My friend Steve Barron directed this new adaptation of Treasure Island for Sky 1 HD which I believe is being shown in the UK on New Year’s Day.

Looks like a LOT of fun and check out that cast.

Donald Sutherland!

Sorry about the voice mail. I’ve been drinking.

And you think your roaming charges are bad…

Some lovely artwork coming out of Criterion at the moment:

I’m still running into people who haven’t seen the original GODZILLA. Mind boggling.

And most people think Kurosawa when the subject of Samurai movies come up. Check out the films of Hideo Gosha and Kihachi Okamoto. I recently rewatched THREE OUTLAW SAMURAI and THE SWORD OF DOOM back to back. Almost fifty years old and they’re a breath of fresh air after some of the nonsense I’ve had to sit through recently.

Plus it’s hard to get bored of watching Toshiro Mifune cutting hands off in the snow.

Not a bad flight.

Full on nightmare though for one poor soul who turned an unhealthy shade of white and vomited for much of the flight when he wasn’t shivering under a blanket or crying in misery. I did think at one point we’d have to land and get him to a doctor, but the cabin crew were very persistent with tea. That eventually did the trick.

Nice to land and see posters for CONTAGION everywhere…

Just finding my feet and avoiding the lag by hanging out with Amy Berg who is stupidly putting me up this trip. As you’d expect her place is filled with writing spots so it should be a productive trip as long as I don’t fall asl…

Like the little yellow sub in Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

Been a while. Had a bunch of writing to do and fell off the blogging wagon. Will try and fix that.

Off to LA this morning for a couple of weeks of meetings, more writing and hanging out with the cool kids.

RED DRIFT is in the bag, Howl’s Moving Castle is on its way, other older stuff lumbers on. Time to start a few new things I think.

I’ll be as active as usual on Twitter and Instagram while I’m away and will blog when I get the chance.

See ya on the flip side.

Google+

Facebook (oops – embedding disabled on the second one)

This is my friend, Dave.

You’ll remember he did the artwork on the titles for PRECISION, but we’re also working together on a number of things that aren’t quite ready for public consumption yet. Buy me a drink and I’ll show you what a talented git he is.

If you follow Dave on Twitter and/or Instagram you’ll have seen these wonderful tiny sketches featuring a shiny new ten pence piece and one added detail. Here’s one featuring the greatest space craft ever made:

Just in case you missed them here they are so far:

“That’s no moon…”

“Where we’re going, we don’t need eyes to see…”

Massive nuclear explosion… Moon torn out of Earth’s orbit…

“A shining planet… Known as ‘Earth’”

“See you later, Navigator!”

“My God… It’s full of stars…”

“We’re in the pipe, five by five…”

“You have been recruited by the Star League to defend the frontier”

“He’s no use to me dead…”

“To boldly go…”

I’m thinking about having the full set framed.

I was watching THE PARALLAX VIEW for the first time in years the other night and while it’s never going to get out from under the shadow of ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN it’s still a little treat of a movie. And while Warren Beatty carries the movie well it was this scene that jumped out at me:

Anthony Zerbe beating a chimp at Pong.

Kinda makes RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES even more unnecessary.

It’s a tiny scene and Zerbe is uncredited, but you’ll know his face from a bunch of classic* movies (including the KISS one) and this has to be one of the best career summaries ever:

He is famous for playing over a dozen roles in which his character exploded.

That’s a weekend of entertainment right there.

*Your mileage may vary

Very cute video posted on Reddit this evening that captures the moment a boyfriend gets off a plane to surprise his girlfriend on her birthday. At one point she asks, “Why is this happening?” as she cries into his chest in a complete state of happy shock.

This is what happened in the Reddit comments:

Star Wars is a goddamn virus.

That video just tipped over 100k views by the way.