Watch: 3 Must-See Trailers

Ryan Gosling stars as a stunt driver who moonlights as a wheelman for criminals.  When he agrees to help the husband of his beautiful neighbor (Carey Mulligan), matters go awry and he must protect the neighbor and her son.  Christina Hendricks, Bryan Cranston, Ron Perlman, Oscar Isaac, and Albert Brooks also star in Drive, directed by Nicolas Winding Refn.

Release date: September 16, 2011

Our take based solely on the trailer: Steve McQueen’s Bullitt x The French Connection x Playstation’s Driver x Winding Refn’s dark directorial style + one angry Gosling = cinematic gold

Sidenote: If you’ve never seen any of Winding Refn’s previous films we highly suggest watching Bronson, The Pusher Trilogy and Valhalla Rising. 

In Another Earth, Rhoda Williams (Brit Marling), a bright young woman accepted into MIT’s astrophysics program, aspires to explore the cosmos. A brilliant composer, John Burroughs (William Mapother), has just reached the pinnacle of his profession and is about to have a second child. On the eve of the discovery of a duplicate Earth, tragedy strikes and the lives of these strangers become irrevocably intertwined.

Release date: In select theaters now

Our take based solely on the trailer: This sci-fi drama that focuses on parallel worlds as it relates to Multiverse theory should stir both your heart and head.

The first full trailer for season 2 of AMC’s The Walking Dead, which premiered at the show’s Comic-Con panel, gives us four intense minutes of footage. At the panel, producer Frank Darabont said that season 2 will pick up right where season 1 left off, with no time jump, and Walking Dead comic creator Robert Kirkman promised “it will blow your mind.”

Premiere date: October 16, 2011

Our take based solely on the trailer: Let’s just hope the zombie apocalypse doesn’t hit before the second season of The Walking Dead is over.

TV Eye: All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace

Via the documentary filmmaker Adam Curtis:

This series of films investigates how people have been colonized by the machines they have built.

Although they may not realize it, the way many people see everything in the world today is through the eyes of the computers. Not just politics and the economy — but also in the way bodies, minds, and even the whole of the natural world are perceived.

The underlying argument is that people have given up a dynamic political model of the world — the dream of changing things for the better — for a static machine ideology that says everyone is a component in a system, and that the aim is to manage these systems and keep them stable.

From the utopian visions of the worldwide web to the idea of an interconnected global economic system, to the dream of balanced ecosystems, all these ideas share an underlying machine vision of organization and order.

The films tell an extraordinary range of stories: from novelist Ayn Rand and her tragic love affairs to the dreams and the frightening reality of the hippie communes; from the brutal politics of the Belgian Congo to the doomsday computer model behind the rise of modern environmentalism; from the lonely suicide in a London squat of the mathematical genius who invented the selfish gene theory to Alan Greenspan and his faith in a new kind of global economic system. And there’s also the computer model of the eating habits of the Pronghorn antelope.

The series argues that by embracing this new machine ideology something very precious has been given up: the idea of progress and political struggle to change the world for the better.

Episode One – Love and Power (premiered May 23, 2011 on BBC Two):

This is the story of the dream that rose up in the 1990s that computers could create a new kind of stable world. They would bring about a new kind global capitalism free of all risk and without the boom and bust of the past. They would also abolish political power and create a new kind of democracy through the internet where millions of individuals would be connected as nodes in cybernetic systems – without hierarchy.

The film tells the story of two perfect worlds. One is the small group of disciples around the novelist Ayn Rand in the 1950s. They saw themselves as a prototype for a future society where everyone could follow their own selfish desires. The other is the global utopia that digital entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley set out to create in the 1990s. Many of them were also disciples of Ayn Rand. They believed that the new computer networks would allow the creation of a society where everyone could follow their own desires, yet there would not be anarchy. They were joined by Alan Greenspan who had also been a disciple of Ayn Rand. He became convinced that the computers were creating a new kind of stable capitalism – “Like a New Planet”, he said.

But the dream of stability in both worlds would be torn apart by the two dynamic human forces – love and power.

As always when watching films on Youtube this is broken into multiple parts. We’ve embedded parts one and two of episode one with links to the other three parts below the videos. We’ve also included links to all five parts of episode two, which is entitled The Use and Abuse of Vegetational Concepts. The third and final episode - The Monkey in the Machine and the Machine in the Monkey - airs this Monday on BBC Two.

Part 3 – Part 4 – Part 5

Episode Two: The Use and Abuse of Vegetational Concepts

Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3 – Part 4 – Part 5

Watch: Bruce Lee’s Lost Interview from 1971

The Lost Interview: Bruce Lee on The Pierre Berton Show, circa 1971 — the legendary martial artist’s only in-depth television interview.

“Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless – like water. Now you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup, you put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle, you put it in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.”

Watch: How TV Ruined Your Life

According to BBC 2:

Ever wondered why life doesn’t measure up to those youthful lofty expectations?

From love and money to fear and progress, Charlie Brooker explores a different universal theme each week as this six-part series attempts to explain where it all went wrong and just how wildly the TV and movie ideal differs from life’s grim reality.

Marking the point where the mad daydreams of TV and the sorry reality of real life collide, the series employs a mixture of archive footage, sketches and interviews that will have you wiping away tears of laughter while nodding in recognition, which means you’ll probably have your eye out if you’re not careful.

The first episode’s theme is “Fear”, an emotion we Americans know all too well. Watch it below. Links to the other episodes are at the bottom of this post.

Episode #2: “The Lifecycle”, watch part 1 and part 2

Episode #3: “Aspiration”, watch part 1 and part 2

Episode #4: “Love”, watch part 1 and part 2

Episode #5: “Progress” comes out March 1, 2011.

TV Eye: Grammy’s 2011 Recap

Let me first preface our recap by saying no one at The Rathaus actually watched the Grammy’s live. Why should we sit through an entire mostly forgettable three hour broadcast when the internet can easily reduce the entire event into bite-sized morsels of must-see footage and photos? So without further adieu here are the most entertaining and relevant links we’ve found so far from the post-Grammy buzz.

• Lea Michelle of Glee fame introduces Lady Antebellum by saying “grammy wimmers” instead of “winners”
• Gwyneth Paltrow, also of Glee fame I guess, totally ruined an otherwise awesome performance of Cee-Lo Green’s “Fuck Forget You” that included Muppets and Cee-Lo wearing an Elton John-like turkey costume.
• Bruno Mars, B.O.B. and our girl Janelle Monáe absolutely killed in what was the best performance of the night by far. When did Bruno Mars become Jackie Wilson and when is he going to stop making boring pop music in favor of some soul/R&B?
• Lady Gaga showed up in/as an egg which I assume is a reference to Mork and Mindy. This is the best tweet (ever) about Lady Gag’s egg thing.
• Lady Gaga also performed her new supbpar single, “Born This Way” exactly like Madonna performed her superior single “Express Yourself” at The Grammy’s in 1989. Rumor is somebody from Madonna’s team uploaded the video to her Youtube channel after the Gag’s performance last night. Cat fight!
• Justin Bieber lost the Best New Artist category to a more deserving jazz fusion musician named Esperanza Spalding.
• Apparently Bieberites then lost their shit and attacked Spalding’s wikpedia page. Bieber performed with Usher and a Pinkett-Smith kid. It was boring.
• Indie darlings Arcade Fire won Best Album for Suburbs. One of their performances included BMX bikes and strobe lights…how alternative.
• The internet then lost its shit because apparently this is the first time some people have ever heard of Arcade Fire. I’m still trying to figure out why Kanye’s album wasn’t nominated.
• A surprisingly nimble Mick Jagger with the help of Raphael Saadiq ripped up a cover of Solomon Burke’s “Everybody Needs Someone to Love” as a tribute to the soulful singer/songwriter who passed away in 2010.
• Fresh from her Super Bowl flub Christiana Aguileria and a bunch of other “divas” tried to pay tribute to near-deceased soul singer Aretha Franklin, tried being the operative word.
• Bob Dylan played “Maggie’s Farm” with folk-rock bands Mumford and Sons and Avett Brothers, it was alright. Spoiler: Dylan is old and he can barely sing.
• Katy Perry, who was wearing what looked to be angel wings, brought her grandma and outfitted her with a bedazzled cane, which is pretty cool. She also projected her own wedding video during her performance, which is not.
• E!’s Fashion Police breaks down the fashion
• Biggest “wimmer”: Lady Antebellum – 6 nominations / 5 wins
• Biggest loser: Eminem – 10 nominations / 2 wins
• Update: CBS Los Angeles reporter Serene Branson has reportedly been taken to hospital for tests after stumbling incomprehensibly over her words during a Grammy’s broadcast. Originally the video went viral because people thought was just a nervous anchor messing up her lines.