I just had a chance to check out The Johnny Cash Project – an amazing crowd sourced interactive music video dedicated to the late Johnny Cash.
The video is created by site visitors using an online drawing tool where all are invited to artistically create a single frame. The frames are combined in an ever-changing visual experience – you will never see the same sequence of frames twice. As of right now, it is estimated over 250,000 people have contributed frames worldwide.
I took some time to contribute my own frame: The Man in Black standing behind a cross grave stone – there’s a very cool feature that allows you to playback your own frame creation in an animation.
The creative idea came about through collaboration of music producer Rick Rubin and director Chris Milk. Milk was also behind the technically-acclaimed HTML5 interactive online music video project, The Wilderness Downtown, for the band Arcade Fire – which I wrote about a few months ago.
The creators intentionally limited the interactive drawing tool’s available styles resulting in imagery that beautifully complements the haunting melody of Cash’s final studio recording “Ain’t No Grave”. According to Mashable, the interactive music video is the first of its kind to garner a Grammy Nomination.
Below is an overview video of the project featuring some of the artist contributors. Be sure to also check out the main project website: The Johnny Cash Project.
Yes, seems like an unlikely comparison – it just happens to be the last 2 films that I’ve watched! Interestingly, however, they have a great deal of elements to compare and contrast. This isn’t intended to be a full review of either movie – both are well worth watching simply if you enjoy great storytelling.
Let’s start with quick overviews:
Inception is an American big-budget film, categorized as a science fiction heist, released in 2010 starring (what some would claim) one of the great young actors of our time, Leonardo DiCaprio. While it covers now familiar ground in tone as a psychological thriller with a science-fiction element, it has generally been regarded as a ‘thinking’ movie. It has some incredible M.C.Escher reminiscent special effects that seamlessly carry the nested story along at a quick pace. The film was written, produced and directed by Christopher Nolan.
Metropolis is a German expressionist silent film released in 1927 and is regarded by cinephiles to be a highly influential film, especially in the science fiction genre. For its time, it was an incredibly ambitious and daring project in subject, scope and style. It is quite notable that up until a few years ago, there had been many edits of the film, the best of which was considered to be about 75% of the surviving original. In June 2008, an archived, but badly damaged, copy of the original film print was discovered in the Museo del Cine in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Re-discovered scenes were re-inserted to create “Metropolis Restored (The Complete Metropolis)“, restoring the intent of filmmaker Fritz Lang. Although his wife, Thea von Harbou is credited as the screenwriter, Lang is widely acknowledged as co-writer.
Beyond the sheer filmmaking scope of both films, they also have a few interesting points to compare and contrast.
Story Length
At first, duration doesn’t seem like a big point, but stay with me for a sec. Today, as in the past, films are often edited down to a duration that “feels” like an acceptable length, often due to budget and theater schedules as much as to create a more concise experience. The average film length is 90 minutes, with bigger budget blockbusters usually getting closer to 120 minutes. Both Inception and the restored version of Metropolis clock in at 148 minutes. (Until the 2008 discovery, most edits of Metropolis were around 90 minutes.)
The notable point for both films is that they don’t feel long. They each have a great flow and the right amount of intertwined sub-plots that kept me engaged. I think this may be due to the fact that both were created initially as screenplays, rather than adapted from previously written works. Clearly, the screenwriters had well-constructed stories for each respective film.
Plot: Corporate Structure/Espionage
The catalyst in Inception’s story is an espionage plot to influence a young businessman, Robert Fischer, to break up his father’s corporate empire. The corporate setting is a more a minor point in that film whereas in Metropolis it is the foundation for the story’s social commentary. Those at top of the ladder control from high above Metropolis (literally and figuratively) and the masses live and work to service the machines below that run the entire city. There are several machinations to bring down or disrupt that structure.
Relationships
At the heart of both stories are a few key relationships.
In both films, a father/son relationship is very prevalent. Inception features a plan that hinges upon the manipulators’ ability to cause the target, Fischer, to question his relationship with his recently deceased father. In Metropolis, the calculated Joh Fredersen runs the city coldly, but continually expresses concern for his son’s whereabouts and well-being.
Inception contains a tragic love story sub-plot about the primary dream manipulator, Cobb and the loss of his wife in his past. In Metropolis, Freder’s primary motivation for entering the underworld is to search for Maria, with whom he has a love-at-first-sight experience.
There are several other complex relationships in Metropolis that greatly add to the depth of the story, including one re-established by the re-inserted film scenes that clear up some questionable character motivations as seen in earlier edits.
Science Fiction
Inception explores sophisticated real-world science suggesting that through chemistry and shared consciousness, it is possible to extract and manipulate information in someone’s mind just as it is possible to extract or manipulate information on a computer system. It is somewhat easy to question “What is real?” in the multi-layered dream environments of the story, just as it was in similar sci-fi epics like The Matrix.
Metropolis, on the other-hand, is considered one of the seminal science fiction tales in that it features one of the earliest robot characters on film. This “Man-Machine” is created to impersonate the character Maria in order to incite the workers to revolt. It should be mentioned that actress Brigitte Helm gives an incredible dual role performance as the altruistic Maria and her evil manipulative robot doppelgänger. Helm was masterful in portraying emotion and sentiment via exaggerated gesture, facial expression and erotic behavior (for the time) - especially as the creepy robot. The character is a clear predecessor to Pris, the Bladerunner replicant played by Daryl Hannah or any of the sexy Cylons from the Battlestar Galactica modern television series.
Now Go Watch!
I’ve only scratched the surface of what makes both of these films worth seeing. There is so much more to compare and share, but I’ve already strayed too close to spoilers.
I’ll end this with one last critical comparison that arises due to the difference of 83 years between the creation of these films. Metropolis tells an amazingly deep story with no live dialogue, only displaying handfuls of title cards for setting and speech throughout the film. Inception, on the other-hand, doesn’t give the audience enough credit – someone found it necessary for certain characters to continually explain what is going on in the story and how “deep” they were. I really feel it is to the detriment of the story’s sophistication.
I absolutely recommend watching both Inception and Metropolis. Inception just for a good story and Metropolis if you’re more into film history or science fiction roots. If you really want to go deeper, read some real reviews or the IMDB or Wikipedia entries for either film.
Those in the Twittersphere have been all abuzz about New Twitter since it was announced last month. There have been tons of #newTwitter tweets – most ranging from “When will I get it?” from the “have-nots” to “I Love/Hate the New Twitter!” from the “haves”. But, it’s been rolling out more widespread in the past few weeks. I, myself, joined the New Twitter Club last week. Even if you don’t have a care for Twitter whatsoever, you might still appreciate this clever animation that shows off some of the features of #NewTwitter, with a little help from a beat by will.i.am and Nicki Minaj!
I have to say, “Check It Out” is growing on me! will.i.am and Nicki Minaj first performed it at the Pre-Show for the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards a few weeks ago and on the David Letterman Show just the other night.
Sesame Street has always involved pop culture personalities, had musical guests, spoofed TV shows, book characters and movies. The latest batch of cross-overs have been pretty hot.
Perhaps the easiest one first – the controversy around Katy Perry’s recent video with Elmo where she parodies her hit Hot N Cold as a playtime invite to Elmo decked out in “dress up” clothes that some parents found too racy – so much so that the episode now won’t be broadcast on TV:
While I’m sure that pre-schoolers won’t have any issues with the cute performance by Perry and Elmo (including Perry’s outfit), I think some Dads may especially enjoy the video.
Perhaps another recent musical cross-over will fair better with parents and kids alike. What I Am is a great song with the simple message of “being the best me I can be” by will.i.am and the Sesame Street crew. My kids are now too old for Sesame Street, but they are Black Eyed Peas fans. The Peas have been hot all year and we all love their latest hits (at least the radio edit versions) and are digging “What I Am” right now:
Next up, the Sesame Street parody titled True Mud may or may not connect with the youngsters. The skit spoofs the HBO vampire series hit, True Blood, where “outed” vampires drink a bottled blood substitute called “True Blood”; this time a suspected “grouch” really wants a mud fix:
Aside from the subtle rhyming lesson, I’m torn if this will appeal to the pre-school crowd. Perhaps the simple juxtaposition of some “weird guy” who insists on ordering mud at the restaurant will be enough to illicit some giggles. If not, then perhaps the stranger’s mudbath at the conclusion of the story will be funny enough?
Indie band Arcade Fire, who has been catching a lot of buzz lately, released a very impressive “music video” on the Internet today. However, this isn’t your run-of-the-mill music video, probably given away by the fact that it was announced on the Official Google Blog. The video is billed as as “music experience” and, I have to say, it is pretty cool.
The project was created by Writer/Director Chris Milk with Arcade Fire and Google. The experience, called The Wilderness Downtown, uses some of the latest emerging Internet web standards including HTML5, Google Maps, and some neat drawing tools. Given that it is a Google project and somewhat experimental, it is best experienced using the Google Chrome web browser.
I’m not so sure about the whole storyline that integrates Google Maps view of your “childhood home” (after you are prompted to enter an address), but the integrated multi browser windows, beautifully synchronized videos/animations and great track are cool enough on their own.
Interestingly enough, when checking the project out earlier today with a colleague, I remarked “Hey, that [scene] kind of reminds me of [the movie] Brazil.” It turns out that Terry Gilliam, Writer/Director of Brazil, directed a live stream project for Arcade Fire earlier this month; so guess that wasn’t coincidence.
According to his TED Speaker bio, David McCandless is a Data Journalist. In his new book, Information Is Beautiful(UK;in the US, it’s being called The Visual Miscellaneum), David and his team of information designers explore a wide range of visualized data points in over 250 infographics.
In this TedTalk video, he explains his enjoyment as a “data detective” – discovering patterns in information data. Good design, he suggests, is the best way to navigate information glut — and it may just change the way we see the world. In particular, McCandless is interested in living data visualization and data mashups.
You can see the TedTalk video on ted.com or below.
While we plan to look out for the schedule in the upcoming fall an winter sessions, We were very excited to learn that Stanford shares over 1,600 videos and podcasts online at their ecorner website: http://ecorner.stanford.edu/. There is an amazing lineup of superstar speakers in a broad range of fields including technology, finance, biotech, mobile, education and government.
I’ve already downloaded and begun listening to at least a dozen podcasts, including Marc Andreessen (Serial Entrepreneur/Ning/Loudcloud,Netscape), Randy Komisar (Author/KBCP), Steve Case (Revolution/AOL), David Heinemeier Hansson (37signals), Mark Pincus and Bing Gordon (Zynga), Mark Zuckerburg, Jim Breyer and Sheryl Sandberg (Facebook), Eric Ries (Lean Startup movement) and a bunch more…
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I just had a chance to check out The Johnny Cash Project – an amazing crowd sourced interactive music video dedicated to the late Johnny Cash.
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I am a self-professed info-fiend who strives to know a little something about everything. This is my personal blog where I occasionally write about random things that I find interesting.
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