Welcome to Macintosh, a history of Apple’s innovative personal computer, told by those who were in some way involved in its invention and development. It informs a lot about the maverick nature of Steve Jobs and his compatriots as they sought to create a computer with a semblance of a soul, which would encourage creativity and how this resulted in a “cult of Apple” that has only grown over the last 14 years with the development of the iMac, iPod, iPhone and now the iPad.

Tales from the Script Hollywood’s Boulevard of Broken Dreams is littered with careers of would-be screenwriters who were crushed between the cruel wheels of feckless studio executives, and their own shortcomings at mastering the art of cinematic storytelling. This film is filled with interviews of those who have had some degree of success including Frank Darabont (The Shawshank Redemption), Shane Black (Lethal Weapon) and master scribe William Goldman (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Princess Bride, among others) whose famous maxim, about what succeeds in Hollywood, “Nobody Knows Anything,” captures the unpredictable nature of the business. It includes course language but is essential for anyone hoping to write and pitch their way into selling a script.

Art and Copy Contemporary advertising began a “creative revolution” in the 1960s as the formerly separate divisions of copyrighting, the dominant element upon which the artwork was based, gave way to a creative marriage of the two (which is what the AMC series Mad Men is currently depicting ). This documentary describes some of the brightest lights in the ad world who find ways to touch the deepest parts of our sometimes unspoken desires in order to sell cars, candidates and computers. Recommended if you want to begin to understand how commercial art is, like it or not, the highest creative achievement of the modern age.

Lest this come off looking like a plug for Netflix, it’s really just my way of expressing what I’ve found in this new VOD world that more and more of us will soon be enjoying–greater freedom to program the media of our lives.

The revolution is in the realm of home video, the segment of the media that impacted the way we use television starting in the 1980s when the VCR boom exploded across the world. Prior to the arrival of Beta and then VHS videotape player/recorders, there was no way to control one’s television or film viewing. When a network broadcast a program or movie, you either caught it the night and time it aired, or caught the episode rerun months later. The Big Three television network, NBC, CBS, ABC, controlled the television content flow on their scheduling grids so that viewers planned their lives around watching their favorite programs.
In the 1970s, the three networks accounted for over 90 % of the audience.

Two huge technological developments allowed Americans to have greater choices over what they did with their television sets. The first was the growth of cable channels and their penetration to more and more homes, giving greater choices of what to watch. The other was the rise of the VCR (the first VHS model shown here) to allow the recording of television programs for later viewing (“timeshifting”) which delivered the audience from its captivity to a program schedule; the VCR could also play prerecorded Hollywood films. The result was that the American home was now more autonomous in its viewing choices. Today, television broadcast networks are down to just over 50% of the audience, having lost out to cable and home video.

The rise of the VCR meant that we began to expect to be able to do our own programming, to view what we wanted, when we wanted. And we could fast forward past commercials, undermining the whole business model of commercial television. Later, when the Digital Video Disc brought us an even better version of Hollywood products, we began to enjoy how good movies could look on our television sets. The arrival of high-definition, widescreen monitors enhanced the aesthetic experience.

When the Digital Video Recorder, such as those made by TiVo, arrived, it used a hard drive to digitally record and store program content for pausing, or replaying anything on TV, a real improvement on the now ancient-seeming VCR. Just like the World Wide Web taught us to expect to get print content easily and for free, home video made us our own exhibitors in our home theater.

But as “digital convergence” made all kinds of content available on all kinds of devices, the term Video on Demand became one of the buzzwords in circulation: the expectation that someday soon, we would be able to order up any content we had once had to rent from our closest Blockbuster store or through the mail from Netflix. But digital convergence means that all kinds of devices can be conduits for the same streaming content. Thus it is that I have begun to experience some of the latest advances in home video.

We have a TiVo HD DVR that records many hours of programming and saves it, creating a library of movies and other programs that can be watched at anytime. We also have added a Tivo wireless adapter which receives wireless signals from our computer’s router. In essence, our router sends out signals from our cable broadband connection to our TiVo so that we can access You Tube, Amazon and other content providers over the Internet. But the biggest source of offerings is that we can watch hundreds of movies and television shows on our Netflix account this way in standard and high definition. For weeks we’ve been watching successive season of Lost in beautiful detail whenever we want to.

But wait, there’s more–Months ago, Netflix sent out an e-mail asking if we’d like to watch content from our Instant Queue on my son’s Wii game console. They sent us a disc that enabled the Wii, already able to receive wireless signals, to play back Netflix programs picked up from our router. Ever since, I’ve been able to watch movies, documentaries and television programs while using our treadmill. And last week I did the same thing on my son’s Playstation 3, which brings Netflix content in even better resolution. If I’m in the middle of a program, on any of these three devices, or one of our computers, I can stop it, and resume the program on another device in the house.

I can tell already that this will continue to change our media habits. As DVD and Blu-Ray sales stay flat, and as more titles become available instantly, we will watch more streaming content instead of having to wait for it by mail, as we have done with Lost episodes. I will still prefer to watch Blu-Ray discs of classic and major films but HD streaming at what looks like 1080i quality will certainly suffice for lots of other content, when more arrives.

This fascinating cnet article reports on Netflix’s strategy of getting more and more rights to programming from Hollywood studios. Even Netflix’s much reported agreement to delay receiving Warner Bros. DVDs for three weeks (allowing the studio to sell DVDs rather than allowing Netfix to rent them) is a long-term tactic to obtain the video streaming rights that will one day save them millions in postage fees as their growing customer based opts to stream movies rather than order them through the mail. They see that as the soon-arriving future of home video–on demand.

Jensen is right to ask the question about how upcoming films can resonate with audiences now quite familiar with such characters–we relate to these characters on some level because we can relate to Batman’s quest for rough justice, Spider-Man’s struggle for a normal life, the X-Men’s societal rejection or the giddy fun of imagining ourselves in a cool metal suit. But what does Green Lantern speak to in the mass audience, or for that matter, the Green Hornet? Is the appeal of Thor or Cap limited to hardcore comic book geeks, the essential audience the Comic-Con panels were reaching out to but not the average moviegoer?

I think it will probably all come down to the story and the attitude of the production toward the character. If it takes an ironic stance toward the “star spangled sentinel of liberty,” Captain America, a character whose red, white and blue costume is hard to imagine in live action (see the picture I took at Universal Studios Marvel attraction) then the audience will mostly stay away. The new movie’s version of the costume, shown above, successfully adapts it to a live action practicality. As a character, Cap’s alter ego, Steve Rogers, a man of the 1940s patriotic spirit, was always at odds with his latter day resurrection into a more cynical and knowing culture–it was his quiet insistence on his American values that made him Marvel’s moral compass, what Superman is to DC Comics. I think it’s quite possible to pull it off if the director an script believes in the classic rendering of the character.

Thor, an actual Norse god, banished to Earth from his mythical home of Asgard by his stern father Odin, would, in big screen translation, have to avoid the attraction to wink at the material and pull a campy Wagnerian spectacle needing only Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny from the class cartoon “What’s Opera, Doc?”

This still from next summer’s release already reminds me of a scene from Das Rheingold or another of the Ring Cycle operas, missing only Brunhilda in a breastplate, helmet and spear. And Green Lantern’s tactic of using his power ring to create a giant boxing glove or fly swatter in combat has always seemed pretty cartoonish even for comics.

So success will all be in the tone and identification of the human drama of each character. Comic book characters only work because there’s something about the hero, other than their fantasy appeal, that attracts readers and makes them care about them. So, Cap is a man burdened with living up to the best ideals of his country–perhaps a metaphor for anyone serving in the armed forces, or with any duty to a higher national cause. Thor is a a golden boy who has never mastered himself or risen to the responsibilities of a royal household and must now learn to serve protect mere mortals, sort of a mythic rich kid who must do community service. And Hal jordan’s Green Lantern preceded and perhaps inspired George Lucas’ Jedi Knights, as an Emerald Warrior, a space cop keeping order on his assigned space sector. These are all types that, if adapted intelligently, will appeal to that desired blockbuster audience the same way Marvel second stringer Tony Stark’s Iron Man hit paydirt by showing that superheroes are always, after all, human.

The problem is, it’s almost impossible to offer a typical reviewer’s description of the plot in order to tell you if it is a good rendering of it without giving away too much. If you’ve seen the trailers, you know that it involves Leonard DeCaprio’s character entering a person’s dream in order to steal secrets buried deep in their minds. Based on this basic concept, I can say that it resembles Nolan’s other films that owe much to film noir in tone and in this case, the crime-themed capers in its structure and its protagonist motivated by something more than ill-gotten riches. The trailers show astonishing special effects that will make the eventual home video releases a must-sea for some indication of how the spectacular visions were achieved. What’s important is that, despite the highly complex plotting, this is a script that explains the rules of the game as you go along, but you have to pay very close attention; and that the convoluted plot never keeps the audience from caring about the characters. This is a film that will take some time to digest for its thrills, themes and significance and is bound to encourage much discussion afterward, so see it with someone who loves movies.

The rationale is, I believe, as as follows: The article mentions the story and scheduling issues–probably scheduling issues because of story issues. The last film, Spider-Man 3, was so bad, cobbling together an incoherent cluster of villains and storylines that lacked the heart and inspiration of the first two. And this was because Spidey 2 had pretty much exhausted the character’s themes and character arc, distilling decades of comic narrative into a marvel-ous feature. There was no way to top it, but the studio’s sequel imperatives demanded a third film and it was a huge b.o. hit.

And star issues because, by now, frankly, Tony Maguire is a little too grown up and many fans are tired of Kirstin Dunst. I imagine the studio simply wanted a fresh start except they’d be foolish to to drop J. K. Simmons as J. Jonah Jameson–hey, if the James Bond franchise can reboot their character as a newly minted double-O, and keep Judy Dench as M, carried over from the previous Bond, Pierce Brosnan, the perfectly cast Simmons should stay as well.

Sam Raimi has said everything I think he could with the character but Sony can only see dollar signs in reviving the character on film–so, apparently the plan is to take him back to his high school years that the first film jumped over and make it closer to a CW teen-angst series thus hitting a major demographic and explore Spidey as a teenager with real problems–which had really been the source of his original appeal. But the picture of the new actor cast as PP looks more collegiate or beyond so this seem strange. In fact, he’s 26, having been born in 1983, so that’s no real difference between where we left Toby and where this guy’s starting, so not even that rationale seems right.

I’ve also read that these films will cost less and thus, it would seem, be smaller films, a less spectacular Spider-Man. Sounds like the Twilight approach: keeps costs down, release one every year or so and target the teens. Hey, and think of the possibilities if the next film actually has Spidey fighting vampires: (Scroll down)

It sure worked for the Twilight films–all that teen angst and blood sucking. And while we’re discussing vampires in Spidey’s next film, how about these guys?

OK, it does seem too calculating, but while I hope the films get Spider-Man right, but I don’t yet see a very different concept working here.

Here’s some neat stuff related to the widely praised Toy Story sequel I reviewed a few days ago.

The Metaphysics of Woody: First off, Owen Gleiberman, movie critic at Entertainment Weekly has written two very insightful piece–his initial review and a follow-up post at the magazine’s site. In both, Gleiberman demonstrates why we are so involved in the life of these toys–whom Gleiberman recognizes as both “characters and objects,” and thus able to capture our imaginations because we understand how toys stir young minds in the creative activity of fantasy storytelling that helps children eventually experience empathy for others.

Seek and Ye Shall Find: For pure Pixar fun, go the Slashfilm article on the “Easter eggs,” hidden in the film. From the first Toy Story to now, Pixar has always embedded their set design with references to past works and characters and often previews a character from an upcoming feature in the corners or background of a new release. This article links to or displays a big toy box full of such hidden gems. This is part of the singular generosity of Pixar’s work that always gives the audience more than other films.

As my family and I walked into the theater, my son, anxious that the film might be another disappointing sequel, muttered, “please be good, please be good.” I responded, “I’m not worried,” since I knew that, unlike other studios, Pixar’s production process has insured that all along the four-year process it takes from conception to post-production, quality control principles allow anyone in the creative process to speak up and critique the story’s development. If you catch story problems at this point and offer corrections and improvements, which is how things work at Pixar, you eliminate 99% of a movie’s problems.

This union of audience appeal with artistic innovation using digital animation has resulted in a string of nothing but hits for the studio 11 feature films, unheard of in Hollywood history. Toy Story 3 is perhaps the best film yet from Pixar, an amazing achievement given the risks of a second sequel when other franchises begin to show creative exhaustion (Shrek 3, Spider-Man 3 for example) and the demands of executives to squeeze more dollars out of a popular property when there are no good new ideas. But this being a sequel to the revloutionary first Pixar feature, the team was determined to get it right.

Andy’s toys have been gradually left behind as their owner’s teen years have naturally drawn him away from childish play to more age-appropriate interests. Woody is the only toy Andy plans to take to college, so the rest of the toys, feeling neglected, welcome a move to a nearby daycare center. Thus begins their next great adventure as they discover that not having a child who owns them means not being special anymore. And there’s more than the rough treatment by toddlers too young to play appropriately with them–the gang soon realizes they’ve been set up by other toys to serve as virtual prisoners in the daycare center. As they did in the earlier films, this involves another Odyssey-like journey of escape back to Andy, if they can find him in time, except this is the most dangerous adventure yet, and probably the funniest–the trademark Pixar rapid joke frequency we’ve experienced since the first film is firmly operational as every gag possibility is full exploited–only Pixar’s writers seem to know the magic of creating laughs that appeal to both child and adult without depending on mostly pop culture references, as the Shrek films have, to a fault.

And the Disney Digital 3-D process adds depth to the images although I question the necessity of this in such well-executed storytelling–I peeked over the top of the glasses several times and saw how much brighter the picture was without them and prefer that to the 3-D image that quickly loses its wow factor.

The level of invention is so high in the film that I couldn’t help thinking it seems ten times more creative than anything in the family category and most others as well (as evidenced by the groan-inducing trailers for upcoming kids animated films). This generosity continues in the famous Pixar end-credit sequence that takes us from the deeply moving climax back to guffaws and joy. Frankly, I feel privileged to live in an era where such instant classics dependably come to us annually, as if Walt Disney was back on the job–in a way, he is; Pixar’s wizards, led by Disney creative honcho John Lasseter, have always loved Disney’s animation classics and sought to perpetuate his vision and spirit. In a summer poor in mainstream movie entertainment, enjoy another miraculous work of great all-ages storytelling.

Drive-in movies had been popular in the 1950s affluence as they satisfied the population’s desire to not just see a movie but to recreate, to get out of the house into the great outside. A drive-in was sort of outdoors but with the added mobility of sitting in your big American car with the goodies you’d brought with you in the trunk cooler or picnic basket. The speakers hung on the rows of posts that looked toward the great white screen. Some drive-ins had sloped grass and gravel parking lines so that your car was angled up toward the screen to enable better viewing. I saw Walt Disney’s Swiss Family Robinson as a child as my first drive-in experience and will never forget the opening scene of a wooden ship desperately tossed on a stormy sea against the night sky behind the screen. The speaker box hung on your open car window with the tinny soundtrack playing.

The best part about a drive-in was that you could get out of the car and walk to the concession stand while able to turn to watch the movie, and perhaps still hear the audio playing from nearby speakers, never missing a thing. Of course for the youth demographic, drive-ins weren’t family affairs so much as infamous passion pits where heavy petting and more could occur in the privacy of a car’s cabin. As car culture faded in the 1970s oil crisis, so did the popularity of the drive-in as the seasonal nature of its outdoor venue and less than theatrical quality of the picture gave way to the blockbuster era of special effects and Dolby sound and variety of the new multiplexes.

Living in south Florida, there’s no winter to shut things down so the Lake Worth Drive-In, like others in the region does fine with the right kind of movie. We drove in and could see that there were two screens, one with its back to the road, and the other in the far corner of the large lot. We paid $6 for each ticket, not bad for an evening show. The box office clerk told us we were at screen 1 and to tune our FM radio to 93.7 for audio. We drove down and onto the large paved lot with painted lanes and parking slots. I found a place just off center and on the third “row” back out of four row. We could see plenty of cars already there, most of them either mini-vans and SUVs, most of them with their rear facing the screen–as in this picture, taken during the last Indiana Jones movie’s release–at first, this was a little disorienting because it looked like they were facing an invisible screen opposite screen 1, but I quickly caught on that with the vehicle’s hatch doors open, passengers could spread out cushions and blankets to lay down and watch. Many folks had camp and lawn chairs set out besides their vehicles to stretch their legs and get comfortable.

Ben and I headed to the concession stand (pictured here) to check out the goodies. It was a crowded structure on the first floor with a smaller projection booth on the roof where images could be shown at both screens at right angles to each other. Ben ordered some cheese nachos and I got a small buttered popcorn for $3.00, still better than a regular theater concession price. We got back in plenty of time to tune our radio to the right station and soon the movie began.

It was strange watching a relatively small image behind our windshield, less bright than a theatrical screen, but the sound was fantastic coming through our car’s speakers; my seat vibrated with low frequency hums during the action sequences. And the movie?

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time is a typical summer blockbuster wanna-be, a good number of CGI special effects at the end and peppered throughout, but it was surprisingly straightforward in tone, lacking the tongue-in-cheek attitude I was expecting. The story of a street urchin, Dastan, adopted by the wise king of Persia and made the youngest of three royal brothers, it’s actor Jake Gyllenhaal’s second foray into blockbusterdom after being part of the ensemble of the disaster film, The Day After. Lots of actors who make their reputation in small independent films will do blockbuster rolls to earn big bucks while they take a pay cut on their more artistic endeavors, and as Johnny Depp showed playing Captain Jack Sparrow and Robert Downey Jr. did playing Tony Stark/Iron Man, one can have one’s artistic integrity and blockbuster fortunes too. Jake’s body is super toned up for the athletic role of the adventurous prince based on the video game from which the movie draws both its name and much of its plot.

A mystical dagger is the sought for object since it can be used to roll back time and thus change history so there are plenty of chases, fights, battles and derring-do but although it doesn’t take itself very seriously, it isn’t nearly as campy as Pirates of the Carribean. In fact, its plot is borrowed from recent current events. The Persians, led by Dastan’s oldest brother, invade a sacred city based on a spy’s false report that the city is forging weapons to use against Persia. These false pretenses are part of a larger scheme but somewhere in the writing stage, someone must have noticed the resemblance to the U.S.’s invasion of Iraq based on intelligence reporting Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. But there seems to be no deeper ideological message so this isn’t Avatar. It did occur to me that none of the Caucasian featured players are close to being any ethnicity played on the screen and everyone talks in some type of British accent (to avoid sounding stereotypically “Arabic?”) so one really can’t take this Hollywood hoohaw with anything but a block of salt historically.

The script seems very much by-the-book in it’s structure and this familiarity may be too predictable for some, but the treasured object at the core of the story allow the climax to be surprisingly moving and heartfelt. It felt somewhat like an Alladin story in its style and lack of snarkiness. Benjamin liked it and thinks its the best movie adaptation of a video game, a task full of failures as moviemakers have so often missed what makes a successful adaptation from interactive to straight cinematic narrative. And he liked the drive-in experience but I’m not sure when we’ll find just the right movie to fit the exterior conditions and altered viewing conditions, but at least now he knows something of the wider American filmgoing experience.