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Masters group photograph c1950s
'The Building School'
Hanover Terrace School became the Brighton Secondary Technical School, and was known locally as 'The Building School'. I don't have a definitive date for this Masters group but think it to be circa 1950.
Can you help with names?
Unfortunately I can't provide names for any of those Masters standing. Seated left to right – Messrs Weedall (Sports -Sussex scrum half), Parfit? (Plumbing), Hargreaves (Brickwork), Downing (Headmaster), McKinley (Art), Taylor (Woodwork), Not known.
If you can help identify any of the Masters not named, please leave a comment below.
Brighton Secondary Technical School Masters group
From the private collection of John Wallace
Brighton Secondary Technical School (20)
Seated far right is Mr Ernie Bullock "Boffin", Science. Standing, left is Mr Ben Chappel, Deputy Head, Technical Drawing and far right is Mr Joe Huddart, Geography. He was ex RN and studied to become a barrister, He stood for Labour in the 1951 election but lost. The other three – I remember the faces but not the names, but they must have taught English, Maths and History. Perhaps that's why I can't remember them!
By David Pierce (10/07/2010)
I was at this school about 1951 to 57. The only masters that I seem to recognise on the back row are Ben Chappel teaching technical drawing and engineering technology, ?, Boffin the chemistry master, ?, Holy Joe Huddart JP teaching geography – the only teacher who would not hit a boy wearing glasses; he waited until they took them off
By Ron Burtenshaw (10/07/2010)
Second from left in the back row I believe is Mr Fry the Maths teacher c.1956-58.
By Frederic M. Avery (01/11/2010)
Second right next Joe Huddart I think was a Mr Hobden a maths teacher. Some years after leaving school I met Joe Huddart walking down the platform of Enfield Station. As regards to pupils of my era 1949 to 1954 in recent years I have seen Mick Poole and Jim Corrigan. I also believe that Brian Roe, Ken Gates and and a chap called Neal have past away. Bob Carden May 2011.
By Councillor Bob Carden (16/05/2011)
I left prematurely aged 15, to the annoyance of the teachers, to become a jockey. I rode, trained and was head lad at a yard where a Grand National winner was trained. I believe the second from the left back row to be Mr Pope (history), middle Mr Freddie Freyne (maths), next to him I think is Mr Hobden (English?).
By Colin (Horsey) Hemsley 1952-56 (13/06/2011)
Front, left to right – Ron Weedall (PE), Parfitt (metalwork), Luke Hargreaves (building and ran Brighton Boys Football team), Edward Downing (Headmaster), McKiley (Art), and Taylor (Carpentry), Bullock (Physics).
By Roger Bateman (15/06/2011)
Back row left to right Chappel Tech Drawing, Fry History, Wilkins Maths, Reigate English, Huddart Geog. Front row Weedal PE, Parfitt Plumbing, Hargreaves Brickwork, Downiing Head, McKinley Art, Taylor Carpentry, Bullock Science.
By Patrick Matless (14/02/2012)
I was in forms 3x, 4x and then 5X - all the lowest of the low and difficult to progress from if you were a 13+ entrant like me! Mr Bateman above should have put the N in McKinly. A great art teacher and who, apart from his stained glass window prowess, designed the £1,000,000 pound notes an advertising gimic for the show "Zip Goes A Million" with George Formby. I recall getting hit hard on the hand by Mr Hargreaves using brickies gauge stick; it hurt. Mr Huddart used to always walk like a sailor with his hands clasped behind his back. I think Mr Weedal had also come from the Navy as he used to insist on playing games like British Bulldog in bare feet. The changing room, in a sort of basement, used to stink of sweaty feet; there were NO showers! It was an awful building, built in 1888 and should have been pulled down in the thirties!
By John Snelling (04/11/2012)
I forgot in my note above to ask whether anyone remembers a French teacher: a M. Behar? He used to take classes to see real French films at the Continental Cinema which I think, was in or near Paston Place. It showed mainly French stuff such as "M. Hulot's Holiday"; "The Green Mare's Nest" and "Clochmerle". He used to live above a shop in Carden Avenue in Patcham.
The Continental cinema was in Sudeley Place just along from Paston Place as John says. I went to this cinema many times to see some really daft horror films as well as other more interesting films that were supposed to be a bit risque. One of the horror films was called Macabre if I remember rightly. It was about a floating skull that went around killing people. There was a load of "get insurance" hype about this film at the time as it was so horrific. I just laughed at it but the girls screamed their heads off. Also as John says there were films by Jacques Tati playing Mr. Hulot's Holiday which to this day I have in my collection as well as other films by the great French artiste. Tati was so funny to me and still is bless him.
By Mick Peirson (20/12/2012)
I can confirm Patrick Matless's identification of the Building School teachers whilst I was there, he has got them 'bang on'. [John, apologies but I have edited some of your comment. Comments Ed]
By John Starley (26/07/2013)
I was at the BSBE from about 52-56 and left when I was 15. Mr Parfitt and Mr Downing along with my father in the headmasters office tried to persuade me to stay on an extra year to take the G.C.E exam in plumbing. I was determined to leave and did not want to be a plumber and the meeting collapsed when I said that if they would not agree to let me leave that they would end up probably throwing me out. Hence I left and Mr Parfitts parting words were "you will regret this for the rest of your life". I applied and got a job at H A Waller & Sons Ltd in Cheapside, Btn. After 14 years on the tools I slowly climbed the ranks to estimator, works manager, director and finally Managing Director. During this time I had the pleasure of serving Mr Parfitt with sections of metal for his metal work classes. I was also a director and shareholder of Whitecross Holdings and Whitecross Refrigeration Ltd. After 31 years I severed my ties with the group and bought a factory in Portslade producing miscellaneous metal work for the building trade. I liquidated the business after 7 years due to an economic recession. Graham Ladd who is a year younger than me but a ex BSBE pupil approached me to set up a metal fabrication factory to compliment his shopfitting business in Worthing. I ran that operation for about 7 years and then prior to retiring my son and his business partner bought a factory in Devon manufacturing security trucks and lorries for transporting cash. I moved to Devon and took over the reigns of this business until my retirement at age 62, I am now 72 and enjoying life in a 4 bedroom 2 bathroom converted 200 year old stables travelling several times a year back to Brighton to stay with my eldest son and to Spain to be with my younger son and family. Mr Parfitt was a brilliant metalwork master but not a very good fortune teller! No, I do not have any regrets other than the school should never have closed and was one of the building trades greatest assets.
By Colin Wares (29/01/2014)
I can't believe that some of those were still teaching in the '70s as well. Parfitt, Spud Taylor, Ben Chappel, Ernie Downing (I seemed to be on well-know terms with the then Head and Deputy for some reason!). I seem to remember an art teach Eric Kinley – is that the same guy – claimed to have invented a sort of spyrograph tool for making patterns using a plastic template and a rubber stopper in a hole that would pivot the template.
By Barry (27/08/2014)
Really good to see my dad, Eric Kinley. He dropped the Mc but was called Mac during his war service with the Royal Engineers and it hung around during the 1950s. I was born in 1953 and dad did indeed invent a rival drawing game, 'Space-O-Graph' which competed against Spirograph but failed. It was only sold through educational suppliers so didn't stand a chance. He was also very interested in stained glass windows and with the boys at school produced a fabulous cellophane image for the Festival of Britain in 1951 which was displayed in the Tech College, I believe after being on show. I have many photos from the time and many of the masters were family friends. I still keep in touch with the sons of Sandy Hargreaves and Norman Hobden who joined the staff later. My dad became quite poorly during my childhood with a chronic chest problem. He died in 1973.
By Sorrell Kinley (03/08/2017)
Hi Sorrell, you are quite correct about your dad, our Mr Kinley, and that some of the boys produced a cellophane image of the "Festival of Britain" in 1951. I went to the "Building" school, which we used to call it, in 1949 when I was 11, but did see the cellophane image in 1951 after it was completed by the older boys, it was in the Art classroom for a while. There are a few other pages on this website about the "Building School"/BJTSBE/BTSBE, in one of them there are posts about the cellophane image, with a picture of it as well I think. You will find it if you hunt around for it.
By Vic Bath (10/08/2017)
Hi John W, as you know we were in the same class; regarding your photo of the Masters, those standing on the back row, on the far end on the right, is Mr Huddart, for religious knowledge and geography; on the far left it is Mr Chappell for technical drawing. I expect since you started this page in 2010 that you now know some of those standing, but I thought I would jump in for a little update for others to see.
Hello Sorell. It was great to see your name. I was in your father's class when you were born, were you the first child? I still remember how proud he was in telling us. I joined the school in September 1951 and "Mac" was my form teacher in 3X, we were a completely new intake class aged 13. You father was also my House Master of "Wren House" There were four houses Wren, Adam, Lutyens and Nash. I was quite good at Art and won 1st prize in 1952 . Viscount Gage presented me with a book on Thomas Bewick the famous 18th century wood engraver at the annual prize giving in the music room at the Royal Pavilion. Your Dad loved leaded and painted glass and I made a picture of a bishop holding his staff in coloured cellophane. Your Dad paid to have it mounted in between two pieces of glass for display. I remember he took us all to Canterbury to see the glass windows in the Cathedral. I considered studying art and becoming a teacher but thankfully your father talked me out of it in a most diplomatic way. I was also good at woodwork, brickwork and technical drawing so I became apprenticed to a large local building company called T J Braybon and Son Ltd and I part time studied and became a Chartered Quantity Surveyor. After National Service I returned to Braybons and eventually ended up as Managing Director. When I retired I went to Chichester University and gained a BA Hons degree in History and Geography. So your Dad was right and did me a great favour. Sadly I no longer have the window or the original book or any photos but I have very very happy memories of your Dad and of my time at the school.
Brighton Secondary Technical School
A pupil 1955-1960
BST School students c1957
Building School 1st XV Rugby Team 1955-56
Building School 1st XV Rugby Team 1956/57
Class Photo c. 1920
Cricket team - c1954
Football team c1949/50
Formerly Brighton Junior Technical School for Building
French Assistant 1972/73
Imitation stained glass window 1951
Later to be Brighton Secondary Technical School
Out of school activities
Pupils and Masters c1957
Remembering some staff
School photo c1962
School photograph 1959
The Coronation window 1951
The Scriber: school magazine 1966
Who was in the BSTC 1954 Rugby Team?


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Q: Trying to query AD users, but getting less than expected results I am trying to query AD to get the list of users
The query is success, and I am getting 90 records as results, the problem is that I am expecting more over than 15000 records.
Before I go to the IT and check the right domain path, it would be great if I am sure that my code is not the issue.
Thank you for every much
Already tried changing the search page size
DataTable resultSet = new DataTable();
resultSet.Columns.Add(new DataColumn("mail", typeof (string)));
resultSet.Columns.Add(new DataColumn("username", typeof (string)));
resultSet.Columns.Add(new DataColumn("displayname", typeof (string)));
try
{
    string DomainPath = "LDAP://MyDomain";
    DirectoryEntry searchRoot = new DirectoryEntry(DomainPath);
    DirectorySearcher search = new DirectorySearcher(searchRoot);
    search.Filter = "(&(objectClass=user)(objectCategory=person))";
    search.PropertiesToLoad.Add("samaccountname");
    search.PropertiesToLoad.Add("mail");
    search.PageSize = 1001;
    search.PropertiesToLoad.Add("displayname");//first name
    SearchResult result;
    SearchResultCollection resultCol = search.FindAll();
    if (resultCol != null)
    {
        for (int counter = 0; counter < resultCol.Count; counter++)
        {
            result = resultCol[counter];
            if (result.Properties.Contains("samaccountname") && result.Properties.Contains("mail") && result.Properties.Contains("displayname"))
            {
                var row = resultSet.NewRow();
                resultSet.Rows.Add(row);
                var Email = (String) result.Properties["mail"][0];
                row["mail"] = Email;
                var UserName = (String) result.Properties["samaccountname"][0];
                row["username"] = UserName;
                var DisplayName = (String) result.Properties["displayname"][0];
                row["displayname"] = DisplayName;
                row.AcceptChanges();

            }

        }
        resultCol.Dispose();

    }

}

catch (Exception ex)
{
    App.Log.Write("Exception while read user from AD: " + ex.ToString());

}
return resultSet;

Expected over 15000 records getting 90 only

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Q: C# UWP. raspberry pi проблема с экраном Суть в том что есть экран 7"от waveshare, который работает нормально на 10586 версии. Но на последней, не адекватно.
Событие tapped срабатывает через куча нажатий. А событие Pointer всё отлично.
Суть в том что tapped прикручено ко всем стандартным кнопкам и т.д (от самой ОС).
Нужно как то решить эту проблему. Есть как вариант отлавливать событие pointer и с помощью его создавать событие tapped.
Как такую магию можно реализовать? Либо может какие другие варианты?

A: Каждый раз отсеивать лишние Tapped. Фильтровать по источнику или еще как-нибудь. Они все одинаковые? Может сенсор бракованный?


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Gio people
The Gio or Dan people is an ethnic group in north-eastern Liberia and in Côte d'Ivoire. There are approximately 350,000 members of the group, united by the Dan language, a Mande language. Neighboring peoples include the Guere, Guro and Mano.
The Dan originally came from the western Sudan region to the north, part of present-day Mali and Guinea. The location and movements of the Dan, Mano, and We can be reconstructed from as early as 1300, at which time the Dan and Mano were located in the savanna region of the northern Ivory Coast. In the sixteenth century, political turmoil, population growth and land depletion caused the Dan to migrate south of the Nimba range and into the high forests.
The Dan had a reputation as a fierce warrior society. One notable warrior chief was Grougbay Zobaneeay, who fought and pushed the tribes that once live in the present day Nimba County to as far as Loguatuo in Côte d'Ivoire. Kipko Toh'ah-Gbeu drove the Kru men from what is now called Tapitah, Nimba County (prior to the arrival of Chief Tapeh); his last major war with the settlers was in Sanniquellie. He retired when he was wounded in the Sanniquellie war. Kipho gave his daughter Lhe'kpahseu in marriage to Grougbay Zobaneeay. Bho'Yaah, who lived in today's Garplay, Nimba County- in an alliance with Kipho Toh'Gbeu, made a truce to quit fighting the settlers. He was actually one of the last chief warriors of the Gios to have resisted the Americo-Liberian military push into Nimba. Gonsahn Ghe'Gbeu was from Miampleu Yeezleu, Nimba County. He also drove the Kphelehs from Eastern Liberia.
This page contains text from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia - https://wn.com/Gio_people

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Forum location: QI.com Forum Index > G Series Talk
View previous topic | View next topic
Ian Dunn
396708. Sat Aug 23, 2008 7:09 am
While people like Pliny the Elder and William Dampier are considered to be the patron saints of QI, Ganesha could be considered to be the patron God, seeing as he is not just the Hindu deva of intellect and wisdom, but he is also quite interesting.
For example, there are several myths concerning how Ganesha got his elephant head. Some myths claim that he may have had even five heads. Myths as to how he got his head include:
He was born with it. As simple as that.
Shiva the Destroyer cut of his human head when Ganesha came between him and Parvati, who happened to be Ganesha's mother. Then Shiva replaced it.
Shani (Saturn) looked at Ganesha with his evil eye, and caused Ganesha's head to turn into ashes. Vishnu the Maintainer replaced Ganesha's head.
Shiva gave Ganesha the elephant head and a protruding belly to make him less alluring.
Last edited by Ian Dunn on Mon Feb 07, 2011 2:24 pm; edited 1 time in total
Davini994
My Ganesh statue, copper and bronze I think:
As the destroyer of obstacles and lord of good beginnings, he's invoked prior to any undertaking, e.g. weddings, and is first placed in a new dwelling.
His image is made up of man, elephant, serpent and mouse. His image is quite specific - everything is as it is to symbolise something.
His belly contains infinite universes.
VaultAir
668711. Wed Feb 10, 2010 3:17 am
The one involving Shiva as Ganesha's father is the most common, according to Brown, in Ganesha: Studies of an Asian God. It's pretty cool to consider that casual decapitation was, in a sense, quite de rigueur for Godly behaviour. Still, the two major strands in Hinduism, Shaivism and Vaishnavism, both have their own origin myth. The other two, Shaktism and Smartism (clearly the dominant religious trend on QI :-) don't concern themselves with the Gods too much, seeing them mostly as metaphors, as is mentioned in another thread on Gods. Fascinating stuff, could go on and on about it, but I just wanted to add a bit specifically about Ganesha, whom I've always found QI.
Davinni994 wrote
His image is made up of man, elephant, serpent and mouse. His image is quite specific - everything is as it is to symbolize something.
Very true. Here's a list, if anyone's interested:
Ze broad expanse of his 'ead zymbolizes 'ees (and by extension, our own, in all the following cases) ability to cogitate creatively. Or think big.
His elephantine ears but small human mouth symbolize 'talk less, listen more', an advocated trait on his part. Gotta love QI that way, as you can have it both ways with impunity over here. Oh, and the trunk symbolizes versatility and adaptability, some also consider it to be a symbol for kundalini, the uncoiling of serpentine shaped spiritual power up our spines, the great awakening and all of that.
His extensive girth signifies an ability to digest all that life has to offer, the mundane and commonplace as well as the spiritual and significant. It's all important on some level. The bowl he carries usually is said to contain a sweet confection of some sort, often coconut or jaggery, which symbolizes the reward for tapasya or spiritual penances. A brief reading of the Ramayana serves to enlighten the central role such rewards can play as granting means to fulfill one's destiny or karmic cycle.
He carries an axe to symbolize the ease with which all temporal attachments may be detached and disposed of as the unimportant encumbrances they are in the face of the quest for moksha. But it doesn't make him ascetic. The offerings placed at his feet symbolize the world's pleasures, to be taken full advantage of. But they are placed below him to signify his control over them and not, as is often the case, the other way around.
Finally, the mouse which he rides symbolizes desire, and again, the fact that he rides it or it looks up at him with worshipful obeisance signifies his (and what should be our own) control over it.
Ganesh Chaturti is a major festival in India, especially in the state of Maharashtra and its capital, Bombay. Its history is QI, when the early nationalists (pre-Gandhi, essentially) were looking for a visible symbol around which to unite Indians to stronger modes of direct opposition to colonial rule, the idea they landed upon was to use religion. One early nationalist, Bal Gangadhar Tilak by name, "...transformed household worshiping of Ganesha into Sarvajanik Ganeshotsav in 1894", to quote wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bal_Gangadhar_Tilak#Social_contribution , a major festival now right up there with Diwali and Holi as national holidays in the Indian calendar. He was part of the Lal-Bal-Pal triumvirate, that every Indian schoolchild gets taught about in the wonderfully left-leaning pro-nationalist (ie pro Congress Party) history that is taught in most schools in the country. They were dubbed the "extremists", who wanted the Brits out of the country altogether, unlike the "moderates", who just wanted a bit more autonomy and delegated responsibility. Gandhi was the latter for quite some time, right upto and after WWI, when he finally realized that the British had (mostly) no intention of keeping the promises they made about dominion status for India. So began the next phase of the Indian Independence movement, the so-called Gandhian phase. Its a lot more complicated than that, I've made no mention of the other major currents in the movement apart from the role of the Congress* , but that's the gist of it.
*The tension between Gandhi and Ambedkar is particularly revealing, because it brings out with striking clarity that the Congress, which claimed to represent the whole of India, didn't even represent all the Hindus (as the Muslim League claimed it exclusively did). Just upper caste Hindus, according to the best known of the "lower caste" leaders.
Moosh
668901. Wed Feb 10, 2010 12:17 pm
I acted as avatar for Lord Ganesh for one of my sister's weddings when I was about 6. It involved getting up at about 4am for puja several days in a row, and being smeared with some yellow mud-like substance. Not that fun really.
Persica
682041. Fri Mar 12, 2010 8:47 am
I have read that Ganesha rode a rat (not a mouse) because the rat was good at getting into difficult places ie at getting around obstacles.
I also have read that Ganesha was a god of obstacles - that he could be invoked to place obstacles as well as remove them.
From Don Handelman "Myths of Murugan: Asymmetry and Hierarchy in a South Indian Puranic Cosmology" (1987) 27 (2) History of Religions pp 133-170 at p 148 (footnote omitted):
"Ganesha is wholly the creation of his mother, Parvati. According to myths of his birth, she made him of her sweat, of her skin rubbings, of the water in which she bathed after making love to Shiva, or of turmeric. In all instances he was created to protect the entry to her chamber. He prevented the access of Shiva, who cut off his head. After the entreaties of Parvati, Shiva replaced the head with that of an elephant. He was made the first son of Shiva (hence his name, Pillaiyar, the son) and the leader of the Shaiva demigods, the ganas (and so his name, Ganapati). He is the Lord of Categories who inserts or who extracts obstacles. He is thought of as somewhat effeminate or asexual, and he often is depicted as a bachelor who sits on the river bank, watching the girls bathe and waiting for one who resembles his mother."
682120. Fri Mar 12, 2010 1:28 pm
Welcome Persica, and thanks for the post :-)
Sadurian Mike
I did like the Simpsons episode where Homer dressed as Ganesha to try to get Sanjay out of an arranged marriage, but ended up being chased up a tree and pelted with stones.
Bondee
Sadurian Mike wrote:
It was Apu, wasn't it?
Sanjay is Apu's cousin, father to a child whose name is Jamshed but sounds suspiciously like Dumbshit when spoken with an Indian accent.
Dah, you're right of course.
And I'm only on my first Apfelkorn.
Zebra57
Should that not be d'oh!
682304. Fri Mar 12, 2010 10:33 pm
Having dug deeper into my treasure trove, I found the references to Ganesha and his riding a rat and other references to his power to create obstacles:
"Ganesha is a remover of difficulties and a god of wisdom. His axe denotes a pioneer who demolishes obstacles, his trunk is all-inquisitive and all-tasting, his big belly is all-receptive, and the rat, his vehicle, goes everywhere."
Ananda K. Coomaraswamy "Indian Images with Many Arms" (1913) 22 The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs pp 189-196 footnote 10 at p 197
The accompanying illustration is of a Javanese representation of Ganesha.
"Ganesha, the elephant-headed Hindu god of auspiciousness, is popularly accepted as the first son of Shiva and Parvati. He is the deity who controls obstacles - inventing them or removing them - and the one who is worshiped before any serious undertaking."
Martin Lerner "Far Eastern Art" (1983) Notable Acquisitions (Metropolitan Museum of Art) pp 78-88 at p78
The accompanying illustration is caption: "STANDING GANESHA Cambodian, Pre-Angkor period, ca. late 7th-early 8th century. Calcareous sandstone, height 17'/4" (43.8 cm)."
Ganesha "is the guardian of thresholds, not only spatially in that he stands at the front entrance, but in that he is addressed at the beginning of any enterprise. Under the title 'Ganapati' he is certainly the most popular general deity in ordinary Hinduism.
"Similarly Ganesha, the elephant-headed "son of Shiva," rides a rat (which to the European mind seems absurd); the rat, like Ganesha the guardian of thresholds, can find a way through all obstacles.
"The proposition that "Ganesha's trunk is phallic" is not an invention of psychoanalysts, but an explicit element in the iconography (Figure 11). We can only "understand" the imagery involved, however, if we appreciate that the figure as a whole is the equivalent of an androgynous representation of Shiva. Likewise we cannot appreciate the full incongruence of representations of the ponderous dancing Ganesha unless we know that they are the equivalent of the elegant dancing Shiva Nataraja. Nor can we understand the image of Ganesha as an ascetic monk (Figure 12, which comes from Java), unless we know the story by which the active creative/destructive aspect of Shiva is the counterpart of his inactive aspect. For example, in the story of Shiva and Parvati, Shiva is the ultimate ascetic, whose impregnable passivity in his yogic exercises is so powerful that the continued vitality of the cosmos is brought under threat. So Parvati/Kali is created as the irresistibly seductive female, with the function of sapping the power of the immovable and unseductable Shiva. With a background awareness of theology such as this we are less surprised when we turn this Ganesha figure round and find he has become a demon destroyer, a truly ambivalent creation (Figure 13)."
Source: Edmund R. Leach "The Harvey Lecture Series. The Gatekeepers of Heaven: Anthropological Aspects of Grandiose Architecture" (1983) 39 (3) Journal of Anthropological Research pp 243-264 at pp 257-9
The figures referred to are:
Figure 11. Ganesha and Shakti. (D. Desai (1975) Erotic Sculpture of India p 92)
Figure 12. Ganesha as seated mendicant monk. East Java.
Figure 13. Back view of figure 12.
A. Getty (1936 OUP) Ganesha plates 30a & 30b
IanZonja
1256571. Thu Oct 19, 2017 5:25 am
Did you ever wonder how Ganesha lost and gained new head?
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Facebook post may have led to South Milwaukee homicide
Victim had $7,000 cash inside home for mortgage payoff
Nick Bohr
Police documents obtained by WISN 12 News Monday shed new light on the investigation of the shooting death of a South Milwaukee grandmother. According to the documents, a Facebook post could have sparked the crime.Sherry Chadwick, 68, was found shot to death in her home in March.Hours before the discovery, police responded to Chadwick's home when she reported that she scared off a potential burglar.The suspect apparently returned, and the second time she wasn't so lucky."(We are) frustrated, really frustrated, you know. My whole family is just, we want closure," said Barbara Streeter, the victim's daughter. "Not that (an arrest is) going to bring her back, but it might help move (us) on, to move on a little bit."According to court documents, Chadwick had about $7,000 in cash in the house to pay off her mortgage and some relatives thought it would be fun to take a picture with the money. With her permission, they posted it on Facebook. The botched burglary attempt and homicide took place hours later."It was only up there for a couple of hours, but that's all it takes. That's all it takes," Streeter said. "Be very careful, very careful, because anything can happen. Anything. I lost my mom."South Milwaukee police weren't available for an interview Monday.No arrests have been made. Anyone with information is asked to give them a call.
SOUTH MILWAUKEE, Wis. —
Police documents obtained by WISN 12 News Monday shed new light on the investigation of the shooting death of a South Milwaukee grandmother. According to the documents, a Facebook post could have sparked the crime.
Sherry Chadwick, 68, was found shot to death in her home in March.
Hours before the discovery, police responded to Chadwick's home when she reported that she scared off a potential burglar.
The suspect apparently returned, and the second time she wasn't so lucky.
Family still looking for answers in South Milwaukee woman's homicide
South Milwaukee shooting ruled homicide
"(We are) frustrated, really frustrated, you know. My whole family is just, we want closure," said Barbara Streeter, the victim's daughter. "Not that (an arrest is) going to bring her back, but it might help move (us) on, to move on a little bit."
According to court documents, Chadwick had about $7,000 in cash in the house to pay off her mortgage and some relatives thought it would be fun to take a picture with the money. With her permission, they posted it on Facebook.
The botched burglary attempt and homicide took place hours later.
"It was only up there for a couple of hours, but that's all it takes. That's all it takes," Streeter said. "Be very careful, very careful, because anything can happen. Anything. I lost my mom."
South Milwaukee police weren't available for an interview Monday.
No arrests have been made. Anyone with information is asked to give them a call.


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Q: No integration option available I have had a "subject" for a while, with the integration option showing a date to mark the 10 year period. Once the period was elapsed, the option is still unavailable saying simply that I can't integrate it.
Does it have to do with ethos? I have collectivist, militarist, and xenophile.

A: As you said where you originally post your question, your subject was not a vassal but a protectorate. It has nothing to do with ethos.
Protectorate can not be integrated into your empire. However, when they reach 40% of your technology, they are converted into vassal and can now be integrated.
Be careful, if you get a new protectorate in mid-game, they will probably never be able to reach the 40% as they start with basic tech, even if you give them free research boost.


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Oscar Season Diary #12: How Soon Is Too Soon? Don't Take "Big Eyes" Reactions To Heart
So often does Oscar season turn into a public war of tastes that we lose sight of the race that's happening right in front of us.
The Oscar race is an ever-evolving beast. With the influence of the online community, the court of social media, and the guilds and critics circles all jockeying to push films into the race before anyone else, Oscar Season now stretches across the better part of a year where it used to fit comfortably within the confines of a few months' time.
As early as May, just a little over two months since the Oscar telecast, we find the discussion revolving around the traditionally un-Oscary Cannes Film Festival. We can try to talk about it in an Oscar context all we want, but that festival will never be a legitimate stepping stone across the Academy pond. The ideologies of both the Oscars and Cannes force an undeniable divide; one is there for the satisfaction of studios and English-speaking audiences (namely the United States, of course), while the other is a celebration of the congregation of art, cinema, and culture along the shores of France's finest coastline.
Still, the Oscar pundits want to do their shoving, their squeezing, their hammering of the season's potential players into the respective boxes they've cut out for them–whether they fit or not. Of course, aside from Cannes, the reality is that we've barely scratched the surface of the festivals that matter in an Oscar context. Telluride, Toronto, and Venice are all still some time away, with slates that have yet to be announced.
And here we find ourselves squabbling about Oscar potential from all ends of the arena. Just last week, a focus group screening was held for Tim Burton's much buzzed-about Big Eyes, a live-action biopic about the life of artist Walter Keane and his wife, Margaret. In attendence were general audience members and Oscar bloggers alike (apparently the Awards Watch crew attended).
Granted, even before we saw pictures from the set, the film's cards were presumably aligned for awards season greatness: Tim Burton, a beloved and iconic filmmaker, has yet to win (or be nominated , for that matter) for an Oscar for a live-action film, and Big Eyes boasts a cast that features Oscar-charged talent like Christoph Waltz (two-time winner), Danny Elfman (four-time nominee), and Bruno Delbonnel (four-time nominee).
Burton has assembled a gaggle of overdue players that, in an ideal world, sets the stage quite nicely for Oscar legacy/career awards for himself, Elfman, and Delbonnel. It's Amy Adams' turn in the other lead role, however, that has Oscar pundits' hearts aflutter.
Since 2005, Adams has gone five Oscar nominations deep without a win. Her rabid online fan base is keen on 2014 being her year to finally win; whether it's just another bout with wishful thinking (that her fans should have long grown tired of by now, as this seems to be the same story heading into every Oscar year after her second nomination in 2008 for Doubt) or a legitimate prophecy remains to be seen, but that doesn't stop those with a voice–hidden behind the screen and typed word–from shouting praises from her end of the ring.
Awards Watch was quick to spout about guaranteed nominations for Waltz and Adams. Others chimed in with–what seemed to be–overwhelming approval for Adams' performance. She's been "overdue" in the eyes of her fanbase for quite some time, and while it can absolutely work in your favor when final ballots go out (and your name is on them, as happened with Kate Winslet in 2008), the art of being "overdue" has little relevance this early in the race, especially when applied to the awards season trajectories of Julianne Moore (who won Best Actress at Cannes for Maps to the Stars) and Amy Adams here.
Still, that doesn't stop the internet age from fostering a community where self-importance breeds a necessity for anyone from an Oscar blogger to a nobody to push something–anything–into the race, but it's simply unwise to make guarantees this early in the game.
It's completely safe for people who've seen Big Eyes to speculate on nominations and gauge a film's potential, but prophesizing a win at this point? It's ridiculous, and it's an increasing trend in the digital age. I'm all for using an informed perspective to gauge how well something will do at the Oscars, but with major performances by actresses who are–quite frankly–better than Amy Adams in general that haven't been seen yet (along with the fact that we don't even know if these buzzed-about performances will be campaigned in lead or supporting), it's very unwise (and potentially detrimental to Adams' awards trajectory this year) to peg her as a winner this early.
Remember how the eye of the target immediately became 12 Years a Slave when Vulture's Kyle Buchanan in September declared it the Best Picture winner? Early praise (and such definitive statements) make the film in question both the sexiest dish for a minute, and immediately fodder for the online court to push it to the background as the "obvious" choice. Early praise is essentially helping a film on its way to front-running to instant death. This early, it's nothing more than loudness for loudness' sake.
The guys over at Awards Watch are borderline obsessed with their red-headed divas, and there's nothing wrong with that, but giving them early access to an already-hyped potential vehicle for Adams' long-awaited Oscar only runs the risk of inflating their reaction, which I guess is good press from the studio's marketing standpoint. The problem with taking these types of early Twitter reactions seriously in the grand scheme of the race, though, is that they're immediate, unfiltered, and squished into 140 characters, where you're forced to talk bigger instead of talking better, and inflated again by the fanboys on forums and blogs that seek them out after the screening. Audiences and pundits are waiting for an excuse to explode with praise for a film that's already charged with Oscar conversation, especially this early in the year. This seems to happen every time an Oscar movie is screened early. They'll freak out and heap praise immediately because:
A) They're excited that they've seen it before everyone else
B) It fills the egos of those who've seen it because they were able to see it before anyone else, so of course they're going to capitalize on that esteem by inflating their reaction as a means to validate the fact that, well, they've seen it before anyone else
I'm not doubting Adams' performance at all. I actually have high hopes for it, though it's just really tough for me to take seriously the opinion of an Adams' fanboys who were given early access to one of her films, but the excitement (and the thirst) of those who've seen the film already is far too real and pre-established to amount to a serious reaction or gauging of her placement in the race thus far, and preview screenings without embargoes on audience reaction are only tools to aid in the film's publicity machine.
It's important to pay attention to people's reactions to these screenings as a whole, and not take the word of a few loud individuals who want to make their opinion on the film matter more than the collective. As a whole, it seems like people liked Adams' performance. If you dig deeper, you'll find that a good number of people actually feel that Waltz outshines her (see Oh No They Didn't!'s review by clicking here).
The opinions of these chosen few don't mean anything more or less than that, and a single day of screenings should, by no means, be used to say that an actress is going to win the Oscar when the landscape she'll be competing in hasn't even been laid out yet. It's just irresponsible and false amplification of an untested, tiny sliver of a much larger race with fixings that have yet to fall entirely into place.
It all amount to little more than jockeying for the pole position, to being able to shout one's own stance at Ground Zero, and our obsession with "being there" at the beginning instead of being in the moment when everything's unfolding is turning the Oscar race into a dull screaming match between voices that don't really matter.
As much as we'd like to gain control, to wrangle our favorites from the grasp of the studios who fuel their Oscar campaigns and steer them along the path to greatness, we lose sight of one thing: it's all in the hands of the Academy, and we must surrender control until the time to intervene is just right. Keep the shouting to a minimum until all the pieces are in play, no?
Posted in Awards, Film, Film Essays/Analysis and tagged 2014 oscar films, 2014 oscar movies, 2014 oscar season, A&E, Academy, Academy Awards, Amy Adams Big Eyes picture, Amy Adams five oscar nominations, amy adams new movie, amy adams next movie, Amy Adams Oscar nominations, Amy Adams sixth oscar nomination, Arts, arts & entertainment, Awards Season, awards season predictions, awards season screenings, Awards Watch Big Eyes, Big Eyes, Big Eyes Amy Adams, Big Eyes Movie photos, Big Eyes movie pictures, big eyes release date, big eyes screenings, Christoph Waltz, Christoph Waltz Big Eyes, christoph waltz new movie, entertainment, film, Films, Margaret Keane Amy Adams, Margaret Keane movie, Movie, movies, movies about artists, Oscar, oscar bait, Oscar Movies, Oscars, Tim Burton, Tim Burton Big Eyes, tim burton big eyes director, tim burton new movie, tim burton next movie, tim burton oscar nomination, tim burton oscar nominations, what is big eyes about, what was amy adams nominated for oscars, what will be nominated for oscars this year, when does big eyes open, Will Amy Adams be nominated for Big Eyes? on June 18, 2014 by Joey Nolfi. Leave a comment
In it for the Long Haul: 4 Things We Learned From Sunday's Oscars
Doubt is such a malicious feeling.
It liquifies, seeps through the tiniest of cracks, and willingly takes hold of our perspective and changes it in a heartbeat, and yet 2013's awards season seemed to be defined by it.
From September through this past Sunday's Oscars, it seemed as though the industry never reached a clearing of solace amidst the chaotic journey to the Academy Awards.
While Gravity, American Hustle, and sometimes even The Wolf of Wall Street seemed to lead the race at any given time, critical backlash or a guild surprise reintroduced doubt unto the emerging frontrunner's wings before they could fully spread.
We had many frontrunners, but we ultimately had none.
12 Years a Slave seemed, on paper, to be the film with Best Picture written all over it, having fallen in line with the Academy's diversifying image (publicizing increased minority membership while boasting its first black female president), which seemed to spell a clear path to victory for Steve McQueen's powerful historical drama, though it became a sitting duck for critics, audiences, and Academy members who don't like to be told what to do.
Instead, they fancy themselves as free-thinkers, seeing in the mirror rebels who buck the system instead of reenforcing it; they are, at times, both. Crash was a rebellious choice for Best Picture in 2004, though it fell in line with a general consensus to avoid the controversial. Films like The Artist, Slumdog Millionaire, and Argo reaffirmed the awards season status quo as generally-appealing Best Picture winners.
What, then, inspired Sunday's change of heart? 12 Years a Slave–a film about black characters, directed by a black man, with a black screenwriter and black stars–won Best Picture, breaking the longstanding streak of white filmmaker dominance.
There are four key things Sunday's Oscar ceremony teaches us about the new breed of Academy that made what is, for them, an incredibly bold choice:
1) The Academy listens to outside sources, but are not dependent upon them
With Best Picture-sealed closure to complete its narrative, the 2013 awards season arc can certainly be traced across racially-motivated factors. The Academy's diversifying membership (more women and minorities were invited last year than any other recent year) and changing leadership (Cheryl Boone Isaacs is the first black female president in Academy history) mirrored a shift in the industry. A general push for more diversity onscreen and behind it led many prominent films starring (Gravity, 20 Feet From Stardom) and made by (12 Years a Slave, The Butler, and Fruitvale Station) minorities to critical and commercial success.
12 Years a Slave fit the bill at a time when racial tensions are ever-present in a nation that sees the split between rich and poor, black and white, and gay and straight widen across countless social and political battles day after day. People look to film as both a reflection of and comment on the society around them, and a film that deals with issues of race in a historical context is the greatest tool of all to both probe the majority and provoke thought across the board.
The Academy had many choices thrust in their face by critics circles and guilds alike. The NYFCC wanted so desperately to champion American Hustle across the finish line first, while the guilds seemed to back Gravity. Gravity winning Best Picture would have made sense statistically, given that 7 total Oscars (including two key Best Picture indicators–Best Director and Best Film Editing) were awarded to Cuaron's masterpiece. In a split year (as the sages over at Awards Daily have consistently pointed out), the Best Director Oscar often goes to the more-respected film (in essence, the "better" of the two, for example: Ang Lee with Brokeback Mountain and Life of Pi) whereas Best Picture is generally favored to win as a crowd-pleaser that pushes as little buttons as possible. This year, Gravity was the latter, though the typical awards procession was reversed. Steve McQueen went home with a Best Picture Oscar instead of one for his directing.
What prompted this? It's nearly impossible to tell, aside from the fact that the Academy sought to forge the narrative that had been placed in front of them by audiences and industry tone. They consciously chose it.
2) The Academy–sometimes–thinks as a singular entity
You hear it all the time when predicting the Oscars: "you can't make generalizations. They're not a collective brain with a singular train of thought." This year, however, the opposite is most likely true.
12 Years a Slave was divisive, yet it was able to win on a preferential ballot, which many believed was impossible given its polarizing nature. To win on a preferential ballot, a film must acquire significant support from Academy members who rank the Best Picture nominees. Not only must it receive a substantial amount of #1 votes, it must also cover a fair share of #2 and #3 votes for the sake of the preferential redistribution process, which many thought was impossible given the film's nature and general Academy tastes (many, in anonymous interviews with trade publications, labeled it as "torture porn" and "hard to watch.").
All in all, the film seemed like either a #1 choice or a #9 choice; there was no middle ground. The film triumphed during a split year (which, for the aforementioned reasons, usually ends up following a certain pattern, with certain types of films winning in both the Director and Picture categories). This means that a conscious split in the votes was made by the majority as Gravity, for consistency and statistics' sake, by all means should have taken Best Picture given its huge wins in other categories.
A majority of Oscar voters made a conscious decision to deviate from the pattern, indicating a more generalized, universal way of thinking for them than is usually assumed.
3) The Academy simply is changing
Recognizing a film like 12 Years a Slave is huge for an Academy that boasts an overwhelmingly white male voting base. 77% of Academy members are men, and 94% of them are white. This essentially means that 12 Years a Slave still had to appeal to a white audience and gain white support, as—even if the entire non-white sect made 12 Years a Slave their #1 choice–6% of the vote is not enough to win Best Picture.
Has the racial and gender majority been reflected in the Academy's past choices? It's very difficult to back it up with statistics, but various interviews with Academy members (like Michael Musto's, published here) seems to indicate that things like the size of an actress' boobs and how good they looked in a particular dress are key factors of the voting process for some. That would also, if we're being general, describe why, on average, younger women tend to win acting awards alongside older men. Do they see the award as a prestigious boys' club that men must work their way into, while throwing sexually-charged votes at young, pretty women in sexualized roles (seriously, look at the characters that have won women Oscars here)?
12 Years a Slave was, undoubtedly, objectified for its racial implications, but its presence in the Best Picture race is justifiable beyond the awards season narrative it perpetuates. It's a finely-crafted film by a budding auteur, and contains as much aesthetic girth as it does thematically.
The Academy has, for the past few years, awarded the same types of films across the same genre with a very small racial angle. The Artist, Slumdog Millionaire, The King's Speech, and Argo are each dramatic–structurally simple–films with general appeal, universal plug-and-play plots, and push as little buttons as possible. 12 Years a Slave is an artful, graphic examination of American history that shies away from nothing. It forces itself off the page, forces us to consider a small part of the foundation of who we are as a nation, and begs us to see African-American history as more than just an old, flat, black-and-white photo within the pages of a textbook.
The film calls for attention on black filmmakers in an age where white men overwhelmingly dominate control over the camera. The film calls for attention on black stars and, therefore, increases a diverse image at the forefront of the industry. The film winning Best Picture indicates that the still predominantly-white, predominantly-male, predominantly-heterosexual Academy, who'd never awarded a film about slavery or "black" issues its top prize before, who'd only given 4% of total acting awards to black actors, was willing to amend its historical tendency to shy away from films about the minority (Brokeback Mountain, The Color Purple).
4) The Oscars are still entirely relevant
Argo currently upholds the legacy of Best Picture winners from the bargain bit at most major retailers (don't believe me? Find the nearest grocery store–you know, one that sells DVDs on that shoddy rack near the checkout–and survey the films offered. I've counted Argo on sale at approximately three different ones in the Pittsburgh area). The Artist, in a sad turn of reality mimicking art and the film's aesthetic, has quietly faded away. Ratings continue to climb for ABC's telecast, however, though there's an uneven weight of relevance distributed disproportionately between the ceremony itself and the films winning awards.
Sunday's show functioned almost entirely as a means to re-insert not only the telecast into contemporary pop culture–both literally (Ellen's selfie begged for interactivity) and figuratively–but also to cement the Academy's opinion as aware, timely, and forward-thinking.
Films like The King's Speech, Crash, The Artist, and Slumdog Millionaire range from mediocre to hugely entertaining and heartfelt. They're the type of film that's pleasing and easy to sit through. They're perfectly enjoyable, though they lack the gravitas and titanic statement that only a true "best of" pick should have. I'm not sure how long even the general public would have continued to take the Academy at least somewhat seriously if films like Argo continued to win Best Picture.
12 Years a Slave is a film with something to say. It doesn't exist as a fantasy amidst a society plagued with struggle. It will not have the same impact in Norway as it does in the United States. It is specific to our culture and to our history, whereas the last three Best Picture winners are fantasies which either glorify and embellish American culture and heroism (Argo and The Artist) or have little to do with American culture at all (The King's Speech).
It's a film that's both reflective and pensive of history and the present. If anything, it increases the presence of the minority voice and offers an alternative narrative to the ones dominated by white screenwriters and white actors. It's a film that resonates now as a genuinely fantastic work of art, but will also establish a legacy that legitimizes the Academy's taste as in-line with contemporary social and political sentiments.
It's a film that, to put it shortly, is in it for the long haul.
What, then, do the Oscars mean to us as a society, if anything at all? It's a self-congratulating, self-made cycle of greatness, but it's become a pedestal of visibility in an industry that's teetering on the edge of a revolution for greater inclusion of minorities across the board.
Is it ok to doubt the relevance of the Oscars? To doubt the impact they have on American art and culture? To deny that, even on the smallest level, art can help someone envision a platform for themselves they never thought possible?
This year, the Academy looked doubt in the face, harnessed it, and talked all of us into certainty for the future.
Posted in Awards, Film, Film Essays/Analysis, Uncategorized and tagged 12 years a slave, A&E, Academy Awards, Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, African American, Alfonso Cuaron, American Hustle, american society, AMPAS, arts & entertainment, Awards, Awards Season, Black films, cate blanchett, cinema, culture, film, Film Awards, Films, Gravity, heritage, jared leto, Lupita nyong'o, matthew mcconaughey, movie awards, movies, Oscar winners, Oscars, pop culture, race, steve mcqueen, The Academy, the oscars on March 6, 2014 by Joey Nolfi. Leave a comment
Academy Chooses for the Future: '12 Years a Slave' Takes Best Picture
Last night, the Academy thought forward and, at long last, chose a Best Picture winner for the long-haul. Below is a full list of Oscar winners (American Hustle went 0-10! Holla!). My in-depth recap will follow later this week.
Best Picture: 12 Years a Slave
Best Director: Alfonso Cuaron – Gravity
Best Actress: Cate Blanchett – Blue Jasmine
Best Actor: Matthew McConaughey – Dallas Buyers Club
Best Supporting Actress: Lupita Nyong'0 – 12 Years a Slave
Best Supporting Actor: Jared Leto – Dallas Buyers Club
Best Original Screenplay: Spike Jonze – Her
Best Adapted Screenplay: John Ridley – 12 Years a Slave
Best Film Editing: Gravity
Best Cinematography: Gravity
Best Costume Design: The Great Gatsby
Best Production Design: The Great Gatsby
Best Original Song: "Let It Go" from Frozen
Best Original Score: Gravity
Best Visual Effects: Gravity
Best Sound Mixing: Gravity
Best Makeup and Hairstyling: Dallas Buyers Club
Best Sound Editing: Gravity
Best Animated Feature: Frozen
Best Documentary Feature: 20 Feet From Stardom
Best Foreign-Language Film: The Great Beauty
Best Live-Action Short: Helium
Best Documentary Short: The Lady in Number 6
Best Animated Short: Mr. Hublot
Posted in Awards, Film, Uncategorized and tagged 12 years a slave, Academy Awards, AMPAS, Awards, Awards Season, cate blanchett, cinema, film, Film Awards, Gravity, jared leto, Lupita Nygon'o, matthew mcconaughey, movies, Oscar Season, Oscars, steve mcqueen on March 3, 2014 by Joey Nolfi. Leave a comment
Final Oscar Predictions: 'American Hustle' Keeps Dreaming, 'Gravity' Pulls Ahead
Gauging the months of speculation, bickering, championing, and–of course–whipping out your notebook to take notes in the middle of a crowded movie theater, it's unfathomable to think that it all amounts to a single night.
Tonight, the 86th Annual Academy Awards will make believers out of skeptics, perhaps proving that the Oscar voters we spend so much of our time putting faith in–because maybe they'll do the right thing this year–won't let us down. Maybe they didn't even entertain the idea of placing American Hustle at #1 on their ballots. Maybe they realized how laughably out of place Jennifer Lawrence's performance looks amidst the competition. Maybe Spike Jonze will tonight win his first screenwriting Oscar for Her's marvelous script over David O. Russell's barely-there skeleton of a screenplay.
We can dream, can't we?
It's so peculiar that a film that's so laughably inferior to the other films in the race relies so heavily on the very idea of lofty expectations and fantasy existence–dreams, if you will. American Hustle is about slimy characters who dream of a better life, whose grandiose expectations yield shifty crimes and short-lived highs, wrapped up in a flashy package, directed by a renowned filmmaker with an astounding Oscar track record (despite not having won a single statue). Russell managed to get his cast nominated in each of the four acting categories two years a in a row. His work represents the often never-realized dreams of the Academy's largest branch–the actors. But, it also invites its audience to feel superior to its characters in a sense that isn't endearing or tongue-in-cheek. We see them as scum, without much redemption.
It's no surprise, then, that the Screen Actors Guild–with large crossover membership with the Academy's 2o% acting membership–bestowed its top prize upon American Hustle. For so many, it embodies the spirit of the dreamer.
The dream for tonight, then, is that American Hustle goes down without a single win. It belongs nowhere near the Oscar race (save for Amy Adams' performance, which is justifiably better than one or two of her fellow nominees'). Scantily-clad women. A plot that's not really a plot so much as a meandering narrative that's not really about this, sometimes about that, and all the time about shouting, sex, and trying to justify itself as something greater than it actually is. In other words, it's typical Academy fare.
While Academy voters are still overwhelmingly old, white men (93% white, 77% male), that didn't stop them from listening to the industry around them when they voted Gravity and 12 Years a Slave into the race, with an astounding 10 and 9 nominations respectively.
Gravity is a British-American co-production driven by a middle-aged female performance, directed by a Mexican filmmaker, and 12 Years a Slave is directed by a black man, about "black issues," starring a predominantly black cast–you know, to them, this is only a "black" movie, and the majority of them have objectified the racial aspect of the film. It's great that minority representation is finding its way into the Oscar race, but does either film stand a chance in the grand scheme of the race?
If you're a by-the-book prognosticator, your answer must be yes. Gravity has, perhaps statistically, the strongest chance of winning going into the race. What it has going for it and against it:
– 10 total nominations, with a guarantee on approximately seven (Director, Cinematography, Sound Editing + Mixing, Visual Effects, Score, and Film Editing [If you're ticking off multiple boxes, logic would only tell you it's appropriate to notch a #1 vote in the Best Picture box]), two of which are generally claimed by eventual Best Picture winners (Director and Film Editing) – Strong support from guilds with crossover membership (Directors Guild of America win, Producers Guild of America tie with 12 Years a Slave)
– High-profile visibility in the months leading up to the Oscars (huge worldwide box-office, largely positive response from critics and audiences, which indicates general plug-and-play appeal that the Academy tends to go for)
– Lacks a screenplay nomination
12 Years a Slave, however, has sentiment and passion on its side which, as we've learned, is sometimes enough to win. 12 Years a Slave's awards summary:
-9 total nominations (though only a lock in a single category [Adapted Screenplay]) – Strong support from critics (the best-reviewed film of the year), though underwhelming box-office indicates lesser appeal across many markets
– Huge Golden Globe win for Best Picture – Drama in January, prior to Oscar voting
– Subject matter that turned many Academy members and audiences off (if you read around the trade papers and websites, many "anonymous" Oscar voters share similar sentiments regarding the film, saying that it was "too much" or "torture porn", in some cases)
– Inevitable racial objectification at the hands of Oscar voters (they see only the race issues, which precede the film's existence as a cinematic achievement and work of art)
History and logic would tell us that Gravity will win, though 12 Years a Slave seems to be riding along the narrative path Oscar voters are forging. If this is a split year between Best Picture and Best Director, 12 Years a Slave will most likely have upset in some of the lesser categories with stronger-than-expected support across the board from Oscar voters. If the tide turned in 12 Years a Slave's favor during the eleven-day voting process, we can expect it to take things like Best Film Editing and Best Supporting Actress away from Gravity and American Hustle respectively.
Of all the acting categories, its surprising that the one which isn't locked-up (Blanchett, Leto, and McConaughey are all too far out front to abdicate) will indicate Academy support across the board. I've had a sinking feeling that American Hustle will emerge as the surprise winner in many categories tonight, though Supporting Actress is the most likely. Jennifer Lawrence is a fabulous actress with a huge career ahead of her, though her performance in the film is stilted. The film overwhelms her. She's wooden, aware of the camera, and has a charismatic ability to have fun while onscreen; none of this, however, translates into a good performance. She's great fun to be in the presence of, though 30 seconds of Lupita Nyong'o's work in 12 Years a Slave puts everything Lawrence does in American Hustle to deep shame.
It seems that Oscar voters (and the industry in general) wants to forge a path to superstardom for Jennifer Lawrence, versus letting her find the work and the roles for herself. They want to be there at the beginning of the trajectory, they want to carve her ascension to the stars with gold. Last year was justifiably the right time for her. This year, it's simply embarrassing that she's nominated.
Tonight has the potential to be over shortly after it begins, as key categories are often announced early. Supporting Actress and Editing generally come before the halfway mark, and have the potential to set a course for the evening. If 12 Years a Slave is to take Best Picture, look for it to steal these awards away from the current frontrunners. On the technical side, be prepared for a 30-40 minute segment where nothing but Gravity racks up statues. It'll likely take a large chunk of aesthetic awards, but don't let that lull you into thinking it will win Best Picture by default.
It's difficult to imagine a film like Gravity not doing well on a preferential ballot. The race is essentially down to three films: American Hustle, Gravity, and 12 Years a Slave, each with vastly different appeal. Is a voter who puts American Hustle at #1 on their ballot likely to put Gravity at #2 or #3? Is a voter who places films that are likely to be eliminated in the first few rounds–like Philomena or Captain Phillips–likely to put 12 Years a Slave as their #2 or #3? I'm of course making the mistake of assuming that appeal remains the same across each of these films in terms of voter perspective. It's simply too difficult of a year to accurately predict.
It's easy to tell if a voter who liked Captain Phillips for the right reasons (it's critical of American domination) will like 12 Years a Slave, as they're both critical of and relevant to tensions of inequality with themes applicable to contemporary culture. If an Oscar voter understood Captain Phillips to be a rah-rah America tale of patriotic heroism, it's extremely difficult to accept that this person would put 12 Years a Slave high on their ballot.
It's a contentious year with no clear outcome. We can only, as we do every year, put our faith in a system of voting and a crop of voters we never trust, to make a decision that essentially means nothing in the grand scheme of life. After all, Crash winning over Brokeback Mountain did nothing but tarnish the Academy's image. The Color Purple's lack of a single Oscar win only hurt the voters who shunned it, not those of us who enjoy it to this day. Whether Gravity or 12 Years a Slave win the Oscar, their presence as quality films won't diminish.
Is it so much, though, to ask that the celebration of film be done right? Is there even a right way to do it?
We never lose faith that the Academy has the potential to do just that. It's enough faith to get us back into the awards season machine in a few months. After all, Toronto, Telluride, and Venice are right around the corner–sort of.
Predictions for the 86th Annual Academy Awards:
Best Actress in a Leading Role:
Best Actor in a Leading Role:
Matthew McConaughey – Dallas Buyers Club
Best Actress in a Supporting Role:
Lupita Nyong'o – 12 Years a Slave
Best Actor in a Supporting Role: Jared Leto – Dallas Buyers Club
Best Original Screenplay:
Spike Jonze – Her
Best Adapted Screenplay:
John Ridley – 12 Years a Slave
Best Documentary Short Subject: The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life
Best Live-Action Short Film:
Best Animated Short Film:
Get a Horse!
Best Original Score:
Steven Price – Gravity
Best Original Song:
"Happy" by Pharrell Williams – Despicable Me 2
Best Sound Editing:
Glenn Freemantle – Gravity
Best Sound Mixing:
Skip Lievsay, Niv Adiri, Christopher Benstead, Chris Munro – Gravity
Best Production Design:
Catherine Martin, Beverley Dunn – The Great Gatsby
Emmanuel Lubezki – Gravity
Best Makeup and Hairstyling:
Adruitha Lee, Robin Matthews – Dallas Buyers Club
Best Costume Design:
Catherine Martin – The Great Gatsby
Best Film Editing:
Alfonso Cuaron, Mark Sanger – Gravity
Best Visual Effects:
Tim Webber, Chris Lawrence, Dave Shirk, Neil Corbould – Gravity
Posted in Awards, Film, Opinionz, Uncategorized and tagged 12 years a slave, academy award nominees, Academy Awards, Alfonso Cuaron, American Hustle, Awards Season, cinema, directors, film, filmmakers, Films, Gravity, Jennifer Lawrence, Lupita nyong'o, Movie, movies, oscar blog, oscar blogger, Oscar Predictions, Oscar Season, Oscars on March 2, 2014 by Joey Nolfi. Leave a comment
Year of the Survivor: Top 25 Films of 2013 + My Personal Awards
We're all in the game to survive.
Film is often our societal mirror, an artistic outlet that serves as a sort of catharsis for those who make it as well as those who view it. Our own survival removes itself from the forefront of our momentary occupation in those dark hours spent in a movie theater. We transfer love, hope, and resilience to those onscreen.
The characters are us, and we are them.
We hope that they survive, and our happiness becomes theirs. There's a powerful balance between reality and fiction, and that's where the power of film lies.
2013 gave us a multitude of characters concerned with the art of preserving the current, restoring that which was lost, or pushing beyond their means to something greater than their life's trajectory would have ever encompassed otherwise. 2013 was the year of the survivor.
12 Years a Slave, The Butler, and Fruitvale Station tell us of the will to survive in a society that deems you unworthy. At a time when the bigger war of racial equality has long since died, small battles of minority injustice wage across our nation. Black teenagers are shot for playing "thug" music too loud. Homosexuals are subjected to religiously-fueled hatred and ignorance, some of which has crept its way into potential laws in states like Arizona and Kansas. Survival is not the same for each of us. Normalcy is not universally objective.
2013's films, however, put a face on so many minority issues.
12 Years a Slave, The Butler, and Fruitvale Station are not films merely directed by black men, rather they're stories that connect to the American culture as told through black characters and black filmmakers. They're not "white" stories directed by black men, nor are they "black" stories directed by white men, as we're so used to seeing. There's an authenticity here that works within and outside of Oscar season, that gives validity to the voice as it pours forth from the source of inequality in an industry where for every black man that directs a film, twenty white men are directing others.
The thing about 12 Years a Slave and Fruitvale Station is that they both are both based on actual events, yet bear cultural relevance to the society around them. 12 Years a Slave forces us to see slavery not as a black-and-white photo collection in a textbook, but as a tangible precursor to what we must deal with at a time where racial injustice is still a very real part of our culture (Fruitvale Station radiates a similar sentiment).
Survival for Dr. Ryan Stone in in Gravity takes the form of physical preservation and spiritual rebirth. In the film, we see a woman, lost in space, fighting for her physical existence while coming face to face with the spiritual turmoil brought on by the loss of her daughter years ago. By the film's end, she is reborn both physically and emotionally after being violently cradled, in a sense, by her astronomical surroundings, ready to take on the world as a toddler taking its first steps when she finally reaches earth.
The Broken Circle Breakdown echoes the pains of loss and redemption that Gravity unearths, exploring the relationship between a man, woman, and their terminally ill daughter, all strung together by their affinity for music. The film forces its characters to weigh the importance of personal conviction versus love for another, powerfully pitting them against their desire to give their lover what they want, but failing to secure what they need. Feeling helpless, hopeless, and beyond repair is something we're all familiar with, and The Broken Circle Breakdown makes the fragility of life and the burden of survival a beautiful disaster to see unfold.
Still, 2013 gave us films where characters succeed and prosper. Philomena, Short Term 12, and Stories We Tell weave intricate portraits of people broken down by their past and a failure to feel secure with "belonging" any place or with anyone, but who find strength through discovery of themselves through the eyes of others. The impact of one life on another is never more powerfully represented than it is in these films, and survival with peace of mind becomes essential to their subjects.
Then, of course, we have the documentaries which hold a mirror to us as an audience. As we watch a daring filmmaker, Sarah Polley, unearth the secrets of her family's history, we bathe in the fruits of her intensely personal labor that is Stories We Tell. With painstaking precision and care, Polley digs through her past to unearth a new reality for herself, one which essentially severed blood ties with the people she grew up with, as she discovers that the man who raised her is not biologically her father.
Blackfish taps into our innate desires to watch, to indulge in the visual, and to be entertained, but also brings us to question the basic human desire to conquer that which is bigger than us (in this case, SeaWorld's enslavement of aquatic mammals). The Act of Killing examines the cruelty of humans unto each other, and how we can at once be so concerned with the preservation of security–as we define it for ourselves–that we let darkness consume our very being.
Chances are that these films will cement themselves in popular, critical, and scholarly culture for years to come. However, the most important films of 2013 are those which tap into film's inherent nature as an art that discriminates against no one, as the power of storytelling is not specific to any one race, culture, or voice.
While 12 Years a Slave is an important film capping off a monumental year for black filmmakers in the industry, the importance of a film like Blue is the Warmest Color–by far the year's best–cannot be ignored. While the LGBT faces discrimination around the world, the film is a welcome celebration of the highs, lows, ugly, and beautiful bits of unabashed love that knows only passion and sincerity, not gender.
It's a film that doesn't so much as challenge us, but invites us to indulge in its splendor, plunging us into the depths of the relationship between a young woman, Adele, on the road to maturation (Adele Exarchopoulos) and Emma (Lea Seydoux) an artist with a budding career.
We go along for the ride as Adele's sexual and spiritual awakening unfolds. The film brilliantly frames her at once as a child–eating sloppily from plates her mother has prepared, bickering with classmates–and as a sexually-adventurous, fully-developed woman engaged in explicit sexual acts.
It's a highly visual film with complex cinematography, riding on the strengths of the lushness of its stars, its images, and emotional affect. It isn't afraid to be a film that you want to drink, to tempt you through feeling versus wordiness and intellect. It's a film you must surrender yourself to, and fall into its warm (sometimes painful) embrace to experience the journey of its characters.
While the film contains explicit sexual content, its treatment at the hands of American audiences speaks volumes about things our culture needs to change. Prudish conservative mentalities will see only the sex and not the passion. They will see only the gender and not the love. They will see only the faults of the characters, and not the foolish, charming power of becoming lost in another person, unable to control our desires or pull ourselves out of the depths even as we drown.
Blue is the Warmest Color is, at once, an uninhibited portrayal of a type of love and attraction which transcends gender, though it is an important film for the increasing presence of the LGBT community in all aspects of life, and it must be regarded and defined by its pure representation of its characters' relationship, as it's a film that doesn't insist upon defining itself by their gender.
An NC-17 rating (which it received in the United States) suggests that there's something evil within its three-hour runtime, that there's something unnaturally burdensome that the film carries and seeks to spread, but the only evil here is to let superficial factors (rating, lengthy runtime) dissuade you from enveloping yourself in the warm embrace of the finest film of the year.
Though Adele embarks on a journey to find clarity amidst a life of confusion, intense passion, regret, love lost, and emotional expenditure, the film cuts us loose from her without a clear resolution so much as reassurance that she's grasped the experience of it all, which finally sees her becoming an adult by the film's end. No more messy spaghetti curled around her lips. No more chewing with her mouth open. No more grappling with her insecurities as a child traversing the uneven terrain of maturity.
We gather that Adele, as she walks away from the frame after accepting that her lost lover has moved on, is on an uncertain path. Where she's going is anyone's guess, but we are certain that, unlike a stubborn child, she has learned something. But, most of all, she's recognized and (somewhat) acquired the tools she needs to keep on surviving, even if a small part of her heart was lost in the battle.
Top 25 Best Films of 2013:
25 – 20 Feet From Stardom
24 – All Is Lost
23 – Spring Breakers
22 – Enough Said
21 – Captain Phillips
20 – Dallas Buyers Club
19 – Blackfish
18 – Fruitvale Station
17 – Prisoners
16 – The Place Beyond the Pines
15 – Frances Ha
14 – Stoker
13 – Blue Jasmine
12 – 12 Years a Slave
11 – The Hunt
10 – Stories We Tell
9 – Nebraska
8 – The Wolf of Wall Street
7 – The Act of Killing
6 – Her
5 – Inside Llewyn Davis
4 – Gravity
3 – Short Term 12
2 – The Broken Circle Breakdown
1 – Blue is the Warmest Color
1) Alfonso Cuaron – Gravity
2) Martin Scorsese – The Wolf of Wall Street
3) Sarah Polley – Stories We Tell
4) Joel & Ethan Coen – Inside Llewyn Davis
5) Felix Van Groeningen – The Broken Circle Breakdown
6) Harmony Korine – Spring Breakers
Best Actor:
1) Leonardo DiCaprio – The Wolf of Wall Street
2) Johan Heldenbergh – The Broken Circle Breakdown
3) Mads Mikkelsen – The Hunt
4) Matthew McConaughey – Dallas Buyers Club
5) Oscar Isaac – Inside Llewyn Davis
6) Hugh Jackman – Prisoners
Best Actress:
1) Cate Blanchett – Blue Jasmine
2) Adele Exarchopoulos – Blue is the Warmest Color
3) Veerle Baetens – The Broken Circle Breakdown
4) Meryl Streep – August: Osage County
5) Julia Louis Dreyfus – Enough Said
6) Lauren Ambrose – About Sunny
Best Supporting Actor:
1) Michael Fassbender – 12 Years a Slave
2) Jared Leto – Dallas Buyers Club
3) Keith Stanfield – Short Term 12
4) Casey Affleck – Ain't Them Bodies Saints
5) Bruce Dern – Nebraska
6) Jonah Hill – The Wolf of Wall Street
Best Supporting Actress:
1) Lea Seydoux – Blue is the Warmest Color
2) Julia Roberts – August: Osage County
3) Lupita Nyong'o – 12 Years a Slave
4) Kristin Scott Thomas – Only God Forgives
5) Oprah Winfrey – Lee Daniels' The Butler
6) Scarlett Johansson – Don Jon
1) Her
2) The Wolf of Wall Street
3) Inside Llewyn Davis
4) Frances Ha
5) Blue Jasmine
6) Nebraska
1) Gravity
2) Stoker
3) Blue is the Warmest Color
5) To the Wonder
6) The Grandmaster
7) Upstream Color
2) 12 Years a Slave
5) All Is Lost
Best Foreign Film:
2) The Broken Circle Breakdown
3) The Act of Killing
4) The Hunt
6) Bastards
2) Stories We Tell
3) Blackfish
4) 20 Feet From Stardom
2) Pacific Rim
3) The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
4) Man of Steel
5) This Is The End
5) American Hustle
5) The Great Gatsby
Posted in Awards, Film, Uncategorized and tagged 2013, abdellatif kechiche, Adele Exarchopoulos, Awards, Awards Season, Blue is the Warmest Color, cinema, film, Films, France, french cinema, lea seydoux, lists, Movie, movies, Top 10, Top 10 Films, Top 10 lists on March 1, 2014 by Joey Nolfi. Leave a comment
I Thought Oscar Nominee '20 Feet From Stardom' Was Down With Sisterhood, Until…
One of the finest documentaries released last year, Morgan Neville's Oscar-nominated 20 Feet From Stardom, quickly establishes itself as a celebration of song, passion, and sisterhood.
It's a film that, like most great documentaries, takes us beyond the veneer of something we so often take for granted. Background artists (whether in film or music), by all means (given their proper name), are relegated to second-tier status during any major performance. Extras create a believable scene around the star, and backing vocalists bolster the solo performance.
20 Feet From Stardom takes us on an almost fantastical journey through the lives of several vocalists who've made a living making as the building blocks of performance. Darlene Love, Lisa Fischer, Tata Vega, Merry Clayton, and Judith Hill have shared the stage with the likes of Mick Jagger, Michael Jackson, and Sting. Their names aren't synonymous with solo success but, through 20 Feet From Stardom's lens, their stories are beautiful, their presence justified to an audience who, in any other context, would've let them blend into the shadows of the stage.
While the film is a marvelous exercise in allowing us to glimpse into another facet of the minority voice, it's also a celebration of the unity–an almost subcultural family–that these singers formed. They share experience, talent, and an adoration of the craft they've perfected over the years. We're watching artists who've overcome the same racial, social, and industry biases as those who receive top billing on the marquee.
Neville makes it clear–like a great documentary filmmaker should–through the juxtaposition of images and patient observation, that these women are, in many cases, more talented vocalists than the singers they stand behind. We don't need to be told much of anything, as a great documentarian establishes his status quo without words, rather through the overall establishment of a quiet narrative ideology within his work.
Neville, for the most part, allows his subjects' stories to speak for them. No words exist that could possibly match the tragedy of an seeing artists such as Claudia Lennear and Lisa Fischer teaching Spanish and standing in line at the DMV. Our judgments aside, however, the artistry is what's important to them, and there's a sisterhood, a companionship, and a yearning for comfort and validation that unites these women in their shared struggle for fulfillment across different avenues–musically or otherwise.
Neville's camera is present, yet never prodding. We feel as if these stories are unfolding with us along for the ride, like a child curled up at the lap of a grandparent, drinking in the history, the experience, and years' worth of pride layed out before us.
There's a scene, however, which nearly derails the entirety of Neville's work, that removes the camera's appreciation for its subjects and replaces it with a sharp, judgmental tone that doesn't jive with the rest of the work.
A large portion of the film is spent so lovingly engaged–like a hapless soul love-drunk in the presence of a voluptuous other–in his subjects' work, that there's little judgment that seeps through the cracks, until Neville takes a very noticeable jab at a contemporary artist.
Toward the end of the film, we're introduced to Hill, a backup singer who was prepping for Michael Jackson's This Is It tour shortly before he passed. After Jackson's death, Hill performed at his funeral and found momentary attention from the media. Her image was defined by association with a superstar. She was a backup singer famous for being a backup singer, though she values her individuality as an artist. Her desire to go solo is made clear, and she consistently notes that she rejected every touring or stage background singing gig she was offered so as not to become pigeonholed by the industry.
Shortly thereafter, we're shown a clip of Jay Leno introducing Kylie Minogue as a performer on his show, with Hill singing backup. Hill claims countless people dismissed her for lowering herself to such a position, and that she even tried to drastically alter her appearance (with a wig and heavy makeup) in hopes of not being recognized.
It was undoubtedly a move that would pay Hill's bills, and Minogue clearly shares a different career and artistic trajectory than Hill, though Neville's inclusion of it begs the audience to compare both women's talents, and ultimate come to the conclusion that Hill is superior to another.
A film which seems to value and explore the alternative to the norm, the diss is surprisingly off-key, demeaning whatever path Minogue took to achieve her success.
The jab not only upsets the tone of companionship and celebration of artistry the film seeks to establish, but is also unfair to Hill, as it forces the audience to consider the legitimacy of what she's saying about desiring to be a true artist instead of a check-hungry star. This forces us to then carry judgments over to other aspects of Hill's career. She appeared on NBC's "The Voice" just last year, though Neville wisely does not include any mention of it in 20 Feet From Stardom. Is that not, from the perspective of the filmmaker who chose to diss Kylie Minogue, similarly deplorable for a true "artist"?
It's here that the technical seams begin to show. When a documentarian's hand is evident, the world we're soaking up onscreen starts to unravel. Neville's opinion on artists and their genre is irrelevant, and the focus is momentarily distracted from the well-made points he established earlier in the film.
It opens the film and its subjects up to unnecessary criticism. It's a dark cloud of negativity and personal opinion that momentarily takes the film from celebrating artistic value and struggle to elevating itself above an alternate facet of the art form we've spent the last 90 minutes celebrating.
Individuality, on the other hand, is something Hill should by all means strive to savor. The film hits upon so many meaningful topics of survival. Bills need to be paid, but singularity in any form is natural to human existence. Whether hearing their voices on radio hits without shared credit with the main artists or watching solo projects circle countless drains, that's where the beauty of the film shines; the persistence of art and individuality comes at a price, though happiness doesn't have to go down with the ship.
2013 was a strong year for documentaries. Affect turned to action for many who viewed the staggering amount of quality documentaries released last year. Blackfish stirred a sleeping public to action, while films like Stories We Tell and The Act of Killing inspired intense introspection as they deeply explored their subject matter.
Tomorrow's Academy Awards will likely tip the balance of a heavily-competitive year for documentary films in the favor of one. 20 Feet From Stardom and The Act of Killing are the likeliest contenders to win the Oscar. Experts predict The Act of Killing, though the broad appeal of 20 Feet From Stardom fits nicely within the narrative of the season. 20 Feet From Stardom puts minority voices put on display, much the way 12 Years a Slave amplifies the racial tensions we still endure in our society to this day.
The accessibility of 20 Feet From Stardom works in its favor. Its editing and technical construction are brilliant but, like a fictional narrative, however, its constructed nature seeps through the cracks and reveals various inconsistencies, and for that it'll likely be singing backup for The Act of Killing come Sunday evening.
Posted in Awards, Film, Film Essays/Analysis, Uncategorized and tagged 20 Feet From Stardom, Academy Awards, AMPAS, Awards Season, cinema, Darlene Love, Docs, Documentaries, documentary, Documentary Filmmaking, film, Judith Hill, Kylie Minogue, movies, Oscars, The Academy Awards on March 1, 2014 by Joey Nolfi. Leave a comment


text:
Tag Archives: Carolyn Le
Storytelling in Words & Pictures: A Creative Classroom with Melissa Northway and Carolyn Le
Storytelling in Words & Pictures
Children's author, Melissa Northway, and Illustrator, Carolyn Le to Lead
"Hands-on" Sunday Afternoon Fun for the Whole Family at the Chuck Jones Center for Creativity
Costa Mesa, CA: Write and illustrate your own short story at the Chuck Jones Center on Sunday, April 24 from 1 to 3 PM with children's book author, Melissa Northway (Penelope the Purple Pirate, Clarence and the Traveling Circus), and illustrator, Carolyn Le (Clarence and the Traveling Circus) nurturing your creativity. This "Creative Classroom" is a free and open to the public event. Space is limited, RSVP a must. 949-660-7793 x 107 or Programs@ChuckJonesCenter.org. The Center is located at 3321 Hyland Ave., Suite A, Costa Mesa, CA 92626 in Orange County's hip new retail destination, South Coast Collection or "SoCo".
"The Creative Classroom" workshops, currently scheduled one each quarter, offer children and adults alike, a safe and nurturing platform for exploring and exercising their creative muscles," said Craig Kausen, chairman of the Center and Chuck Jones's grandson. "We are at a critical turning point in our economy, from a manufacturing to a service economy and what business leaders are looking for in new hires is the ability to think creatively. One in six new jobs being created in California today is in the creative industries."
The goal of the Creative Classroom workshops offered by the Chuck Jones Center is to encourage students to find within themselves a world where the laws of gravity don't apply; a world where the space-time continuum can be altered; a world where they're in control to break the rules. Imagine then, applying that kind of creative thinking to everyday life. How would they solve the problem if they weren't constrained by rules, expectations, and assumptions that are imposed on us and we impose on ourselves?
About Melissa Northway:
Melissa Northway was inspired to write children's picture books after her daughter was born in 2006. She joined the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) to find out how to make her dream of publishing a children's picture book come true. The journey was long and tons of work, but in January 2011, her first storybook app, Penelope the Purple Pirate, was released through her company Polka Dots Publishing and app developer PicPocket Books. She has published three children's books that have received numerous awards that her daughter thinks are pretty cool! Her books are available on the iTunes store, Amazon and Barnes & Noble and she is currently working on her fourth children's book. She is also the creator and editor of the lifestyle website Dandelion Moms. You can find her at www.dandelionmoms.com and www.melissanorthway.com
About Carolyn Le:
Carolyn draws on the sunny California days, and her love of storytelling to create her watercolor paintings. She has twice received a first-place Illustration Award for her portfolio from the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators Editor's Day, have received a Merit Award from the Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles and have had her work shown in galleries in Los Angeles and London. The illustrations for her first picture book, Clarence and the Traveling Circus, received a Reader's Choice Award for Illustration. Currently, Carolyn is writing and illustrating her own picture books and dreaming of ways to make her secret wish of having the power to fly come true.
This entry was posted in Chuck Jones Center for Creativity, Events: Past, Present & Future, Inspiration, Other Artists of Note, Press Releases/Media Coverage and tagged Carolyn Le, Creative classroom, free and open to the public, illustration, Melissa Northway, storytelling, things to do in Orange County, workshop on March 29, 2016 by Robert Patrick.


One of my worst blunders of 2010 was selling Priceline.com (PCLN) in the low $200s after booking a very nice gain. In the 15 or so months since, it has rallied another 150%ish. As Homer S would say "DOH!". I would think at some point the expectations would be too high for this company to continue to beat, but that day has yet to come. The company just reported a $2.66 v $2.45 expectation on a 38.5% year over year revenue growth rate. International sales, which are now almost half of the business, were blockbuster! (+80%) They just moved guidance well over analysts $4.40 for next quarter as well.
The Group had revenues in the 1st quarter of $809.3 million, a 38.5% increase over a year ago. The Group's international operations contributed revenues in the 1st quarter of $389.1 million, an 80% increase versus a year ago (approximately 79% on a local currency basis).
The Group's gross profit for the 1st quarter was $505.8 million, a 58.5% increase from the prior year. International operations contributed gross profit in the 1st quarter of $388.2 million, an 81% increase versus a year ago (approximately 79% growth on a local currency basis).
Non-GAAP net income in the 1st quarter was $137.0 million, a 57.1% increase versus the prior year. Non-GAAP net income was $2.66 per diluted share, compared to $1.70 per diluted share a year ago. First Call analyst consensus for the 1st quarter 2011 was $2.44 per diluted share.
"In the 1st quarter, the Group benefitted from strong growth in our global hotel business, particularly at Booking.com and Agoda," said Jeffery H. Boyd, Priceline President and Chief Executive Officer. "Room nights booked grew by 55.8% and our international gross bookings grew by 79% compared to prior year first quarter. The Group's hotel business continues to benefit from improving ADRs, a continuing shift from offline to online bookings, increased penetration of core European and North American markets and outstanding growth in new markets throughout the Asia-Pacific region and South America."
"The Group's global rental car operations grew rental car days booked by 64.7% in the 1st quarter 2011 as compared to the prior year. A significant portion of this growth can be attributed to the Group's acquisition of TravelJigsaw and its international car hire operations, which continues to grow at impressive rates. Priceline.com's airline ticketing business returned to positive growth in the 1st quarter, with a 2.1% gain in ticket sales and improving growth in opaque ticket sales."
Year-over-year increase in total gross travel bookings of approximately 53% - 58%.
Year-over-year increase in international gross travel bookings of approximately 76% - 81% (an increase of approximately 53% - 58% on a local currency basis).
Year-over-year increase in domestic gross travel bookings of approximately 8% to 13%.
Year-over-year increase in revenue of approximately 36% to 41%.
Year-over-year increase in gross profit of approximately 57% to 62%.
Non-GAAP EBITDA of approximately $310 million to $320 million.
Non-GAAP net income of between $4.70 and $4.90 per diluted share.