One of the movies I stumbled onto over the weekend was “Little Black Book” Not a huge fan of the whole “chick flick” genre, you might be wondering why I watched it. Although Brittany Murphy may have been the star of the film, what hooked me was all the references to Palm. As my tag cloud can attest, I’ve been a bit of a fan over the years. I will admit that my passion for the platform has definitely waned over the last five years, going so far as to tell them goodbye, but I couldn’t stop watching.

To some extent I was really doing nothing more than reliving the late heydays of Palm. I remember all the promotion that Palm put out on the film and how they felt that the Palm Tungsten C was one of the characters in the movie. Although that may be taking things a bit too far, it was definitely the star of the show in my eyes.

palmOne Press Release

In “Little Black Book,” Stacy Holt (Brittany Murphy), an associate producer for daytime talk show hostess Kippie Kann (Kathy Bates), is frustrated when her boyfriend Derek (Ron Livingston) refuses to discuss his past relationships. With the encouragement of co-worker Barb (Holly Hunter), she delves into his palmOne^™ handheld to learn about his ex-girlfriends. The digital footprints of past and present romances are kept on a Tungsten^™ C handheld from palmOne. This little black book, used for work and play, is the technology star of the film.

The movie itself was mediocre at best. If they had used a Blackberry instead of a Palm, I wouldn’t have lasted more than 10 minutes before changing the channel. But they didn’t. They used a Palm and they used it through the film here-and-there. One of the more memorable scenes for me was where they were displaying a Palm application via a projector up on the wall. The image was obscured by the actors and they never actually made reference to it, so I can only assume that it was used in an earlier scene that was deleted, but you could clearly see a few soft buttons and an outline of the user interface. It literally made me catch my breath.

As silly as it may sound, what dawned on me was just how much I used to be IN LOVE with Palm OS. There she was — Palm OS — right at her peak, still vibrant and full of potential, in a major Hollywood movie and she looked fantastic. The Commodore 64 may have been my first crush on technology, but the Palm Pilot was my first true love and seeing the actors make references to it and for her display to appear on screen just brought it all back.

It was like seeing photos of your first girlfriend and remembering how great it was back then. Today you’ve both grown older and gone your separate ways, but to recall that time in your lives when everything just clicked and it is so delightfully delicious to recall. At a commercial break, I closed my eyes to hold onto that memory as long as I could. It was like savoring a single bite of a desert long forgotten. You hold onto it with all your senses as it slowly dissolves away and then you swallow and there’s nothing left.

To drive the analogy into the ground, Palm has since let herself go and left me for someone new a few years ago. She’s now but a glimmer of her former self and I stopped calling because it was just to painful to see her like that. Of course she has a younger sister, the Palm Pré, which everyone is excited about, but that’s not the one you fell in love with.

Besides, I think to myself, I’ve moved on and I’m in a happy and committed relationship with my iPhone. Our relationship is stable and secure and even after two years, we’re still acting like we’re dating. There’s so much stuff to see and do that there simply isn’t enough time in the day.

But every so often, I hear a beep, or see a certain squarish oblong button and I’m instantly taken back to the days when technology was a little bit simpler and the world was still eagerly waiting to be conquered.

As I scrolled through page-after-page of videos and links of utter hilarity, I came across this video that I just had to share. Bathtub IV is one in a series of videos from Keith Loutit’s “Little Sydney” project and it’s just brilliant.

Bathtub IV from Keith Loutit on Vimeo.

Note: this is not stop motion, and these are not models. I showed this to Dan and we talked about it and how Keith created this fantastic video. Seems that he’s shooting HD and combing tilt-shift and time-lapse. Incredible.

The film was shot in 1976 on the streets of Paris. Lelouch mounted a gyro-stabilized camera to the bumper of a Ferrari 275 GTB and had a professional Formula 1 driver race it from Porte Dauphine, past the Louvre to the Basilica of Sacre Coeur. The entire course was completed in about 9 minutes, with the driver reaching 140 miles per hour in some sections. If you watch the film closely, you’ll see him run red lights, nearly hit real pedestrians and going the wrong way up one-way streets. Remember, the streets were NOT closed, because Lelouch was unable to obtain a permit for the filming.

After the first public viewing of the film, Lelouch was promptly arrested. He never released the name of the driver, but according to IMDB the Formula 1 driver and personal friend of Lelouch is Jean-Pierre Beltoise.

Having ridden many of the streets shot in the film, during a month I spent in Paris, I found this film to be absolutly terrifying. Granted, I rode the streets by bicycle, where my top speed was probably 20mph, versus the 120mph in the film. It’s completely dangereous, reckless and stupid – but it’s a lot of fun to watch.

Found this clip this morning courtesy of my good friend Kerry Woo and I just had to share it. If you’ve ever seen the cult classic movie Office Space, this is a video using the “SuperFriends” with some of the choice audio from Office Spaceoverdubbed. It’s a wicked combination that makes for a nice Monday pickup.

One small warning, Office Space was rated R, so some of the language is PG-13 or higher. So if you’re at YOUR office, I thought you might want to be aware of that fact before a few choice curse words flew out of your speakers.

Review:
I first saw this movie while on a business trip to Chattanooga. I needed to finish up some work on a presentation I was making the next day and there was nothing on TV, so I decided to splurge and rent an On-Demand movie. Most of the movies I had either seen, or had no interest in seeing and just as I was about to turn it off, I came across About A Boy. I hadn’t heard much buzz about the movie and I’m not a fan of Hugh Grant, but for reasons unknown to me, I rented it.

I was expecting another one of Hugh Grant’s saccharine romantic comedies where he plays a charming befuddling fop as he’s done ad nauseam since Four Weddings And A Funereal. Granted, I liked Four Weddings immensely, but by Notting Hill I’d had my fill. Much to my surprise, Grant was playing a completely different character and was clearly attempting to break his mold. He’d done that once before in Bridget Jones’ Diary, where he played a jerk, but now he was taking it in another direction entirely. It’s a refreshing and more importantly interesting change.

But this movie isn’t all about Hugh Grant’s character Will. His co-star is new comer Nicholas Hoult, who plays the boy Marcus and he carries his own. Ultimately, the movie is about both of them, and so Hoult has the responsibility of carrying half the weight of the movie and he does a splendid job. Rounding out the cast is Toni Collette and Rachel Weisz, each do an excellent job as well. Suffice to say that the casting for this movie is brilliant. Each character is fully developed and rich with complexity and emotion. I bought each and every one of them. Not once did I feel that there was a weak link in the bunch. That’s also surprising because this type of movie is hard to pull off.

So what kind of movie is this? At it’s heart, this movie is a comedy. That being said, with subject matter such as suicide, it is most definitely a drama as well. That’s a fine line to walk in a film but Weitz Brothers deftly manage to pull it off. Granted their movie is based on the Hornby book by the same name, so they had a rich palette to begin with, but the brothers clearly rose to the challenge and created a fantastic movie. There have been plenty of good books that have been butchered at the box office and Boy is a rare exception. There’s no cliche’ choices made by the characters and the director’s did a great job at staying true to the tone of the book. Chris and Paul also stretched themselves with their camera work and it pays off. If you’re into “film” there’s a lot to chew on between the use of jump cuts, depth of focus and swing shots. None of this gets in the way of the movie. If anything these camera techniques add to the performances and help tell the story.

Interweaving it’s way throughout the movie and in some cases almost playing a role in the film, is the music and it is spot on. All the music was written by Badly Drawn Boy specifically for this movie. I was not familiar with the artist prior to seeing the film, but the director’s couldn’t have made a better choice. Although each song stands on it’s own on the soundtrack, each song also easily blends into the scene and lends a hand in creating just the right tone for the movie. After listening to the soundtrack, I could imagine it as simply a regular artist release, so it stands on it’s own. Yet when it’s worked into the movie it’s pure gold.

I absolutely love this movie. After my first watching I was reduced to a puddle of tears by the time the credits rolled. Yes I laughed. Yes the movie is very very funny, but it also touched me on a very deep level and emotions were bound to follow. In an odd sort of karmic journey, I happen to be taking a flight to San Jose the next week and the movie being shown was About A Boy. Having just seen it a few days before, I figured I’d pass on seeing it again so soon, but after the first scene, I was digging for my headphones to watch it again. Being that I was in public, I quietly wiped a few tears, but managed to keep it together. Upon returning from San Jose, Boy was being shown yet again and I watched it for a third time! In the space of two weeks, I had seen the movie three times. That’s definitely a first in my book.

So why do I like it so much? I’d like to think that I’m not alone in this, but it’s because I can relate to the movie on so many levels. There are so many scenes that I could describe, but in the end I would be retelling the entire movie. Every scene has something in it that is worth watching again and again. I can relate to Marcus as he’s picked on in school, tries to cope with his mother’s depression and ultimately knowingly faces complete and utter embarrassment as a last ditch effort to make his mother happy. The names and places have been changed to protect the innocent, but I’ve been there. Then there’s Will who has to finally face his demons and his father’s legacy in order to join the human race and be a part of other peoples lives. Although not an exact context, I’ve been there in one way shape or form.

Surprisingly, I caught myself watching it again the other day on DVD and it struck me that this movie is now in my Top 10, or dare I say Top 5 movie list. I maybe be borrowing from another fantastic Hornby book/movie High Fidelity, but it’s true. It’s not Citizen Kane, but it is one of the best movies that takes a funny look at becoming a man through two different people. In trying to describe this movies to others, I’ve called it “A guy’s romantic comedy.” That doesn’t really nail it on the head, but I’d like to think that About A Boy, IS a guy’s movie. The subject matter may not have Rambo’s, or Rocky’s, but any guy who can think about something other than sports, or monster trucks should get something from this movie. It’s Hugh Grant’s best work to date. It’s based on a hugely successful book and it’s funny as hell. What’s not to like?

My Rating: (5 Out Of 5 Stars)