Rui-Long Monico - Geneva // USA Conexion : Archives

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
		1	2	3	4	5
6	7	8	9	10	11	12
13	14	15	16	17	18	19
20	21	22	23	24	25	26
27	28	29	30	31

« 2005-09 | HomePage | 2005-11 »

Friday, October 28, 2005

Movie Review: Rize

Rize (USA, 1992)
Director: David LaChapelle
Genre: Hip Hop Documentary

Artistic Vibe: 9/10

Fun Vibe: 8/10

Total Vibe: 8.5/10
View Trailer

Usually Hip Hop documentaries are either cheap footage of thugs showing off their guns or a ridiculous cliche attempt from White America to understand its culture. I was crossing my finger for Rize, on paper it looked like the awaited Messiah, and I really didn't want to be disappointed.

Well my fears didn't materialize into reality. David LaChapelle did a great job and I should have never doubted him. Being one of the greatest hype photographer of the past ten years in the fashion and show-business, he brought all his experience to paint an aesthetically perfect canvas for his introduction to the clowning and krumping culture.

Although very different, Clowning and Krumping are two style of Hip Hop dances that grew up in South Central, Los Angeles. Clowning was invented by Tommy the Clown, an ex-drug dealer who started dancing dressed up as a clown when he got out of jail. The concept was soon recuperated and used in Crunk and Reggaeton videos. Yes, every time you see a ho shaking her booty to Lil Jon, she is clowning. Krumping is way more hardcore. In between heavy metal moshing (less brutal and more based on the rhythm) and capoeira, the genre is paralleled to African tribal dances by LaChapelle.

I'm not gonna waste my time talking about the plot ('cuz there is none) or to discuss the sociological effects (LaChapelle is a photographer not a scholar) but rather break down LaChapelle's artistic work.

Opening up with archive footage of the 1965 Watts riot and the 1992 Rodney King riot and ending with a quote from Martin Luther King, Rize is a movie with strong images that delivers equally strong emotions. The soundtrack sounds like it was crafted to embody the moves from every dancer in this documentary, moves that LaChapelle took care to perfectly translate to screen with a rare grace.

Rize being the first great Hip Hop documentary in years, I highly recommend it to every purist anti-bling bling HH-headz out there.

23:55 Posted in Movies & TV | Permalink | Comments (13) | Email this | Tags: Movies

Thursday, October 27, 2005

October 2005 Music Quotable: Sage Francis - Makeshift Patriot

Starting now, I am going to post once a month some great lyrics just like The Source. Benzino if you're reading and bytching about me plagiarizing you, you can kiss my ass. Put your suggestions for next month's Music Quotable in the comment section, it doesn't have to be Hip Hop but it can't be heavy metal or country 'cuz I hate this shyt.

For this firt Music Quotable, let me introduce y'all to Sage Francis' vision of the media and the post-9/11 trauma. Poet/Rapper/Political activist show us with great cynism how the Rethuglicans are manipulating us. Looking through the eyez of a pig:

Sage Francis - Makeshift Patriot - 3rd Verse:

We're selling addictive, twenty-four hour candlelight vigils on TV.
Freedom will be defended at the cost of civil liberties.
The viewers are glued to television screens, stuck,
'cause lots of things seem too sick.
I use opportunities to pluck heartstrings for theme music.
I'll show you which culture to pump your fist at,
which foot is right to kiss.
We don't really know who the culprit is yet,
but he looks like this.
We know who the heroes are,
they're not the xenophobes who act hard.
We taught the dog to squat,
how dare he do that shit in our own back yard.
They happen to scar our financial state,
and char our landscape.
Can you count how many times so far I ran back the same damn tape?
While the cameraman creates news and shoves it down our throats,
on the west bank, with the ten second clip put on constant loop to provoke US angst.
So get your tanks and load your guns and hold your suns in a family huddle,
'cause even if we win this tug of war and even the score,
humanity struggles.
There's a need of blood for what's been uncovered under the rubble;
some of them dug for answers in the mess,
but the rest were looking for trouble.

22:10 Posted in Music | Permalink | Comments (41) | Email this | Tags: music

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

Synopsis: Nip/Tuck Season 3 Episode 6 - FrankenLaura

Nip Tuck

Tell us what you don't like about yourself...

Is it just me or this episode was fucking awesome.

Thanks to Christian's accusation of being the Carver, the McNamara/Troy practice is near bankrupcy. Their client list just vanished, their website was shut down and the overall bad press won't make it easier for the surgeons to recover financially. They end up doing the shitty jobs, such as a German tourist who doesn't speak a word of English, a 150 years old mummy that wants to look younger or FrankenLaura.

FrankenLaura is the sick product of some cramatorium dude. Laura is the guy's sister, she died in a car accident and ever since, he is been sleeping with her rotten body. Unfortunately for the sick fuck, as the body is decomposing he is not longer able to get his groove on so he chopps her dead off, bring it to the cramatorium and fix it to other dismembered body part, thus the name FrankenLaura. He eventually gets caught and the owner of the morgue hire Sean to fix the "little problem". Fucking necrophiliac.

Gina's back and she is still a bytch. An ungrateful, greedy bytch. Christian has been giving her money on the side so she wouldn't sell her body for survival, but when he announces her that he can't hold this promise anymore, she calls him an asshole. What a ho, he didn't owe her anything, he just gave her the dough out of goodwill.

Anyway Gina goes to visit Julia and convinces her to invest in a spa recovering center. They put the down payment in a superb mansion occupied by squatters, prostitutes, and crackheads and pimp it out. The chemistry between Gina and Julia is undenyable and it's cool to see theim enterprised their own biz while the McNamara/Troy practice is sinking in a sad irony. Oh, I almost forget, since them two girlz don't have that much money, Gina decided to pay her employees and the whole construction company crew by giving them blowjobs...hahaha...

Liz resigned and went to work as general practitioner for Julia. Ok, that is mess up. Sean doubled her salaries not too long ago and now she leaves as soon as the practice experiences some bad moment. I feel like half of the women in this show are bytches.

Sean finally realizes that he is a loser. He lost his wife, he lost his son and now he is losing his practice. It's like the moral of this show is "honesty doesn't pay unlike cheating and lying". Can anyone spell AMEN for me?

23:55 Posted in Movies & TV | Permalink | Comments (2) | Email this | Tags: Movies

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

NBA bans Hip Hop fashion among players

Starting with the 2005/2006 season, the NBA will enforce a new business casual dress code among players during team functions. NBA players will now have to wear a suit, a sport coat or their uniform while sitting on the bench. The new requirements also forbid sleeveless shirts, shorts, t-shirts, chains, sunglasses while indoor and other bling bling assortments or excessive jewelry to be worn while the players participate in activities such as arriving and leaving games, conducting interviews, making appearances or any promotional attendance. However, the NBA committee didn't show concerns for tattoos, piercings or haircuts.

One of the partisan of this policy is Lakers Head Coach Phil Jackson. Jackson, in an interview with the San Grabriel Valley Tribune, argued that the Hip Hop attire is "like gangster, thuggery stuff" and therefore should be banned. The opposition disputed the rule as being "implemented out of racial bias".

Now, I don't know wassup with them fools, I mean it's like the NBA gone conservative and wants to divorce from the Hip Hop culture or sumting. It's stupid 'cuz Basketball is almost part of the hip hop culture. 50% (if not more) of all NBA playas come from the hood, listen to hip hop and dress accordingly, so what you Rethuglican fuck, we don't ask golf players to stop dressing like grandpas. A huge part of the Basketball paraphernalia is composed of gold chains, throwback jerseys or Hip Hop attitude. Anyway, ever since those tall-Israeli took over the NBA it's not interesting anymore. I'd rather stick to watching NCAA or the And-1 Mixtapes.

21:30 Posted in Music | Permalink | Comments (48) | Email this | Tags: music

Monday, October 24, 2005

Cam'Ron got shot

Cam'Ron was shot and wounded yesterday (Sunday, October 23rd) when he was leaving a club in Washington, D.C. in his show off Lamborghini. Apparently some gully ass thugs stopped him at a traffic light and pointed a gun at him. Refusing to give up his Italian baby, Killa Cam took the fuck off when one of the thug shot him, wounding both of his arm. Cam'Ron was in DC to perform for a college homecoming dance.

Anyway, I was kinda surprised that Killa Cam didn't pussied out on this one. I didn't expect a guy that dresses in pink all the time to say no to some real thug. I'm guessing that proves us all that he ain't a fag like let's say Ja Rule or P. Diddy. Give you props on this one bro!

23:55 Posted in Music | Permalink | Comments (27) | Email this | Tags: music

Sunday, October 23, 2005

New Ipod Video Commercial with Eminem

Those genius from Apple had another great headache with pictures (=an idea) to promote their (rather deceiving) Ipod Video.

Much in the same manner of their previous commercial with Daft Punk or the Black Eyed Peas, Eminem's silouhette is bouncing in front of an abstract background inspired of the graffiti scene.

I'm not too much of an Eminem fan, especially of his latest work, but I gotta admit that his character and music (they used Lose Yourself) blend pretty well to the hot tones of the background.

I love Apple, they always come out with the best graphical shyt on the market, and this commercial proves it well. Take a look at the video yourself and tell me what you think of it.

Download the video here. The movie requires Quick Time.

12:50 Permalink | Comments (29) | Email this | Tags: music

Saturday, October 22, 2005

UNICEF Smurf Ad Campaign

Do you remember when you were young watching that cartoon about a Marxist society full of blue creatures living in colored psychedelic 'shrooms. I thought it was funny how they were addicted to a green plant similar to the one that produces cocaine, were probably all gay since there was only one smurfette (unless she a ho) and how they all tricked that tall Israeli looking Gargamel dude. Sweet memories huh?

Anyway, the UNICEF came out with a new televised advertising campaign showing their beautiful fongus village getting bombed, leaving death and devastation among the smurfs, baby smurf being the only survivor. The goal of the campaign is to increase awareness about the bombing of Palestine by the Israelian army ooops... I mean against people to kill children or something like that and optionally to raise some funds.

Click here to download the ad. The movie requires Quicktime.

15:40 Posted in Politic as usual | Permalink | Comments (3) | Email this | Tags: humor

Friday, October 21, 2005

Tech Review: Gmail

With all the buzz surrounding Gmail and me needing a new email since my previously held Yahoo account was hacked, I had to test this webmail from the almighty Google. So I've been using Gmail for over two months now, it's time to draw some conclusions.

There are so many positive points about Gmail that I don't know where to begin. Ok let's start with the most obvious: it's size. With over 2.6 Gb (& counting) of free space, Gmail totally destroys the competition. It's simple, no need for annoying mail client (Outlook) or to delete any messages since the space is not a problem any more. It's really easy to send big files, music or even short movies over the net now! The other major innovation is the interface. Minimalist and simple to use, the interface reflects Google’s search engine. With a capacity of over 300’000 emails, it would have been chaotic to search for an old message. Enters here a powerful internal search engine, fast and convenient that will help you find anything you want.

I also like the anti-spam service; unlike other email (Yahoo, Hotmail) it works extremely good and filtered every single spam message so far. The conversation utility is pretty sweet too, it allows you to follow emails that you have send and receive from a same subject much like an Instant Messaging client would. It’s kinda weird at first but very useful when we get the handle of it. There is plenty of other little tools here and there and I’ll let you discover them by yourself.

Concerning the negative points, I heard people complaining about text ads reflecting the content of their mail and that it was invading their privacy. I don’t know ‘cuz I haven’t seen any of these ads yet, wait and see on this topic. To nitpick a little bit I would add that Gmail needs an anti-virus, a blacklisting function and a translation tool (like on the Google toolbar). But like we said it’s not the final version yet.

Gmail is still in Beta testing. It is impossible to obtain an account without receiving an invitation. The good thing is, I just happen to have myself a hundred invitations left. For those of you that want to receive an invitation, leave a (nice) comment with your email and if I feel like you deserve one, I'll send you an invitation.
Here are a couple of sure ways to be on my good side:
- Leave a donation
- Support my website through patronizing
- Send me naked pictures of you (only works with pretty girlz)
- Visit my page often
- Leave plenty of comments

19:40 Posted in Web, Blogging & Technology | Permalink | Comments (0) | Email this

Thursday, October 20, 2005

Book Review: A Small Place by Jamaica Kincaid

A Small Place (Antigua, 1998)
Author: Jamaica Kincaid
Type: Essay

Artistic Vibe: 5.5/10

Fun Vibe: 7.5/10

Total Vibe: 7/10

Antigua, one of the jewel of the Caribbean sea, natural paradise for wealthy jet-setters, a small place englobed by beautiful seas. Antigua, better known for its white sand beaches, tropical weather and banking policies rather than its literature. Out of bitterness, Jamaica Kincaid breaks the illusion set upon her country to denounce it's illnesses.

In this essay, Kincaid divides her work in four distinct parts to better understand how and why Antigua's standard of living are so low today. In the first part, we take a trip around the island looking through the eyes of the typical white tourist blindfolded to the horror of poverty. Then Kincaid criticizes the government for being so corrupt and to have sold the country so rich drug dealers and foreign investors. The native Antiguans take some shot too for not challenging their way of life. Finally, the last part is about the beauty of Antigua.

Kincaid's tone during the whole 81 pages of her essay is definitively angry. Personally, I like her style. The long sentences, the simple structure, the in-your-face attitude, gives the novel a very powerful and unique fashion. Unfortunately, I think Jamaica Kincaid lacks any real solutions to the problems she points out. Of course it's not her job to find solutions, but it would have been nice to read some of her suggestions. She is also flawed by the use of two many fallacies such as stereotyping and oversimplifying group of people and some hot issues. Oh well.

This novel was not written for artistic or entertainment purpose. Instead, A Small Place was seeking to shock people. It was aimed at the average American or European that visits this island without realizing that unemployment became the norm, that there is no decent hospital or library, that education is a fancy word and that the people that owns Antigua don't even live within it's boundaries. If that was her goal, it certainly did accomplish it. It was even banned in Antigua...

22:45 Posted in Books & Readings | Permalink | Comments (0) | Email this