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News Archive
Current: June 2004
Neal
Asher Interview
Psychologically disturbed android killing machines. A Beast
that harvests people to research its genetic dabbling across time
by sending them back to the primordial ages. A mysterious Japanese
man still living millennia after Hiroshima. A physicist that uses
nanotechnology to merge with a spacecraft. Welcome to the weird
and wonderful world of Neal Asher.
(INTERVIEWS)
Big
Ben
Ben Jeapes interviewed. The author speaks about penning
cracking reads like 'His Majesty's Starship' , the differences between
writing SF for the young adult market and the 'grown-up' sector,
and the sadness of shutting the doors at his own publishing house,
Big Engine.
(INTERVIEWS)
Just
a Tad More
If Tad Williams' Memory, Sorrow & Thorn series is "the fantasy
equivalent of War and Peace" (Locus magazine), then Tad must be
Fantasy's Leo Tolstoy. The prolific Mr Williams is cornered for
some vodka and a chat.
(INTERVIEWS)
Bruce
on Bruce
The father of cyberpunk - or at the very least the Uncle
- Bruce Sterling, chats about his new technothriller, The Zenith
Angle, with real-life security expert Bruce Schneier.
(INTERVIEWS)
Forty
Whacks
Scots SF author Ken Macleod visits sunny Spain for the second
installment of 'Stitch and Split: Selves and Territories in Science
Fiction', in Seville, sponsored by the Universidad Internacional
de Andalucia. Take a walk with Ken down the Latin road to SFF.
(COMMENT)
Eight
Days in Zagreb
Our jetsetting Scots SF author Ken Macleod flies out to
Croatia as a guest at the Sferakon convention. He finds the old
world of Yugoslav science fiction intriguing, from the pulp cover
translations of Western SF novels to state-sponsored SFF societies.
(COMMENT)
The
Weird Tale of 'Pulgasari'
Mark takes a look at the fantasy film Pulgasari; featuring
a beast which was a North Korean giant monster who ate iron and
grew to hundreds of feet high. It's director was kidnapped from
South Korea, taken to North Korea, imprisoned for four years with
no explanation, and then forced to make the only Marxist monster
movie.
(ARTICLES)
Godsend
In Godsend, Frank finds a run-of-the-mill child-cloning
thriller turned into a flaccid frightfest that is all clumsy thumbs,
and no controllable finger to decisively point this devilish dud
of a movie in the right creative direction.
(FILM REVIEWS)
Shrek
2: Frank's Take
In Shrek 2, we are gleefully reunited with the amiable pot-bellied
giant and his colorful crew of supporters that include his new wife
Princess Fiona (Cameron Diaz) and his old sidekick Donkey (Eddie
Murphy).
(FILM REVIEWS)
Shrek
2: Mark's Take
There is distinctly less magic and fun in Shrek 2 as the
title ogre has problems becoming accepted by his in-laws. All the
same cast is back with the same voices, but the tone of the film
is darker and we don't learn a lot more about the characters that
we liked in the first film.
(FILM REVIEWS)
Van
Helsing: Mark's Take
Not as bad as it might have been, but still no bargain.
This is a fast-paced and overblown CGI-fest that leverages off of
the old Universal monsters but does not actually want to use them.
Writer-director Steven Sommers of the 'Mummy' films handles action
scenes well, but is poor with directing acting or even giving us
a very good story. This is a film of dubious thrills and no chills
whatsoever.
(FILM REVIEWS)
Van
Helsing: Frank's Take
In this film, our Frank finds an exceedingly glossy but
empty-headed thrill-seeking monsters mash mishap that boasts competent
big-budgeted special effects but little else.
(FILM REVIEWS)
Eternal
Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Mark uncovers quite probably the best new science fiction
film he has seen since Minority Report and well before. A device
allows for the removal of painful memories by erasing them. The
hitch is that the memories must be opened and partially relived
as they are being erased. Charlie Kaufman's third script is demanding,
but it is delightfully engaging, intelligent, and even profound.
(FILM REVIEWS)
Troy
Despite the showcasing of buff bodies clashing with conviction
in this historic sword and sandals fable, Troy is an elaborate action-adventure
yearning to sweep the moviegoer off their feet but the uneven rhythms
sullies its energized scope.
(FILM REVIEWS)
Offworld
Report June 2004: Science Fiction and Fantasy
Interviews with Peter Crowther, Steven Brust, John Jarrold,
Neil Gaiman and the stars of Van Helsing; JG Ballard considers disaster
movies, Stephen Baxter dishes the dirt on the writing secrets of
SF, and Octavia Butler ponders the nature of power.
(NEWS)
Offworld
Report June 2004: Weird Science
The Pentagon's science fiction weapons program (railgun
warships, anyone?), space tugs, a robot built out of DNA, NASA's
wilder dreams, the fantasy folk seen in Scotland, and why we should
be begging China for a decent space race.
(NEWS)
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