Seasonal Greetings

As this year is getting near to an end I wish you all

Merry Christmas

and a

Happy New Year

To sum it up for this year

I have been kind of lazy to post in the blog lately. Maybe this is a sign of me becomming more lazy, more occupied or just a general sign that times are changing??

I have no real answers for you but I am going to be nice and sum up a few things. In the movies world I have of course seen quite a few nice movies as well as old classics.

Ratatouille is a masterpiece. I can not say anything else, the story is funny, the anims are funny. The whole movie makes you laugh but in the end the morale is: Everybody can cook… Is it true? Well who cares as long as it is fun?

Beowulf – This one was a disappointment. I don’t know but except for the main monster (which is awfully ugly) there is not much to go for here. A mediocre childrens anim looks better than this – and the story is like a short story made way too long.

Other stuff I have seen: The Color of Red - a good classic thriller, Unbreakable – even better classic and Rambo II and III – I don’t know what to say about it but it is funny to see the Americans feelings about the afghan at that time: “They never give up”

In the world of books I have been reading Kama Sutra, it is a interesting book, maybe not a lot of new and I choose to think of it as a ancient pimpguide which still can be used as which.

I have also read the book which the Varg Veum movie was based, a little bit better than Henning Mankel in the writing, but much more clever put together! The book differs remarkably from the movie and sometimes I think – what did the storyboard writers think?? Anyway it’s a good movie so no hard feelings.

I also read the second Stieg Larsson book which I found even better than the first, its like the writer saw his small faults in book one and make a awesome firecracker of book two. Now all is left is the finale in book three.

I also finished my second book and have started on the third one. Writing goes a bit slow there as well as here… but sometime next year it should be ready.

In the world of gaming I have been lazy as well (surprise) but are now enjoying Unreal Tournament 3 – a winner from beginning till end. Brings a lot of the old and some of the new UT power – and is a must for all people that likes this kind of action.

I am also playing the new expansion to Never Winter Nights 2, it is not as good as the original game, and it tries to bring a new twist to the gameplay with its spirit eater feature.

Still this is almost as good as they comes and I hope it will keep me busy for medium January next year.

That’s about it for now.

Death Proof (movie)

Quentin is behind some real classic movies, Resevoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, and he is also behind the story of the excellent True Romance. Beside of these movies his movies is of various character. From Dusk till dawn is pretty good at times and the Kill Bill movies goes further (maybe too far) in Quentins movie register.

Death Proof tries not to take itself to serious and while it is a remake it is also a product of what Quentin always have tried to reach; Pure entertainment, his way.

Bad language, pretty girls, gore and semi intelligent language. For me this movie smells like, he finally got it right, but however it is never deep, and therefore will not reach the heights as his earlier classics, but if you can dig it being a bit shallow, you'll enjoy it all the way.

The movie is also somewhat some kind of girl-power movie. And it reminds me of the movie I made with the film school earlier, although nothing in Quentin's league, it has the girl power as the main theme.

Shooter (movie)

Shooter is a movie that delivers exactly what it promises to deliver, which fits me perfect. The screenplay and the action gives us nothing we have not seen before, but why bother. Its all done very well, the acting, the action - the whole package.

But it will never be a classic because of 2 things, one its not made in the seventies and to it does not go far enough in the cool factor. The hardest line in the movie is: “You don't understand, he killed my dog,” - for this movie to get up in the A heaven it would need to take this further something like Clintie does with the mule in the first of his classic spaghetti westerns.

I was thinking of this movie compared to Bourne Trilogy's 3rd movie, and while Bourne is outter crap this is the one to watch.

The Idiots (Movie)

Don’t let the cheap wrapping and the dogma effects trick you: This is a masterpiece of a movie. It is dead funny almost all the time through but at the same time it is dead serious and it hits hard in the end, a little like in ”Million dollar babe” where you just enjoy the movie full time and when the blow comes..... you just sit there halfway in chock.

At least some of the actors in this movie are professional, but you will not guess. They all play so good idiots you think that they are just normal people with a slight psychic issue. Its really impressive to see the dogma effect making it all realistic when we know that it is directed and scripted.

Another great thing about this movie is that its really the best reality show I have seen. I am so tired of all the reality crap on TV but this is good stuff. The movie is also trying ot be somewhat a documentary (at times) and it reminds me of one movie: The Blair Witch project, which was an extremly popular movie, but which I find to be the outtermost CRAP.

And ”The Idiots”? – its the perfect example. Learn from it. Enjoy it. Become an idiot yourself.

The Contractor (movie)

This movie borrows a few elements from other movies. First of we have the ”I can not ride” scene borrowed from ”Unforgiven”. Later the movie borrows big from ”Leon/The Professional”.

While these elements are winner elements, specially the last one, it can not bring the movie up to the A status. Ok, even if Wesley Snipes has a lot of B movies behind him, many of them I still enjoy because they still deliver some good action. In this movie however he seems to be old, slow and useless – and since its not too long ago I saw some good Snipes action I have a feeling that this is the director’s fault – but of course I can not be sure.

But this is not all. The story also is plagued by a problem. The movie does not contain any progress, its basically Snipes going somewhere and running away from the scene repeatedly. And all this basically makes the movie a pain to watch.

But because of what I said in the beginning the movie also has bright points, and so it is that it can be a perfect waste of time one day you just can’t be bothered to think.

Jo Nesbø - The Saviour (book)

I get more and more impressed about Jo Nesbø’s writing. Every line he writes, every paragraph is such well written and all hold necessary pieces to unfold the mystery. There is really not too much more to say about it – this is reading that everybody will like!

But still I have to pick on a few things in this book. This time around the main criminal is kind of poor and is kept in low state through the book – while this is a part of the books story – it just doesn’t manage to keep the tension up like usual. Instead we are kept on the line with the surrounding stories and intrigues – and with reason. In a way this book could be theme brother with the Stieg Larsson book I’ve been writing about earlier - and that works well.

Also a weak spot is that Harry Hole is not such under pressure as usual and while he is always present – it just isn’t the usual tension. But of course, this is just me being picky.

Varg Veum (movie)

I am impressed by this movie. The settings are gray. The video quality as well as the extremely good angles (its not often you see such good work) – the makeup, the clothes… yes everything is professionally made.

But as you guessed there is something missing. I am not really sure what it is though. Because this movie has everything going for it to make it a instant hit. Ok there could have been some more action and I would have appreciated that, but that is not always a necessary ingredient for a Detective story kind of movie…

So I will take it all down to such a indefinable ingredient as Warmth, the movie lacks that magically touch of warmth that is needed to give it a dice 6.

They are making a new movie in the Varg Veum series so I am looking forward for it.

Breaking News – (movie)

This movie is somewhat an Asian take on the classic ’70 heist movie style. Not the heist movie style that Hollywood sometimes remakes, but one with a twist so don’t expect any Ocean 11. The weak part of the movie is that the action scenes lack some of the realism and hardcore cutting that we often are used to see.

The good part is that there is some interesting camera work, some excellent acting and some clever story twists without taking itself to seriously but still even small scenes have tons of story to tell.

All in all it’s a beauty!

Stieg Larsson – Men who hates women (book)

I want to start up by praising this book. It is a masterpiece. Without using the Alistar Mclean method (constant action) the writer manages to create a web of suspension that before you know it has you sweating and you read 100 pages in 3 minutes. No really. The story is built up upon 2 main story lines as well as a few sub-plots. The first main plot is somewhat a traditional crime scene with a limited field of time and space as well as suspects. Still there is plenty of room for intrigue. The second main plot is the hero’s (a financial journalist) failed case against a finance top.

The hidden or not so well hidden theme about men who hates women is well placed into the movie, and tells us men in unsubtle ways about the bad things men can do. It is also perfectly matched into the hero’s subtle way of giving lost women what they need and dream of. However at the same time he has an openly free sex relationship with a friend which of course none of the other girl manages to accept. Cleverly done and is much more “up to date” and suitable than many other hero’s female relations.

Even though this is an extremely good book and I advice everybody and anybody to read it, I will now put the things on the negative:

- The story is written in an extremely objective way and sometimes the sub plots and the detail is just too much, but not too often.

- The strongest part of the storyline is the fact that the writer follows the classic story building quite perfectly, this is also the biggest weakness for example just after the first main story has been solved the story halts. And to let it progress into solving the other main story the writer has to make some cheap tension that’s just not realistic and to be honest – the end of the book becomes a mild anticlimax.

Lost in Translation (movie)

Finally I got to see this movie. I understand fully some of the comments other people has given to me about it. It is not a conventional movie at all.

The movie is very visual affected, also the music, sound and the acting is all performing a visual substance. So I can only conclude with the fact that this is basically a Artistic Presentation. But since not many people would go ahead and watch such a thing, they have added a little story to it.

The story however is just like a small short story of an old person and a younger version of the old person (even if they are different sexes) that meet and somewhat are lost in the dilemma of: Does it all have to be repeated or can we change it this time around?

So even if most of the dialogue is feeding the visual art (added up by Bill Murrays notorious way to give half ass coments) some of the first lines together (far out in the movie) is giving away the story plot.

The end is emotional in many ways and gives us a feeling of unknown but by looking at the people we know that things will not repeat itself and in such a way both are redeemed.

But the big question I ask myself is whether this is a masterpiece or just an art presentation smuggled into a blockbuster? I really don’t know, to answer that I have to see the movie a few more times, and by this statement it means that it is already a classic.

Baltazar (Restaurant)

By mistake? Or maybe just in the hunt for a great Italian restaurant we ended up in this high class restaurant.

So every once in a while I enjoy being in a high class restaurant and having a really great meal and this is without a doubt one of the best Italian restaurants I have visited for a while. Basically it is excellent food for a hefty price tag. The only downside I can give it is the fact that sometimes the service people did not have the high level of sophistication that is expected at a place like this.

The Bourne Ultimatum (movie)

I am not too happy writing this as I know its…. Well for the first this movie got some excellent reviews and one review called it “the best action movie ever” for the second the masses also love the movies about Jason Bourne.

That’s why its so hard for me to say that its utterly crap. I don’t think the reviewer that praised this movie as “the best action movie ever” have seen a lot of action movies.

While I can go good for the first 2 movies in the series, (Even if I don’t put it on the top of the pops) the third one has nothing new to offer. The story is going further like, behind the story of “Who is Jason Bourne?” – we are finally getting to know. The problem is that the story has no strong points and progresses just like one washed madras.

The action itself is mediocre and reminds me of plenty B movies of Steven Seagal, Chuck Norris and the likes. The music is the same. The tempo reminds me a lot of HairSpray (!!) because it never really stops up to let the story progress. And this means we are fed with B movie action and nothing else for the whole duration of the movie – which just tires you out. Problem is that many of these old action movies that I refer is better than this. The Bourn Ultimatum has only 2-3 action clips that are truly unique and raises the awe sensor. The rest is crap.

Now there had been a lot of Bourne has better action than the rest, than James Bond and so on. I remember back in the days when Mission Impossible 1 came out, it was sort of the same. The truth is that good action movies has been redefined all the time, unfortunately good camerawork, or cutting the action like crazy can make things look good for a while, but when Jason Bourne fights like an old Chuck Norris – someone will notice? – or maybe not?

In a way it is sad to see that the Bourne trilogy ends up this way – a little like watching Matrix 2 and 3 and wanting them to be good, but seeing only crap.

My tip is, stay away from this movie, you don’t need to know the secret about Jason Bourne.

Jo Nesbø – Rødstrupe (book)

I couldn’t wait and had to read more about the alcoholic policeman Harry Hole. Again it is an extremely well done book. While it doesn’t have the same smashing intro as in “Marekors” but builds up better in several dimensions that gives us the feeling that everything is connected, yet we do not know what it is.

Its a intermix of happenings that are the big strength of this book. It is so much of it doesn’t really feel realistic, but at the same time we are not able to put the finger on what, and in the end things are put together in a kind of epic (!!) masterpiece and we don’t really have an idea that what is realistic or not.

It’s the kind of story that hits us and leaves us thinking, thinking about a lot of thinks. Jo Nesbø also shows excellent in dept knowledge about all kinds of (un)interesting things.

Hairspary (movie)

Hmm. Good or bad first? Ok let’s take the bad. While the theme of the movie is serious enough: integration, the tension of the movie never rises above “there is bad things in the world but lets sing a song and everything is ok” level. When even Disney presents seriousness like in Bridge to Terabithia, then this is too weak.

The other weakness is that the movie has a little to less story break between the song numbers. And also it just can’t get enough of showing us John Travolta as the fat mom. Come on, it might be funny for a while but not forever. This leads us to being kind of overfed on dancing and music and we just don’t care for what happens anymore. Look at the classic Blues Brothers – one need a paste of music and story and fun that makes it all fit like a glove.

The good is that the music and dancing is well done (although not my taste) and will probably be a big hit to the smallest ones. But that’s all there is to it.

Jo Nesbø – Marekors (book)

For many years I have been hesitating to read Jo Nesbø, this is obviously because he is the brain behind the group “De Derre” and I had this kind of idea that he wouldn’t be much of a writer.

Of course I was wrong. Just like he is the mastermind behind songs like “90 meter bakken” he brings it even further in this book about the policeman Harry Hole.

I am hooked and can hardly put the book down. I am lost and the 400 pages are over in no time.

This is clearly a masterpiece. His writing reminds me mostly about John Le Carre, but where Carre sometimes become slow and boring Jo keeps up the paste with borrowed influence from other writers as well.

Even though the book sometimes has trivialities and the main villain even gets away, most people won’t even notice ;) That’s just how well he grips the reader.

As for some negative: The beginning of the book is really the best and Jo just can’t manage to keep it up for the whole book. I think he should have cut the book down with about 100 pages and it would have been perfect.

Still I am already on my second Harry Hole book.

Nokia N95 – second thoughts

Earlier I gave some first impressions on this multi function phone device. This was in the days before iphone was reality. Its like ages ago. My first impression was really good, I had been waiting in for this device for a long time and I was a excited to have it in my hands.

The excitement ran out fast as an explosion.

And there I was stuck with an expensive cell phone that gave me almost nothing. What happened?

The S60 series 3 that this phone uses is slow, unresponsive. Pretty annoying.

The GPS didn’t work with Tom Tom. Equals useless

The Camera is darn slow. The camera is still quite good but it is annoying with the speed.

Low software compatibility. I can hardly find software that is compatible, except the mayor software. Equals pretty useless.

Mp3 player. Slow but useful? I don’t care for mp3 players on phones anyway.

Bugs. Plenty of bugs present that keeps irritating.

For the rest: The phone is basically just slow and unresponsive, this even with a good chip inside. I am sure there are faster 5MP cameras out there with an even slower chip. The fact that I can not get the software I want is annoying. Gaming is even worse. This phone has a 3D accelerator! And almost no games can use it. It will change when the N-gage platform is re-launched – but then this phone is already old.

I must say this phone sucks. And I still use the 6680 for GPS navigation as well as the OS is much faster and responsive.

Nokia, get a grip! Sort this phone out!

Gert Nygårdshaug – Dverghesten (Book – Norwegian)

Mengele Zoo er ubestridt en av Norges beste bøker noensinne. Men hvordan er det med de andre Nygårdshaug bøkene? Gert har tydeligvis noe å fortelle om i flere av bøkene sine. I de groveste trekk er Dverghesten en eventyrreise roman. Denne typen romaner har hatt en tendens til å bli veldig populære og enkelt reise seg til klassisk status.

Gert prøver å bringe mer inn i eventyrreisen og blander inn masse fysikk, kvanter, teorier, natur, kjærlighet og humor. Til sammen blir dette en meget interessant bok selv om den hardpakker så mye at du fort kan bli svimmel av alt som skjer.

Boken er fra 80 tallet så er innholdet fortsatt like aktuelt i dag. Selv om boken er innom mange teorier og leker seg uvørent med virkeligheten så er boken en liten juvel i samlingen din og bør leses.

Henning Mankell – The Dogs of Riga (books)

Sometimes, I try something new. In Sweden there is a Television produced kind of Hennig Mankell movies. The movies are produced in high speed under a low budget, but still they manage to entertain in a nice way. Its more or less because they feel somewhat like extended length criminal episodes.

So I finally thought, lets give the writer a try and read one of his books; Big mistake of course. While this Swedish writer is sold in 36 nations this really does not give any real quality assurance.

I was really, really disappointed about his writing. I mean: even though criminal books are not my favorite (mainly because they normally does not goes deeper than solving a crime) I have read quite a few of them. The marked for criminal books are huge and hard. And there are really many, many excellent writers that make books that shines of quality.

So what is wrong with Mankell? The story does not really thrill you. The writing is childish. In fact I get associations with The Hardy Boys. While I was a teenager I think I read about 100 Hardy Boys books. (Boy must I have been bored…) And while this was ok at the time, as soon as I got over to Morgan Kane I never read another Hardy Boys Book.

So I guess in a way Mankell can thrill a small audience of teenagers and readers who never got beyond the Frank Stratemeyer level.

Poor you. Stay away from these books and watch the movies instead.

Greetings to the Autumn - Yoyoyo Acapulco in concert

My friends in Yoyoyo Acapulco had a blasting year of success this year, suddenly having a rather good lineup with gigs this summer. I went to see theire last one this year and it was a real success. In fact it was so good that the crowd was screaming for more songs, but since Yoyoyo Acapulco is a fresh band they had no more songs so they had to re-play a song. This drove the crowd insane and we got live ukulele breaking on stage! The Yoyoyo Acapulco way. I also got the new 7” inch from them and so should you.

They now pronounce the summer for over and Gausdal-Indie is a music genre that has come to stay!

Rush Hour 3 (movie)

The first movie in this series became an instant hit. The spectacular "fun" action of Jackie Chan combined with Chris Tuckers voice made a funny and catching buddy-movie. The second Rush Hours tried more or less to copy the first without too much luck. Typically for sequels it that they don't put enough in it but just copy what worked last.

Now for the third installment I just read some reviews that got bottom scores. Whatever that reviewer had for dinner that day I have no idea. Fact is: Rush Hour 3 is and action comedy and that’s what we get: Loads and loads of fun. It might not be brighter than a lot of sexual jokes, but it is done in a nice way and it gets us laughing all the time. In between and sometimes together with the gags we get some nice and spectacular action. While Jackie is quite old and can not show off like he used to, they more than make it up with the usual nice tricks here and there and a really awesome fighting scene in the end. While maybe the marital arts is not top notch, it completely breath takes you when combined with the scenery and sound-fx. Too bad it is not taken further.

Some action movies can really learn something here. Oh and the story? It sucks, but who cares?

Drammen Elvefestival (music festival)

As if I just could not get enough music in my ear I just had to go and see this happening, mainly because of the main star of the evening: Joe Cocker. The evening started off with:

Bjørn Eidsvåg.
He is the preacher who became a musician instead. He is getting very old and that one can see, but he knows the secret to continuous success: A good backing band - in fact all musicians that evening knew that. In general his music is a bit too boring to be interesting for most of us. But unlike studio albums a little live show and some good musicians behind can do wonders. And when he does good we know it will be an awesome night.

Åge Aleksanderesen & Sambandet
Aleksanderens' is somewhat Norwegians version of Bruce Springsteen. In many ways this was a real highlight of the evening. He has a extended record of songs witch are loved and known by most of the Norwegian citizens which means that the audience will be totally thrilled form song 1. When the backing band is also allowed to play freely on all songs and put in fun, multiple guitar solos and sax solos wherever they feel for it you get some really good and traditional Rock'n'Roll. I definitely think that studio music producers have something to learn here!!!

Joe Cocker
Joe Cocker does not leave much to chance so there is little room for "playing" with the songs. There is the occasional sax solo but his sax player sucks and could easily have been changed with the one from Sambandet. Except for that his band plays his tunes in more than perfect ways. Joe himself sings out of his full lungs and I have no idea how he manages to keep it through. The things he does with his voice is amazing, pushing it far beyond the studio records and keeping it above excellent at all times. Respect. He also has a weird way to play air guitar, maybe I should challenge him for a gig one day.

Major HW/SW crash

I had some major HW/SW crash so I lost a lot of stuff. You will notice that some of the picture links on this blog will not work anymore and those pictures are forever lost. Hope you all enjoyed them while they still where there.

:) The Don

Øya Festivalen 2007 (music)

This year I gambled and bought festival tickets before the program was announced, this to be sure to get tickets. In a way this was a total bummer as there were no bands there that I would die to see. Yes there were some big bands and a share of good smaller bands, but none of them which I would die to see. We were up for four and a half day of festival and music! I can tell you that I was totally exhausted quite already on Friday and on Saturday I was about lost. I have a feeling that next time I will do less. But who knows by this time next year I might be all up for it again.

Hellsongs
First off was Hellsongs on the club night. This Swedish band plays soft and intelligent covers of old Hard Rock Classics, a must for the ear and soul. I hope to see them again sometime.

The Captain & Me
While this band certainly had some problems getting fully synched (I think the members change quite a lot) they had a lot of fun on stage and some of the songs was really entertaining, but at other times everything just turned into rumble and porridge. A band to watch for the fun and the cheer of playing.

Theatrefall
This young band was really funny to watch. I think they had too much time playing computer games because at times that was what it sounded like, a bad composed computer tune. Even if the songs where not the best, the beat and the fun made up for it so I quite enjoyed them.

Astroburger
This was once a promising band in the league of Run Dog Run, but whatever happened it lost that. The music is somewhat a tale back in time to what was going to be big once a time but never really got there.

Run Dog Run
Is like Astroburger just better. In a way I think this is the early beginning and the legacy to a few other Norwegian bands that have managed to take it further. I feel somewhat lucky to have seen them at least once.

Subway Safari
The last thing on the club night was this interesting big band. It was a good show and good music to dance to. Something I can recommend if you’d like a good night on the town.

Bare Egil Band
The main festival was started with "Ikke bare bare Egil band" and while I would have preferred to see "Hurra Torpedo" again, Egil shows us again that he is completely mad and gives us a blasting and funny concert.

Tinariwen
I really enjoyed this band. What an interesting music genre: Gerillja Blues. It was also really good for dancing, so I danced. The band members were around the festivals afterwards and easy to spot because of the burkas.

Woven Hand
A good show. A lot better than I had expected it to be.

Bonde Do Role
Surprisingly fresh and impudent.

Nine Inch Nails
I do like Nine Inch Nails and the concert was quite good, problem is that it is like they play the same song again and again. There are just so many bands that have taken this song style further.

Gogol Bordell
This is quite a funny show and worth to see. It started off well and just got better.

Eagles of Death Metal
Surprisingly good again. Not only funny but catchy.

Tool
While I am not the biggest Tool fan, I acknowledge that the last Tool album was quite good and so was this concert.

Spoon
Much better than I thought. The live performances beat the album versions big time.

Heroes and Zeroes
Good band. Just as expected.

Anja Garbarek
This was probably the biggest surprise for me. I knew that this woman made some crazy music, but this was all beyond my expectation. She played up there in the league of Björk. Really nice stuff!

... And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead
Average good band.

The Jesus & Mary Chain
Just about what to expect from them.

Roky Erickson & The Explosives
While my brother loves this band and so does many others, in fact there were 3,5 extra number, its not really my style.

Timbuktu & Damn
Timbuktu had been DJing all night and obviously he must have been just as tired as I where. This affected the start a bit. But after some jumping around and screaming Swedish in our ears it all became a real enjoyable feat. "Everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die"

Killing Butterflies
Interesting band, Deserves a look.

Bjørn Torske
This is somewhat a special feat seeing Torske running around on a stage instructing people to play one track loops. Exchanging synths and sequencers with real people, real instruments (to some extend). It sounds really well but the songs had no real build up, no kick off, to repetive. If Torske can iron out this it will be a killer.

Melvins
Played better than in Barcelona and ATP (last year) but still, definitely just noise for me

Maribel
Too pink for me.

The Besnard Lakes
There have been quite a few good bands coming from Canada. This one sounds promising on paper but the performance was a bit to washy for my taste.

Skambankt
This band surprised me again. A great rock band that sounds better than Ingenting did.

Bloodlights
Pretty good!

Lady Sovereign
A lot of you like her. But not quite my taste.

A princess and her angels

There has been a lot of fuzz in the media after Princess Märtha stated that she could communicate with animals as well as she was involved with this schools that teaches people to get in touch with Angels.

One of my friends even got so frustrated about the guarantee that the school gave (it has been removed) that all students would manage to get in touch with angels.

I think this is all funny. While I am not going to take any side in the discussion I think it is funny because it makes such fuzz.

1. People gets pissed of because she states that she masters as well as can teach others in the art of communication with angles. This is funny because Norway has a government church that has angels all over the place. (Common to everybody that knows about Christianity). Some of the profiled members of the church has also been one of the hardest opponents to Märtha. That is understandable of course as The Church wants to have monopoly on the Angels. But for others, why do we so easily accept the Angels of the church and at the same time attack Märtha's Angels?

2. The Angel Guarantee which was argued to be a promise they couldn't keep (2 person sent formal complains to our consumer council. One of which is my friend) This is of course good enough, there is a law against advertising lies as well as a law against selling something phony. But then why is it that every place around has the "Best Hot Dog" or "The Best Kebab"?

3. There is a third thing as well that I found funny but I don’t remember it right now. But for sure Martha has been able to get a lot of attention to the school, to the royal family and to the problematic about New Age Waves.

Of course Märtha is still on my good-girl list so if she ever get tired of Ari she can count on me ;)

Chandra Vikram - Sacred Games (book)

This is one of the long books I was complaining about earlier. Although this was the best one of them and in the en I managed to finish this almost 1000 page book.

It is some kind of mini epic story. Through jumping back and forth in time and place we follow an Sikh policeman all the way from when his mother was young, till when he manages to prevent a major disaster for Bombay and India. We also follow one small time bandit making his way into becoming on of three major gang leaders and we also watch him fall. In addition to this we get the opportunity to follow other people lives that gets involved in the story.

The writing style is fairly involving and a lot of things are happening during the book. The progress is somewhat slow but the writer manages to keep the reader interested in the stories while he tells more about the Indian way than of the actual main plot.

There are some main themes that the writer points out several times: The major one is the relationship between Hindus and Muslims, while I don't think the writer tries to pick side in the struggle or maybe he does? There is also the indifference between other groups, for example Sikhs.

The main villains story is probably the biggest part of the book, and is somewhat India’s version of The Godfather (but not quite) - the funny thing (or sad) about the whole villain story is that everybody tricks him all along and in all his greatness he is just a fool.

There is also a theme that I think the writer is eager to tell is that a good person (the main detective) which chooses to live a somewhat good and righteous life will succeed in the end (even if it will be a hard way, and many tough choices to make) and may even be able to save The World.

And there is the last thing that I think the writer tries to ask us: "Why save all this?", meaning all this crazy things that goes on in the world. Why? This is much clearer than in the usual hero saves the world story and it gives it that extra edge.


This book is a irritating masterpiece. A book that will keep sticking in your head long time after you finished it.

This book is for anyone that can be bothered to read large books and a must for all Crime Book Lovers.

The Cutter (movie)

It surprises me that Chuck Norris somewhat have managed to have some revival to popularity, mostly because he is absolutely hopelessly hard. How could this be, the man whose main audience is 13 years old kids with pimples (no offence?)?

So I sat down and watched this piece of crap movie.

Let’s start with he bright side. Somewhere in the process the original script must have been quite good, and however wrote it must be totally angry for the way its been fucked up. However you can see its brilliance shine through at certain places. But then for the rest its been cut into unrecognizable pieces and the story (surprise) does not even stitch together.

The camera angel are always bad, always wrong always spot on. Chuck is old and out of shape, it doesn’t have to be anything wrong with that since there are several oldies around and a lot can be done with a little of movie magic. But there is no magic. The whole thing is just plain awfully silly.

This woke up the curiosity in me. The reason why people make bad movies are always a mystery. Of course since I have tried it myself I know it is not easy - but still. So I sat down and watched an old classic: "Missing In Action". This is supposed to be one of the better Chuck Norris films.

To my surprise, except for a much younger Chuck the movie was just as bad in every way. Can it be that it is the same team behind? I would not have guessed. So to sum it up, while other B rated action heroes during years of B movie making sometimes actually have managed to touch the A movie heaven, Chuck's highlight is still to be beaten by Bruce Lee.

The Illusionist (movie)

This is a total different movie than The Prestige. First of, while The Prestige is a story of rivalry, this is more some kind of romantic drama. Where The Prestige keeps tricking us and playing us, The Illusionist only plays one major magic trick on the viewer.

How the movie will end is rubbed into us in the beginning even more than in Smokin' Aces, but we can sort of forgive it since its a part of The Illusion ;)

The feel in The Illusionist is a lot more unreal than in the Prestige, while the truth might nevertheless be the quite opposite. Talking about being fouled?

The Illusionist is a classic story about one man (poor) being in love with a high class woman (rich) and because of this not being able to get her. It helps of course that this man is the best magician ever seen. This is basically the essence of the movie and is the same archetypical elements that one can find again all over in fairy tales and stories. Just like Cinderella for example.

What I wonder is: Isn’t the odds a bit too easy for this man since he is such a magician, or is the fact that he must devote most of his life into becoming the best, to get her, a too big sacrifice?

I really don’t know... But anyway - a good movie to watch - if you like romantic drama....

Smokin' Aces (movie)

This movie is built up after the, lets build up with all kind of bad guys and then let them meet and kick the shit out of each other.

So this is a brutal action movie with all kinds of bad ass criminals against each other trying to hit this mafia guy as well as FBI tries to protect him.

This gives us a really good shootout and one that can be enjoyed. Some scenes are also really well done. Excellent as entertainment.

Where the movie fails is:

1. It tells us too much about the ending early in the movie. While this is a common movie phenomenon and is meant to be a good thing, we don’t need it to be rubbed in - especially when it’s meant to be a surprise.

2. To make us feel identified enough with the FBI to understand why the Agent acts like he does in the end of the movie. In fact its a big question of the whole FBI tactic and why it is done in this way, and which other way it should have been executed in.

3. It does not tell us enough about the bad ass guys that survive.

"What's it all about?"

Garden State (movie)

This is some kind of twist between a nerd movie and a romantic comedy? It is actually a quite popular genre among nerds (guess why: movies where nerdy people actually get to be with such nice people like Natalie Portman. You know, you can play computer games, eat chips and watch Star Trek and still have a chance... Ha ha. )

The main character has been on drug so long he can not feel much and although the movie he more or less has very little emotions and facial expressions. There is somewhat some progress in this during this told tale.

The main character is home for his mother’s funeral and at the same time he gets time to meet up with the ghost of his childhood. He digs into the past. Why doesn’t he talk much with his father and why he has been on drugs for so long? At the same time he falls in love with this girl, which are quite strange herself. (Natalie is not only pretty but an excellent actress)

This movie is quite cute and the story unfolded it interesting.

But please cut out the crap in the end of the movie. Its like "The Wedding Singer" without the bells and whistles. It’s so pathetic it almost destroys the whole experience.

Transformers (movie)

I sometimes used to read the comic books when I was younger. I also played the game on C64. The movie recreates this very well. Its a teenage movie, with robots (or autobots) that can transform. The movie picks up the teenage theme right on spot and it works very well.

Although the movie got some shitty reviews, I think the movie is almost within the Transformers universe. It is not a realistic movie. So let’s play on action, fun and enjoy some crazy robot action for a while. Basically the movie does not take itself too seriously and that is what I like.

Bridge to Terabithia (movie)

This is somewhat the Disney version of Pan’s Labyrinth. Not that it the same story or anything, rather not, but they both mix reality and fantasy - in such a way I wonder. What are the fantasy elements about? Is it so that story writers have no idea about how to make a true fantasy anymore? Guessing on the popularity I think not. I think that when you are little real life is a little like this. The way a kid sees the reality is often a little between its own fantasy and the actual reality.

The real element in this movie switches between some classic school comedy/drama to the little problems the main boy has with his poor family. The fantasy side is the children self invented fantasy (?) land. The boy and the girl while to young to be romantic have something of a deeper friendship. Since this is a Disney product the style is much more polished for children and done very well to entertain an family audience.

Like in Pan’s Labyrinth however we meet the harder reality of life and we are introduced to death. While Pans labyrinth is generally more scary and tougher it has a happier way of portraying death and it all falls nice with the fantasy story.

The meeting with Death in this movie is short and brutal and changes the tune of the movie completely. It turns out to be quite a sad movie. This is quite unusual to see even in adult movies of this type (when he meet her or vise versa).

The boy also feels guilty about what is happening. Partly because he knows that if he had chosen otherwise it would have turned different. The father tries to comfort him out of these thoughts.

The boy star of this movie plays a little too lousy. Always the same look, almost no expression in his face. The girl on the other hand always plays plenty of expression, probably a little too much. Acting is still an important essence to create a good movie - but of course it can not always be easy with child-stars.

It reminds me a little of a episode of peanuts where one of the students get cancer and they explain that there is nobody’s fault. It just happens.

All in all I think both this and Pan are good movies. There are some nice touches for sure, although I am bit unsure what they actually try to say.

Smashing Pumpkins - Zeitgeist (music)

Some people will (again) argue that this is not the true Smashing Pumpkins, and they are right. For Smashing Pumpkins is the first 3 albums, plus the excellent "Pisces Iscariot" The rest turns out to get noisier and noisier turning into a mess that looses that really nice Smashing sound that I and several others have come to love.

With Swan, Billy Corgan sort of got a little back to music again, without actually totally succeeding. With Zeitgest it’s a bit the same. So fine is the line this time that when I hear each song I am not able to make up my mind whether what I hear is complete noise or if it is actually something like a good tune. This is frustrating because I want it to have the old Smashing sound, but it is not quite it.

Would it have been better with the original members? I am not sure. But I think Billy should put on Gish and Siamese Dream on repeat some 30 times or something next time - to go back in time - and make another timeless album.......

- p.o.

Rain and Summer

Summertime and rain in Norway belongs together. People are complaining as usual. Get a life. For all of you, learn to take either an early or late vacation so that you’ll be able to enjoy the good weather. Or simply enjoy the rain as I do.

Playing

Long time back I gave a quite bad review about Age of Wonders 2, this mostly because the first installment is such a neat and good game - but now I have recognized that I was a bit to rash on it so I gave it another try. The truth is that AoW2 is quite a good game, they have improved on the game since the first one, but they have also changed the game play a bit, trying to make it more unique, in a way it is and in other ways it seems more similar to HOMM this time around.

So it is worth playing around with but I still think the first one is better. It is more unique and the style is cleaner. I also tend to think the music is better in the first one and gfx is maybe not better, but serves its purpose better.

I am also playing Overlord, this new game is some kind of cross between Dungeon Keeper II and a arcade adventure. It also reminds me about the Nintendo game Pikmin. All of which are extremely addictive games. So the idea is great and the game oozes loads of Devil freshness. And is quite fun to play. The gfx is impressive and sound as well.

But then we get the problems. It is not quite Pikmin. It is some kind of arcade adventure which has to be played with active strategy. Come on. I have never liked strategy elements in Arcade Adventures. If I want to push stones and move levers Ill play a pure strategy or puzzle game, I don't need Laura Croft to do it. I need Laura Croft to jump around and kill enemies. So? Well in Overlord you can choose to kill beast yourself or use your minions, problem is, you tend to die to fast if you do it yourself, so you’ll end up using your minions all the time, and you know - the fun runs out quite fast - and it all becomes irritating.

And there it goes, I would wish that this game had become either Dungeon Keeper III or something with a stronger strategy element like Pikmin....

24 season 6 (TV series)

Many people thinks season 6 is the weakest yet. And why not? It is a series that has been going on for several season so how to keep it up? The truth is that this time they didn’t try to go for the shock and awe thing and went back on the 24 formula and said, if we can not make a new and grander threat - just lets make the old ones better.

In a way it is better, because it is more laid back, it doesn’t try to show us something new, but has a very tight with only one loose end (which I think will be solved eventually in the next season). The story does not have all that mumbo jumbo side stories that really just is irritating, but more important is that the dialogue and the events that happen are more realistic. Before in 24 there would often be the kind of situations that just where irritating stupid(or maybe I have just watched to few 24 episodes??).

As I was reading about season 6 on the net I came over people who complain about 24 for promoting certain bad behavior like torture among others. For me this has never been an issue as what happens on the screen is always fiction for me. But I know well that there are people who have problems distinguish the difference between fact and fiction and I acknowledge that the nature of 24 might at certain points "promote" certain unfavorable issues. But then again, so does plenty of other movies, TV shows as well as computer games. So I don’t think 24 oversteps here...

I enjoyed this season quite well, but it would be nice with something else than nuclear weapons and standard terrorists one time.....

Ocean 13 (movie)

This time they have not made the mistake of trying to make a sequel, but instead it is more like a stand alone 70's movie with the Ocean twist. This in turn leads to that the whole feel and play of the movie is kind of unique and reminds me in a good way about these classic heist movies. They have also not made the mistake to make time counts, and in the movie time does not work like in the real world, but we are talking about Ocean time - which fit anything that makes the movie cool and funny.

It is probably funnier this time around, not taking anything seriously and the few setbacks in the movie is just there for fun, to entangle the script more and get things the way the makers want it. Ocean 13 is like the bonus play where there seems to be no real challenge, just fun loving criminals.

Books

I am reading 4 books simultaneously - this is mostly because none of them mange to capture my full attention and I am having a hard time finishing them. Why is it that so many writers pour out 500+ pages books that just cant be worth more than 150-200 pages? It is something I have been noticing a lot in movies lately, that there are produces plenty picture, sound and sometimes acting perfect movies, but with very little story; little meat on the bone - so that it becomes boring and I am wondering afterwards - what did I actually see? What is the point? This also applies to some of these books, very well written, a lot of time on details, but why is it that when I have read 150 pages, the story has barley started?

If a book is going to be more than 150 pages, it needs to be worth it. It needs to be breathtaking. Please how am I going to get the power to finish these long books?

Breach (movie)

This is a movie from the biggest spy breach in US history. The genre of this movie I have seen before, one young guy that is set to work "undercover" to get friendly and trusted by someone else in order to achieve the desired goal. However this movie is very different in the way that it doesn’t ask why - it even says in the end of the movie: There is no reason to ask why? - But you know what, I want to know why. I see a movie with a spy that is obviously a psychopath and no references to why it is so.

It is not a thriller, because all scenes that are meant to wake the thrilling sensation are all in avail. It is moreover some kind of drama film, and since we are presented to a super psychopath spy as well without knowing why, this movie is more about the cost of working for FBI and the willingness to pay that cost. This theme is however meant to be a side theme, like seen in many other movies.

Is it worth to see this movie? If you want to learn about the biggest spy in US history: no. If you like to see a drama movie: yes, maybe.

Die Hard 4 (movie)

I was quite afraid that the special effects would have destroyed this movie. This fear was strengthened by the stories I have heard from other people that saw it.

But I had a pleasant surprise. While the forth Die Hard movie is about hacking and also features some special effects it is done with honor to the Die Hard concept, which was built up during the 3 previous movies. A skyscraper, a plane, New York and now hackers: one cop standing alone against some bad guys, becoming 2 (buddy movie) in the third installment and continuing to be a buddy movie this time around.

The concept of raw action, one liners, and fun to break down all the bad guys.

It is true that the main bad guys is not as bad as any Gruber's but then again his dominions are, and these are they guys John McClane fights most of the time - so its good. The main bad guy is however young and probably appealing to a younger audience.

You will get some awesome but a bit overrated action scenes at times, but its all done with such honor to the Die Hard concept that we will forgive it most of the time.

It brings back pieces from all three previous movies, at the same time it updates the series to a modern standard and introduces us to some breath taking action.

This is an excellent movie and one of the best from Bruce in a while.

Pan's Labyrinth (movie)

This is for sure no children movie, so then what is it? Is it a family movie? For older children maybe? I am not quite sure. While it does have an element of fairy tales and a small girl, the main elements of the story is a lot more brutal and has something to do with Franco's Spain.

This movie is one of those that has received excellent critics so I guess I should just go along. It is true that the movie is somewhat enjoyable, but when you take it apart it is hard for me to get what is the target audience for this movie. Is it trying to tell small kids about the cruelty of the grown-ups? Or is it trying to tell grown ups about the wonderful world of small children.

Truth is, the fairy tale elements are not really much, the labyrinth is overrated.

I think the movie is mainly about the innocence of youth, and about this child who is in the age where innocence and vivid imagination is about to break and she is about to enter the world of the grown ups. In the adult world there are cruel things going on, but also heroes fighting for the good. The little girl is put on several tests but chooses the good before falling into evil.

And I guess this is something that hits people really well and it is why the movie receives such excellent reviews.

Min misunnelige frisør (movie)

In the beginning I thought this movie was a thriller. This is because the hairdresser seems to be a psychopath. But it turns out to be only skin(or hair)deep and the movie is actually a romantic comedy.

So either the movie some kind of misses that message until later in the movie or I its just me who couldn’t get it. While I can not say that this movie is an A class movie, it does have some truly funny moments - and might be worth to watch on a Sunday afternoon.

Blood Diamond (movie)

I am not a real fan of Leonardo di Caprio, but here he really does a good job. In fact this is a brutally excellent film. One can always think whatever about movies that try to capture some of the brutality of some of this World and put it on the big screen. Does it help? Will the audience actually take the message and go back to real life and try to make a difference, or will we wash off the message and live like we did before? And even then, is the movie speculative in its brutality and hash reality by showing us children soldiers, civil war, poverty, greed as from real life?

I don’t have answers for this, but what I know is that humans always love a good story and when the story also tells more without pointing the finger of morale on us. The message goes deep in us and it does make a difference, maybe not much but still.

I don't really have much more to say about the movie, it’s an excellent film and so everybody should watch it - but be ready to tackle some action. If so - go and see it with a date ;)

The Prestige (movie)

I was recommended to watch this movie. After watching it I am still wondering if this is a movie about Tesla or not. Ok the positive stuff first. It is a nicely done movie. It is about to competing magicians(!!) over the year that envy and hate each others. The story constantly tries to pull the magic tricks on the viewers as well, pulling out twists and surprises all the time. The pictures, the music, the acting all work really nice.

Now to the bad part: I really has to put the emphasizes on all these things as there seems to be a problem in modern film making that one has so much resources in making over perfect staged movies but one seem to forget a lot of things that makes a movie good: first off, this is or seem to be a rival movie so the two magicians actually already dislike each other even before the first accident happens. In the beginning the quick swaps between the characters and the time jumps confuses us as watchers and we are not given a soft enough introduction of the characters too keep up the patch. (This is similar to the movie The Departed). While this is extremely irritating I think the movie gambles on the fact that after a while we will get the hang of it and then the movie can continue in the same pace, swapping places, time, and pouring out strange twists.

There is almost no character development in this movie. Anybody in the movie industry should know that one of the key factors to a successful movie is character development, the only thing I see in this movie is one of the magicians going from "not wanting to get his hands dirty" to the opposite, but it happens in a snap and there is no real explanation why.

The movie is way to long, the movie tries to be built up as an epic story, the problem is that the movie is built up by the same blocks all the time, rivalry, fight, surprise twist and than more rivalry. The story simply progress by repeating it self for more than two hours - and in the end I wonder what is it the movie tries to tell us?

The morale of the movie is failing, sometimes there is none; sometimes it tries to be some. However unlike Asian movies which can have strange morality lines, the western movie industry seems not to be able to do this as well and we get something of a schizophrenic taste in our mouth.

I think it is actually trying to tell us what a great wizard Tesla was, and in such the movie is in fact perfect despite its faults. I also think that the movie is playing with us on other levels as well, and in a way the rivalry is maybe also a part of another trick? but I will not say which one - if so - the movie receives another plus point from me.

Although the movie is a bit to long, I think you will enjoy it, together with a magic friend.

Spain 2007 (Vacation)

Barcelona
Ahh. Everybody has told me for such a long time: Barcelona is a really good place to go. And it is right so. Everybody is happy, everybody is beautiful. The night life is excellent! The Catalonian cousine is crazy - they seem to mix all kinds of stuff and sometimes they really succeed. Tapas and paellas are great to get the day going, and when you are tired there is the siesta for you.

I finally got the chance to see the Gaudi houses. It was much better than I initially thought. This is great architecture. I wonder why there is not more people that has adapted the Gaudi style as I really would like to live in a house that is like a fairy tale.

And of course they had the Kinder Surpresa Grande!! Good stuff!


Madrid
Later I took the train over to Madrid and spent some quality time over there. Visited an old friend of mine and relaxed in his swimming pool.

Primaverasound 2007 (Festival)

Primaverasound 2007

I think the primary reason I went here was to see

The Smashing Pumpkins
While not really like the original Smashing Pumpkins I think they actually play better now. Not that I have seen them live before, but I have seen live recorded footage. And I have been waiting whole my life to get a chance to see them. Billy Corgan showed off his excellent skills on the guitar and the band showed off. It was one of those moments of immediate pleasure. While they did not play my favorite "Silverf*ck" they did play almost all the other good tunes, and even a few I didn't know.

It was pure rock. I could really feel the grove.

Biggest Surprise was that they played an acoustic cover version of Neil Young's "winterlong".

At times there where some sound problems, but I don't think most people noticed in the drag of the pumping Smashing Pumpkins.

The Fall
I saw The Fall at the Øya Festival last year. There they played uncontrolled and it was pretty much a sad experience. This time around they played a fantastic gig and it showed that they really enjoyed the punk this time.

The White Stripes
My brother has been telling me strange stories about this band. I have no real clue about what to believe, but at least I find it all to be really odd. The White Stripes i without a doubt a really good band if not truly groundbreaking. However 1 and a half hour with this is maybe a bit too much. I think what they really need to do a festival like this is to break the gig up in several small ones...

Black Mountain
They had some sound problems for sure, but it was a pretty good band. I get the feeling they are some kind of mix between classic hippy style and modern indie rock. It works in scary ways, but sure is worth it.

Band of Horses
They had major sound problems, but still this was one of my surprises (as I have never heard of them before) - being one of the best gigs of the Festival. I wonder though why the name is Band of Horses and why all of them are jumping around the stage looking all gay. The music however rocks! You should go and see them.

Built To Spill
My brother has tried to make me like this band for years, and suddenly he succeeded. I just brought my special imported Air Guitar and joined up with another air guitar player and we played along with the band for the whole show.

Sonic Youth
Another time with Sonic Youth, this time performing "Daydream Nation" live. I can only bow my head for this band as they just play better and better, and it’s a totally enjoyment every time I watch it!

The Rest
Queues was a drag, to get in I actually had to do the line 5 or 6 times. Beer was crap and way to long lines, and you had to stand in line to get tickets to stand in line to get tickets to get beer. And the beer was so small before you had finished the line to get tickets you would need another beer, which sellers sold for double price cash while you where waiting in line.

The food was excellent at times, except the sausages which tasted crap.

The ATP stage had some really good shows. At times there were also some good DJs on the Vueling stage, especially at night.

YoYoYo Acapulco Live

For anybody (including me) that missed Yoyoyo Acapulcos live performance at the Norwegian Wood Festival this year, here is some live footage from NRK:

http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/262741

Pictures from Spain and Svalbard

I have put out a small Album of pictures from Svalbard and also from my vacation in Spain, including a few concert pictures from Primaverasound 2007. In addition to that I happend to have misplaced one picture from Kristiansand there as well.

<>

Online Exhibition

A friend of mine suggested this link to me. It is a pretty nice online exhibition.

www.ashesandsnow.org

I suggest you get some time to spare for your own, turn up the volume and enjoy.

Spiderman 3 (film)

Some places this production is referred to the most expensive movie ever other places I have seen it referred as one of the most expensive movies ever. I guess there must be some inconsistency in what the actual production cost is. What we can agree in is that this film is a pretty expensive monster.

Now, does it show?

Not really. While the movie is complete with more beautiful skyscraper action and nice special effects of the villains, there is really not much we haven't seen before. In many ways I prefer it this way as more sfx would just have become overwhelming. But I do think that somewhere on the road way to much cash has been put into this movie.

It is just not worth that much.

Trying to forget about this issue we go back to what we are really interested in:

Is it any good?

While I used to read a lot of superhero cartoons when I was younger, I have never really been a fan of the superhero movies. Very few movie makers are able to capture the original feel of the series as well as giving them fresh blood when transferring them to the big screen.

For people who hasn't read the series this is not such a big problem because they don't know what to expect and therefore often like what they see. I myself are more negative to it, but sometimes they hit the right spot and you have a good superhero movie.

I though Spiderman 1 was a failure - except of course the skyscraper action ;)

In Spiderman 2 they managed to capture what Spiderman is all about. It is actually a parody. Yes a comedy. Not everybody knows this because it is a bit hidden. But Peter Parker is a super hero that mocks a bit with the other. While Superman pretends to be human and Batman is a playboy, Peter Parker is (despite his superpowers) extremely human and fragile. The fact that he is Spiderman is more a nuisance than a wow factor in his life. I think this is what people like about Spiderman and why he becomes some popular. This formula seems also to be working better on the big screen than in the cartoons - which means Spidey was before his time and have just been waiting for his moment to show!

Spiderman 3 follows up from Spiderman 2 and plays on the right issues in the Spiderman universe. This time the storyline is in fact quite complicated. There are several villains and some are even friends? And of course there are problems, with Mary Jane, with his aunt, with money, with work and within himself. The struggle with himself is magnified with the dark suit, which I think was a perfect choice to port from the cartoon as it is the best Spidey story!

To sum it up I think Spiderman 3 is just as good as the second movie, perhaps better because its just more complex without getting the dull moments.

And now, do I need to make a Spiderman evening with all three movies? Aaargh... That will be a lot of web mess....

300 (film)

I haven't read the cartoon so I can not say whether it captures this well or not. What I can say is that I do not like the design look. Come on; Snow that looks falser than a 30 dime comedy? The overall design look reminds me of an intro to some PC game or something (limited budget).

Yes I do understand that this design choice is meant to be cartoon like and not realistic. So Ill try to pretend I buy this.

And that works. The movie is basically full of action and not that much story. The narrator voice is excellent and I just feel that they tell what would normally be displayed in "narrator boxes" in a cartoon. The dialogue of the movie is also excellent because most of the time its just hardcore talk and only to small extend is it used to tell the story.

This is very refreshing as the majority of the movies today does the mistake that they have to tell everything in dialogue instead of actually using dialogue to challenge the viewers. It also works because the movie doesn’t really have much story to tell but is actually trying to please us with a few hours of hack and slash.

It totally works. All the way and despite not liking the design I love the movie. Such tough guys just killing whatever comes their way, I like. But it doesn’t necessary mean that you will.

It was an honor to watch this film.

Spanish Reunion

One of these a few from last years Spanish course got together to eat some Tapas(!) as well as get a status update in how our Spanish is evolving. For myself I have to admit that my Spanish is unfortunately on total hold.

While I really wish to progress I know I have to wait till a little later.... But one day...

The tapas was nice and we had some good fun.

Congratulations to Yoyoyo Acapulco

As a part of The Norwegian Wood festival a few lesser known bands get the chance to send in their demos and the best of these will get a live gig on the Underwood stage during the festival. This has become one of the platform for bands rise up from the unknown into devoted greatness.

To make this a cash cow the jury did choose the 20 best bands where 8 would go further to the festival. To become among the 8 the bands fans had to cash out votes by sending SMSes. Basically the bands with the most and eager fans - that spends the most cash on SMS - wins. All in all quite a cynical way to exploit the fans that just wants to see the band do well.

I want to congratulate my friends Yoyoyo Acapulco and all the fans with the gig on Saturday 16. June this year. And hopefully they will deliver an awesome show! Loads of soap bubbles for everybody.

Acopalypto (movie)

This movie received mixed reviews, many complained that Mel Gibson had used to much violence.

I think this is an awesome movie and that the level of violence is quite low. The level of realism is quite high. One should not misunderstand high level realism with unnecessary violence.

I have absolutely now idea what the Mayan used to wear but I have to say all the effects, makeup and clothes are extremely well done. It seems to be totally authentic. In this case "seems to be" is sufficient for me.

The movie does not follow a traditionally story line and neither is it an epic movie. It is more in the special theme genre, and I think the theme this time is the not too unknown: Survival. This keeps the movie on a constant edge. Still Mel Gibson has not gone in the trap of making it a fast pulsating movie but instead he gives the movie air during each thrilling moment - which in turn increases the thrill and the watchers joy.

To say something bad about this movie: It seems that it they are using some kind of high end movie equipment which sometimes when there is to much going on - gives to much realism which in turns seem unnatural. (I saw this in last years Miami Vice as well) - I think maybe this is somewhat correlated to Walt Disneys problem with animations where too realistic movements lead the animations becoming funny. It is not too often this happens tough and most people will probably not even notice it.

All in all: a really enjoyable movie.

Johanne Hildebrant - two first books about Valhalla

One of these days, walking down the alley I decided to look at a book sale and out I came with the first book of Swedish Johanne Hildebrandt first book in her trilogy about Valhalla. A few minutes later (maybe closer to 30 minutes?) I was sitting down at a cafe and reading.

And to my surprise I just couldn't stop. I was hooked before I knew it and days became night and day again and before I knew it - it was all over.

This kind of writing style is not necessary good writing. It’s just about keeping the tension so high at each moment of the book so you just can't put it down. A style perfected by Alister McClean.

Johanne tells the story about the forbidden an intense love between Froeya and Thor. As they are not allowed by their tribes nor the Gods to love each other it is both a sad but still intriguing and beautiful story.

While Johanne portraits these mythic Gods as humans or very human like she is maybe a bit short into giving them typical archetypical faces of envy and power.

What I am trying to say is while she is making really good story and I enjoy it like several others, she fails to go deeper. I am not sure but this could also be the strength as going deeper can easily fail.

Then later in the same alley I went into a different book store and got hold of the second book at a bargain price. Wow that was pure luck!

And I was back at it again. The second book brings the Legend of Valhalla further and this time we follow Idun, the fruit of the secret passion of the first book.

It is obvious the Johanne has become a better writer since last time as in this book the writing is tighter and more thrilling than ever. This could also be because the story line is in all not that complex.

I am looking forward for the third book that concludes this trilogy.

Kill Buljo - (Movie)

This is a Norwegian parody on Quentin Tarantinos "Kill Bill". Tarantino is himself very happy of being parodied. Of course one can expect anything when it is a Norwegian movie.

Ok now to the serious stuff. Although there are some technical shortcomings here, specially with the camera angels and some bad acting the complete experience is overall very well done. But the best part is that it is genuine funny.

I am unsure if it would be funny for anyone but Norwegians, but I think so as it is parodying famous material.
I recommend it for all that is up for a good laugh.

Letters from Iwo Jima (movie)

I choose not to see Flags of our Fathers first. This is because Letters from Iwo Jima is supposed to be the best one. I am a big time fan of Clintie and most of what he has done. However sometimes there is a "flop" like Mystic River (While a top notch movie, it fails to really get its story trough) so I am always a bit skeptic to see his films. Mainly because I don't like to be disappointed.

Letters from Iwo Jima is a true pleasure to watch. The anti-violence message Clintie has tried to tell us since "Unforgiven" has now been even more perfected than in Million Dollar babe. While there is no usual Clinite "hard-ass" here - the movie has all the small quirks that puts a smile on your face.

The camerawork, the cutting, the flow, the story - everything is almost perfect, and I smile all the way through the movie. Sometimes I even fall in total laughter because he (Clintie) puts his anti-violence messages in such a superior ways.

Now of course this movie is a American movie and no matter how much it tries to tell the story from Japanese point of view I think it will probably fail on a few places. It would be nice to know what the Japanese themselves think about this.

The one let down of the movie is that it doesn't have a normal story line. While the first part is the common "get to know the people" it continues straight into war mode and it never really builds in a classic fashion. I think this is because Letters from Iwo Jima is more of an Epic movie (altough in a very sorth amount of real time) and therefore the story is also more complex and more like the big time epic stories.

There are few directors left that knows how to make such a good movie like this and unlike most of the oldies Clint Eastwood never seems to fade but just gets better and better.

There are only reasons to see this movie and no reasons not too.

Bjork - Volta (music)

Back in the days of "Debut" I didn't quite get why MTV was broadcasting this crazy girls "Human weakness" all the time. It took me a long time before the song reached me and I understood. Understood how good it all was. (Quite similar to my experience with the games Tetris and Lemmings, maybe I am a bit slow sometimes) I think it is because Bjork is "so much more" and she constantly requires a lot from the listener.

Since then I have been hooked. The quality of the different albums have changed a lot and we pretty much never know what she will be up to. Every time Bjork explorer something new and expresses this part of her to us. Her albums is a journey into a travel that goes from Iceland to any influence she meets on the way. In the line Volta brings back a bit of the formula that was lost last time - and in its own Volta is defiantly worth some listening.

Volta is not though in the top of the pops. In fact it is hard for her to reach the kind of height she had at the start of her carrier. But we do hope she will.

Dinsosaur Jr - Beyond (Music)

It is a rule that says that when a band reunites and make a new album it will never be any good. And it will take 3 albums before they reach somewhat the old heights before they broke up again. Dinosaur Jr puts this rule to blame. While the band members doesn't really stand each other, and try to be far away from each other on the scene - we do have a quality album in our hands.

In fact is is just like Dinosaur Jr is supposed to be. Awfully great and all the tunes are just as good as the old albums. In many ways Beyond sounds like time stood still and that they where songs made back in the days.

It’s hard for me to explain - but its just like old days when I was a little boy and I put on Dinosaur Jr and relaxed off after school. Basically it’s just perfect - I can't get enough of it - lets hope they keep going at least for two more albums :=)

Tronderfest

I don't know if there is any good word for this in English. But it is basically a party style where everybody pretends to be from the region of Troendelag. In many ways this is very much alike to a bad taste party.

The subtle differences is that all participants are trying to reach one kind of bad taste. And therefore it is some pretty funny stuff.

We had a great pre-party in the tendencies of being like fourteen year old (fjortis) again and drinking like we have no idea what we are doing.

Then we went out and the place the party was at was totally empty so we went to Nikkers instead an continued with some bad ass displaced Tronder-dancing.

Det blir itj fæst uten Skjinnvæst

Prayer for today

Today I purpose to live

My life will shine
As the morning sings
I walk in liberty
Bound in true dreams
Manifested promises
Chase my forward motion
A covered path before me
The fruits of my hoping
The fruits of my living

Today I purpose to love

My love will speak
With the sound of grace
Merciful within mercy
The works of my faith
Smiles of overflowing
Inspire my giving
Abundance of joy as rain
The fruits of my living

Wine Tasting

I went with some friends for a wine tasting event at Hotel Contenintal. It was 350 wines in 4 hours. To be honest that is quite a race. Of course you don't get time to taste them all as you need to take the time to really taste the wines and make notes.

I was pleasantly surprised that the general quality of wines where quite good and there where some really interesting wines to taste. It felt like being in France, Germany, Italy and Spain all together. I really enjoyed the evening and afterwards had a lovley dinner at Teatercafeen.

Deja Vu (movie)

Tony Scott is behind some of the best movies ever (read: True Romance, The Last Boy scout and Top Gun) and this is of course something to keep in mind. Deja Vu takes a quite serious Sci-Fi theme and turns it into a pretty good movie - half serious, half entertaining. Denzel plays his role really well. However the movie is filled with trivial things and action sequences that is there only to "keep us going" and is not really needed for the story. While this is quite ok, it does take the movie down from being a classic.

The general feel that the movie gives us is a good thrilling feeling and we can't really know if things will be good or not (if you didn't watch the trailer that is... bummer). When looking through the triviality we are presented with a deeper story about love and about changing the future and past for the better. Even if the obvious glitches like the "time machine" and the projection of items are totally unrealistic I think that this is what the triviality cover up - so that it feels like the "time-machine" a totally sane idea.

In the end I must say I enjoyed this movie and so will you.

Perfect Stranger (Movie)

This movie has gotten some mediocre reviews. I however think that this is wrong because this is in fact quite an enjoyable movie. The fact that Halle Berry is not a very good actress adds up to the realism in the movie. Her nervous not so very played movements are quite realistic in how her role would be. Said in a different matter: Halle Berry is such a bad actor she fits perfect in the role. This adds up to the thrilling sensation of the movie. Bruce is of course playing better than in a long time, unfortunatly he is not allowed to have a really big role in the movie.

While Perfect Stranger is no: 6th Sense, it is quite a good thriller and against some others believes has all the ingredients to a good thriller - it even puts it in a little different way for pleasure.

First Impressions - Nokia 95 (Hardware)

Ahh, finally the all purpose phone in my hands. Its like the butter(fly) in me is totally in .........

To begin with I have tried several smart phones lately. I am the kind of guy that tries all programs and possibilities of a system to see how it works. The high end SonyEricsson phones are pretty good all around, however as Neonde(behind the P8/9xx series) decided to produce their own phones SE has had problems following up the success. well partly they have but I know many are looking for something like a P1000.

Then we have the Windows smart phones. The first edition of Windows CE I find to be pretty good. Light and flexible with an impressive pack of compatible software thanks to the IPAQs success. Also there is little of the overhead and the fuzz (vaporware). Seems to me for every later version of this portable Microsoft OS it gets worse and worse. The latest version I tried is 5.0 which in theory can do everything you want but in practice is just a major pain and you end up with nothing working. Another problem is that we already have version 6.0 and the software has problem to be compatible and this means you will always have a limited bag of software that you need.

Of course I have had a extreme usage pattern of phones so I decided to go for a second hand Nokia 6680 to save some cash. While this is strictly maybe not a smart phone, it runs Symbian S60 and I was just so relieved to finally have a OS that works and still have fairly good software support. But what is even more important is the OS is efficient to use and has what you and I need both as a power user as well as a light user. While I think there is still room for massive improvement in user friendliness in the GUI - it still gives me pleasure when compared with the others on the marked. iphone will probably show us later how to make something better.

So here we are at the stand with the Nokia N95 which runs S60 3rd edition, making it incompatible with a lot of the software. I really hope a lot will be ported over soon.

Now what does this phone offer?

A 5 MP camera. As we all know its not the number of MP that makes a good camera but the lens what is behind the lens. The sensor is not good enough to support the 5 MPs and one should probably think of it as a decent 3 MP camera. Maybe not to impressive for some of us but I firmly believe that there are to categories of photographs. The normal one; usually called the amateur. Which means about all of us that enjoy to take photos at parties, holidays and so on but does not take much interest and time into creating beautiful pictures. For us this phone-cam will do! The other kind is the (semi)pro photographer that will need a better camera anyway - a much better one. If I am going to purchase a better camera it will be one of those - but not until I have the time and the urge to go into the semi-pro business. Meaning: that a Nokia N95 can save you the bucks and hassle of an extra camera.

Other thing to say is that the current firmware is not fully optimized for the camera so the quality will improve with future firmware releases. A camera that grows better with time - how cool is that?

A GPS. No this is something to say. Its built in and several 3rd party software does not support it yet (come on TomTom!!) and this can be a drag as it forces you to use the Nokia built in application. Basically this is a service that gathers the info needed through a online service, meaning it will cost you both a subscription and GPRS data packets. The application itself is quite neat but has to little features to offer to satisfy most of us. There has been a lot said about the GPS antennas sensitivity. While it takes a bit time to initiate satellites, it does perform quite nice when driving :) Wayfinder 7 is also compatible with N95. It works quite like the Nokia one. But gives you more juice - options. The firmware also hasn't optimized fully for the GPS so the sensitivity will increase with time... Again this is nice.

A SIP phone. I really like hooking up to WLAN and have my IP phone service on my cell phone. No need to have a separated phone at home anymore. (ok for families this might not be the ultimate choice?? - but maybe I will look into the possibilities to engineer a solution for this later on)

3D accelerator. I am wondering if this phone actually gives better 3D than the Nintendo DS lite, I have to wait for some new games to compare. It is very promising indeed.

Mediacenter - I am not so much for using a cell phone as a media player, I still prefer the ipod. But for those lighter users this phone has all you need.

Radio - Again I don't think I will need it much, but some people might find it useful

Everything else you need - N95 does about anything you'll ever want.

The negative sides: Its a sucker for battery. It is fully possible to make the battery last a long time if you don't use the phone much. Problem: if you buy this phone you will be a power user, which means you will use the options the phone gives you, which means battery life is a joke. Nokia should go back and give everybody that purchased this phone a free battery upgrade (yeah, like that would ever happen).

First Impression - Nintendo DS lite (hardware)

Supposedly I needed to get some new toys. It became a Nintendo DS which I am totally in love with. Its hard to say what it is, but this little device has everything it needs to become an ultimate playing device. Is it the touch screen? Is it the built in mic and WLAN?

I think of all it is Nintendo. Nintendo has years on the back of tuning in the gameplay experience. The target Nintendo player is a lot younger than those of PSP and therefore the games available usually are a bit more childish than on its competitor.

This is where Nintendo does it things best. Nintendo "lends" (to put it in a nice way )its expertise to the game developers to make sure that every game released on a Nintendo system will give us the ultimate experience. Overall this works pretty well.

Come to think of it, back in the days when Nintendo released Gameboy with a dull monochrome screen, Atari gave us the Lynx with 4096 colors (just as many as on a Amiga system). While many people still remember Atari with good memories, truth is whatever games are sold as Atari Classics today - they are just mostly a bunch of crap. Lynx games was crap and people preferred to play Mario on a monochrome screen - for a long time. Even the GB color was not a such a improvement and it was not until the GBA that we got some decent color handheld gaming.

And this is why Nintendo can release so called inferior HW systems and still win our hearths. For the first the Nintendo DS Lite is quite ultimate in many ways, the ways Nintendo reinvent the gaming experience for us. For an old time gaming Mongol like me it makes my heart soft as butter(flies) and I hardly can put my DS away at all.

I defiantly want to write some more about the games later, but for now.....

We will finish up with the downside: As I kind of mentioned earlier the lack of propher adult games, meaning fighting, beating is a bit weak. Yes there is a few but they are lacking. The other thing is that 3D gfx can be a bit dull.

But as we know - gaming is all about the pleasure and that’s what it is

:)

Upcoming Stuff

Beside the fact that spring is here and all the joys of the upcoming summer - whatever enjoyable surprises it will bring; I have a few "nerdy" things that are thrilling me.

First up is a few things from Bioware. After finishing the excellent Jade Empire (without a doubt one of the best games ever!) I found out that the game Mass Effect is coming pretty soon. (Something to play on rainy days??) Mass Effect is said to be a KOTOR style game with all the Star Wars association removed - so defiantly a winner.

Then we have KOTOR 3. There are mostly rumors and no verified info about this. Some people thinks that Mass Effect is what was supposed to be KOTOR 3. Some says that it will be made after Mass Effect either by Bioware or Obsidian. I don't really know, but after Jade Empire I can not wait!

NWN2 expansion - The first expansion to Never Winter Nights 2 is also something to look forward to. This expansion will continue where NWN2 finished and let us do all that high level D&D stuff.

Zelda on DS - Finally the DS will get its own Zelda game, expect it to be: awesome.

Smashing Pumpkins with a new record. 7. July we expect to get a new record from Smashing Pumpkins. While I am not expecting a new "Siamese Dream" - this can be the beginning of something nice.

Live Free or Die Hard - I just hope the forth Die Hard movie will be awesome and conclude the series with a BANG.

Spiderman 3 - I expect this one to be even better than number 2. Or so I hope.

Vote for Yoyoyo Acapulco to play at Norwegian Wood Festival

My friends Yoyoyo Acapulco are among 20 bands of which 8 of them gets the chance for a live performance at the festival.

To get in the top 8 they need your votes: Send a SMS simply saying “Wood 20” to number 1987. From abroad it will be: +47 1987

(This is of course another lame way to earn SMS money – but in this case it is for a good cause! ;D )

Links for more information:
Yoyoyo Acapulco Page: http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=105348553
The Contest: http://www.nrk.no/musikk/1.2157808
Norwegian Wood Music Festival: http://www.norwegianwood.no/
Blog entries: http://blog.eardrumsmusic.com/2006/09/yoyoyo-acapulco-fantastic-fun-american.html and http://milkmilk-lemonade.blogspot.com/2006/10/yoyoyo-acapulco.html

Vote now! Spread the word ;)

Jade Empire (game)

Just as I was talking about the perfect beat-em-up - something quite close to it arrives in my hands. I am impressed with Bioware - they deliver quality games almost all the time. They have ripped out the D&D backbone of the engine and swapped it out with a lovely arcade style Martial Arts.

It works so well - I honestly have to admit I am hooked. It is not like the ultimate beat-em-up with Tekken 5 as described earlier but this is as close as you can get. It is almost like heaven ;) And with the RPG element on top of that - this is a game you simply gotta love.

Not any bad sides? Well in one it reminds me a lot of KOTOR, but that’s just good. Other than that I think he fighting should have been more sophisticated with a lot more moves and such - and maybe given us more health so that we could have had longer fights - (best of 3 anyone??)

One can hardly understand what kind of work it is to put together a game like this. Then again to imagine all the testing that is needed to make a game like this flow like the wind. Luckily this has been converted to PC from console so we know we don’t have to deal with all the bugs – as it still is so that console games has to be almost bug-free before release. With all the live-content of nowadays consoles that might not last for long.

I really hope Bioware will continue to improve this formula and make a Jade Empire 2 very soon - and why not a KOTOR 3 at the same time???

Demon Stone (game)

I actually find this game fun. I do like beat-em ups and this slash-em up is quite enjoyable. It is much like the Lord Of The Rings one and I think that is its biggest weakness - that it doesn’t feel unique enough.

I think of the prefect beat-em up this way: You take Tekken 5 and give you the possible to walk around and explore and beat up whoever comes your way. Why doesn't anyone make anything like this.

Compared to this Demon Stone can not reach up. There simply is to many monster and to much push the same button over and over again. So it shortly falls down in the pit. The game is also quite short and I understand why - you simply can't enjoy it any longer than that.

Probably not worth any cash - better do the Lord Of The Rings one.

The Good Shepherd (movie)

I have watched a lot of crap lately and this one is another one.

Who was it that decided that the rules of personal development doesn’t apply for movies anymore and that you (and me) actually find it interesting to spend 3 hours watching a person using having only one facial expression.

The only thing interesting I find with this movie is that the morale seems to be: if you sleep with a woman you are guaranteed it will be a spy. Nice...

BTW: Matt Damon suck!

Eragon (movie)

This is a fantasy tale that tries to be different? At least it tries to introduce a new magical system. Nothing wrong with that really - but it takes the movie apart because it somewhat childishly tires to teach us this system incorporated with the thin story line.

I think the main problem is that no one really took the time to quality assure the system and the story and so there we are. Then again I guess this is a children movie - so I shouldn't expect too much?

Babel (movie)

This is another big movie that receives great scores. I think you can put in somewhere in the same place as Haven and Traffic while Babel is for sure the best one of these when it comes to photography, acting and music. In fact it is so well done all over that it is to cry over - because the story is nothing.

The story gives me nothing but wasting my time. The story tried to be interesting, to hint about hidden deeper meanings and so on. But all in all - even if there is some interesting points here and there - the story just doesn't give anything, and then this movie really has very little to show. Except of course the parts the movie excels in.

The Da Vinci Code Extended Version (movie)

I didn't read the book and I have no plans to do so either. But this means that I have no real idea whether Dan Brown actually writes any good or not.

This movie however is a sad affair, unless you are about 6 years old, you will not find much tension or drive in the story.

Come on. Secret societies using unscrambled cell phones? And not tracing others using cell phones? Naaaah.

The main problem with this movie is however that the most interesting moments is when the mystery of Leonardo Da Vinci’s picture is explained. The actors are not allowed to portrait the rolls with any personality, which turns Tom Hanks into a dull and boring character. Even the policeman Fache has no personality and the only one that keeps us a bit entertained is Silas.

Basically the story and the drive is not really there and I just feel like I have been wasting my time.

Ed Wood (movie)

A friend of mine recommended this movie to me, in the belief that this was fiction. When I told him that this was based on the real life of The Worlds worst director ever - he freaked a bit as he thought it was just: too far out.

This movie is made by the Burton/Depp team. We already know that it will be brilliant. Quite different, funny and very well done as expected. After this you might actually want to see "Plan 9 from outer space" and "Bridge of the Monster" just for the laugh.

Reunion party

The old(???) guys from children school came together the other weekend and celebrated some kind of reunion party. At that time we where only 6 people so it wasn't too much a hassle to organize.

And yet it became a hit. A good time to remember the old times when one was childish (because I am not childish at all nowadays ;) naaaah) and did a lot of strange stuff that children does.

It in turn lead to a friend coming over on Monday after to put up come C64s and played some of the old games that we used to play. Quite amazing how bad these games really are, but they kept us playing for hours and hours back then.

We went through the old classics: World Games - The weight lifting is a real classic. Winter Games - The Biathlon is pretty cool. Not to forget the Epyx song. My oh my.

It also lead to this habit to eat IFA pastilles again at least for that week.

Later I installed a C64 emulator by another friend and we had a shot at some other classics like: Terry's Big Adventure, Hopping Mad and the crazy Olympic Skier. Nice fun!

Waiting for Easter

We are of course waiting for Easter. Tempratures has been rising again. We are hoping that we will be able to keep the snow for all the skiing that has to be done.

Plans for Easter has still to be made though. I guess it will be another of those. Jump on a band wagon and see what happens....

Mossaka Evening

The first time I tried Mossaka was on my Bosnia tour in 1998. It reminds me a little of Lasagna but then again it is actually quite different. So I decided (by request) to try to make my first Mossaka. Would I be able to put it all together? I did the usual food research to see if I could get some tips. And suddenly there is was. An almost perfect Mossaka dinner...

It was also the first time I made a Greek salad. In fact I liked the salad even more. Reminding me of the time spent in Thessalonica in 2001 before we went into Macedonia. (Pictures and info about this tour can be found here: http://home.online.no/~chand1/Web-page/index.htm )

I ultimatly made another Greek Salad two days later as a main course. Yummy.

Windows Vista (Software)

It is true. As soon as you tried it you will never go back to Windows XP again. I who never really like the once so "fancy" sides of Windows XP always run it with optimal performance and classic views have now been enchanted by Vistas new look and you do suddenly have a reason to run it with all the eye-dropping features on.

ON!

With my AMD X2 3800+ with 2GB ram + 1GB Ready boost it is fairly responsive and quite fun to use. However it requires almost all the processor power and the CPU FAN is running constantly and the CPU temperature is high and on the rising.

Telling me: I need a new computer.

The new interface is in many cases a pure rip-off from Mac OS X. And why not, it is a good OS to rip-off from. In fact Vista is the first OS (of my opinion) that has some truley user friendly features. The big icons on the desktop are to my dislike but I see that it will loved by many.

The HUGE dialog boxes that assist you in what's going on is also something I dislike, but again something that is user-friendly and will be good for many.

For example, I have a friend that has had nothing but problems with his PC in such level that it never would work - resulting into it being quite useless for him to have a PC. After a long time of this I suggested to him to switch over to Mac OS X and he has been happy ever since. No problems at all. While the switch to Vista won't be ass painless - it is a step in the right direction.

Something I really don't like is that it often can become totally non-responsive, even to such keyboard actions as CTRL-ALT-DEL - It has not crashed - you basically just have to sit and wait for Vista to sort itself out.

You also have plenty of new or changed tools to help your system out. I suggest you to familiarize to these as soon as possible.

Vista will for sure boost Hardware sales to a new top. Everybody needs a new computer now. Xp is old-fashioned.