0328 – Edge of Tomorrow (2014)

spacetime coordinates: 2020 London // France // Switzerland

Edge of Tomorrow (alternatively known by its tagline Live. Die. Repeat. and marketed as such on home release) is a 2014 American science fiction film starring Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt. Doug Liman directed the film based on a screenplay adapted from the 2004 Japanese light novel All You Need Is Kill by Hiroshi Sakurazaka. The film takes place in a future where Earth is invaded by an alien race. Major William Cage (Cruise), a public relations officer with no combat experience, is forced by his superiors to join a landing operation against the aliens. Though Cage is killed in combat, he finds himself in a time loop that sends him back to the day preceding the battle every time he dies. Cage teams up with Special Forces warrior Rita Vrataski (Blunt) to improve his fighting skills through the repeated days, seeking a way to defeat the extraterrestrial invaders.

Edge of Tomorrow Concept Art by Kev Jenkins

Gender roles

Comparison to video games        Battle suits

Sequel      IMDB

0324 – Gummo (1997)

spacetime coordinates:   summer of 1996  Xenia, Ohio

Gummo is a 1997 American dystopian art film written and directed by Harmony Korine, starring Jacob Reynolds, Nick Sutton, Jacob Sewell, and Chloë Sevigny. The film is set in Xenia, Ohio, a small, poor Midwestern American town that had been previously struck by a devastating tornado. The loose narrative follows several main characters who find odd and destructive ways to pass time, interrupted by vignettes depicting other inhabitants of the town. Instead of using standard movie lights, the production was lit with fluorescent lights to give the movie a haunting, yellowish look. “Gummo” is considered to be a cult film.

Trailer

Themes

The Diary of Anne Frank II

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119237/

311 – Nova Zembla (2011)

Nova Zembla is a 2011 Dutch historical drama film directed by Reinout Oerlemans. It is the first Dutch feature film in 3D.

The film describes the last journey of Willem Barentsz and Jacob van Heemskerk through 1596-1597 when they and their crew tried to discover the Northeast Passage to the Indies. However, due to the sea ice, they are stranded on the island of Novaya Zemlya and have to spend the winter there in Het Behouden Huys (The Safe Home). The story is told through the eyes of Gerrit de Veer, and is loosely based on a diary he published in 1598 after his safe return. Gerrit is portrayed as having a relationship with Catharina Plancius, the daughter of the astronomer, cartographer and reverend Petrus Plancius, who pioneered the concept of the North East passage to reach the Indies. The Novaya Zemlya effect, first described by De Veer, is shown in the film, albeit in a non-historical fashion.

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http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1911607/

0305 – Ori and the Blind Forest (2015 video game)

Ori and the Blind Forest is a platform-adventure Metroidvania video game developed by Moon Studios and published by Microsoft Studios. The game was released for Microsoft Windows and Xbox One on March 2015. In the game, players assume control of Ori, a white guardian spirit, and Sein, the “light and eyes” of the Forest’s Spirit Tree. To progress in the game, players are tasked to move between platforms and solve puzzles. The game features a system called “soul links”, which allows players to save at will, and an upgrade system that gives players the ability to strengthen Ori’s skills.

A sequel, Ori and the Will of the Wisps, was announced during Electronic Entertainment Expo 2017. A Definitive Edition was released in 2016.

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS (MINIMUM): OS: Windows 7 / Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E4500 @ 2.2GHz or AMD Athlon 64 X2 5600+ @ 2.8 GHz / Memory: 4 GB RAM / Graphics: GeForce 240 GT or Radeon HD 6570 – 1024 MB (1 gig) / DirectX: Version 9.0c / Storage: 8 GB available space

steam

279 – Jungle (2017)

spacetime coordinates:  1981 expedition into the uncharted Amazon in Bolivia //  Tuichi River

Jungle is a 2017 Australian adventure/ psychological thriller film directed by Greg McLean and written by Justin Monjo. The film is based on Yossi Ghinsberg‘s nonfiction novel Jungle: A Harrowing True Story of Survival. Jungle follows the three weeks that Ghinsberg spent in the Bolivian jungle without any supplies or help. 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3758172/

0265 – American Pastoral (2016)

spacetime coordinates: 1960s  New Jersey

American Pastoral is a 2016 Hong Kong | USA crime-drama film directed by Ewan McGregor and written by John Romano, based on the 1997 novel of the same name by Philip Roth.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0376479/

204 – Cloud Atlas (2012)

spacetime coordinates: Pacific Islands, 1849 // Cambridge/Edinburgh, 1936 // San Francisco, 1973 // London, 2012 // Neo Seoul, 2144 // Big Isle (Hawaii), 106 winters after the Fall (2321)

Cloud Atlas is a 2012 German-American science fiction film written and directed by The Wachowskis and Tom Tykwer. Adapted from the 2004 novel of the same name by David Mitchell, the film has multiple plots set across six different eras, which Mitchell described as “a sort of pointillist mosaic.”  The official synopsis describes it as “an exploration of how the actions of individual lives impact one another in the past, present and future, as one soul is shaped from a killer into a hero, and an act of kindness ripples across centuries to inspire a revolution.”  Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, and Jim Broadbent lead an ensemble cast.

Lana Wachowski stated “people will try to will Cloud Atlas to be rejected. They will call it messy, or complicated, or undecided whether it’s trying to say something New Agey-profound or not. And we’re wrestling with the same things that Dickens and Hugo and David Mitchell and Herman Melville were wrestling with. We’re wrestling with those same ideas, and we’re just trying to do it in a more exciting context than conventionally you are allowed to. … We don’t want to say, ‘We are making this to mean this.’ What we find is that the most interesting art is open to a spectrum of interpretation.”

imdb // wikipedia