Richard Linklater impresses like few others

Extremely interesting stuff about Richard Linklater's thought processes,and even more so, his practical approach. If there had to be one guy to model myself on as a filmamker, Rick is the guy.

Ebert

This guy is seriously good.

Sample this:
Motion pictures are an illusion. They aren't really made of moving images at all, just a series of stills projected at 24 frames per second. The motion is a trick created with the help of shutters, lenses, a little sprocket device known as the Maltese cross -- and the human brain, through a phenomenon known as persistence of vision.

Jean-Luc Godard famously claimed that cinema is the truth 24 times per second; Brian De Palma countered that it's really 24 lies per second; and Pablo Picasso offered the cosmic perspective that art is a lie that tells the truth. All of these things -- tricks of the eye, mechanical illusions, artistic skills, suspension of disbelief, philosophical principles, metaphysical questions -- are at the mysterious, romantic heart of "The Illusionist," written and directed by Neil Burger, and based on the story "Eisenheim the Illusionist" by Steven Millhauser.

Like "F for Fake," the delightful meditation on art and deception by Orson Welles, "The Illusionist" places the very film you're watching at the center of the illusion. There's an irony inherent in making a movie about magic, since the photographic medium is discontinuous and subject to post-production manipulations beyond those that can be created before a live audience. But it also focuses your attention elsewhere, on the illusory properties of movies and storytelling, and how much we love to be dazzled by illusions in art, politics, religion, and other realms.

Mumbai? It's so far away...

Early morning call from my (current host in another metropolis - I am away from my metropolis) friend's mother brought me news about the Mumbai drama. My reaction was, "What's new?"

I honestly think that as long as I am not directly affected by it, terror attacks will not cause me any greater emotion, than perhaps a hollow attempt to feel for those who lost their lives and loved ones.

It is being touted as the biggest attack on India yet. I am not shaken by it.

Terror attacks have become everyday news. They've lost all their shock value on me.

I was interested to know if any news channel was covering the hostage crisis. I was hoping that Reality TV had something interesting to throw up... but no, disappointed.

My brother lives in Mumbai. Some of my best friends live there. They were 200 m away from action. But they are safe. And that's all that matters to me.

You know why I am not more disturbed? Because nothing will come out of it. I wish I could do something, but I know there's not.

Lives are cheap in India. Wherever I go, my network may or may not follow me. But there are tens and hundreds and thousands of people. I don't care about them if I can't do anything for them, and they for me. I want to change this. I want to do something for them.

The problem is too big. Until it's tackled honestly.

Terror - We read the news, watch the entertainment and express our concern and dismay with distorted faces.

Terrorists - we hate them because they hate us.
Because we hate them.

We have failed to prevent terror attacks, because we have failed to understand terrorists. All we have learnt is to hate their guts and to kill some of them, if we can(!).

But as I said, we have too many people in India. Lives are cheap. Terrorists come cheap. But they go expensive.

We need change. All you would be terrorist guys out there - Rehman, Mustaq, Mahmood, Mohammed - whatever your names may be. I love you. I wish I could do more that this, but words are all I have for now.

Something I want to get my hands on

Up Series
Of course, Boyhood will be the better, I suspect, when it eventually comes out.