Thanks to some friends with connections at the Paramount, I managed to get a seat at the world premiere of Mike Judge’s new film, Extract, last night. It has a similar feel to Office Space, a film that didn’t do so well at the box office, but built a huge following on video.

The cast includes Jason Bateman, Ben Affleck, Mila Kunis and Gene Simmons as a smarmy ambulance chasing lawyer.  It’s also filled with a raft of scene stealing performances by the cast in smaller parts. The opening scene in a music store is hilarious and sets up the character of Cindy very well. I was pleasantly surprised to see T.J. Miller as the character of Rory, the heavy metal forklift driver. My wife and I were big fans of his character Marmaduke on the short lived ABC comedy, Carpoolers. J. K. Simmons continues his run of scene stealing performances (Spider Man, Burn After Reading) as Brian, the supervisor who can’t be bothered to remember any of his employee’s names. David Koechner plays the annoying neighbor, Nathan. Matt Schulze is great as the atypically aggro stoner boyfriend of Cindy and Brent Briscoe is amusing as a Pepsi swilling couch potato. Judge makes a cameo near the end as one of the factory workers.

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I took my 10-year-old son to see the double bill of The Day The Earth Stood Still and Forbidden Planet at the Paramount last night as part of the awesome annual Summer Film Series. I love seeing old films there.  My wife and I used to go when we were dating. It’s only $8 for both films. I remember seeing a double feature of Rear Window and Vertigo that included a buffet in between features. If you’ve never been, I highly recommend it. The theater is a real local treasure that should be preserved and the best way to do that is to attend the films. It’s a win-win.

No buffet last night, but we did have an unexpected treat. Tom Savini, well known horror movie makeup and effects artist, was sitting in the row in front of us during Forbidden Planet. I was pretty sure it was him, but opted not to bug him. I wondered if he might be in town for Robert Rodriguez’s Machete, which is filming here in Austin right now. Turns out I was right.

This is window art at the Metropolitan 14 South. I always photograph window art when I see it if I have my toy camera along with me. The artist’s name in this case appears to be Poliakoff. Ditching other responsibilities, I wasn’t there to see the Star Trek movie. I joined the laughing audience for Next Day Air. I do like this sign though: “Have a Trektacular time.” Who is the mysterious Poliakoff?

Over on austin360.com, Omar Gallaga is reporting that Time Warner Cable have annolunced the tiers they are going to use for capping and overage-charging for their broadband cable offering. For the last couple of weeks this has been a hot topic on the interweb thingy, and has generated piles of bile, some useful analysis but much of it missing the point.

There is no doubt, there are out there amongst us interweb users, some leaches and obsessive, compulsive overachievers. In opposition to the TWC changes people are marching out all sorts of claims and justifications for being big-data users, why they are the “bleeding edge”. What they do today, will be the norm’ in a few years time. Well, that maybe, but probably not.

Time Warner Cables business model is under attack on all fronts. They are doing what all nascent monopolies do when under attack, they push the boundaries of what can get away with. This usually more broad in America than in Europe, because America is the great defender of free enterprise, freedom of choice, and commercial innovation. No amount of facebook pages is going to change that.

Only, we just don’t have any of those things really when it comes to digital communication. Cellphones here in the US are restrictive, expensive, fragmented and fine examples of monopolistic practices. Some of the best cellphones in the world are now crippled when sold outside the US, so that when they are used in the US, they don’t get full network, 3G speeds, meaning the “network” operators can charge and tie you to multi-year contracts, oh and it’s OK coz we get “free” phones.

Cable TV here in the US has hardly changed in 30-years. The addition of HD has been done in a haphazard, fragmented way with no real innovation. Unlike Europe where broadcast, often free to air, HD offers many more channels and multi-screen viewing, interactive services etc. See for example what Sky and the BBC have done with that little red-button in the UK. Why is it for example, that when watching a “home shopping channel” you have to dial 1-800 and wait, press buttons and speak to a person? Broadband, is bi-directional you know…

When the cutover to broadcast HDTV happens here in the US, it will be a pure swap, no new advance services, just the same old channels, mostly showing repeat programs(not in HD) and thats about it. What most Americans will find is that the signal will break up frequently during rain storms and other bad weather thats affects b roadcast quality. Unlike conventional TV(non-digital) though, you won’t get a degraded picture, you’ll get nothing at all.

And so, back to Time Warner Cable. I’m a triple play subscriber. I don’t watch much TV, mostly I record a few shows per week and only watch them on Sunday evenings. I have my home phone service through TWC, although heaven knows why. No one has the number, and I don’t use it for outgoing calls, especially now I don’t work from home. Many people don’t have “home” phones now, they use their Cellphones, I should join them, except my cellphone has no docking station and really isn’t suitable for a 2-hour conference call using any kind of headset.

Here is another example of lack of innovation in the US. When was the last time you saw a phone in the US that was your cellphone when outside the home, and when inside the home, used the broadband service to connect rather than wireless, and allowed you to switch seamlessly between the two as you walk out of the house, without dropping the call?

I think that in the 2.5 years I’ve had my TWC service, I’ve watched maybe 5 on-demand movies. This is an area that most people focus on when analyzing the effects of broadand usage capping by TWC. It’s clear, isn’t it?

TWC have every reason to stop you downloading legally or otherwise, movies from the Internet or watching them online. If they can stop or price that to discourage, THEY can charge you for the same movies, either through subscription channels, or on-demand.

So, lets recap. TWC offers four services:

- Basic cable inc. subscription channels
- Basic internet cable broadband connectivity, soon to be tiered by usage
- Landline telephone service(wired)
- On-demand movies(chargeable)

The threats to their business are:
- Declining use of basic cable, subscription channels and on-demand movies because people get their entertainment elsewhere.
- Telephone service is under attack from cellphones and VOIP, Vonage, Skype etc.
- Basic broadband is underattack from “unlimited” subscription and pre-pay cellphone data plans, 802.11 wireles in coffee shops, down at Austin City hall etc.
- Basic cable is stagnent, uninteresting, overloaded with cheap promotional shows and home shopping networks and 24-hour news channels that basically make the news up as they go along.
- Consumers are also increasingly savy, well you’d hope so. What many realize is that it’s all data. The cable you watch, the telephone calls you make, the on-demand movies, even if you do everything the TWC way, it all arrives and leaves your house as data.

So, here we have a high-noon showdown. The customers don’t understand why part of their data service should be metered and priced seperately from the other parts of the same data connection. The cable company, in this case, TWC, is playing the typical, dumb, fat and happy monopoly that can and will charge as it sees fit, easy things first and trying to paint a small section of their customers as the problem.

TWC should be forced to compete for my business, not get it on a plate. After all, if I don’t subscribe, I can’t get anything back for the ugly, 1920’s style cabling and poles that litter my street, having to have the trees cut back to protect their golden-egg.

First, TWC should be forced to unbundle it’s TV service. The cable channel selections should be offered in more flexible groupings or by individual channels. It is simply way past time this should have been done. I’d pay a premium for about 8-channels total and would prefer more bandwidth than more channels.

Second, the broadband service offered by TWC should be split into two. A bulk data backbone service and a last-mile service. The bulk data backbone service has to be sold, on a tiered/metered service to companies that handle the last-mile service. TWC is more than welcome to compete as a last-mile provider. Yep, this is effectively turning TWC backbone into a “utility” by the back door.

Third, irrespective of the first two, the home telephone service offered by TWC should be unbunlded. If the first two recommendations are adopted, this becomes largely irrelevant as the last-mile providers will need to provide advanced services, or just compete in race-to-the-bottom cheap pricing. If race-to-the-bottom pricing is the only innovation, then overtime TWC will just rebuild it’s monopoly through acquisition. This is exactly what allowed AT&T to come back from near death to semi-monopolist(and yes, I know it’s not the same AT&T and it didn’t really come back, it’s just branding, but the point remains.)

Fourth, again irrespective of the first three, TWC needs to design, develop and deliver REAL digital cable offerings. This isn’t just the same old channels and a 1980’s style programming guide sent down a digital channel. It’s interactive TV; it’s online HD games delivered without a PC or gaming system; it’s an interactive YouTube channel; it’s interactive news; it’s bidirectional video calling; it’s something that America and especially here in Austin we could be proud of.

Arguing about broadband caps/tiering, overage pricing is just missing the point, and will end up in tears in 10-years time, TWC will be the next GM looking for bailouts to subsidize it’s “essential” services. And please Omar, suggesting stimulus money now for TWC is just rubbing salt in.

Office Space 10th Anniversary - Photo by Jette K

I’m a little late on this, but that’s nothing new. I’ve seen several posts re-capping the Office Space 10th Anniversary screening at the Paramount a little over a week ago and have been insanely jealous and kicking myself for not trying to get tickets.

If you’ve never seen Office Space, go out and rent it immediately. Better yet, buy it. You’ll want to see it again once you’ve seen it the first time anyway (and after that go rent Idiocracy). The 10th anniversary was held here probably because it was filmed in Austin and is Mike Judge’s home town. I used to see him at several South Austin eateries.

I sent out the first link on Twitter a week or so ago. Jette K, Austin film critic extraordinaire, has posts on Cinematical and Slackerwood with reviews of the events along with some pretty great shots.

The Alamo Drafthouse blog also had a couple of posts: one pointing to a Flickr photo set and the other about a  G4 Attack of The Show episode that covered the anniversary festivities.

An old co-worker spent most of the summer of ‘98 as an extra in the film for about 5 seconds of screen time.

not to mention appalled.

I was cruising the channels over the w/e and caught the end of a this movie by Richard Linklater. I pressed the “info” button and the description said, Coming to age movie filmed in Austin TX. I scanned through the guide and set-up to record a later showing on HBO.

Seeing “The Unforseen” gave me a great insight into some old Austin politics, places and history. Dazed and Confused, with a long list of todays movie stars including Matthew McConaughey, Jason London, Ben Affleck and an uncredited part by Renée Zellweger, did none of that. There were a few glimpses of the Austin of what was 1993 when the film was made, rather than 1976, when the film was set, but nothing much.

I’d like to hear from folks. Was there any approximation to reality in that film? Did American teenagers really act anything like that in the 1970’s or worse still today? Were any of you extras in the film??

Don’t get me wrong, I’m no prude, I’ve even got the pictures to prove it. Back in the UK I’d gone through the skinhead phase, the Bowie phase and was into disco by 1976 and sure there were some less than shining nights out now I look back. But the hazing stuff, the beatings, the humilation of the girls? Really, in the 1970’s – Wow. No wonder the rasied the drinking age to 21 in the US.

As for the claim in this trailer, the film featured the best music of the 1970’s, actually I’d say the music was mostly offset by 2-4 years before the film was set.

Or was this film about as close to reality as Friday 13th?? Discuss.

Sometime today my pre-ordered Unforseen DVD should show-up via UPS Ground. According to Laura at Two Birds Film, they had contractual AND technical issues both conspired to hold the release back until September 30th.

By coincidence, this Thursday, October 2nd, Alamo Drafthouse will be holding a showing at Barton Springs itself and presented by The City of Austin and The Austin Film Society.. The pool will be “closed” from 7pm to 10pm, and during that time normal BS charges will apply for entry to watch the film(thats $3 to you and me). I can’t wait to see it again, but have plans for Thursday and Friday, so I guess it will have to wait for the weekend!

At the risk of just seeming like another Cheerleader, or a bore, I thought I’d follow-up on Lauratex Metblog Austin post about the Unforeseen movie.

I’d seen a trailer for the film at a previous visit to the Alamo Drafthouse on South Lamar, I hadn’t actually got around to going to see it, you know, busy life and all that!

Lauratex said “it should be required viewing in Austin”. I say, if you moved to Austin after 1995, or were not old enough to remember the Circle C/Barton Springs fight, maybe like me you thought George Bush only started to mess up when he got to the White House, this is the best use of 90-minutes of your time this week!

I know I don’t really know much about Austin, I know “keep Austin weird” isn’t just a bumper sticker but really I had no idea.

While I can see that there are many people who wouldn’t agree with the main message and direction the film takes, as someone that swims a Barton Springs two or three times a week, I found this film really profound and found myself weeping twice during the film. I won’t pretend to do a balanced review of the film, I don’t think I could.

The main thrust of the film is about the development of the Circle-C ranch, apparently a sub-division(another good reasons why I couldn’t turn in a balanced view of the film, I don’t understand much of the terminology used) and the impact it could have on Barton Springs. While the film could have demonised developers, it didn’t for me. It did fairly show that the balance is out of kilter when it comes to developing new, green field sites.

The film is a thought provoking cross over between documentary, story telling and historical record. I suspect that editorial changes made some of the things the people interviewed seem even more prophetic, the small boy who liked living in the new house but was concerned they’d finish the rest of the houses, as he’d have no space to play; the couple who were complaining about their inability to water their new lawn, but “people come first”; the old farmer who seemed wise well beyond his education, if not beyond his years.

The best speaker for me wasn’t Robert Redford, erudite though he was, journalist and author William Greider summed it up best for me, “Growth itself is not the enemy, it is the nature of that growth—the quality within.”

the Unforseen is still showing at the Alamo Drafthouse South, although screenings are getting fewer and fewer as the weeks go by. The current screening list is here. Yes, and that means you ttrentham.

Austinite Terrence Malick’s latest, Tree of Life, has been filming in here since February.

The Wife was in the GNC in Sunset Valley a couple of weeks ago and was told by one of the clerks that she had just missed Brad Pitt.

Today, she’s at ABIA heading out of town and spotted Sean Penn who she described as “taller than I thought”. I told her to tell him that she loves Bad Boys (no, not the one with Martin Lawrence and Will Smith) & Fast Times and to give him props for his appearance on the ”Fort Knoxville“ episode of Viva La Bam. We won’t speak of I Am Sam, Shanghai Surprise or the overacting in Mystic River. Penn also had a small part in Malick’s last film, The Thin Red Line, along with a ton of other well known actors.

Matt Dentler, who just recently moved on from doing the programming for SXSW Flim. blogged last year about an unexpected dinner with Malick that also included Richard Linklater and Francis Ford Coppola at Vespaio. Malick also produced the documentary about development and Barton Springs, The Unforeseen, which is currently playing at Alamo South Lamar (and mentioned earlier this week on this blog).

Aloha, Mr. Hand.

Ever wonder why Austin’s traffic has gotten so bad? Perhaps you don’t think it’s that bad if you’re from L.A., but it’s definitely much, much worse than it used to be. If you’re a central Austin inhabitant, you may not venture out to the ‘burbs much. Maybe you’ve been to Barton Springs Pool or hiked along Barton Creek? All of these things may not seem related, but to anyone who’s been in Austin awhile and cares about the natural environment – it’s definitely all related. And now there’s a film that starts to bring it all together – The Unforeseen. You now have another week to go see it at the Alamo Drafthouse South!