Hasta La Gadget!

“The White Helmets,” a stirring documentary about a group of men in Syria who try to save bomb victims from the wreckage surrounding them, won the Oscar for Documentary (Short Subject) at the 89th Academy Awards on Sunday.

The film garnered national attention before the ceremony after Khaled Khatib, a Syrian cinematographer who worked on the film, was barred from entering the country by the Department of Homeland Security over unspecified “derogatory information.” He had obtained a visa to come to the U.S. before the decision.

The win marks the first time a Netflix film has ever taken home an Oscar in any category. Four Netflix documentaries ― “The Square,” “Virunga,” “Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom” and “What Happened, Miss Simone?” ― had previously been nominated for Documentary (Feature) and lost. 

Ava DuVernay’s “13th,” which takes a critical look at the criminal justice system, was also nominated for Documentary (Feature) on Sunday, but lost as well.

In only 40 minutes, the duo behind “The White Helmets” ― director Orlando von Einsiedel and producer Joanna Natasegara ―  tell the story of a group of first responders who rush into disaster with the hope of saving even a single life. Recognized by the white helmets on their heads, the group jumps into action at the first sign of a bombing and drives toward the rubble.

Released in September, “The White Helmets” takes a complicated subject matter and boils it down into something inarguable: a tale of real-life superheroes who are putting their lives on the line to help those caught in the political crossfire of a horrible conflict. 

According to WhiteHelmets.org, more than 150 members of The White Helmets have died while trying to save the lives of their fellow citizens. “For them and for every Syrian civilian, let’s watch this film, share it with our friends, and demand support for the White Helmets and their message of peace,” the site reads. 

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MSI has unveiled a new graphics card to its line-up, the GeForce GTX 1070 AERO ITX 8G. Designed primarily for small form factor PCs with mini-ITX motherboards, this space-saving VR-ready graphics card is configured with 1920 CUDA Cores, a 256-bit memory interface, a core base clock of 1506MHz, a core boost clock of 1683MHz and an 8GB of GDDR5 memory set @ 8008MHz.

Driven by NVIDIA Pascal architecture, the GeForce GTX 1070 AERO ITX 8G comes equipped with MSI’s award winning TORX fan (w/ ZeroFrozr technology which eliminates fan noise in low-load situations by stopping the fans when they are not needed, literally bringing noise down to 0dB) and provides 1x dual-link DVI-D, 2x HDMI and 2x DisplayPort output ports.

Unfortunately, there’s no word on pricing yet. [Product Page]

The post MSI GeForce GTX 1070 AERO ITX 8G Graphics Card Unveiled appeared first on TechFresh, Consumer Electronics Guide.

The LG G6 is live and official and is definitely one of the most interesting smartphones this year. Its 18:9 screen is just begging to be tested in the real world. That said, LG has so far left out the details of when the smartphone will actually land in the real world. Unsurprisingly, major US carriers are quick to jump … Continue reading

When Viola Davis walked onstage at the 89th Academy Awards on Sunday to accept her award for Best Supporting Actress, she also vaulted herself into one of the most prestigious acting clubs in the world. 

With the win for her work in the 2016 film “Fences,” Davis becomes the 23rd person to complete the so-called triple crown of acting, which is the term used to describe actors and actresses who have won at least one competitive acting award at the Oscars, the Emmys and the Tonys. 

She is the first black woman to do so.

Prior to “Fences,” Davis had won an Emmy in 2015 for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for her work on “How to Get Away with Murder” and two Tony Awards, first in 2001 for her work in “King Hedley II” and then again in 2010 for her work in the Broadway rendition of “Fences.”

Davis joins an acting group that includes acting legends like Jessica Lange, Helen Mirren, Al Pacino and Ingrid Bergman. But even some of the greatest actors and actresses in history, including one of Davis’ acting heroes, Meryl Streep, haven’t completed the triad like Davis did Sunday. 

Notably, Whoopi Goldberg actually has also completed a triple crown of sorts, but her Tony came from producing the Broadway musical “Thoroughly Modern Millie,” not acting in it. 

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Of all of this year’s expected Oscar wins, Viola Davis’ might be the most gratifying.

The actress’ performance in “Fences” moved critics and viewers, earning her an Academy Award nomination for the third time — this time, in the Best Actress in a Supporting Role category.

Sunday’s win is the actress’ first Oscar. Davis is the first black actress so achieve such a feat, and a win in the category only amplifies everything she’s accomplished.

Her first two nominations were for “Doubt” and “The Help”; for the latter, she lost out somewhat controversially to Meryl Streep.

Because she’s been snubbed in the past, her win this year wasn’t a sure thing, although critics agreed that her stellar performance made her the frontrunner. Earlier this year, Davis took home the Golden Globe for her efforts; in 2010, she won a Tony Award for playing the same part on Broadway. 

In her acceptance speech, Davis said, “People ask me all the time, what kind of stories do you want to tell, Viola? And I say, exhume those bodies, exhume those stories, the stories of the people who dreamed.”

She continued, “I became an artist, and thank god I did, because we are the only profession that celebrates what it means to live a life. So here’s to August Wilson, who exhumed and exalted the ordinary people.”

She continued to praise the playwright behind “Fences,” which she described as, “a movie that is about people, and words, and life, and forgiveness, and grace.”

The win is especially powerful in light of the film’s themes. Davis played Rose Maxson, the pragmatic housewife of Troy Maxson, and a woman who did what she could to keep her family thriving amid turmoil.

Davis’ tenacity, too, is an inspiration.

After her speech, Twitter lit up with praise for Davis: 

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