Star Trek

I saw the preview for Star Trek while waiting for a Clive Owen movie to start, The International. The International was a pile of steaming dog turd, but the preview for Star Trek hinted at something far more exciting and watchable. I never mentioned my suspicions to anyone, for fear of being poked with a stick while onlookers mumbled the dirty "Trekkie" word in my direction. I let the thoughts of interest slide, and ignored any urges to investigate further.

Then, I saw that the movie was out in South Africa. I could go watch it. I told my girlfriend, and told her sister, and said "let's go see what's showing", knowing fully well that I would use my manly beard to influence their decision, and that we would go watch Star Trek. I watched it. My suspicions were confirmed in 126 minutes of sheer awesomeness - Star Trek is the greatest movie of all time, ever. There, I said it. I'm not ashamed.

You disagree? Have you watched it? If yes, and you still disagree, then shut up and go read someone else's blog (right after clicking a money making advert link, that is). If not, then reserve judgement until you have seen it, and until it has blown your mind hole. If you are one of those "Trekkies" and your complaints are about the inaccuracies surrounding the film, then I give you two statements:

1. It is the year 2009. Things change (and get better). Deal with it.
2. Shut up and go read a fellow Trekkie's blog.

For the rest of you, who are going to continue reading this post, I give you my mind-hole-blown thoughts on the movie, and why it has me reeling in childish giddy-excitement every time I think of it.

Firstly, I'll start by saying that the recent launch and success of the STS-125 Shuttle Atlantis repair mission played a huge part in my interest in the film - not in my interest to actually go and watch the film, but in the reignition of my interest in space in general. Twitter played a large role in that too, so you could say that twitter made me love Star Trek - a terrible crime if there ever was one! But back to point - the updates from Mike Massimino and NASA got my interest back and I did plenty of reading up on space, and planets, and the shuttle and Hubble and theory around faster-than-light-travel and all things included therein.

My next point regarding the movie is a standard thought I've had for the last few films I've watched (particularly new Hollywood movies) - the movies assume I am stupid and need absolutely everything explained to me, for fear I won't grasp the mind-numbing plot and won't spend my well earned cash on the brand. Well, Star Trek does a good job of avoiding the mistake of filling in every possible detail of certain themes - it skips large chunks of our protagonist's life without missing anything; we are well aware of what makes up his character by the time the story begins in earnest.

Our main protagonist was well cast (James T. Kirk, for those of you who have been living in a cave for the last 40 years), I felt - the girls will certainly love him, and he has that Hollywood "cowboy" manner that is common in movies like Top Gun; an easily likeable, but also troubled, character. The rest of the cast is also well done, easily recognisable for the fans, and fresh and updated so that the popular youth who have never watched Star Trek will be interested. Spock is a fantastic portrayal as well, so hats off to the casting crew for picking him.

The storyline itself is pretty cool, it's not dull and is not too obvious, and it gets away from any need to stick to Star Trek guidelines by throwing in some time travel and alternate universe theories - always a good bet. There are the typical cliches that one needs in order to keep with the Star Trek franchise, and I'm happy to say they're well done and not boring or unrealistic. The amount of times the young Jim Kirk gets the crap beaten out of him combined with the number of times he finds himself clinging to a cliff or ledge by his fingertips is a typical Hollywood move, but it makes for an entertaining, action packed watch in any case.

The visuals are awesome, and the sound is great too - in a surround sound cinema the loud sounds of space travel and fist fights set the mood for a great watch - I found myself on the edge of my seat, jaw hanging, utterly absorbed in the action for large parts of the film. The awe of space and space travel, new planets and things like Space Tethers and free-fall space diving made for a totally believable, absorbing, action packed, nail biting movie. There have been few movies that have kept me so engrossed that I barely touch my popcorn-smartie mix, and Star Trek was one of them.

It may not have the level of character development and thought provoking plot twists that critics need, but any seven year old boy watching this will be running around on flying motorbikes, dodging the event horizon of black holes made by red matter, and greeting their friends with the "live long and prosper" sign for much time to come. I felt like a seven year old kid watching Star Trek, and I insist that you won't find a more entertaining movie anywhere for a long time.

Watch this movie - resistance is futile.

Twitter Space

The recent meteoric rise of Twitter has influenced my life greatly in the last few weeks, for several reasons. One of them is the sheer addictiveness of the whole thing - it's easy, write a quick status update (my favourite part of Facebook anyway), click send, and watch a few friends update their statuses too. Add replies, hashtags, followers and Twitpic, and you have a whole community of people who are both completely normal, and a bit techno-geeky.

Another reason is the interesting combination of people who use it, with many celebrities and porn stars joining the fad, along with major news agencies and political campaignists, and your run of the mill average Joe Blogger. The topics are interesting, and there is the usual gathering of smut and crude spam crap that naturally follows all internet societies, but it is for the most part entertaining, enlightening and interesting enough to get me through boring meetings.

Then, on cue, enter a world first (well, a universe first, if you like) as astronaut Mike Massimino becomes the first person to tweet from space. Fellow tweeters (in his field) are NASA and soon to be in space astronaut Mark Polansky. There are others, but these are the ones I follow (if you're suddenly itching to hear what I have to tweet about, I can be found here). Tweeting about astronaut training, the days leading up to the launch of Atlantis on STS-125 on the last ever repair mission to the Hubble telescope, and then tweeting about the spacewalks and missions in space, and now their return, these tweeple have kept me glued to my computer screen.

I have always been fascinated by space, but following their tweets (also where I learned of the existence of www.nasa.gov/ntv) brought the whole experience right home. The images from NASA have been awesome, as have their regular updates on the missions, and I found myself wondering what it would be like to be an astronaut and if I could actually be one - thoughts I'm sure most boys have at some point - and it is possible (though difficult for South Africans, especially deaf ones like me) and more easily accessible than most would realise.

It has been a thoroughly revitalising experience for me, to see technology and a fast growing fad be used to get public interest growing in projects that people might otherwise not see or hear about. I would probably not have watched the launch of Atlantis live on NASA TV if it weren't for Twitter, and by extension neither would the girls in my house. It's awesome that things like these are made easy to find, and while it makes the world a smaller place, it gives us knowledge we'd otherwise have trouble finding, and that makes it more awesome.

The other interesting twitter experience I've had is following the account of Liverpool TV. The journalists regularly tweet about stories or promotions on the website, or generally interesting facts of life in and around Liverpool Football Club and the goings on. With tweets about training, interviews, youth and reserve team matches, team reports, press box lunches and generally the laughs surrounding the club and it's employees, they're a must follow for me. I know more about the club and players now than ever before, and my natural thirst for LFC knowledge is sated by the advent of a cool idea, Twitter.

It certainly has changed my life, even if it has just given me somewhere to post useless updates and read up on interesting bits of inside info. I never considered myself to be completely conversant with all bits of technology and it's uses, or to be a techno-geeky dude, but if these circles are what I'm confined to when I use Twitter, then I'm cool with that. I tweet. Do you?