Coming up on the 27th, the Indianapolis Comic Book Show takes place. It happens a few times a year (usually about 3), lasts one day, and includes minimal guests; this event is strictly for the collector. Too bad the timing this year means they will miss their audience.
Avatar finally comes out this weekend! The trailers have been amazing, the interactive app has been fun, and the hype has been overwhelming. I have pretty much been waiting all year for this film, and I am glad it is finally time to watch it.
Also showing on the big screen this week is RiffTrax: Christmas Shorts-Stravaganza, with special guest Wierd Al Yankovic. The program is live on the 16th, with an encore replay on the 17th; feed your zip code into each date to find the closest theaters to you.
Appearing live in Virtual Reality this week is Cory Doctorow on Copper Robot, doing a real time interview in the Second Life Seaside Theater, over at World2Worlds Island. That happens on Wednesday, the 16th, 8PM SL time (11PM EST, since 2nd Life time is California time). If you already have the free 2nd Life software installed, this is the SLURL that will launch it and take you straight to the event. If you are trapped behind an office firewall and can’t get into the metaverse, you can watch it in real time at Copper Robot, or grab the podcast after the event to listen to at your leisure.
Next week brings both The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus and Sherlock Holmes to the big screen. I’m going to have to see each of them, and maybe swoop back for a second pass at Avatar.
Like they did with Terminator Salvation, the WB Insider is having a Harry Potter Event online on Saturday, December 12th (3PM EST). You drop the Blu-ray DVD you bought into your internet connected BD enhanced player, and log into BD-Live; that will allow you to hear them respond to questions, kind of like a real-time Comments On function. You will also need a computer logged into their web site if you want to ask questions of your own to Daniel Radcliffe and the director while watching the latest movie.
From December 10th to the 17th is the Bahamas International Film Festival, and I can’t think of a better place to have one in the winter. A lot of the pieces (69 of them) are shorts, in the 5 to 30 minute range, and one of them looks really interesting: The Macabre World Of Lavender Williams. The cast includes Lily Jackson, Rex Linn, Christopher LLoyd, and John Lithgow in this 26 minute fantasy film. Another one to consider is At World’s End, a Danish film from this year about someone who believes he is 130 years old, an action-comedy.
From December 2nd to the 6th is the Sante Fe Film Festival with a number of interesting movies touring the festival circuit. The one that caught my attention at this one was Mythic Journeys, part animation, part documentary, and all story, starring Tim Curry, Mark Hamill and Lance Henriksen.
Running December 4th to the 17th is the 9th annual Anchorage International Film Festival, and with a tag line of Films worth freezing for you can bet there will be some good ones in the mix. They do have some we have seen at other festivals, like Zombies of Mass Destruction, and some new ones, like Homemade Vigilante, where his super-power is enthusiasm and his qualifications are his cape and comic book collection. Then there is the huge number of animations the have playing in blocks. In their assortment of film making workshops they even include an Animation Workshop 101 for people looking to create their own.
I know I have been posting about Film Fests on Tuesdays, but starting tomorrow and running through Saturday is the International Robot Exhibition 2009, and I couldn’t let that pass without a mention. It is being held at the Tokyo International Exhibition Center in Japan, and it is interesting to note that the Service Robot category is now almost as well represented as the Industrial Robot companies.
In Goa, the The 40th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) kicked off yesterday and will run for the next 10 days. Likewise, kicked off on the 21st, and running through the 29th, is Tokyo FILMeX 2009. I think going forward I am not going to even mention festivals that I can’t say anything about, in this case because I do not yet read either language.