District 9, the trailer
District 9 opens this week. It’s getting great buzz and reviews. The above District 9 trailer can be found, like all of your movie trailers, on Wimgo.com.
Here’s The Oklahoman’s George Lang’s review. More from Lang at his StaticBlog.
After reading more about this movie, I discovered it’s based on “Alive in Joburg.” Here’s more from newteevee.tv:
But if you still aren’t sure if it’s for you, skip watching the trailer — instead, check out the 2005 short film it’s based on: Alive in Joburg, directed by District 9 helmer Neill Blomkamp (who also directed Tempbot, and was going to direct the now-on-hold Halo feature film). Alive is District 9 writ small, a documentary-style look at what would have happened if, in 1990, Johannesburg, South Africa’s apartheid system was complicated by the arrival of some truly illegal aliens.
See the six minute documentary below, from Google Video.
Do You Know OU?
I taped three segments with OU women’s basketball star Whitney Hand this morning. The Oklahoman and NewsOK are sponsoring the segments that will play on the big screen during football games at Gaylord Memorial Stadium.
The “Do You Know OU?” segments will be about 60 seconds in running time and feature facts about OU that you may or may not know.
I met the Learfield Sports/Sooner Sports Properties crew at the Sam Noble Museum early this morning. Whitney and I first taped a segment in front of the Pentaceratops (glad Whitney got that line and not me). First taping took only 15 minutes so I only saw the dino portion of the museum. Looked pretty cool. They had to turn off the dino roars in the background for our taping.
From there we went to the stadium and the training room, which is below the stadium. After a wardrobe change, the crew had me in the Hydroworx, an oversized, fancy hot tub with a treadmill in the bottom. Whitney explained the benefits of this machine and how it helps athletes recover from injuries.
And then we marched onto the field to tape a segment on the Pride of Oklahoma. I wore a too-small jacket from the band, Whitney had on a hat.
Big props to the Learfield/Sooner Sports crew. They had their act together and were great to work with. All three tapings were wrapped up in about 90 minutes. Whitney did an amazing job of nailing her lines every time. She should think about broadcasting as a future after hoops. She’d be a natural.
Rick Bayless advances to Top Chef Masters finals
I’ve watched Top Chef since season two. Not afraid to admit that. The production quality is quick and entertaining. The chefs themselves are usually interesting. I like that Top Chef keeps the focus on the food and the dramas between the chefs in the kitchen – instead of the bedroom like a lot of reality shows.
Top Chef Masters to me isn’t quite as entertaining, but Rick Bayless has been fun to watch. Bayless is an OKC native who specializes in Mexican cooking and is a big dog with two restaurants in Chicago.
Wednesday night, Bayless advanced to the Top Chef Masters finals which will be August 19 on Bravo at 9:15 pm.
I did a debrief with The Oklahoman’s Food Editor Dave Cathey, aka The Food Dude, aka @thefooddood. Cathey says the “Vegas favorite” would be Hubert Keller, a French chef.
Our friend Ryan Parrott, owner and chef at Iguana Grill in downtown OKC, will host a watch party on Wednesday. We are planning some live coverage and video from the scene. Cathey says Bayless has agreed to call in after the show.
Now on YouTube, Local News
Interesting read in today’s NY Times.
With its ability to collect articles and sell advertisements against them, Google has already become a huge force in the news business — and the scourge of many newspapers. Now its subsidiary YouTube wants to do the same thing to local television.
