In a fairly recent edition of Stephen King's Entertainment Weekly column, the author tackled the topic of movie blurbs. Anyone who's watched television or read a newspaper knows what King is talking about. These are quotes that are said to be about the film in question. Most commercials will cite the film as one of the best of the year or praise the lead actor's performance.
King takes some of the most commonly used blurbs, as well as ones that he found talking about new releases and translates them for us so that we have a better idea of the true meaning behind the seemingly straight forward quote.
For example, King says that when a blurb says that the film is one of the best of the year, it's not; or that when a movie is described as "delightfully funny" it simply means that you might get a chuckle or two at best.
As said before, King found quotes that were used to advertise certain movies like the recent Sherlock Holmes, Invictus, andTwilight: New Moon (don't worry it's a rather mild quote and it's nothing that would rattle any cages).
It's an interesting take on the standard "rave reviews" that movies get. Check it out and give it a read.
read the full article at http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20338349,00.html
Stephen King on J.D. Salinger's Legacy
As book aficionados know, author J.D. Salinger passed away a few days ago. King took it upon himself to put his own thoughts down on paper and share them with the world in his latest edition of his Pop of King column.
King laments the loss of the author, but points out that he himself wasn't a huge fan. King goes on to say that the man lived to 90 years old, as such, King states that the loss of younger authors like Beverly Jensen or Raymond Carver was greater since Salinger lived a full and long life.
King also brings up the possibility of unpublished manuscripts that may be discovered now. He says it would be a great way for Salinger to give us more even beyond his own death.
King also brings up the possibility of unpublished manuscripts that may be discovered now. He says it would be a great way for Salinger to give us more even beyond his own death.
Stephen King discusses the fall of the Jay Leno Show
It took awhile, but Stephen King has finally weighed in on the Jay Leno Show fiasco that has been all the rage on the blogs and Twitter. His latest Entertainment Weekly column tackles the matter and the master of horror expresses some joy over the failure of the show.
Interestingly enough, it doesn't really have to do with what NBC did, rather he's pleased that the show tanked because it signified a further encroachment on written, pre-scripted television material. King points out that had the show succeeded, there would've been a glut of imitators.
Whenever one network hits it big with a new show, others try to milk it for all it's worth. One need only look at the reality show phenomenon to see this. A better example would be when Friends first came out and hit it big, every network had their poor man's imitation that didn't even bother trying to be subtle. We saw pilots for shows like Buddies, Partners, Acquaintances,Poozers, Pals, and Homies.
King never makes a declaration saying he's on team Coco or anything of the sort, he likes Jay (and even expresses a degree of sympathy for his situation), but King says he would rather prime time TV remained in the hands of regular scripted programming. It makes sense seeing as he's a writer and storyteller.
Stephen King discusses the Academy Awards
With the Oscars having aired not too long ago, it's only natural that Stephen King would make that the topic of discussion in his latest Entertainment Weekly column. He doesn't so much do a recap of this year's winners so much as discuss the awards in general.
King points out that people generally fall into the category of liking the movies and loving the Oscars or the other way around.
Like Stephen King, I fall into the latter category, preferring movies over the award, although when something great does come along, it's nice to see it get recognized. As King points out though, the awards don't matter. While it's fun to have a movie to root for, if it loses, that doesn't mean it loses any merit in your own opinion. The fact that the Oscars tend to take dozens of other external factors into account only helps your case as far as deserving movies go.
Movies are pretty subjective, there are people who like Ghostbusters 2 over the original or who weren't impressed with Heath Ledger's turn as the Joker in The Dark Knight. Try as you might, you can't really quantify movies in such a way to truly determine what's the best as different things speak to different people.
Citizen Kane is oft hailed as the greatest movie of all time and I hated it. I saw it twice and it bored me both times. Zodiac is another film that wowed critics that left me wanting. I'm sorry, when you make a movie about the Zodiac killer that is so long that even the killer loses interest and leaves (at the halfway point no less), you're doing something wrong. That's my take on it, but a vast majority of people seemed to enjoy it.
The subjective nature of film is part of the fun though. When you try to turn movies into a paint by numbers session, you end up with Oscar bait. As it is, varying opinions can lead to interesting, and often humorous, discussions.
Kindle vs. Ipad
With the release of Apple's new iPad, tech geeks everywhere are salivating at the fancy gadget. This got Stephen King thinking about e-readers in general. In this month's Pop of King article for Entertainment Weekly, the best selling author discusses the pros and cons of the iPad as well as it's main competition, Amazon's Kindle.
He starts by relating how he wrote a short story exclusively for the Kindle called UR (which I will be reviewing in the future), which is about an e-reader that can access works from parallel dimensions. Since then we've also seen the release of the nook and, of course, the iPad.
As far as the two products go, King states that he won't be getting an iPad. He is content doing his e-reading on his Kindle and he says that for all the other things, he has his Mac computer.
From here, the author assesses the threat that e-readers pose to bookstores, publishers and authors. It's kind of ironic seeing as how with other mediums (movies and comics specifically) the general consensus is that digital distribution is the future.
I don't agree with it myself, sure it's nice and it can be a great space saver for the avid collector, but people like showing off their stuff. The convenience of having a whole library stored in one handheld device is a great one, but most would rather stock a shelf to house their book collection and use the Kindle on the side.
The price of e-books also becomes an issue. King brings up the fact that, for a while, Under the Dome was available for 8 bucks, which he states is less than half the price of the paperback edition and wonders why that is (maybe because there aren't any printing or shipping expenses? I don't know.)
Here's where it gets rather interesting because, as a consumer, I want to pay less for e-books. I like it when things don't cost a lot of money. To be honest, I find it vexing when the digital copies are the same price as the regular books. Authors, on the other hand, don't care and want the price to be high because they get a cut and higher prices means a bigger check. It's not wrong, they busted their humps to write that book (not to mention become a regularly published author in the first place) and they do deserve to be paid, but your view on what the cost of e-books should be is going to be pretty much based on which side of the fence you're on.
For all of their benefits, e-readers do have their faults (a big one for me is the fact that the Kindle's battery drains and dies even when the thing's turned off) and there is some consumer resistance. I don't see e-readers going anywhere, but the same goes for books.
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