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CES La Vie! It was a big week for HD with the arrival of the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. And people are perhaps beginning to awaken to the idea that neither of the new HD disc formats may necessarily be Betamax. The Associated Press’ Gary Gentile commented on the continuing HD-DVD/Blu-Ray format rivalry:
Analysts and executives thought that by this year's show, there would be a clear winner, especially after Sony in November released its Playstation 3 video game console, which comes standard with a Blu-ray disc drive. Instead, both sides have hunkered down for what could be a long fight, and some are even conceding that both formats may be here to stay.
"In an optimal world you would have one format," Kevin Tsujihara, president of the Warner Bros. home entertainment group, said this week. "But there are many industries where multiple formats have existed and flourished." Tsujihara noted that in video gaming, three incompatible formats - Playstation, the Microsoft XBox and consoles from Nintendo, including the recently released Wii - have existed for years.
Trouble With LG’s Blu-ray/HD-DVD Combo Player? LG is set to introduce on Feb. 4 the BH100, an $1,199 machine designed to play both Blu-ray and HD-DVD discs. But there’s word that the new device will not play HD-DVD’s HDi (aka iHD) interactive content. So I’d continue to give consideration to just taking your $1,200 and buying an HD-DVD player, a Blu-ray player, and an A/B switch.
Warner Intros Blu-Ray/HD-DVD Combo Discs Another way to resolve the format war? Warner Bros. says it will introduce in the latter half of the year an HD disc that will play in both HD-DVD and Blu-ray machines and will not cost “materially” more than a regular disc. It’s called a “Total Hi-Def” (THD) and you can read more about it at engadgethd.com.
Moriarty Says HD-DVD Wins AICN editor Drew “Moriarty” McWeeny says HD-DVD has won the format wars because Blu-ray is not pursuing pornography. This is particularly telling because I think Moriarty says he has no use for porn.
HD Pic of the Week!!
Here’s some of what this site’s headgeek, Harry Knowles, had to say about “Clerks II,”  which arrives on HD-DVD today:
… What [writer-director Kevin Smith] has slyly done in his own ass-to-mouth, donkey show kinda way -- has crafted his own modern mid-thirties geek retelling of AMERICAN GRAFFITTI. This film is a turning point movie. Set on that day where your old life and your new life are set to split -- and it scares friends, one's self ...
Then there's Rosario Dawson -- this actress is amazing. She has a wanton sexuality about her that flies off the screen. She's able to project sex, womanhood and one of the guys all at once. Rosario plays "Becky" the manager of MOOBY'S and Dante's gal pal. The most sublimely beautiful moment in the history of Kevin Smith films takes place with her and Dante on the roof of the Mooby's - Rosario teaching him to dance - by having Jay & Silent Bob boom-boxing "ABC 123". This song is... pure innocent joy. When Michael was black and the age he wanted and still wants to be. The scene that erupts from this was beautiful. Simply beautiful. …
CLERKS II is fucking funny. It also counts. It isn't an empty bag of laughs, there's a lot of soul here. …
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Hey, everyone. Capone in Chicago here.
As of right now, BABEL is a contender in my book for the finest film of 2006 (the film is in limited release now, and opens wider this Friday). I know I've still got two months left to make that determination, but I can't imagine another film reached the heights of filmmaking and plumbing the depths of the human soul quite like this extraordinary work. So the opportunity to sit down with BABEL's director, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu while he was in town during the Chicago International Film Festival was almost intimidating, especially since his previous two films AMORES PERROS and 21 GRAMS were among my favorites of the years they were released.
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Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here.
I just wanted to run a link back to my original BABEL review as the film opens today in limited release, and I encourage you to use that talkback to discuss the film if you do take a look at it this weekend.
The people who are bitching that it's "too much like their other films" miss the point. They've made a thematic triptych, like Kieslowski's RED, WHITE, and BLUE, and I think this final collaboration between Arriaga and Innaritu deserves serious attention even in the midst of one of the best overall movie seasons since '99.
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Hey folks, Harry here with another review singing the praises of Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's BABEL. Which is one of the finest films you'll have an opportunity to see this year. Here ya go...
Hi AICN peoples! MeTheHead again with a review of Innaritu's "Babel", which I caught on sunday before "Pan's Labyrinth". A tough movie to write about, just because there's so much to say and- at the same time- so much going on in the movie that should be experienced for the first time as you watch it- not as you read a review written by some jerk on the internet.
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu has a real gift for using music in his films as a storytelling device, or a way to make an accute emotional impression on the audience to help carry them along on a character's inner journey while external events move the story forward (I know: I'm sort of just describing the role of score in movies in general, but I think that there are varying degrees to which directors even care about the music in there movies, and then there's someone like Inarritu, whom I think might be choosing a lot of music very early in production and with great deliberation). I still have a gut emotional reaction whenever I hear "Lucha De Gigantes"; that one recurring song from Amores Perros by Nacha Pop. There's an amazing scene in Babel that uses Earth, Wind & Fire's "September" so deftly, so masterfully to evoke that feeling of being with all your best friends and on your favourite intoxicant in the hottest spot when the most dance-able song you could imagine comes on and everyone seems to feel the same as you, only to suddenly remind us- with brilliant sound editing- that the central character in the scene can't hear a thing. She's completely deaf.
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Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
There are three guys right now who seem to be hitting their artistic stride at the same time, and what I find fascinating is how there seems to be the same sort of creative comrade
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