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Japanese Posters by Rebounder
Japanese Posters by Rebounder
7
7.0 (1 Ratings)
Album Rating
The main ingredient here is mystery.
I saved this track and came back to it a week later. Since then there has been quite a bit of interest from other blogs, and now that I am writing the piece for CHILLFILTR I don't know where to begin. This song reeks of both repurposed cliche and fresh instinct. I know next to nothing about the project. It's like the songwriter just tagged his idea 'made in the east village' and decided to go on vacation.

The similarity to Post Malone and Arctic Monkeys is pretty clear; and the Friday night party vibe is going to find a lot of believers.

“You’ll find her sitting in the back of the bar with a cigarette on her lips
talking to the ex-frontman of a favorite band she ain’t heard yet”
— Rebounder
  
The Midnight Sky (2020)
The Midnight Sky (2020)
2020 | Drama, Fantasy, Sci-Fi
4
6.6 (12 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Predictable and cliched
The Midnight Sky is a science fiction film directed by George Clooney, the latest in a long line of Netflix originals to hit our screens, based on the 2016 book ‘Good Morning, Midnight’ by Lily Brooks-Dalton. George Clooney plays Augustine, who encounters young girl Iris (the adorable Caoilinn Springall) after remaining on earth following a global apocalypse. Together they must travel across the Arctic to reach a weather station that will allow them to warn returning spaceship, the Aether, captained by Adewole (David Oyelowo) and crewed by Sully (Felicity Jones), Mitchell (Kyle Chandler), Sanchez (Demián Bichir) and Maya (Tiffany Boone).

The trailer for this had me concerned. It looked very similar to many other sci-fi/end of the world films (think Sunshine, Interstellar, even The Day After Tomorrow) and nothing about it looked particularly original. I had hoped that the trailer might be misleading, but I’m afraid to say that this is every bit as lacklustre and predictable as the trailer implied.

Visually this looks stunning, both the set design and the special effects have obviously had a decent amount of time and money invested in them. Alongside this, Alexandre Desplat’s score is beautifully ephemeral and haunting, and accompanies the story well, feeling very in keeping with both the Arctic and the space settings. And aside from a decent cast, I’m afraid these are the only good things I can say about this film. The main problem is the story itself, it’s entirely predictable and suffers from every space and sci-fi mishap you could ever think of, from unexplainable drifting off course to the destruction of important equipment (comms of course, would you expect any less?) due to an unpredicted meteor strike. And this cliched predictability just makes the story so dull and drawn out over its two hour runtime.

To be honest, the whole film itself and the actions of the characters just doesn’t make any sense. You have a pregnant astronaut, who has virtually no sexual chemistry with the man she’s having a baby with, and who’s allowed to go outside into space with little concern over her or her baby’s well-being. A scientist who falls into sub-zero Arctic water which appears to have little impact on his health. And a child walking around in a summer dress with bare legs in the Arctic climate. Admittedly this latter point is addressed towards the end of the film in a rather obvious and over used plot twist, which is still rather unsatisfying. There’s also the large number of unexplained plot points. I’m all for keeping the watcher guessing and hate films that feel the need to over explain every aspect of the plot, but The Midnight Sky takes the opposite approach and explains barely anything. If you go into this expecting to find out what caused the radiation apocalypse or what happened to the rest of earth’s population you’ll be sorely disappointed. It also makes references to a K-23 colony ship that the Aether hasn’t heard from, yet provides no explanation or background as to the outcome of said ship, and also gives us flashbacks to Augustine’s past yet with little reason other than to provide an “A-ha” moment for the aforementioned plot twist. And the decisions made by the astronauts on the Aether once they’ve found out about Earth’s fate are just laughably ridiculous especially considering the fate of the rest of the population.

Despite the promising cast and effects, The Midnight Sky is yet another disappointing Netflix original that is light years away from some of the more brilliant sci-fi stories that have come before it.
  
The Memoirs of Stockholm Sven
The Memoirs of Stockholm Sven
Nathaniel Ian Miller | 2022 | Fiction & Poetry
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
The Arctic has always seemed to me to be a terrifying, forbidding place, which sounds very much like I’m not going to enjoy “The Memoirs of Stockholm Sven”, doesn’t it?
Well, wrong.
Fascination and terror seem to often walk hand in hand in my reading. There’s no way that I’d willingly go to these freezing, inhospitable places, but that’s no reason not to read a novel about it.
And what a novel this is.
Sven, who unsurprisingly comes from Stockholm, has always stood out from others and wants to go to the Arctic to seek adventure. But when he does go he finds himself working in a mine. Back-breaking, dangerous work, that ultimately ends in disaster for him. The result is a face that makes him even more of an outcast. But it also seems to attract the people who will be his friends. People who will help him to learn to live in the frozen north independently: Tapio, the Finn who teaches him to trap animals, shows him what to eat and when to eat it; Charles MacIntyre, a Scottish geologist who helps him to find his way back to life after the accident.

This is all written in the first person, and it really does feel like a personal account. You could be forgiven for thinking it’s a true story - in fact it is a very human story. Sven’s determination to survive and learn to be self-sufficient is touching, funny at times and always life affirming. Sven experiences great highs and achievements, as well as terrible lows.

I’m so glad that I read this.
  
The Thing (1982)
The Thing (1982)
1982 | Horror, Sci-Fi
I've actually been meaning to see this movie. The death of Wilford Brimley caused me to watch it in honor of his illustrious career.

When watching this film for the first time in the 21st century, you absolutely must accept and understand that the visual representations that are made are circa 1982. At times, that is a difficult thing to remember.

The story told in the movie is quite a good one. A trope that would become a classic. A mysterious chain of events takes place that leads to an arctic crew coming to terms with the fact that they are not alone. As if that wasn't hard enough to come to terms with, they come to understand that this being is attempting to literally "become" one of them. The acting is good for the time of production. Fans of the genre and fans of films from the era should definitely be able to enjoy this movie without effort.
  
Arctic Scavengers
Arctic Scavengers
2009 | Bluff, Card Game, Fighting
Hot Heads in the Ice
It was a thursday night and I was round my mate's house ready for my first ever 'gaming session'. Overwhelmed by all the colourful cardboard I realised my expectations of Monopoly and Cluedo were embarrassingly ill-informed.

Arctic Scavengers, the first and last game of the evening, couldn't have been further from my previous gaming experience. A fantastically thematic and competitive deck-building game, it was love at first fight. Deep into a post-apocalyptic winter wasteland, I was soon digging for medicine I would later use to attract hunters and was recruiting brawlers with my charismatic team leaders. After winning the fourth contested resource (a dog sled to add to my grenade) I was hooked and by the time we had thrashed out our final fight I had completed my online checkout.

Pros:
- Simple card drafting game perfect for new players.
- The theme is excellent and match the components brilliantly.
- The length of the game can be controlled by limiting the number of contested resources, allowing for faster play if required (although not recommended).
- The idea of digging for medicine seems hilarious but deciding whether to keep the shovel or take the net can be game-changing and keeps every decision interesting.


Cons:
- The expansions seem to take away from the core game too much for me adding in too many components which alter the base mechanics too much.

The Game

The game is won by the player who has the most people in their clan by the end of the game - after the last contested resource is won.
Playing best with four players, you are required to develop your initial deck in order to fight other players for contested resources and be the strongest clan among the post apocalyptic wasteland.

During each round a player draws 5 cards and is given the opportunity to perform any of the available actions before deciding whether they want to fight for the available 'contested resource'. Able to complete actions such as digging for junk, recruiting new members to their clan or drawing other cards from their hand, Arctic Scavengers is a game where you have to balance the potential to draw a useles refuge, who offers nothing in a fight but increases the size of your clan, with the need to draw brawlers for the fight. Do you choose the versatile scavengers who can do everything, providing you with a variety of options, or go big and recruit thugs for the next fight.

A brilliantly varied game Arctic Scavengers can be played differently every time the lid comes off and no matter who you play against you see something new. I can honestly say that everyone I have played this with have loved it and it is off the shalf at every games night.

I realise that this game will often be compared to other self contained deck-builders such as Dominion and Clank but this is by far my favourite of these and has permanent residence on my shelf for the foreseeable future.
  
The Golden Compass (2007)
The Golden Compass (2007)
2007 | Action, Drama, Sci-Fi
Just nukes the ever-loving fuck out of the book. To turn a pretty bloody and challenging series into this hyperincompetent snooze of shit storytelling, genre rehashing, and violently diluted themes (or what's left of them, if anything) should have been criminalized on arrival. Find me anyone who can tell me what the plot of this is or why anything in it happens, this is 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘋𝘢 𝘝𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘪 𝘊𝘰𝘥𝘦 of crummy children's fantasy flicks (which were the 2000s answer to the dull, samey YA craze of the 2010s). Oh and those Academy Award winning effects? They're fucking ghoulish. The production is nice but how anyone could think this mess of badly-aged animation and awful greenscreen work looks good is far beyond me. The armored polar bears were pretty dope though, and this wakes up a bit in the weird 15 minutes where a group of crazy institution fanatics start experimenting on children out in like the middle of the arctic for no real reason lmao. But otherwise absolutely not, no thank you.
  
TS
Teak's Second Start (Itayu Lake, #7)
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Teak's Second Start tells the story of how Teak, an arctic fox shifter, escapes from his possessive boyfriend, who not only has a wife already, but turns out to be part of the Hunters. Teak moves to Spirit Valley where he hopes his new life can begin. He receives a shock though when not only does he meet his mate, but his ex follows him and soon causes all sorts of trouble.

These Itáyu Lake novellas are the perfect, quick, read for a sunny afternoon. The writing and pace is smooth, with no editing or grammatical errors that disrupted my reading flow. Although you receive a small benefit to reading the prior books, it in no way affects this story if you haven't. Short, sweet, and sexy. Definitely recommended by me.

* A copy of this book was provided to me with no requirements for a review. I voluntarily read this book, and my comments here are my honest opinion. *

Merissa
Archaeolibrarian - I Dig Good Books!
  
The Great Alone
The Great Alone
Kristin Hannah | 2018 | Fiction & Poetry, Romance
9
8.5 (13 Ratings)
Book Rating
This was my second Kristin Hannah book, and it is set in very different circumstances to the last one (the last one was The Nightingale, set during World War 2). This is set during the 1970s in Alaska, in the back of beyond.
This is a story of survival: Leni and her mother survive the violence of Leni's Vietnam War vet father (who is suffering from PTSD after being held as a prisoner by the enemy). Cora, Leni's mother, will not leave him, saying that she loves him and needs him, and repeatedly pays the price. Leni loves Alaska and her boyfriend Matthew, but tragic circumstances take her away from both for a number of years. Many years later, under different circumstances, she is able to return.
I think I really like Kristin Hannah books. The way she describes the surroundings in Alaska: the wildness, the beauty, the unpredictability. I've read a couple of books recently set in the cold, snowy arctic circle, and this only made me want to actually see it myself even more!
 I know I'm only two books in to my Kristin Hannah experience, but I can't say as there is anything about either of them that I didn't like. I'll be hunting down more!
  
The Midnight Sky (2020)
The Midnight Sky (2020)
2020 | Drama, Fantasy, Sci-Fi
7
6.6 (12 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Moody and Atmospheric
Ever since his stint on ER, I have been a fan of George Clooney’s - and not just because he is charming and charismatic on film - but because I find that he brings an interesting facet to whatever character he inhabits
.
And with his latest effort THE MIDNIGHT SKY (Directed by Mr. Clooney, as well) he does not disappoint as his performance - and his Direction - are fascinating to watch.

Based upon the novel by Lily Brooks-Dalton, THE MIDNIGHT SKY tells the tale of a lone scientist (Clooney) in a remote, arctic research station, who is one of the few remaining people on an Earth that has become uninhabitable. He rushes to warn some returning astronauts to avoid their home planet.

A thoughtful, moody film. THE MIDNIGHT SKY will not be everyone’s cup of tea - and you have to be in the mood for something somewhat slow and contemplative - but if you are, you will be rewarded with a rich tapestry of visuals and performances that will be, ultimately, fulfilling.

Let’s start with what works - George Clooney. His direction and his performance as Augustine, the scientist, are both sparse and compact. Neither of these facets have an extraneous movement or tone and they work hand-in-hand to deliver the film that Clooney, obviously intends to give us.

Visually, this film is beautiful to look at - inter cutting the vast emptiness of space to the vast, snowy emptiness of the Arctic. The images that Clooney was able to create was well worth watching this film for.

Clooney was also fortunate enough to cast a variety of stellar performers in a film that has very few roles, so the ones that are there better deliver the goods - and they do. From Ethan Peck (Spock in Star Trek:Discovery) who plays the young Clooney in a flashback (I am very glad they chose to do this as opposed to “de-aging” Clooney) to the Astronauts: Felicity Jones, David Oyelowo (who I continue to like more and more every time I see him), Kyle Chandler and Tiffany Boone. All strike the right tone for the moodiness of this film.

Special notice should be made for Damien Bechir’s astronaut, Sanchez. He was terrific in the limited screen time he had and elevated every scene he was in. Bechir has become one of those performers who I get excited about when I see that he is going to be involved in a screen project.

What doesn’t work? Well…as I stated before…the pacing. It is slow (almost coming to a stop) at times. Since this is a film that will be streamed via Netflix, I can see many, many folks grabbing their phones at times, which is too bad, for the moodiness - and pace - worked for me (or at least the for the mood I was in while watching this).

My other issue with this film is the contrived circumstances that both Clooney and the Astronauts find themselves in. It isn’t enough that Clooney has to journey across rugged Arctic terrain to find a more powerful antennae to communicate with the Astronauts, we have to throw in cracking and melting ice to it. And, of course, just as the Astronauts connect with Clooney, a surprise meteor shower damages the communication array. These contrivances just wasn’t need for the type of movie this film was trying to be. It’s almost as if the Studio Heads said “it’s too slow and talky - put some action in this thing”.

But, if you are able to stay with this film, the ending pays off very well, indeed. I found that it earned it’s ending and I walked away moved and satisfied.

Letter Grade: B

7 stars (out of 10) and you can take that to the Bank(OfMarquis)
  
40x40

Heather M (8 KP) rated Bear's Magic Moon in Books

Dec 31, 2018 (Updated Dec 31, 2018)  
Bear's Magic Moon
Bear's Magic Moon
Suzanne Pinner | 2012 | Children
8
8.0 (2 Ratings)
Book Rating
The message for children is very positive. (0 more)
A story about bravery.
Little Bear loves his life on the ice, and has great fun all day long. However, there is one thing that Little Bear doesn't love: the DARK. He is afraid of the dark. So afraid is he, in fact, that when Daddy invites him to the new moon celebration, he cannot go, even to hear Wise Old Bear tell stories of his adventures.

Little Bear huddles in his home until a scary, shadowy figure appears in the entrance. This turns out to be Wise Old Bear, bringing a kind lesson to help Little Bear.

I love this lesson, and it's one that I always try to tell myself, my sons and the children I teach. Bravery is being afraid but going ahead and doing the thing you're afraid of anyway. Bravery isn't not being afraid. I believe that myself and it's great to see this being taught in a lovely picture book.

The illustrations are lovely, with lots of colour and interest added to the snowy landscape and Arctic skies.

This is a story that you will love to read with your children and would work well in the classroom too.


I posted this review on my blog:
https://wp.me/p9SEjW-76