Enlarge Warner Bros. Pictures Bad Seed: Isabelle Fuhrman is destined for a place in Hollywood’s Evil Child pantheon for her outrageous embodiment of homicidal orphan Esther.

Warner Bros. Pictures Bad Seed: Isabelle Fuhrman is destined for a place in Hollywood’s Evil Child pantheon for her outrageous embodiment of homicidal orphan Esther.

Orphan Director: Jaume Collet-SerraGenre: HorrorRunning Time: 123 minutesRated R: Disturbing violent content, some sexuality and languageWith: Vera Farmiga, Peter Sarsgaard, Isabelle Fuhrman

Enlarge Warner Bros. Pictures Mommy Issues: Guilt-wracked over a lost child, Kate (Vera Farmiga) longs for a larger brood.

Warner Bros. Pictures Mommy Issues: Guilt-wracked over a lost child, Kate (Vera Farmiga) longs for a larger brood.

Enlarge Rafy/Warner Bros. Pictures Clan Warfare: Max (Aryana Engineer), Daniel (Jimmy Bennett), John (Peter Sarsgaard), Kate and Esther make one big happy family — until Esther throws Max in front of a car and burns down Daniel’s treehouse.

Rafy/Warner Bros. Pictures Clan Warfare: Max (Aryana Engineer), Daniel (Jimmy Bennett), John (Peter Sarsgaard), Kate and Esther make one big happy family — until Esther throws Max in front of a car and burns down Daniel’s treehouse.

Can the persistence of the Evil Child Thriller be attributed to the fact that America, when it comes to the movies, behaves like a nation of helpless, frightened children? This theory is suggested by the minor brouhaha surrounding Orphan, the story of a preternaturally mature munchkin who terrorizes the upper middle class of Connecticut. Some have worried that this silly, vicious, wildly campy shocker may have a detrimental effect on adoption. Now, there are any number of amusing things about the movie, but the notion that prospective adopters may think twice in order not to bring home a deranged foreigner with a penchant for dressing in 19th century clothes and killing people with hammers is the most delightful. Worrying over the sociological impact of Orphan is like fretting over whether the popularity of Up will prove responsible for a decimation of the Boy Scout population due to helium-flotation mishaps. And in any case, were someone to adopt a child like Esther (Isabelle Fuhrman), and find themselves witnessing a troubling set of behaviors (maiming other children) and weirdly sophisticated talents (a mastery of language skills, painting and Tchaikovsky), they would surely exhibit a less dramatically convenient brand of denial than the parents here. Kate Coleman (Vera Farmiga), it should be said, has an excuse. Orphan opens with a splendidly nasty dream sequence giving vent to her guilt over having lost one daughter in childbirth — and nearly losing another to an accident she slept through in an alcoholic stupor. Having sobered up, Kate is eager to increase her brood, and together with her architect husband John (Peter Sarsgaard), agrees to adopt freaky little Esther. Trouble almost immediately ensues, as Esther slithers her way into this bobo paradise and starts manipulating the Coleman kids (Jimmy Bennett as Daniel, Aryana Engineer as Max). Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra — a Spaniard notable for directing Paris Hilton in the Hollywood remake of House of Wax — from a screenplay by David Leslie Johnson, Orphan hits mostly predictable notes in a scenario that stops short, just barely, of throwing a cat on a piano. And yet the movie is, as these things go, enjoyably trashy. Farmiga, in a very strong performance, gives the proceedings enough ballast to create genuine camp. It’s hard to believe the director is taking this all seriously, and the audience most assuredly isn’t, but Kate most definitely is. And for all the mounting absurdity of her dilemma, she evokes real sympathy. Though Sarsgaard merely looks bored, the child actors are terrific. Little Miss Fuhrman’s outrageous, giggle-inducing performance — a camp tour-de-force of hysterical maliciousness — is destined for a place in the Evil Child pantheon. And the movie does a nice job of establishing the tension between her machinations among the freaked-out Coleman kids and the psychodrama of their neurotic parents. As for what, exactly, is the problem with Esther, Orphan builds to a climax at once obvious and utterly random. And why not? Sometimes being treated like a frightened, helpless child is just the thing to pass an hour howling with laughter and jumping in your seat.

The Bottom Line
A breathlessly-paced thriller that swings a mighty blow against state and corporate corruption in Korea. 
 

Director
Ryoo Seung-wan
Screenwriters
Ryoo Seung-wan
Cast
Hwang Jung-min, Ryoo Seung-bum, Yoo Hae-jin

A crime thriller that pits an errant, bellicose cop against a miscreant, maniacally ambitious prosecutor, The Unjust, achieves a happy marriage between commercial savvy and artistic integrity in its hard-hitting depiction of Seoul as a city of corruption. Social realism rarely sits comfortably with technical razzle-dazzle, punchy storytelling and larger-than-life star performances, but Ryoo Seung-wan pulls it off with direction that balances cool cynicism with seething moral outrage.

According to Ryoo, the plot is partly derived from several recent government scandals. The shocking examples of social injustice on display probably touched a raw nerve among local audiences, bringing him $18.7 million’s worth of ticket revenue. Asian genre fans familiar with Ryoo’s repertoire of macho action films (Crying Fist, City of Violence) may need time to adjust to the way he turns his emphasis from physical combat to a war of wills.

The catalyst in The Unjust is an unsolved series of schoolgirl murders that is rocking police credibility. The police’s crisis management proves that citizens’ mistrust is totally justified – Captain Choi Cheol-gi (Hwang Jung-min) is put in charge and told to find a fall-guy for them to stage a media stunt. Choi enlists the help of Mafioso-cum-property-magnet Jang Seok-gu (Yoo Hae-jin). By doing so, Choi becomes Jang’s pawn in his land-bidding wars against another corporate shark Kim (whom Choi put behind bars sometime ago). This triggers the hostility of Kim’s protégé prosecutor Joo Yang (the director’s brother Ryoo Seung-bum), who retaliates with unscrupulous tactics.

The film evinces a deep irony: while the initial crime continues to elude closure at the end, everyone else, especially defenders and enforcers of law behave like pathological criminals. Arguably Korea’s most masculine action director, who excelled in shooting boxing, gang fights and martial arts, Ryoo turns The Unjust into his vehicle for a most scathing rebuke of machismo. In his predominantly male world tempers are almost always on boiling point, fueling the narrative’s nervous tension like a volcano in perpetual eruption. 

What sets this apart from other Korean thrillers exposing corruption like the Public Enemy series is the anti-heroic and gritty nature of the action. There is not a single mano-a-mano fought as a test of strength or honor – just a cycle of violence whereby everyone takes it out on whoever’s lower down the pecking order.

The tough personalities and fiery clash between the lead roles maintain a grip on the audience till the end. They are matched not only in intelligence, but in egoism, selfishness and ruthlessness. Choi’s increased desperation to cover his tracks makes him a tragic anti-hero. He is neatly foiled by Joo, who is so ready to be bad as long as it advances his career. But ultimately, Choi and Joo are engulfed by the greater rivalry between judiciary and police departments. The three leading men turn in flaming performances. Ryoo trumps them by giving unthinkable gradations in vileness.

Like a recklessly speeding car, the narrative pacing barely allows the audience to take in screenplay’s intricate plotting, which neatly unravels cause and effect. Technical credits, especially cinematography, are excellent — dynamic swooping shots and tight handheld camerawork exaggerates spatial contrasts to symbolize class inequality. 

In BattlePaint, you play a cube. In fact, you’re not even a cube — just a square. But boy, are you fast! And you can shoot in all directions. That’s important, because there are baddies coming in from all over the place.

The “baddies” are swarms of other squares, in all sorts of pretty colors. They track you all over the screen, and you run around very quickly and just shoot, shoot, and shoot some more. If that doesn’t sound very emotionally deep, it’s because it isn’t. But it’s fun!

After you shoot a baddy, it splashes paint as it disappears. You need to skate across this blob of paint and “eat it up” to get points. This game is fast. It clocked in at around 60-70 FPS on my system, and was loads of fun to play. It does tend to insult you when you die, though, but don’t be offended — I don’t think it’s personal.BattlePaint is an addictive geometric shooter game originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 09 Mar 2011 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.Permalink | Email this | Comments

On March 14, just days after Google released a new version of its Chrome browser — and right before Mozilla is set to unwrap its latest edition of Firefox — Microsoft will be unleashing Internet Explorer 9 into the wild, adding to the next chapter in the hotly contended browser wars. It’s the first major update to Microsoft’s Web browser in nearly two years, and it aims to attract users back to its platform with several new enhancements added to version 9. The new version of Internet Explorer brings a completely new interface.

Enlarge Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine In Panic of 1869, Charles Knoll depicts members of a wealthy family who have just lost everything. Oil on canvas, 1869.

Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine In Panic of 1869, Charles Knoll depicts members of a wealthy family who have just lost everything. Oil on canvas, 1869.

Taxes, foreclosures, rich-poor discrepancies, recession. Sound familiar? Sure it does. But it also describes an earlier economic period in this country — and the unlikely subject of an exhibition of artwork at the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, Calif. The exhibit is called Taxing Visions, and in one its late 19th century paintings, Charles Knoll depicts a smart living room — with fine textiles and upholstery, a fancy mantle piece, and a chandelier. “All symbols of what were upper class trappings,” explains Jessica Todd Smith, chief curator of American art at the Huntington. But the painting is titled Panic of 1869, and the people in this well-appointed room look devastated. “The man is sitting in a chair with the paper at his feet announcing the panic,” Smith says. “His hand is covering his face. His other arm reaches dramatically for his wife, who’s turned in the other direction, looking disconsolate. The baby is crawling on the floor, completely disregarded in the mayhem.” The family has lost everything in that economic downturn — one of many that took place in the U.S. in the late 1800s. It was also the age of the mega-rich industrial “Robber Barons” — Rockefellers, Carnegies, Huntingtons.

Enlarge Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Mass A woman dressed in rags is the subject of Tattered and Torn by Alfred Kappes. Oil on canvas, 1886.

Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Mass A woman dressed in rags is the subject of Tattered and Torn by Alfred Kappes. Oil on canvas, 1886.

“We know that this great wealth developed, but in fact, between 1873 and the turn into the 20th century was a huge depression,” says Steven Koblik, president of the Huntington. “The money was not well divided. This great wealth was concentrated in the hands of the few.” That may sound familiar today, but what the economy went through back then was much worse — huge cycles of bust and boom, massive migrations from rural to urban areas, and a major influx of immigrants. This exhibit shows what the underside of the Gilded Age looked like. In his 1886 painting, Tattered and Torn, Alfred Kappes depicts an African-American woman wearing a dress patched together from rags — she looks utterly exhausted. And yet, the woman dominates the canvas; she is monumental. Despite her exhaustion, Smith says, the woman has great dignity: “She is concentrating so carefully on lighting this match to light her pipe as though it were the one small pleasure remaining.” It is, perhaps, the last tobacco she can afford. The same woman — nameless, now — appears in another work in this Huntington show. The engraving by Gustave Kruell was taken from another Kappes painting called Rent Day.

Enlarge The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens Gustave Kruell created this engraving based on Alfred Kappes’ painting, Rent Day.

The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens Gustave Kruell created this engraving based on Alfred Kappes’ painting, Rent Day.

In the engraving, a man and a woman sit side by side, leaning into one another. Their shoes are worn, their clothing is patched, and they are counting their coins with bony fingers. “The title, [Rent Day], says so much,” Smith says. “You have stress of whether or not they’re going to be able to come up with the amount. That’s a theme that’s really throughout the show: this sense of the difficulty of … making ends meet.” The artists in this exhibit pay attention to the outsiders of their day: African-Americans, women, artists (there are several paintings of artists locked out of their studios after failing to pay their rent) … and of course, children. A blind beggar in Julian Alden Weir’s 1879 The Flower Seller stands behind a little girl who holds a tray of flowers — the man is sad and resigned, but the little girl is angelic. So too, in the 1886 painting, Buy a Posy. “This painting by John George Brown is of a charming little girl looking wistfully past a small bouquet of flowers to a potential buyer,” Smith says. “One of the typical devices Brown used are these wonderful, limpid, large brown eyes that are meant to engender sweetness and sympathy and convey the longing of the child.”

Enlarge North Carolina Museum of Art A child with imploring eyes looks out of John George Brown’s 1886 work, Buy a Posy. Oil on canvas.

North Carolina Museum of Art A child with imploring eyes looks out of John George Brown’s 1886 work, Buy a Posy. Oil on canvas.

She’s poor, yet she seems happy — sentimentalized, says curator Kevin Murphy — as are several of these painted children. “One of the artists … was once asked why he didn’t paint [the children] dirty,” Murphy says. “You could imagine that these children that were out on the street all day would be pretty dirty. He said that if he painted them with dirty faces, they wouldn’t sell.” After all, why would anyone wealthy enough to buy paintings during that depression want to have sad, tattered children on their walls? But Murphy says some of the paintings of this period did sell — paintings of street children selling newspapers, matches, or fruit. “Some of these were quite popular at this time because a lot of the very wealthy people were either immigrants or were one generation removed from being immigrants and being poor,” Murphy explains. “These images provided a sort of a nostalgia, and also reinforced that everything was possible in America — that you could start off being a flower seller on the street or a match seller, and become Andrew Carnegie.” These paintings helped to perpetuate the American dream — that this country was a place of hope, where bright futures might be right around the corner.