Castlevania 9.0

La Loire

In Memoriam

Beyond the controversy, blanket, the horrendous plastic surgery, the psichological problems and every sick aspect of his life, the death of MJ was, in a sense, the death of childhood for some of us. Thriller was the first album our generation bought and it truly was a climax for pop music.

Instead of recalling a career, let's just see how the self-proclaimed king of pop influenced cultures and brought us joy, seen through a somehow different lens:

Charlie Goleada Barcelona

Barcelona

Old Boy

Seoul

Gooooooood Morning Vieeeeeeeeetnaaamm

Hanoi

Ha Long Bay

Hoi An

Hue

Can Tho

Phu Quoc

Ho Chi Minh City

Kafkian Winter

Praga

Ay Joaco!

First there was this:


And now this:


And to top it off:

Trans-Siberian sex toys and what not

Illumination
Ultimate

Not A Crime

Dogs Were Barking
Wonderlust King
Mishto!

Tribal Connection

60 Revolutions

American Wedding
Sacred Darling
Baro Foro



Start Wearing Purple
It's Too Easy To Be a Cynic
Mala Vida
Think Locally, Fuck Globally

A Year at the Movies

• Most "What the fuck?" moment: Charlize Theron is also a superhero in Hancock? Worse, they were a couple in ancient times?
• Most "I can't recover from seeing that!" moment: Matthew Fox speaking spanish in Vantage Point
• Most "I want to like it more but I can't" film: Indiana Jones and the Legend of the Crystal Skull. Question: How is Indy's dad dead if he drank from the Holy Grail at the end of The Last Crusade?
  
• "Samuel L. Jackson's seal of crap" film: Jumper. Now you know it: if Sam's in a movie, it probably sucks.
  
• Most "Pretentious self-satisfying pet projet": Maradona by Kusturica. Apparently, Maradona's "hand of God" goal was planned as a socialist coup to the establishment. Best Fiction Ever.
  
• "Annoying Karaoke singer" award: Pierce Brosnan in Mamma Mia. It's bad enough that we have to endure musicals, there's no need for this Saw-inspired torture.
  
• "Maradona's Destroy the legend" award: Al Pacino and Robert De Niro in Righteous Kill. After a mediocre decade at best (Showtime? Simone? 88 minutes? Godsend?), are the two icons heading for leads in CSI:Wichita?
  
• Worst excuse for a film: X Files 2. They actually thought people craved for more Duchovny.
  
• "I am starting to hate her but I don't know why" actress of the year: Nicole Kidman. Maybe it's because she looks a little pretentious. Or because her pregnant belly is no larger than a beer belly. Or because she hasn't aged since Days of Thunder.
  
• "Follow Joaquin Phoenix and retire already" award: Eddie Murphy. Should've retired in 1989, along with Soul Glo.
  
• Wile E. Coyote award for persistence and utter failure: Madonna, now directing. How can this be stopped?
  
• "I thought this was a movie and not 24" award: Taken. Dishonorable mentions: Vantage Point, 88 minutes. I thought the phrase "real time" was buried with the crash of the dotcom bubble.
  
• "Typecasted in a corset" award: Keira Knightley in Atonement and The Duchess. Maybe its because all those costumes make us believe that your chest is actually full, maybe it's because your movies in present time are, hmmm, awful? (The Jacket? Domino?)
  
• "Was this really a movie?": Mamma Mia. It was more like a perfume commercial mixed with singing under the shower. Apparently, they just gave the camera to some innocent bystander and asked him to shoot.
  
• Worst career move: Mark Wahlberg (Max Payne? The Happening?). Hire Ari, bitch!
  
• "In your face!" award: Scarlett Johanson. She's everywhere, like your annoying friend that comments everything in Facebook but ultimately has nothing to say or show for herself. What is she's going to do when she's 40 and can't play precocious anymore?
  
• Most enlightning moment of the year: Audiences finally realized Mike Myers is NOT funny. Hope this kills all planned Shrek sequels.
• "Makes you think" moment: Oliver Stone directing W. After World Trade Center and Alexander, it seems to confirm that you lose your edge with age.
• Proof that kills the theory that Europeans are more cultivated and intellectual: Mamma Mia is the highest grossing film of ALL TIME in the UK, Bienvenue chez les Ch'Tis is the highest in France.
  

L'Interista

Milan

Mucha lucha!

Para poder lidiar con este dia de anglicismos tipo change, hope y swing states y descansar un poco de la sobredosis de hockey moms, Joe the Plumber (o Tito the Builder), Clintons, Obamaxploitation y no-neck McCain, nada mejor que mirar de nuevo a nuestro continente donde dos fenomenos paralelos nos enseñan que el verdadero entretenimiento se encuentra en la tierra de la Copa Libertadores y no en los live coverages que analizan que significa cada variacion de un décimo de porcentaje en las urnas.

En esta esquina tenemos a las cholitas luchadoras. Efectivamente, con nombres como La Rompecorazones, La Vengadora, Carmen Rosa, La Alteña y el muy creativo La Campeona, la lucha libre de cholitas se inscribe dentro de los anales "bizarros" del folklore latino al lado de los ya famosos peces samurais bogotanos.

Aparentemente, el furor de la lucha libre de cholitas, bastante popular en los barrios humildes de La Paz y otras ciudades del Tibet Suramericano, se explica en la revindicacion de las mujeres y del pueblo indigena en general. Para la muestra, una cholita dandole su merecida paliza a La Alteña (luchadora no cholita, sino de piel blanca):


En la otra esquina tenemos al ya no tan underground Fray Tormenta, quien sirvio de inspiracion para Nacho Libre. Si, Nacho Libre existe, es mexicano y si, lucha para poder tener plata con que ayudar a los niños de su orfanato.

Otra prueba mas que el mundo de la WWF con sus payasos gemelos, bikers y robots se queda corto frente al sinnumero de personajes que nuestro creativo continente puede aportar.

Si el desocupe es maximo, aca se pueden ver videos de las peleas que espero poder alguna vez ver en vivo:

City Crumbling

NYC

Greed & The City

As I watched the film adaptation of Sex and the City on a plane recently, I couldn't help but notice how ironic it was that the New York version that this movie displayed and encouraged was crumbling down just outside my window.

At this point, it is really hard to know if the series fueled a lifestyle of 500 dollar shoes, breakfast mimosas and hefty apartements on the average New Yorker or if, conversely, the appartements, restaurants, wardrobe and lounges of Carrie and friends reflected the average day of working girls at the time. But the question of which inspired which is irrelevant on an era where the line between TV and reality is blurry. What really matters is that in the future, when people want to understand what really happened during the credit boom and what caused the 2008 crash, they just have to watch a couple of episodes of the series (watching the whole movie is too much of a punishment).

Not coincidentially, the series and the movie cover the whole decade where excessive leverage, minimal rates and 1-800-FREEMORTGAGE made a whole generation believe that a one bedroom apartment in Greenwich Village, a Louis Vuitton puppy bag and daily Cosmopolitans at lunch were just around the corner. Just like small town blonds arrive in LA to make it in showbiz, Ivy Leaguers flooded the city to indulge in haute couture, VIP lounges and, of course, casual sex. This generation, boosted by Gordon Gekko's "Greed is good" motto (but misinterpreting the rest of Oliver Stone's Wall Street) managed, by means of 9 figure bonuses made up of just thin air, to turn Hugo Boss, Armani and Moët & Chandon into the new Gap and Heineken.

Well, fear is good too. And even if recession will negatively affect all of us non-hedge funders, hopefully housing will become reasonably priced, risk will be treated as such and ludicrous salaries will be curtailed. But best of all, we wont have to bear for some time with Mr. Bigs and Carrie Bradshaws, fiction and real.

Strike a Pose

Intro/Candyshop
Beat Goes On
Human Nature
Vogue


VIDEO INTERLUDE

Into The Groove

Heart Beat
Borderline

She’s Not Me
Music

VIDEO INTERLUDE

Spanish Lesson
Miles Away
La Isla Bonita/Lela Pala Tute
Romanian folk musical interlude
You Must Love Me

VIDEO INTERLUDE

4 Minutes
Like A Prayer
Ray Of Light

Hung Up
Give It To Me (Finale)

A Rush of Blood to the Head Indeed

Life In Technicolor
Violet Hill
Clocks

In My Place
Speed Of Sound
Cemeteries Of London
Chinese Sleep Chant
42

Fix You
Strawberry Swing
God Put A simile Upon Your Face + Talk (Techno)
The Hardest Part
Postcards From Far Away
Viva La Vida
Lost
The Scientist
Death will Never Conquer
Viva la Vida remix
———
Politik

Lovers in Japan

Death and All His Friends
——–
Yellow
The Escapist

A riot

Kaiser Chiefs

01: Everyday I Love You Less And Less

02: Everything Is Average Nowadays
03: The Heat Dies Down
04: Never Miss A Beat
05: Ruby
06: Modern Way
07: Half The Truth
08: Na Na Na Na Na
09: I Predict A Riot

10: You Want History
11: The Angry Mob

12: Take My Temperature
13: Oh My God


R.E.M.

1. Bad Day
2. Living Well Is The Best Revenge

3. What's The Frequency Kenneth
4. Drive

5. Man Sized Wreath
6. The Great Beyond
7. Ignoreland

8. Hollow Man
9. Electrolite
10. Imitation of life
11. I'm Gonna DJ
12. The One I Love

13. Fall On Me
14. Let Me In

15. Horse To Water
16. Orange Crush

17. It's The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)
18. Supernatural Superserious (Encore)
19. Losing My Religion (Encore)
20. Man On The Moon (Encore)

Again

London 2

It's Just Good Chicken

First you have to see this:

To enjoy this:

El Corazon que a Triana va

Sevilla

Ingrid In The Sky With Diamonds

Como siempre, Ingrid mirando al cielo:


Si, todos estamos contentos y aliviados. Pero si molesta un poco que todo se haya enfocado en la libertad de Ingrid, libertad a la parisienne, llena de hoteles de lujo, Paris Match, islas Seychelles, Carla Bruni, etc, todo con un poquito de mistica de renacida, con arrodillada, gracias a Dios, la Virgen, el Rosario, etc, etc. Esta bien que lo disfrute y lo crea, pero por favor, no nos lo refrieguen en la cara.

Parecen olvidarse de lo mas importante, libertad para los que faltan: