The Oscar trailer is great, although based on the last few years (thankfully) more of a lampoon of films that seem to be setting out to win an Oscar than films than actually do. (And here's another thematically similar video.)

Enthusiastic expression of enjoyment! Link to thematically similar video.

It was definitely done well enough that it was no longer cheap. I especially love little details like "Murmur of agreement." And the performances are what make it spot on. "Impassioned plea! Whispered repetition." It's like an acting exercise.

It may be a cheap joke but it was done so well - the tone of it is just spot-on!

That was awesome! Because those really do look exactly like trope scenes from Oscar-type movies. It may be a cheap joke, but it was pretty on the money.

"LEAD FEMALE'S NAME!!!"

Since we were talking about Academy Awards this is one cheap joke but I totally dig it.

It occurs to me that by rejecting the rules and structures that make a game a game, what Tale of Tales have done is come up with computer-implemented toys. The Endless Forest, The Graveyard, The Path, Fatale, Vanitas - they're all basically like fancy baubles. You crank the handle, the music plays, then Jack pops out of the box and it's over. (Or, in the case of Vanitas, you open the box and you fiddle with the bits and pieces inside and then you close it again.)

The thing is, even though games are not art (as I note they declare), by the standard they set toys aren't art either. Vanitas isn't going to make the world a better place or make the player aware of their own mortality or allow them to touch the transcendent - or rather, it's no more likely to do that than any other collection of whimsical items kept in a box in your pocket. If I wanted to make a statement about maturity and being grown-up and serious, I would point out that aimless, rule-less play with toys is only satisfying for so long, and as kids grow up they impose rules and structure on their play (turning away from toys and embracing games) as part of the process of making sense of the world, and thus people who play videogames are inherently superior to people who watch TV. But if I said that, I would be an arrogant piece of shit who judges people based on what they do in their leisure time. You know. Like Tale of Tales.

Also, I'm pretty sure the idea that the world, right now, is collapsing into flames and ruin is pretty fucking insulting to, oh, I don't know, anyone who remembers the 1940s, or who lived during the Cuban Missile Crisis. I think anyone who looks at the current world situation and declares that we're facing armageddon is not just showing a lack of perspective, they're glossing over events which are still in living memory.

(Also they're not even good toys. If The Sims is Lego, what Tales of Tales are making are babies' rattles with rape pictures painted on them.)

Re: Tale of Tales - It's not just pretentious, it's incoherent.

It is, unfortunately, the inevitable result when people are unable to see how irredeemably fucking stupid they are.

I know it sounds like an overreaction, but I genuinely do want these guys to die of something. Not something painful, I just want somebody to come up to them one at a time and say "okay, fine, whatever, you win at life" and then shoot them in the head.

(Also, I notice that they are doing the Ron Edwards thing of claiming that there was no indie scene to speak of when they came along. I'm pretty damn sure there were plenty of independent designers and groups putting out interesting games without the support of big-name publishers in 2002. They just didn't call themselves the "indie" scene because they weren't insufferable poseurs out to get a reputation for sticking it to the man - they just wanted to make good games, their way.)

(Also also, on the path: "A game about something rare: about girlness. Specifically, about a girl's pain." GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.)

Probably only Dan will get this, but the big list of "no's" from the Tale of Tales site reminds me of the end of The Nine Lives of Tomas Katz...

No competition. No genre. No guns. No dying. No game over. No levels. No boss rounds. No scores. No saving. No canned storylines. No bleak personalities. No buttons. No menus. No icons. No words. No motion sickness. No pseudo-realism. No cartoons. No pre-rendered backgrounds. No more superficial juvenile games. No pre-chewed plots. No violence. No chat. No quests. No backstory. No character customisation. No choice of character gender. No goal. No exploration. No interaction. No rewards. No power. No efficient control. No rules. No plot.

...No Dave...

(I might be tempted to add "no fun"...)

I love the fact that it is paced slowly rather than constantly delivering instant, sentimental gratification

My issues with Brokeback had nothing to do with this, personally. I love reading angsty gay romance stories where it's all painful and tentative and teasing and heartbreaking. And the film did have its moments. When Jake Gyllenhaal's character was walking through that little town and picked up that male prostitute (I *think* that's what was going on), it broke my heart. I love Jake Gyllenhaal in that movie, but (not to speak ill of the dead) Heath Ledger not so much.

I know a lot of people who like it too. It just didn't particularly work for me because I think I expected so much (maybe too much) from it.

Re: Tale of Tales - It's not just pretentious, it's incoherent. They rail against modernism for taking art off the right path, but they also complain that the problem is that people are just unable to enjoy themselves and so commit wars. The solution to which is to not produce the kind of games that people enjoy but the kind of games that they *should* enjoy. It's like saying that the solution to the problem of plotless modernist novels is to produce novels that are more enjoyable than the thrillers and pulp novels that people actually like reading. Or something.

@ Sonia: I hate Empire. It's sexist, philistine and an absolute sucker for its own hype. But the best picture feature does give an overview of what other films were nominated in that year, as well as a sense of the kind of decision-making process.

Re: Brokeback Mountain - Well, I don't want to re-open this one but I have to say I *love* Brokeback Mountain. I love the fact that it is paced slowly rather than constantly delivering instant, sentimental gratification, and I love the performances, cinematography, romance. It's not just because it's about the gays - Philadelphia and Milk were both about the gays, but I don't think anyone was especially upset they didn't win (and Sean Penn robbed Micky Rourke) because they were essentially formulaic Hollywood.

However, I've come to accept that not everyone shares this view of Brokeback Mountain. What I think *is* indisputable, as Sonia says, is that Crash shouldn't have won. It's an awful, shallow, self-congratulatory film (as is Valley of Elah) - Paul Haggis has the knack for making middlebrow films that are able to masquerade as something more. It's the ultimate example of moral ambiguity over moral complexity - the ambiguity consists of every character doing *one* bad thing and *one* good thing, which supposedly challenges all our prejudices and expectations.

The real shame is that it is also beat Capote and Good Night, Good Luck, which are both great, intelligent "issues" films. Even Munich was powerful, if not necessarily good.

wah link didn't work.

If you haven't read it, check out: http://www.timecube.com/ it's ... actually faintly sad, but ToT are beginning to sound a *lot* like it.

In other news:

I never realised quite what colossal twats the guys at Tale of Tales are.

I mean seriously, this is beginning to sound like fucking timecube

Playing D&D With Pornstars gets the Wizards of the Coast seal of approval.

Interesting that they chose to interview Zak, considering that a) although he's a great ambassador for the hobby, the blog isn't exactly "family-friendly", and b) he doesn't even play the current edition of the game...

There was a South Park episode where Cartman dismisses arthouse cinema as being about gay cowboys eating pudding. I didn't watch Brokeback because I knew I couldn't sit through it without remembering the episode and sniggering.

I suspect the other reason people insist Brokeback was robbed was that it was ABOUT TEH GAYS. One of the depressing things about Brokeback is that pretty much the only opinion one is allowed to have about the damned film is "IT IS AWESOME BECAUSE IT HAS GAYS IN IT" or "IT IS SENT BY SATAN BECAUSE IT HAS GAYS IN IT".

Which leaves those of us who thought it was boring, trite, predictable, and far. too. long. rather out on the cold.