| 12:08a |
School of Rock
I was going to see the director's cut of Alien with Wendy, but the Gateway theater and Austin Chronicle had different ideas of when it was showing, grrr... So we saw School of Rock, which was pretty enjoyable fun. It's simultaneously a fun feel-good movie with a classroom of cute likable kids who have an adventure (as they become a rock band) and also an excuse for Jack Black to run amok with his obnoxious-yet-likable antics. His character is a downtrodden failed musician who ridiculously ends up being a substitute teacher at an expensive school and teaching the stuffy repressed little rich kids how to rock out and stick it to the man. On one hand, the plot is thoroughly familiar: eccentric teacher inspires his class while facing resistance from the conventional school system and conservative strict parents; wacky antics and inspirational achievements ensue, and everyone has fun and feels good in the end. And indeed, kids in the theater seemed to enjoy it. Yet unlike most such movies, which tend to be overly sentimental and formulaic, this one was more subversive than a typical kids' movie (e.g. rants about some specific real-world political issues, and some much edgier humor than a normal kids' movie), so it was quite enjoyable for adults too, and much of the credit goes to Jack Black. It was interesting to observe the script carefully avoiding four-letter words so as to be kid-friendly, yet nonetheless it felt like a perfectly good vehicle for Jack Black to go wild and do his thing. He rants and rocks out and is in practically every scene. Despite his hyperactive ranting, his character is rather likable, I think because he's motivated by an idealistic obsessive love of rock music, and despite his overenthusiastic outbursts he is actually quite a nice caring respectful guy: the friendships he forms with the kids are quite believable. Plus he's self-effacing rather than full of himself. The movie also works well no doubt due to Richard Linklater's smart influence, even though it is certainly fluffier and sillier than other Linklater films like Tape, Waking Life or Before Sunrise.
I recently saw another crossover kids/adults' movie, Finding Nemo, and I liked School of Rock more. Finding Nemo seemed too pat and formulaic and jokey and "family-friendly" (though it was of course beautifully executed animation). School of Rock was grittier and, well, more rocking. |
| 10:02p |
plia informo pri tradukoj ĉe userfriendly.org 1. Mi tradukis la du sekvajn komiksojn (por dimanĉo kaj lundo). Mi certas ke iu bildstrio estos tro malfacila por mi, sed eble mi tradukos multajn... mi vidos. Dume, estas amuze kaj interese, kaj la tradukado ne postulas tro da tempo. 2. Mi malkovris ke, kvankam la retpaĝaro ne uzas UTF-8-kodon, mi tamen povi tajpi UTF-8-literojn, kaj la retpaĝaro tradukas ilin al html-entojn en la finita paĝo (kvankam mi mem ne povas tajpi html-entojn!) Stultas, sed funkcias... do bone. Nun miaj estontaj tradukoj tie havos ĉapelitajn literojn. 3. Unu kialo por traduki userfriendly.org estas por plikonsciigi UF-ojn pri nia kara lingvo: multaj homoj legas userfriendly, kaj ŝajnas laŭ mi ke traduki popularan komikson estas bona metodo por tio. Kaj jam iu rimarkis amike, hura! |