Please Re-cut This Film! An appeal for Atlas Shrugged: Who Is John Galt? (Part Two)

AtlasShruggedNote: If you haven’t seen the film, take my word for nothing in here. PLEASE see it and draw your own conclusions. It’s still running in 65 theaters around the country.

Continuing my review of Atlas Shrugged: Who Is John Galt, I wish to pause for a disclaimer and a shout-out. First, the disclaimer: I am speaking frankly about this film because I believe in the project. I respect the passion of the creative team behind it. I understand the obstacles they had to overcome to bring an overwhelmingly popular book to film under the eye of a film industry that largely holds its audience in contempt, and believes that this book is only popular because most of the reading public is too stupid to know what’s good for them. I admire their effort, and I hope it will ultimately pay off.

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No Blog This Week

The_ScreamI had one all planned, and partially written, but circumstances have conspired against me. I decided, on a whim, to spend the weekend trying to meet a very short deadline on an opportunity I’d just learned about. I met it, but I spent all of my free time Saturday, Sunday and Monday evening writing and editing.

On top of that, I had a system outage at work Saturday night, had to plan for a long-overdue meeting with my staff Monday morning, and then Monday learned that we’d be pulling an all-nighter this Wednesday, and spending every moment until then scrambling to be ready.

So, sorry… No blog this week. But I hope to start next week feeling accomplished.

And, hey, if you’re coming to Baltimore Book Festival, stop by the SFWA tent at 4 PM this Friday and listen in on the panel I’m doing with fellow members of the Heinlein Facebook Forum on Robert A. Heinlein’s literary legacy.

Please Re-cut This Film! An appeal for Atlas Shrugged: Who Is John Galt? (Part One)

imageI don’t want to write this review, but, dammit, I feel obligated.

Actually, I feel torn. One the one hand, I supported this movie financially via Kickstarter. I think very well of the producers and creative team who have, thus far, brought us one excellent film and one pretty good one in this trilogy. Criticizing them in public feels a bit like airing dirty laundry, disloyalty to the cause. And yet… When I see something done poorly, by people who want to do a good job, and I know how it could be done better… I feel like I have to say something. Even though saying something seems to put me in the ranks of the many film critics who will say this movie is a desperate, laughable attempt to bring recognition to a set of lunatic fringe ideas, and that the poor quality of the film is just a testament to how unsound their thinking is.

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Review – Space: 1999 – To Everything That Was

space1999_classicI happened upon this volume almost by accident. I’ve always been a huge fan of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson’s 1975 – 1977 science fiction series, Space: 1999. I’ve got a bit of a chip on my shoulder about it, in fact, because the show seems to provoke resentment from most corners of Fandom. If you’re a fan over the age of about 35, you remember how it felt to like Star Trek or comic books, back before Fandom became just another cash cow for Hollywood? Before the Marvel Movies conquered the box office? Before The Big Bang Theory? (The show, not the actual theory. Note the italics. Punctuation is key.) Before geek was chic?

Yeah, it was a bad feeling to be a fan in those days. Everyone looked down on you, to include your peers, siblings, teachers, sometimes even your parents! Well, as bad as that felt for, say a Star Trek fan, it was worse for a Space: 1999 fan. Everyone looked down on us, including all other fans! To this day, I’m careful at cons and on panel discussions about mentioning my love of this series, because people actually groan in revulsion.

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Goodreads Giveaway – Somewhere in the Middle of Eternity

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Somewhere in the Middle of Eternity by Phil Giunta

Somewhere in the Middle of Eternity

by Phil Giunta

Giveaway ends September 24, 2014.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win

I’m very proud of this little collection, which introduces five new authors and a new artist to the Firebringer stable. I hope everyone will enter to win a free copy, and, if you don’t win, will buy a paper or e-edition from Smashwords, Amazon, Barnes & Noble or the retailer of your choice!