#h.r. giger archive

[2001hz]

H.R. Giger: 'Virus' 2000 from HR GIGER icons (2002)

#biomechanical art #sculpture #photography #hans ruedi giger #h.r. giger #h.r. giger archive #2000 #2002 #my scan

[zegalba]

sorry y’all tumblr is banning my h.r. giger scans because i guess they’re just too gnarly lmao. it sucks because those images don’t exist online and i cant even publicly archive them

[artofthemystic]

NOT OUT OF THE WOODS YET by Otto Rapp Via Flickr: Created in NIGHTCAFE - Stable Diffusion SDXL 1.0 - New Feature: trained Model for Drawing. Here I trained AI with over 60 images of my drawings, the result of this training is combined with my textprompt. the prompt included H.R. GIGER, BOSCH and BOGOMIL'S UNIVERSE EVOLVED from a botched previous evolve. This time, burned it with 60% prompt and 70% noise! The evolve trail goes back to a actual drawing of mine as a seed image, but I relegated the previous one to the archives. It was basically a repeat of what went before. Lesson learned. If you want variations, then go above 50% with the noise level. PROMPT: "IT LIVES IN THE WOODS" drawing by Otto Rapp at the Cryptid Taxidermy Museum, in post apocalyptic wonderland, in heaven everything is fine by lady in the radiator and brothers quay, stopmotion cinema photograph by H.R. Giger, by Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Hieronymus Bosch, Art Nouveau, intricately detailed, hyperrealism, fantasy, imperial colors; Bogomils Universe

#nightcafe #surreal #mysterious #fantasy #dream #AI #artificial intelligence #design #drawing #visionaryart #fantasticrealism #Alternate Reality #Bogomil's Universe #H.R. Giger #lady in the radiator #Brothers Quay #Cryptid Taxidermy #apocalypse #Arcimboldo #Art Nouveau #flickr

[tilbageidanmark]

Movies I watched this Week #87

I finally watched (transfixed!) Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai du Commerce 1080 Bruxelles, Chantal Akerman’s feminist masterpiece. This detailed portrayal of middle-aged housewife Delphine Seyrig for 3+ hours was hypnotic and subversive. Akerman made it with an all-female crew when she was 25.

The meticulous dullness of her daily routine, her regimented obsessiveness were so tedious, so mundane, that when the tiniest cracks showed on the surface, they were shocking: like the split-second pause when she was peeling potatoes. So different, it reminded me of Polanski’s Repulsion.

Still, mysteries remained: What was the meaning of the flickering blue light in the living room? What was the arrangement with the baby? 8/10.

Next on my list: Her previous film ‘Je Tu Il Elle’.

🍿  3 more by Alejandro Jodorowsky:

🍿 The Dance of Reality (2013) was Jodorowsky's first film after a hiatus of 23 years. Magical realism like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, dreamy surrealism like Salvador Dalí, breathtaking poetry like Salman Rushdie - there’s nobody in cinema like Jodorowsky. If I were to organise the 1500+ films I’ve seen since the beginning of last year, this will possibly rank as my very best, No. 1 film. Wow! (Photos Above).

🍿 “I wanted to make a film that will give the people who took LSD at that time the hallucinations you get with that drug, but without hallucinating...”

Jodorowsky’s Dune, a 2012 documentary about his legendary lost masterpiece. He gathered a formidable team of participants, Orson Welles, Jean ‘Mœbius’ Giraud, H.R. Giger, Pink Floyd, Salvador Dalí (who was to get paid $100,000 per minute of screen time), Mick Jagger, Udo Kier, Amanda Lear, and others. But the 10-14 hour running time was eventually one of the reasons the film was never made.

🍿 The Severed Heads (1957) was his first film (which was thought to be lost for over half a century). It’s a low-budget, short mime adaptation of a Thomas Mann story, about a woman who sells human heads at her shop. Avant-garde film-school concept, that I found simple and unimpressive.

🍿  

2 special Beatles features:

🍿John & Yoko: Above Us Only Sky, a terrific documentary about the 1971 recording of the Imagine album at their Tittenhurst Park home. A must have for any Beatles fan. 9/10.

🍿 The complete Magical Mystery Tour 1967 movie is available for free viewing on the Internet Archive! I remember proudly owning the original double-EP with 24-pg booklet and listening the heck out of it, to "Magical Mystery Tour”, “Your Mother Should Know", “I Am the Walrus", “The Fool on the Hill”, "Flying", and “Blue Jay Way".

Joyful silliness, random drug-fueled hallucinations - No wonder it was misunderstood and poorly received at the time!

🍿 

2 starring Faye Dunaway and Robert Duvall:

🍿“The American people want somebody to articulate their rage for them !”...

I just learnt about ‘Culture Industry’, Theodor Adorno’s Marxist term that explains ‘Pop Culture’ as a 'factory which produces standardized cultural goods (I.e. entertainment, sports, news, politics, fashion, technology, slang., etc), that are used to manipulate mass society into passivity’. And at the very same day, I re-watched Paddy Chayefsky’s prescient masterpiece Network, still a perfect metaphor for exactly this concept.

Remarkable performances by all the actors, Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch, Robert Duvall and Ned Beatty as Arthur Jensen, terrific dialogue and prophetic satire. 

I didn’t realize that the Howard Beale story was based on a real on-screen suicide that happened two years earlier in Sarasota, Florida. 10/10.

🍿 I finally mustered up the courage to watch Margaret Atwood's dystopic The Handmaid's Tale. This Misogynist vision which is taking over America is the scariest shit I know. I'm literally heartbroken when thinking about the fate of women in the 2030 United States of Gilead, after the abolition of the constitution.

However, as a movie, this 1990 version was not scary enough, also not good enough. In spite of the talent involved: Screenplay by Harold Pinter, score by Ryuichi Sakamoto, etc. 2/10.

🍿

My first film from Tunisia, The man who sold his skin, was nominated for 2021 Oscar for 'Best foreign film’. A thought-provoking story full of pathos of young Syrian lovers who must separate after the start of the civil war. The girl is saved by marrying a wealthy man and moving to Belgium, and the boy agrees to have a large visa tattooed on his back by a controversial artist, so that he too can move to Europe, hoping he’ll win the woman’s back. Becoming a commodified living canvas becomes a flashpoint of meanings about art & politics. With Monica Bellucci. 8/10.

🍿

Buñuel’s nonredeemable world of Viridiana, “voted the best Spanish film of all time in a 2016 poll organized by Spanish film magazine Caimán Cuadernos de Cine”. Sacrilegious, blasphemous finger in the eye of all that is holy, charity, piousness, Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper, forgiveness, progress. 9/10.

🍿 

First watch: I didn’t get Mildred Pierce. The story of an independent, single woman, who manages to build a successful business on her own, and which is framed as a murder mystery (that was not in the original James M. Cain novel) never got me engaged. And the clash of a self-sacrificing mother and her spoiled, ungrateful daughter, who hated her because she can never give her the lifestyle she deserves was muddled up for me.

🍿

In the thrilling French romance Two of us (Deux, 2019) two elderly women, who live across the hall from each other, have also been secret lovers for decades, and now plan to move to Rome together. But then one of them has a stroke and becomes mute and paralyzed, and is unable to tell her family the truth about her relationship. A beautiful Old People drama of the same level and maturity as Michael Haneke’s ‘Amour’, Charlotte Rampling’s ‘45 years’, and Stanley Tucci’s ‘Supernova’. Barbara Sukowa is magnificent in it. 9/10.

🍿

2 with Chinese actress Tang Wei:

🍿 Long Day's Journey into Night (2018, and unrelated to the Eugene O'Neill play of the same name), directed by the young Chinese prodigy Bi Gan. A strange and different Poetic Noir film about dreams and memories. Esoteric, literary and complex, it tells of a man coming back to the neglected mine town of his childhood after the death of his father, and of his looking for a woman he loved and lost 20 years earlier.

It end with a spectacular hour-long, single-take 3-D shot of a dream within a movie theater, that is as evocative and unique as any of Tarkovsky or Terrence Malick most artful scenes. (I streamed the 2D version, but read that watching it in 3D elevates the film even more.)

🍿 Decision to leave, my third by Park Chan-wook (after ‘Oldboy’ and ‘The handmaiden’). His latest is a poetic romantic Korean noir about a married insomniac detective who falls in love with a mysterious murder suspect. Plus for the use of Mahler’s symphony, but otherwise I could not fathom the subtext of the symbolic plot.

🍿

Pauline at the beach, my first of Éric Rohmer’s 1980s series ‘Comedies and Proverbs’. This sunny, airy, sensual and elegant story is the kind of film I can watch all day every day, like a sweet and light cup of citron mousse. 8/10.

🍿

Love Me Tonight (1932), a pre-Code musical comedy with Maurice Chevalier playing a Parisian tailor. It starts with an innovative opening of City awakening, that is nearly like a ‘Blue Man’ episode.

🍿

My first from Congo, Zombies by Baloji, is rather a 15-minutes music essay, a reflection on Kinshasa’s technology-obsessive generation. Wildly creative “in the style of Takeshi Kitano”. 🍿 

“…Are you tired of sloppy, cut-rate funerals?…”

While waiting for the upcoming ‘Weird’, which promises to be an excellent "Weird Al" Yankovic project, I tried his 1989 cult parody UHF. Unfortunately, except of a few gags and jokes, it fell flat for me. 3/10.

🍿 

I watched the new pulp trash Loving Adults only because it’s another Danish film, but this being an actual Netflix Production, it was generic, cheesy, cliched, and just downright awful. I need to write down what exactly makes the typical Netflix film so terrible! 1/10.

🍿

Throw-back to the art project:

The Handmaid's Tale Adora.

John and Yoko Adora.

Tattooed Adora.

Zombie Adora.

Adora with Buñuel.

Adora with Jodorowsky.

🍿

(My complete movie list is here)

#movies

[arg-machine]

Wallpapers seen at machine HQ...

Another short, quick post: a new machine HQ wallpaper post, to be exact. The last such post was made many months ago, and arg felt that it’d be nice – and nostalgic, too! – to publish a new set of wallpapers this time.

Unlike all the previous machine HQ wallpaper sets, this one, however, doesn’t have a specific theme; that’s because it’s a collection of images that – for some reason – weren’t included in any of the previous sets.

However, don’t think of this set as arg scraping the bottom of machine HQ’s wallpaper barrel, but consider it a nice sampler of the various forms of popular culture – music, visual arts and comics, for instance – from which machine HQ wallpapers have typically been sourced so far.

Wall to wall… Included in this new – and somewhat varied –  set are the following [left to right in the image above]: art from Ironflame’s Blood Red Victory album, a Japanese woodblock print by Hokusai, a fragment/excerpt from a painting by H.R. Giger and a portrait of The Crow, the cult comic book character.

As usual, you can download these wallpaper images [1080x1920] as a zipped archive from this location.

And that’s it for this post. Visit The Apocalypse Project [on twitter and on tumblr], and stay tuned to machine HQ blog. Also, don’t forget to visit machine HQ on Instagram.

#design

[eye-of-enigmatic-thought]

Ben 10 Alien Design Reviews – XLR8

For today’s Ben 10 alien review, we have one of my personal favourites, XLR8!

XLR8’s in-universe species are called Kinecelerans, which come from the planet Kinet. Though in the original series with XLR8 they could talk and act at a steady place, in the newer series they are more jittery and hyperactive and tend to have low attention spans, I don’t know which I like better to be honest, I think the former is less cliche and I still liked XLR8’s character and found it fun back then but the latter can still be fun when done right, though I’ve not seen the latter series’ portrayals so I can’t really say if I like their characterisation better!

XLR8, and by extension Kinecelerans, looks very dinosaur-like and his body plan closely resembles our prehistoric raptors. His head is smoothly crested and armours his head and his ‘often’ exposed face, which brings us to one of the REALLY interesting bits of his anatomy.

Whenever XLR8 needs to run, he brings down his face shield to help protect his face! And the best part? It isn’t artificial at all, it’s a completely organic function he has! That’s a REALLY cool concept and it helps the face mask has a really cool pattern for it as well. I love how it also all resembles some organic version of a motorcycle helmet whilst perfectly mixing in these elements into a slick head design.

Another thing I wanna talk about is how XLR8 actually runs with wheels, see those little sphere that he’s standing on? Again, not artificial, but completely organic too! And he uses these wheels to help enhance his speed! I dunno how WHEELS can ever be evolved due to their inherently too complex structure, but it’s still a really cool design nonetheless. I really love whenever a design incorporates organic and inorganic elements and manages to blend them together really nicely.

And if anyone knows a thing about me is that I LOVE dinosaurs, and the fact that XLR8 not only resembles one, but also has the smooth anatomy with his spine and torso extending into his tail rather than the tail just happening to be attached is a nice detail that I’m glad they’ve paid attention to.

The look of his hands are also pretty interesting as well with their claw-like fingers all joining up into looking like a jabby spear.

And last but not least, his colour scheme and pattern design, I really like XLR8’s blue, black, and white colour scheme and how it’s used. The angled stripe pattern of his tail is also a neat touch and it reminds me of road barricade tape, which is helped by the flat look of his tail. And you gotta love how his patterns on the torso look almost like a motorcycle outfit!

Overall, XLR8 has probably one of the coolest designs of the aliens, I love how it incorporates elements of a lot of ‘cool’ things such as dinosaurs and motorcycles and smoothly blends it together. And whilst I know XLR8 may not ‘count’ due to all his ‘inorganic’ elements being actually organic parts of his anatomy, I do love the biomechanical elements of his design and how they fit along to his anatomy. Just a really slick and fun design overall!

XLR8 never appears in the UAF seasons, but he does appear in the opening for UA, not much to say here honestly, it’s the same design.

Omniverse’s design I have mixed feelings for, it’s the same, but the body shape is more humanoid and the spine doesn’t extend down to the tail as much, but it’s still subtly there which I’m glad they’ve kept. Some parts of his design are noticeably exaggerated whilst some less so, the barricade tape-esq stripes of his tail are now more ordinary stripes which is a tad disappointing to me, but I love how humongous his wheels and head are now and don’t mind the spindly legs so much, I think they’re pretty amusing exaggerations! The added green is also nice, and now that I think back to it, I dunno what I was on about with Diamondhead’s colour scheme in the last review, looking back on it they all honestly seem fine to me, guess my monitor is that bad (but the reboot’s weird green shading still has my contempt and I still feel pride to my recolour of it).

Reboot XLR8’s design is now more humanoid entirely and that makes me a little sad, but I’m glad the tail still seems to smoothly fit with the rest of the anatomy. His design is very cute though, and I like how separated and more bulbous his eyes look now, it’s adorable to me! I also like how there seems to be more of a texture on his arms now, maybe implying scales! He also has spikes now which I’m neutral towards as I think he’s fine enough without them, but eh, they don’t clutter his design up TOO much and are alright. The colour scheme here is also really nice as well, and I like the extra blue tones!

Once again I like the OS design more, but XLR8’s design throughout the other incarnations are still fun. Like I said before I love the mix of organic and inorganic elements and considering how that crest and his body shape, maybe silhouette wise, resembles and was maybe a G-rated reference to H.R. Giger’s Alien, those elements really fit as well! Just a nice design that you can’t go all that wrong with, as shown throughout his incarnations!

Intro

previous/archive/next

#Scarfasaurus Reviews #ben 10 #ben 10 ultimate alien #ben 10 omniverse #ben 10 reboot #xlr8 #creature design reviews

[sephiraallen]

Memory: The Origins of Alien is a documentary that delves into the stories and concepts that led to the creation of the original Alien movie. It offers insight and never-before-seen materials from the archives of Alien creators Dan O'Bannon and H.R. Giger — including original story notes, rejected designs and storyboards, and exclusive behind-the-scenes footage.

Get yours here: shop.legionm.com/collections/memory-merch

#Alien #Dan O'Bannon #H.R. Giger #movies #alien day #necronomicon #giger egg #chestburster

[documentarynews]

“Memory: The Origins of Alien” set for a summer release

Screen Media and Legion M have acquired the North American rights to Alexandre O. Philippe’s “Memory: The Origins of Alien,” an exploration of the classic sci-fi film “Alien.”

“Memory: The Origins of Alien” unearths the largely untold origin story behind Ridley Scott’s cinematic masterpiece and reveals a treasure trove of never-before-seen materials from the archives of “Alien” creators Dan O’Bannon and H.R. Giger.

The never-before-seen materials include original story notes, rejected designs and storyboards, exclusive behind-the-scenes footage, and O’Bannon’s original 29 page script from 1971, titled “Memory.”

Screen Media and Legion M plan to release the film in theaters this summer, timed to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the theatrical release of “Alien.”

Source: Deadline

#documentary #documentaries #doc #alien #sci fi #science fiction #movies

[curatorofthisdigitalmorass]

MEMORY - THE ORIGINS OF ALIEN 

If MEMORY - THE ORIGINS OF ALIEN were only a comprehensive account of Alien’s origins — ancient myths, comic books, H.P. Lovecraft, sci-fi movies, and parasitic wasps — it would still be fascinating. But how did Alien lodge itself so indelibly into our cultural imagination? Philippe’s real interest lies in the deep resonance of myths and our collective unconscious. The strange symbiotic collaboration between Alien creators O’Bannon, Scott, and H.R. Giger suggests a greater synchronicity across history, art, and storytelling, a synchronicity that gives us the Furies, creatures of Renaissance painting, and even chest-bursting aliens.

Propelled by a pure joy of cinema (and sociology), the film is strewn with unearthed archival material, designs, and story notes. It’s safe to say you’ll never think of Alien the same way again.

MEMORY - THE ORIGINS OF ALIEN will be making its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival later this month. It's scheduled to be screened at the Egyptian Theatre at 9:45pm on January 24th. In anticipation of its premiere, a poster has been released online - a poster that sports the very first painting H.R. Giger did of the xenomorph egg and alien for O'Bannon.

#Alien #Memory The Origins of Alien #Ridley Scott #documentary #alien 1979

[bruinhilda]

Ah, my right of passage.  Pretending to be 18 and praying the Waldenbooks clerk didn’t ask for ID.  Also walking the 3 miles so I didn’t have a parent asking me, “what have you got there?”  Not that they were into restricting my reading; I just didn’t want the potential embarrassment of them realizing that I was reading something with porn in it. 

I would eventually move on to much better “adult-themed” things, but Heavy Metal was a revelation to me at the time, and I still have a soft spot for it.  I’m glad it’s being digitized and preserved.

#Heavy Metal Magazine #Some of it's amazing #Some of it's disgusting #your mileage may vary #but it's worth flipping through

[iffltd]

Above:

Tom Skerritt as Dallas   John Hurt as Kane   Veronica Cartwright as Lambert   Yaphet Kotto as Parker   Harry Dean Stanton as Brett   Ian Holm as Ash   Sigourney Weaver as Ripley

Director Ridley Scott

pre-production and concept art

Chris  Foss

Jean Giraud, “Moebius”

H. R. Giger

Ron  Cobb

storyboards and concept illustrations by director Ridley Scott (also known now as “Ridleygrams”)

 the film in selected frames         

starring   Tom Skerritt   John Hurt   Veronica Cartwright   Ian Holm   Yaphet Kotto   Harry Dean Stanton   Sigouurney Weaver

written bt Ron Shussett  Dan O’Bannon     cinematographer  Derek Valint   music by Jerry  Goldsmith     edited by Terry Rawlings   production designer Michael Seymour   costume design  John Mollo  concept artists  Ron Cobb   H.R. Giger   Chris Foss   Jean Giraud   produced by Walter Hill  David Giler  Gordon Carroll   Ivor Powell   Ronald Shussett   visual effects  Brian Johnson   Nick Adler   directed by  Ridley Scott   released by 20th Century Fox

Making    A   L   I   E   N

professional / fan art - movie poster one-sheet style

this is the third in a series of “comprehensive” visual essays on several great the movies;  the first two installments, STAR WARS (1977) and 2001 A Space Odyssey (1968), are available somewhere in my archives  (though I may reblog them soon)

#ALIEN (1979)

[2001hz]

H.R. Giger: 'Biomechanoid II' (1975)

#h.r. giger #h.r. giger archive #giger #gigeresque #biomechanoid #biomechanoid II #1975 #dark #gothic #biomechanical art #airbrush art #body #paintings #illustrations

[hyannah]

Anon Archives vol. 1

I really value communication with you guys, but I also don’t want to clog everyone’s dashboard. To fix this I’m going to be compiling anon messages into archives unless I feel they they should be answered separately. To receive a quick response, feel free to message me off anon so I can reply privately :) *smooches*

I think my lineart tool is just the default brush with max density and 10% min size. Here’s the settings for my two most used brushes :).

It’s a universe set entirely apart from our world and history - think of it more as a dark fairytale. In terms of aesthetics, though, I’d place it around 1880s-1900s. 

Not all that different from the way a lot of artists use them! Just clipping masks with the texture layer set to “overlay” and opacity between 15-25 depending on the scale of the canvas. I’m very picky about my colours so all my textures are b&w to not mess with my hues.

“Stop, sto-” Wolfe manages to choke out around the blood coating the inside of his mouth, finally gaining control over his broken body as Ghasper’s influence retreats back into his bloodstream. Coward, he growls inwardly, and receives a mocking chuckle from the hound that reverberates from the very core of his being. Hunter towers tall and unmoving over him, eyes glazed magenta with Mallory arching proudly over his shoulder like a silent guardian. His usually full and luscious lips are contorted into a vicious snarl, sweat-drenched garb clinging to his sculpted thighs. Thick, toned, manly thi - [UNKNOWN FORCES VIOLENTLY WRENCH MY KEYBOARD FROM MY HANDS AND I’M FORCEFULLY ESCORTED FROM MY BLOG] 

Thank you very much! When I was 15 I studied a 3-year course at WCS and graduated in 2015 with a degree in graphic design. I articulated straight on to 2nd year at University of the West of Scotland where I studied computer animation. It focused mostly on 3D. It’s not a specialised art school or anything but it doesn’t have to be - remember that if you plan to study art. I plan to go back to get my honours degree after my gap year! I graduate with my regular diploma in November I think.

That’s okay, anon! Believe me, just having people think of my characters as cosplay-able (what) makes me so happy. Thank you!

Thank you so much! I really appreciate you taking the time to check out my stuff. I hope I can continue to please you in the future :’) I’m totally not worthy of those sweet words u///u.

Thank you for your suggestion! I’ve seen a few webcomics do something similar, now that you mention it. I’m not so sure how I feel about cross-platforming my comic just yet, since I like the idea of a “central hub” of sorts...at least for the first few chapters. Tumblr does offer a lot of customizability (that’s not a real word Heather) but I think I’ll stick to Tapas or Webtoons for the moment! I really value your insight though, thank you.

Thank you very, very much! Oh man, I’m not really sure I’m the person you want to be taking any solid advice from, but I’ll give it a go. I consider myself way more of an illustrator than an animator, so I’ll give you drawing advice.

Be open to all kinds of art. Even if you live and breathe cartoons and character design, you’ll be surprised by how much you’ll learn just from taking the time to observe and appreciate things outside your own interests. I’m a dyed in the wool character illustrator and digital artist, but I can’t tell you how many hours I’ve spent marvelling at H.R Giger and Ilya Repin’s work. You don’t have to become a fine arts connoisseur by any means, but it helps to be open minded.

If you’re at the awkward in-between stages of your art - where you can draw with relative confidence but you’re struggling to find your individuality - try making influence maps. These helped me so much when I was 14 and going through my first “style crisis” where I hated everything I drew. This was because I was ignorant to my own interests. What do I love about my favourite artists? What gets my blood pumping? Why is it that I love vibrant colour pallets, cartoons and expressive eyes, but also marvel at the gritty eldritch atmosphere of Zdzisław Beksiński’s hyper detailed nightmare paintings? Is that even normal? It is. Variety is great as an artist and knowing what you as an individual like and dislike is invaluable.

When you draw, try and minimise the amount of times you take your hand off the page. If you’re prone to “flicking” your pen a lot, it can make your lines look inconsistent. By training your hands to make confident strokes, you’ll get cleaner drawings and learn to work faster.

If you’re a sensitive person then art can be a surprisingly difficult hobby to maintain, as you’ll find your emotions bleed out into anything you create. This is great for naturally driven people who can channel their frustration and insecurity into bettering themselves, but some people are fragile. That’s okay. There’s no shame in feeling overwhelmed. It’s alright to put the pen down and take a break for a while. Just promise me you’ll pick it back up again.

Gesture drawing is great for learning anatomy. Instead of getting caught up in having proportions/details perfect, try to instead focus on the pose in its most basic form. Capturing the momentum and direction of the body can give your drawings a more fluid look and reduce rigid characters.

Well, that’s just a bunch of really weird and vague tips but I hope it helps. It’s a broad topic to cover...if you need anything more specific then I’ll help as best I can :)

I think people need to tone down their virtue signalling and let people enjoy themselves. This is why people are too afraid to have fun anymore, and why merciless cringe culture is going to haunt young kids into adulthood. Animation memes will fall out of popularity like every fad in existence has done before it and you’ll get your wish.

#anon archives #asks #phew this took a while #but i read everyone's tags and captions and comments so I want to give back as much as possible #quite a rude anon at the end but i feel strongly about the subject #anon

[brokehorrorfan]

Blu-ray Review: Species

When scientists searching for extraterrestrial intelligence receive a transmission from outer space, they follow its instructions to splice alien DNA with human DNA. After mere months, the resultant science experiment gone wrong, codenamed Sil, resembles a 12-year-old girl (Michelle Williams, Blue Valentine). She possesses great strength and agility, which she utilizes to escape her isolated enclosure at the research facility. After a brief period in a cocoon, she transmogrifies into a beautiful woman of about 20 (Natasha Henstridge, Ghost of Mars) and finds herself in Los Angeles looking for a human with whom to copulate.

Meanwhile, Xavier Fitch (Ben Kingsley, Shutter Island), the government scientist who led the experiments, assembles a team of professionals to track Sil down. The ragtag crew come from various backgrounds: government mercenary Preston Lennox (Michael Madsen, Reservoir Dogs), empath Dan Smithson (Forest Whitaker, Arrival), anthropologist Dr. Stephen Arden (Alfred Molina, Spider-Man 2), and molecular biologist Dr. Laura Baker (Marg Helgenberger, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation).

Dennis Feldman's (The Golden Child) script for 1995's Species rolls science fiction, action, and horror into one board package. It may not be a particularly strong showing for any of those genres individually, yet the combination therein proves to be a successful one. The film is a bit on the long side, clocking in at 108 minutes. A repetitive midsection continually finds the bounty hunters one step behind Sil, but it benefits from being bookended by an intriguing opening and a strong finale.

Thankfully, director Roger Donaldson (The Bank Job) embraces the B-movie concept with an A-level execution. Handsome cinematography by Andrzej Bartkowiak (Speed, The Devil's Advocate) and a resonant, orchestral score by Christopher Young (Hellraiser, The Exorcism of Emily Rose) help to sell it. Donaldson does not ignore the concept’s inherent camp completely, however; he allows, if not outright encourages, the actors - a fine collection of veterans and newcomers - to go just a tad over the top.

Like her character, Henstridge is thrown into a new environment with her acting debut (receiving an "introducing" credit up front). She's lovely and frequently nude, but she also brings a sympathy to the monster. She's a victim, after all; a fish out of water acting on instincts and fighting for survival. Williams, a few years prior to her breakout on Dawson's Creek, plays Sil's earlier form. The young actress shows her chops by conveying emotion without dialogue.

Madsen, still hot off the success of Reservoir Dogs and Free Willy, seems to be in on the joke, playing the cocky leading man role with panache. Whitaker valiantly attempts to make an unnecessary character work, but he's one of the worst psychics in cinema history. He often states things that are obvious and/or not helpful, best exemplified by the scene in which he walks into a room with a dead body and profoundly notes, "Something bad happened here." Kingsley's well-documented talents are underutilized. Whip Hubley (Top Gun) pops up as a friendly local with whom Sil tries to mate.

Going into production on the heels of Jurassic Park, Species was an early attempt at combining practical and digital special effects. The CGI may not have been bad for its time, but the video game-like graphics have not aged well, particularly when the alien assumes its final form at the conclusion. The gooey, practical creature and special makeup effects by Steve Johnson (Ghostbusters, The Abyss), on the other hand, are timeless. Johnson collaborated with influential artist H.R. Giger (Alien) on Sil’s design, which explains why she looks like a cousin to Alien’s Xenomorph.

Species looks better than ever with Scream Factory's new 4K scan of the inter-positive. The two-disc Collector's Edition Blu-ray release carries over two audio commentaries recorded back in 2004. The first, with Donaldson, Henstridge, and Madsen, is a casual chat among reunited friends. The second, featuring Donaldson, Johnson, visual effects supervisor Richard Edlund, and producer Frank Mancuso Jr. is more technical, but it features several long gaps of silence, particularly in the midsection when there aren't many effects to discuss.

There's only one new special feature, but it's a good one. Afterbirth: The Evolution of Species is a 36-minute featurette with Donaldson, Bartkowiak, Young, Johnson, production designer John Muto, chrysalis supervisor Billy Bryan, and creature supervisor Norman Cabrera. The focus is largely on the copious special effects, including some good behind-the-scenes footage and photos. A solo interview with Henstridge is recycled from Scream Factory's 2016 release of Species II, but she spends a good chunk of it discussing the first film.

Archival extras are also ported over: The Making of Species: The Origin, The Concept, The Discovery, a 49-minute, three-part documentary detailing the production; Engineer Life, a scholarly examination of the science behind the film with actual scientists; H.R. Giger at Work offers a look at the enigmatic artist, including behind-the-scenes footage of him creating; Designing a Hybrid, dedicated to the special effects; an alternate ending, which would have added an unnecessary happy note to end on; the theatrical trailer; and three photo galleries (production design, creature design, and stills). There are some redundancies among the extras, but it's nice to have everything in one complete package.

More than just the Giger connection, Species owes a great debt to Alien and Aliens. Its memorable finale leans heavily on those films, with the dank, winding sewers of Los Angeles taking the place of cavernous spaceship corridors as the group hunts down a maternal alien. A flamethrower and a one-liner suspiciously similar to Ripley's "Get away from her, you bitch!" are even employed. While Species lacks the impact of Alien or Aliens, mashing some of its highlights with a Dr. Frankenstein-like science angle, updated for a '90s audience, makes for an entertaining venture.

Species will be released on Blu-ray on July 11 via Scream Factory.

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[davincisdreams]

ALIEN: COVENANT Official Poster Art - On Sale Info! To celebrate Alien Day, DaVinci's Dreams has teamed up with ACME Archives, the official Twentieth Century Fox licensee to release a fine art movie poster of Alien: Covenant! The poster exhibits H.R. Giger's Xenomorph as a truly renaissance art piece, and captures the true horror of the various species within the Alien universe in spectacular fashion. Alien: Covenant will be available as a timed-edition release from Wednesday (4/26) @ 5PM GMT+1, 5PM BST, 12PM EST through Monday (5/1) @ 8PM GMT+1, 8PM BST, 3 PM EST on our homepage, davincisdreams.com as well as Dark Ink and Bottleneck Art Gallery.

[peteramthor]

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