The useful pick:
So, Omaha and I went out to Pirates of the Caribbean last night at the Auburn Supermall. I was rather impressed with the production values; there were very few glitches in the digital effects and the swordfight half-in, half-out of the shadows is exceptionally well done. The costumes are gorgeous, as are Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, and Kiera Knightly (in that order). Geoffrey Rush is over-the-top as the villain but in such a wonderful way.
OhGreatAthena, what the fuck happened to Jonathan Pryce? The oh-so-suave-and-sexy pitchman for Lexus in the early 90's looks as if thrity years rather than ten have settled on his face and waist. He has jowls now. [Massive shudder].
And I was very pleased with the degree of nautical detail. Being a Patrick O'Brian fan and having done quite a bit of research for BloodyBeth, I was able to recognize to a significant degree much of the terminology and equipment being used. I could almost hear the director saying, "Look, Master and Commander is coming out soon, we can't screw this up, there are people out there now who know this stuff."
Beautiful and engaging without being deep, it was a fun flick. But![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jatg is right about the music: it's just the Gladiator soundtrack warmed over.
The useless pan (unless you happen to live in the Queen Anne district of Seattle):
The new Safeway grocery store in Queen Anne on Mercer Street has gone up where the old one used to be, and having been in there once or twice, I have to ask the architect: What were you thinking? What once was a rambler-level standalone store, wide and shallow, with easy access to the doors from anywhere in the store, has been turned into an into a multi-level apartment complex with a safeway store in the basement. The building is on a slope, so whatever spark designed this store optimized for volume by putting the doors at the end where the slope exposes the basement level, at the south side. At the same time, the "15 minute parking" zones were installed on the street, on the north side.
The end result is that, to get a gallon of milk (the dairy is at the far end of this long, deep layout) while in one's car, one must park and walk over four hundred yards. It's the most inefficient layout I've seen for a grocery in years, resulting in the kinds of treks one reserves for a Costco or a Sams or something like that. They should provide Segways for their less able-bodied customers.
It's close to my office, but the interior layout is so annoying that I'd almost prefer to walk to the Larry's up the street: in either case, it's a walk of four city blocks.
So, Omaha and I went out to Pirates of the Caribbean last night at the Auburn Supermall. I was rather impressed with the production values; there were very few glitches in the digital effects and the swordfight half-in, half-out of the shadows is exceptionally well done. The costumes are gorgeous, as are Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, and Kiera Knightly (in that order). Geoffrey Rush is over-the-top as the villain but in such a wonderful way.
OhGreatAthena, what the fuck happened to Jonathan Pryce? The oh-so-suave-and-sexy pitchman for Lexus in the early 90's looks as if thrity years rather than ten have settled on his face and waist. He has jowls now. [Massive shudder].
And I was very pleased with the degree of nautical detail. Being a Patrick O'Brian fan and having done quite a bit of research for BloodyBeth, I was able to recognize to a significant degree much of the terminology and equipment being used. I could almost hear the director saying, "Look, Master and Commander is coming out soon, we can't screw this up, there are people out there now who know this stuff."
Beautiful and engaging without being deep, it was a fun flick. But
jatg is right about the music: it's just the Gladiator soundtrack warmed over.The useless pan (unless you happen to live in the Queen Anne district of Seattle):
The new Safeway grocery store in Queen Anne on Mercer Street has gone up where the old one used to be, and having been in there once or twice, I have to ask the architect: What were you thinking? What once was a rambler-level standalone store, wide and shallow, with easy access to the doors from anywhere in the store, has been turned into an into a multi-level apartment complex with a safeway store in the basement. The building is on a slope, so whatever spark designed this store optimized for volume by putting the doors at the end where the slope exposes the basement level, at the south side. At the same time, the "15 minute parking" zones were installed on the street, on the north side.
The end result is that, to get a gallon of milk (the dairy is at the far end of this long, deep layout) while in one's car, one must park and walk over four hundred yards. It's the most inefficient layout I've seen for a grocery in years, resulting in the kinds of treks one reserves for a Costco or a Sams or something like that. They should provide Segways for their less able-bodied customers.
It's close to my office, but the interior layout is so annoying that I'd almost prefer to walk to the Larry's up the street: in either case, it's a walk of four city blocks.
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