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spacetime coordinates: 19th century, unnamed Asian frontier desert outpost
Waiting for the Barbarians is a 2020 Italian-American drama film directed by Ciro Guerra (El abrazo de la serpiente) in his English-language directorial debut. The film is based on the novel of the same name by J. M. Coetzee (adaptation written by author). It stars Mark Rylance, Johnny Depp, Robert Pattinson, Gana Bayarsaikhan, and Greta Scacchi. (wiki)
timespace coordinates: AMC describes the series as a “modern fable set in Long Beach, California about a disarmingly optimistic local ex-surfer, Dud (Wyatt Russell), who’s drifting after the death of his father and collapse of the family business.” In the first season, Dud joins a fraternal order known as the Order of the Lynx, hoping the Lodge can put him “on the path to recover the idyllic life he’s lost.”
Lodge 49 is an American comedy-drama television series created by Jim Gavin. It aired on the television network AMC in the United States from August 6, 2018, to October 14, 2019, spanning two seasons and 20 episodes.
The title alludes to the novella The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon, which Gavin references as an inspiration. (wiki)
In Welcome to the Greenhouse, award-winning editor Gordon Van Gelder has brought together sixteen speculative [climate fiction (cli-fi)] stories by some of the most imaginative writers of our time. Terrorists, godlike terraformers, and humans both manipulative and hapless populate these pages. The variety of stories reflects the possibilities of our future: grim, hopeful, fantastic and absurd.
Included is new work by Brian W. Aldiss, Jeff Carlson, Judith Moffett, Matthew Hughes, Gregory Benford, Michael Alexander, Bruce Sterling, Joseph Green, Pat MacEwen, Alan Dean Foster, David Prill, George Guthridge, Paul Di Filippo, Chris Lawson, Ray Vukcevich and M. J. Locke.
Greener Grass is an 2019 American comedy film, written and directed by Jocelyn DeBoer and Dawn Luebbe in their feature directorial debuts, based on the 2015 short film of the same name (YOUTUBE). It stars DeBoer, Luebbe, Beck Bennett, Neil Casey, Mary Holland and D’Arcy Carden. (wiki)
DeBoer and Luebbe explained that the films of David Lynch, John Waters and 1960s and 1970s landscape photography was an influence. Visually the film is reminiscent of 80’s-music-video aesthetic / fashion aesthetics / 90’s infomercials.
Seven Worlds, One Planet is a documentary series from the BBC Natural History Unit. The seven-part series, in which each episode focuses on one continent, debuted on 27 October 2019 and is narrated and presented by naturalist Sir David Attenborough. Over 1,500 people worked on the series, which was filmed over 1,794 days, with 92 shoots across 41 different countries. (wiki)
Freaks is a 2018 American-Canadian science fiction thriller film directed, written and produced by Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein. It stars Emile Hirsch, Bruce Dern, Grace Park, Amanda Crew, and Lexy Kolker, who was seven years old at the time of filming.
The film tells the story of a 7-year-old girl named Chloe (Kolker) who is locked in an abandoned house by her disturbed father (Hirsch). The mysterious Mr. Snowcone (Dern) convinces her to escape for his own suspicious reasons. (wiki)
A promotional poster for the film features a street sign with a one eye logo and a phone number to call to report “abnormal activity”. The number is 1-800-517-5890 and when called, a recorded message with a woman’s voice would say, “Thank you for calling the abnormal defense hotline, provided by the Department of Homeland Security.” The recorded message at first urged others to be on the lookout for “freaks” and it said that you can leave a message to report any abnormal activity from freaks. A few days later, the recorded message was changed to warn others to stay away from an upcoming San Diego Comic Con “free underground prescreening of Freaks” on July 18, 2019.
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