This is hot off the presses.
Peter Jackson and New Line Cinema have reached agreement to make J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit,” a planned prequel to the blockbuster trilogy “The Lord of the Rings.”
Peter Jackson is set to oversee the film adaptation of “The Hobbit.”
Jackson, who directed the “Rings” trilogy, will serve as executive producer for “The Hobbit.” A director for the prequel films has yet to be named.
Relations between Jackson and New Line had soured after “Rings,” despite a collective worldwide box office gross of nearly $3 billion — an enormous success. The ...
Being a single guy, every once and a while I find myself reading the personal ads in Vancouver. I used to do it thinking that there was the possibility of meeting someone online, at least someone with similar interests and what not to hang out and be friends, but it’s pretty clear most of the people on those sites these days just aren’t really the caliber of people I’m looking for. I actually met one of my girlfriends on lavalife years ago, and we hit it off and are still friends to this day, so I don’t think it’s completely unheard of (although people back then used to seem a bit more ...
Last night I got together with some of my old high school friends for an evening of games and Christmas cheer. It was great seeing that old group again — we don’t nearly get together enough. We played “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader”, which was actually harder than we thought. That being said, I demolished the competition and walked away with the “you totally fucking rule” badge. The final winning question, answered by yours truly in a display worthy of it’s own Rocky film, was “What Year Was Toronto’s CN Tower Completed?”
1976 Bitches. 1976.
Tonight I’m having a few people ...
I had a few people over sort of on a whim last night, and we all sat around listening to music and enjoying Christmas nachos. I’m not sure if this is officially year two or year three for the nachos, but I’ve been trying to up the ante each year to see if I can outdo myself.
They Almost Don’t Fit
I had a few Christmas decorations sitting around in boxes, so we all took turns throwing a few up on the tree. Keira helped herself to R2-D2, and I think I got stuck with Yoda.
Good times. Only five more days of work and then I’m off for a while. I’m getting excited about heading back home ...
I hung out with some of my old high school friends tonight at a little Christmas dinner, and a few people brought up my recent blog posts about favourite movies scenes. We immediately launched into a big discussion about which other scenes were pretty awesome from our childhood memories, and I think we ended up with a list of about 20 or 30.
First movie we talked about was one Brennen and I totally loved years ago: Tombstone. Here’s is the scene where Johnny Ringo and Doc Holliday have their final battle. Obvious spoilers ahead.
I’m your huckleberry. ...
Heat is a totally awesome movie starring both Al Pacino and Robert Deniro. There are many classic scenes in it, but one that stands out is the coffee shop banter between Pacino and Deniro where we learn a pile about both characters. This type of scene has been used in countless movies since then, but they all basically pay homage to this part.
Why I think it’s so fascinating is that both characters open up to each other and somehow relate, even though they are basically enemies by trade. And let’s be honest, Deniro and Pacino both kick ass. ...
Easily one of my top ten films ever (well maybe top 20) is the rare gem that is Cameron Crowe’s “Almost Famous.” If you haven’t seen it, you should immediately head out to the movie store and rent it. It’s full of touching moments, laughter, self discovery and even a dash of romance.
Not only is the writing and story telling superb, but the photography and cinematography are both outstanding. I’ll post a few scenes here I really like (obvious spoilers).
The scene on the bus after the Golden God bit is also classic:
It’s all happening folks. ...
There are so many incredible scenes in The Lord Of The Rings, it’s really difficult to single any of them out. The books were pretty influential in my early childhood, as well as shaping some of my literary and cinematic preferences in my teens. I am totally a LOTR geek, and even wore a little ring around my neck for a few months after reading the series for the first time. Actually, the first thing you see when you walk in the door at my Vancouver apartment is a framed poster of Aragorn from The Return of the King (so cool, I know).
When the movies came out, I was totally excited, and ended ...
Are you trying to save energy by changing over incandescent light bulbs to CFL bulbs? Well, there may now be a new alternative that uses even less power.
Glow in the dark kitties!
Yes, you too can own one of these purring light-bulbs! Simple feed them from time to time and all your energy needs are solved!
You can read about it here. ...
No, the number 1 doesn’t mean this is my all time favourite movie scene, because I plan to post a lot of these over the next few weeks, and I haven’t even thought about ranking them yet. However, I’ve always really liked this one scene. I could care less if you hate Tom Cruise or think his religion is bogus (even though it is) — this scene is pretty high up there in terms of cinematic perfection in my mind.
As a whole, Vanilla Sky wasn’t that great, but this last scene, with the music, the wisps of romance, the vibrant vanilla sky, the New York landscape, and the thought of what it must ...
The original Star Wars Trilogy really needs no introduction, so I won’t really say much about it except that it totally kicked ass, as would any trilogy involving a bad guy voiced by James Earl Jones.
This scene is a classic battle scene involving Luke and Darth Vadar, where of course Luke loses his hand at the end and ultimately learns who his real father is. And seriously, pretty much every kid who ever watches this scene spends the rest of their lives making lightsaber noises whenever they swing anything. Hell, I even hold out my hand when I approach automatic doors and pretend I’m using ...
So, I’ve been meaning to ask this question for a long time. Yesterday I had a pile of traffic, thanks to a few inbound links from some massive sites. I broke into the thousands for unique visitors, which doesn’t happen that often in Duane-land. Given that only about ten people ever comment, I gotta ask, who are the rest of you guys? Nearly 50% of you are returning visitors every day, and yet you lurk in the shadows, thick as thieves I say.
The lack of comments either means:
I’m really boring
YOU’RE really boring
I’m pretty sure I am not boring all the time, which means it JUST MIGHT ...
I just got back from an appointment with my plastic surgeon. After two surgeries, I am still left with a few problems, the first of which is a slight visual dissimilarity between my left and right eye, and the second is double vision above my mid line.
Based on some recent measurements I had done, my surgeon proposed four courses of action:
Do nothing
Remove a bit of skin from eyelid on my “good” eye to make it sort of match the appearance of my “bad” eye
Adjust the eyelid of my “bad” eye to make it better match my “good” eye.
Open me back up and either adjust the current implant, ...
Chad’s party last weekend was the first of the Christmas bashes, but they are coming hard and fast starting tomorrow. I just picked up a new pair of dress pants and my altered jacket from the tailor, and tomorrow I’m spiffing it all out down on Granville Island. There should be a small little pre-party at my pad near False Creek, and then a small little ferry ride over to Bridges, which is a fairly nice seafood restaurant right on the edge of the marina. Kasia won’t be coming to my place beforehand because she apparently needs a gazillion hours to get ready before hand, so we’ll just have ...
I accidentally ran into this song the other day on my iPod (yes, I have lots of music I haven’t heard before on my iPod), and there’s something about it I really liked. I’ve been working on playing it myself, and I’m pretty close. It’s rather hard (for me) to pick this song and try singing at the same time, but I’m getting better. In the video the other guy is doing most of the guitar work.
Check it out. It’s an acoustic version they recorded at MTV. ...
Mailed another package. It was supposed to be there in two days. Of course, it’s the end of day two and it’s not there. Surprise, surprise.
Stupid thing isn’t even supposed to be in Missassauga, it should be in Toronto.
I hate you Canada Post. Hate you bad. Next time I’m using FedEx or UPS. ...
Friday afternoon I logged into my myspace account after a long absence and, after debating about it for about 3 seconds, deleted my account entirely. It’s not like it caused me any headache or anything, but I just don’t use it really at all anymore and don’t have time to maintain that and my facebook account. So, after searching around for a while, I managed to find the “Delete Account” button and forever put it into the trash.
Anyone else actually still use myspace, or has everyone migrated to Facebook now?
Also, a few people have been tracking my new blog entries with twitter – if ...
This is a pretty important week in the life of Duane. On Tuesday I’ll meet up with my plastic surgeon which might potentially be the last meeting I have with him regarding this whole affair. My first meeting was about twelve months ago and resulted in two surgeries to my eye socket. I’ve spent this last year bouncing between doctors offices, getting eye exams, several CT scans, and will meet this week to probably wrap everything up.
In terms of my vision, it’s still not perfect. I see pretty much everything perfectly below the midline (i.e. looking straight or down), but as I look up I tend ...