This is the website of Abulsme Noibatno Itramne (also known as Sam Minter). Posts here are rare these days. For current stuff, follow me on Mastodon

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September 2010
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More Dangerous World

The chart above is the number of Current Travel Warnings from the US State Department over the last year. Just noting that the trend is upward. Of course, the trend has generally been upwards since the first time I looked at this back in 2004. Here is a chart showing that whole time period. Prior to 2009 though, I was only adding data very sporadically, for instance adding only 2 data points at all in the 2005-2008 time period. Since April 2009 though, I automated it to add one new data point every day, so the trends are much clearer.

Tron

Original Release: 1982 Jul 9
Watched: 2010 Sep 12 to 2010 Sep 13
Queue: Sam’s
Format: DVD

So, I’ve recently moved from going through my queue in the order things were originally added to the queue, to picking randomly what will be next. But I make exceptions when there is a particular reason to watch something sooner rather than many years in the future. In this case of course Tron: Legacy is due to come out this December, so to prepare we all had to watch Tron. I think I last saw Tron in the theaters when it first came out. Most likely with my dad.[[[ jml]

V ?

That last bit was Alex. He liked Tron.

Anyway, Tron. This is of course one of those classic geek movies. At the time it seemed like it was just so cool visually. Watching it now, it just looks so cheap and basic. There was of course actually not that much CGI in the movie. Wikipedia says less than 20 minutes. The rest is just made to look like what people thought CGI should look like. And Sark? What’s up with the paper things on his head? It looks like something somebody’s first grader cut out or something. Of course, this was great at the time I guess. But it just shows how fast these kinds of things move. It will be interesting to see what they do with the new movie.

Then of course there is the actual plot, which honestly just doesn’t make much sense. Well, I mean, OK, if you back up a bit from it, it is just your standard quest thing once you get into it. They are on a quest into the enemy’s territory to destroy him with an object that he is vulnerable. Hmmm, Tron as Frodo?

Bottom line, it was fun to watch in a nostalgic kind of way, or to prep for watching the new movie. But I’m not sure it really holds up as a stand alone movie. It just sort of seems dated and quaint.