Sunday, December 14, 2008

Good Morning, Films Based on Graphic Novels or Books

E.B. White (Elwyn Brooks White) Author of Charlotte's Web and Stuart Little, editor of the Elements of Style. A great writer.



Good Morning


Last night, I tried to read Teach Yourself Negotiating by Phil Baguley. I honestly tried to read it, but the writing was very tepid. It was thick and boring. The content itself wasn't bad. It probably was very good advice, but it had a soporific effect on me. I had to put the book down about halfway through it.

I am starting on reading Guerrilla Negotiating Unconventional Weapons and Tactics to Get What You Want by Jay Conrad Levinson. This book so far has caught my attention and held it. The writing is gripping. The book describes you as a guerrilla who is fighting an unconventional war to win in business. Strategies are described as you being a maverick out to change your business into a winning position. It is quite appealing. The content might not be that different than the first book, but the style certainly is.

There really is no excuse for when people write poorly, no matter what the subject is. A good writer can make almost any subject interesting. At least, this is what I believe. Writing should hold peoples attention with a little bit of wit, even if it is a textbook on plumbing. All it takes is a little bit of extra effort on the writers part.

I also watched Ultimate Avengers 2, Rise of the Panther an animated Marvel comics feature. I really enjoyed it. It was fun seeing the classic Marvel characters of Thor, Ironman, Black Panther, Giant Man, Black Widow, Wasp, Captain America and Nick Fury in action. The interaction of the superheroes was the best part of the film. The villains were cookie cutter evil aliens.

The imaginary African kingdom of Wakanda was also quite interesting. Black Panther is the king of Wakanda. The theme of isolationism and refusal to let outsiders into Wakanda added to the back story. Of course the heros win, but one of them dies which adds to the melodrama. Captain America is especially well done in this animation. He is not just portrayed as a superhero, but as a supersoldier in the service of the American government. Also Thor casts runes and speaks to Odin revealing his connection to Asgard.

The film had a lot of action in it. Most of the film was fighting the evil aliens. One of the aliens is a shapechanger who fought Captain America during World War II. There is also the evil alien superscience with the weird metal vibranium. Vibranium is something which might have come out of Flash Gordon or Buckaroo Banzai.

The animation special feature includes a clip on the making of the animated movie. The talent used in the film is all top notch, Joe Quesada, Mark Millar, Stan Lee, Greg Johnson, and many others made the film possible. If you like superhero comics this is a very good set of animation. It also is a standalone film. The authors specifically wrote the film so you would not have to have read the comic books to understand what was happening.

The Ultimates comics are a revamping of the older comics like X-Men and Spiderman for a new audience. We bought the Ultimate X-Men and the Ultimate Spiderman graphic novels for our library for the young adult collection because they are a rewrite of the old storyline for a more modern audience.



I just started two threads on Blogcatalog discussing Films based on Graphic Novels, and Films Based on Authors lives. I am looking to get a new list of films to watch. So far people have suggested Barfly about Charles Bukowski and A Mighty Heart about the Wall Street Journal Reporter Danny Pearl. Both are probably films I might want to watch.



Two other films were mentioned, Capote and Shakespeare In Love. Both sound like very interesting films.

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