For those who found Vendetta an apt metaphor, you MUST see:

[Gabi Hayes]

''A Scanner Darkly''

just wait, you heard it hear fairly recently

I'm series

go SEE it, despite some of the acting

you'll know what I mean.....

[Gabi Hayes]

1. no spoilers, btw.....I don't even want to comment on it...

must be seen (in the proper state of consciousness would be appropos) on a big screen to be appreciated

AWE-inspiring


just sayin'.....others will have their Points of view, but, JEEEEEESUS!!!!

It speaks to what the future holds, my fellow citizens

[Gabi Hayes]

2. not the same genre as Vendetta, really.....near future dystopia

sort of deal, but much more subtly wrought, without any special effects, other than the film-to-drawn cells technology, like his previous stuff

you'll see

and the BEST thing about it is the name of the lead character: Robert ARCTOR, a real person who had posted here in the past

I got to know him at TT a little bit, and exchanged a few emails with him awhile back.

when I can unscramble my mind a bit, I'll come up with some details, but it really blew me AWAY when I saw the character's name writ large, literally, on the screen.

check it out here:

Robert Arctor!

[maalak2]

3. proper state of consciousness?

what do you mean by that?

if you mean under the influence of drugs, i think you might have missed the point of the movie... 'A Scanner Darkly' has a very strong anti-drug message, and was written after becoming sober in part as a tribute to many of his friends who died or became seriously messed up as a result of the choices they made.

[Gabi Hayes]

4. you infer, as well as imply a great deal, grasshopper,

and you, indeed, convey one of the major precepts espoused in this most provocative movie.

"proper state of consciousness" is an infelicitious combination of words, now that you mention it, though, it's actually a fairly effective use of irony, now that I think of it, considering, as you said, the putative message of the movie.

thanks!

[maalak2]

5. just curious, i agree it was a great movie, but...

i'm just wondering what you meant by "proper state of consciousness"... if you mean under the influence of drugs, that would seem to be the exact opposite of what Philip K. Dick was trying to get across.

[Gabi Hayes]

6. welcome to DU, btw! I edited my last post since you put yours

up.

I have to agree, considering the list of names at the end.

things to do: find out what PKD was referring to WRT that list.

BTW, I read ''Androids, etc.'' after seeing Blade Runner, and, as with a few movies I've seen, had to put that in the category of "movie better than story".


I'll be very surprised if I feel any differently after reading this one.

Did you see it with anyone?

Did you talk about it at all?

[RoyGBiv]

7. I've read it but not seen it ...

I almost universally hate what people do to his stories when they turn them into movies, particularly the Ahh-nold ones.

Blade Runner (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep) is the exception in my mind. The movie and story are different in a lot of ways, but what they did with the movie, they did well.

Perhaps I'll seek this out, if it's made with the same reverence for the story Dick was trying to tell.

[maalak2]

8. thanks :)

Blade Runner had an unbelievable and rare combination of amazing direction by Ridley Scott, great acting by Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer and Edward James Olmos and one of the most groundbreaking electronic scores ever composed by Vangelis. as much as I love Philip K. Dick's writing, i have to admit the book had a tough time being better than the movie... although after reading the actual story it becomes much more interesting to consider the question of whether or not Deckard was a replicant himself. Ridley Scott didn't really read the book too much and was able to focus in on different aspects of the story. Dick himself saw a special screening of it shortly before he died and was reportedly very enthusiastic about it.

I would definitely reccomend reading 'A Scanner Darkly'... this movie was much closer to the actual book, and the book itself is quite possibly Dick's most agonizing and personal writing. it was one of the first things he wrote after becoming sober, but it is mainly a reflection of the time he spent between 1970 and 1972, after being left by his first wife he became heavily hooked on amphetamines, stopped writing completely and had a bunch of teenage drug users living at his home in Marin county and what we talked about after seeing the movie was how much of the story was autobiographical and which characters maybe have been more based on reality than fantasy.

on another note, after giving a speech called "the android and the human" Dick checked himself into a special drug rehab program, and it was apparently during that experience that he got the idea for... (well, don't want to spoil the movie but let's say one of the major themes in the movie :) ) after reading 'A Scanner Darkly', you also might want to check out The Dark-Haired Girl, which is more of a collection of letters & writings during that period.

[Gabi Hayes]

9. thank YOU! I didn't know most of that stuff, and it really makes a lot

more sense now

I'll definitely read the book now.

I wondered what the deal with those poor people at the end of the movie....I thought he was too old to have friends into designer drugs.....speed is as bad as it gets....still.

see what they did to soldiers after they found out how "effective" it is

[newyawker99]

13. Hi maalak2!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[Minstrel Boy]

10. Director Richard Linklater

may have persuaded Bruce Willis of Bush admin complicity in 9/11:


Acclaimed writer-director Richard Linklater, currently riding high on the favorable reception of A Scanner Darkly and best known for his 2003 production School of Rock, has publicly slammed George W. Bush as a "Yalely frat boy" who is in over his head and more corrupt than Richard Nixon. Linklater also says that his efforts to disseminate documentaries which point the finger at the US government for involvement in 9/11 have changed paradigms for several A-list Hollywood stars - including Bruce Willis.

...

Linklater said he had handed out DVD's on set which carried claims that 9/11 was perpetrated by the US government to erect a police state to Bruce Willis, one of the stars of Linklater's upcoming Fast Food Nation.

"He said it put him in such a head space that he will be quiet on issues of national policy."

Linklater said Willis had told him in an e mail that the videos had changed his entire political paradigm.

And yeah, A Scanner Darkly seriously rocks.

[Gabi Hayes]

12. this is getting stranger by the moment.

I can't imagine what it must have taken to get throught the self-absorption/narcissism to make Willis take a look at the world around him....his kids, I hope.

well, GOOD for him

dunno if it's a good thing for him to start yammering about it, given what's happened to any other celebs that dare broach any sort of fascistically incorrect subjects

hope he goes about it, if he does, in a sensible manner

how much more money does he need, after all?

he could be remembered for something positive, instead of a string of right wing piles of garbage, with a few exceptions

[Gabi Hayes]

11. Holy mole...this TableTalk thread is comprised of names that I know,

and used to do the same thing with as here.....amazing. they decided to fork over the big bucks......

http://tabletalk.salon.com/webx?14@439.1zzGaZ92QxU.0@.596c5547/0

willy mugobeer is there, later, for those who spent any time on bush AWOL stuff

TT is also where Marty Heldt posted the intitial FOIA info he pried out of TANG and the Air Force, way back when

[anarch]

14. personally, I'm holding out for the movie version of VALIS

Not really, I'll probably have to go see A Scanner Darkly. That's gotta be one of the saddest books I have ever read.

Nothing to do with P.K. Dick, but my favorite cinematic metaphor for our political and cultural situation is They Live.

[genie_weenie]

15. Not many here *really* understood V...

Mainly because of the changes wrought by the Matrix brothers on Moore's idea/theory.