Why Honolulu police can have illegal sex in the name of law enforcement, how one L.A. neighborhood has chosen to destroy America, and who might actually be responsible for destroying the planet (spoiler: it’s us). It’s a rather depressing What’s Ruining Our Cities!
Gravity was a stunning piece of cinema
Changes in Red Hook, violence in Kiev, and new ideas for Paris from mayoral candidates.
Posted in: Today's ChiliChanges in Red Hook, violence in Kiev, and new ideas for Paris from mayoral candidates. Plus Bogotá bans cars for a week, California might divide into six states, and the surprising history of Hollywood. These are all the Urban Reads you need.
The hacking scenes in House of Cards are wildly unrealistic
Few Hollywood announcements are treated with such fierce-yet-wounded anticipation as video game adaptations. Full of incredible artistry, instantly-recognizable characters and an increasingly-mature approach to storytelling, you’d be forgiven for thinking gaming is a medium particularly well suited for making the jump to the silver screen. But history tells another story.
The announcement last year that Los Angeles would be replacing its high-pressure sodium streetlights—known for their distinctive yellow hue—with new, blue-tinted LEDs might have a profound effect on at least one local industry. All of those LEDs, with their new urban color scheme, will dramatically change how the city appears on camera, thus giving Los Angeles a brand new look in the age of digital filmmaking. As Dave Kendricken writes for No Film School, "Hollywood will never look the same."
It’s always fun seeing how huge-budget Hollywood films were shot, and what equipment they use. SetLife magazine created a list of just what cameras and lenses were used on each film nominated for 2014 Best Picture and Best Cinematography nominees. It’s not without some surprises.
100 Famous Movie Quotes as Charts
Posted in: Today's ChiliNathan Yau has turned the American Film Institute’s 100 most memorable quotes from American cinema into chart form. Here they are, in all their wonderful geeky glory.
Before a story about toys, before monsters went corporate, before anyone went searching for Nemo, and before twenty seven Academy Awards, Pixar was a high-end computer hardware company whose clients included the government and the medical community. The story of Pixar isn’t exactly full of superheroes, adorable robots, or talking bugs. The tale of the most profitable and critically adored animation studio in the history of the world (yes, by sheer gross numbers, more so than Disney) is one filled with financial difficulties, fired Apple employees, digital printers, and an animated left hand. And it all started with a Mormon graduate student at the University of Utah.
San Francisco’s tech companies are bringing it down, L.A.’s having trouble growing up, plus sexy cabbies, vertical cemeteries, Bloomberg’s next act, and much, much more in this week’s Urban Reads.