back in that gigantic refrigerated warehouse full of sneakers, exercise machines and spandex athletic wear, just able to make out the intense light from the sun reflecting off the cars in the parking lot through the automatic glass doors as it scattered in the front of the store, those echoes of light the only hint that it was in fact summer at all (not counting the occasional sweaty jock looking for Nike dry-fit jogging pants).

Anyway, the point of that protracted ramble into my scarred adolescence is that though angry punk rock songs sound tracked my discontent in those days, I can’t help but think that Adam Wiltzie’s ethereal solo debut under the moniker the Dead Texan fits my memories of that monotonous summer far better. The lush, slow chord progressions that cycle and cycle and build and build seem like the perfect expression of a lost summer afternoon, just out of reach. The warm, near-death, barely conscious songs like “La Ballade D’Alain Georgee” lend a sad weight to anything, though for some reason the connection to that empty warehouse, a cold box in the hot summer sun keeps coming to mind…(read more here)

movies

720 – Into the Forest (2015)

timespace coordinates:  the near future, British Columbia – remotely located home in an old-growth forest during a massive, continent-wide power outage that appears to be part of an overall technological collapse.

36fafb0b4ddd72d6eb6af19962d9ed78Into the Forest is a 2015 Canadian drama/ end-of-the-world thriller written and directed by Patricia Rozema starring Ellen Page and Evan Rachel Wood. The film is based on the book written by Jean Hegland published in 1996.  *scored by Max Richter.

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movies

0719 – A Prayer Before Dawn (2017)

timespace coordinates:  late 2000’s Chiang Mai Prison, Klong Prem Central Prison aka “Bangkok Hilton,” Thailand.

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A Prayer Before Dawn is a 2017 internationally co-produced prison-/boxing-/survival-drama film directed by Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire, from a screenplay written by Jonathan Hirschbein and Nick Saltrese, starring Joe Cole. It is based on the book A Prayer Before Dawn: My Nightmare in Thailand’s Prisons by Billy Moore.

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The true story of an English boxer incarcerated in one of Thailand’s most notorious prisons as he fights in Muay Thai tournaments to earn his freedom.

The inmates in the film are all played by real ex-inmates who have served time in Thai prisons.

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