Don’t Lego that imagination!

Lego Hello World, by horseattack

thanks Erin, via nerdist & likecool

Related links:

Double Negative

Ramsey Bros. Pictures pays tribute to Hollywood’s Golden Age. The Glitz. The Glamor. The Grammar.

thanks Erin

Submitted by Josh Jaspers:

Urban fox hunt video was hoax aimed at the media, say film-makers
by Paul Lewis
Guardian.co.uk
6 August 2010

Chris Atkins explains how he hoaxed the press into printing stories about urban fox hunters.

It was the internet video that sparked a media outcry: grainy footage that seemed to show four masked men drugging a fox and later beating it to death with cricket bats in a London park that was posted on YouTube and Facebook earlier this week.

But the Guardian can reveal that the new sport of “urban foxhunting” was an elaborate hoax. The film-makers, Chris Atkins and Johnny Howorth, said no real foxes were harmed in the film, which was intended as a satirical swipe at “media hysteria” over the danger of urban foxes.

Animal rights campaigners had expressed fury over the “bloodthirsty” huntsmen, eliciting the support of MPs on Twitter and prompting an inquiry by the Metropolitan police’s wildlife crime unit.

YouTube and Facebook removed the footage and the controversy was covered in news outlets including the Guardian, the Times, the Daily Mirror and the Daily Mail. The BBC was also duped, sending a reporter to Victoria Park, Hackney – the supposed scene of the crime. Amid a growing furore, the animal welfare group League Against Cruel Sports launched a campaign against urban foxhunting, while the RSPCA said it was investigating. (more…)

Submitted by Larry Croft:

Reykjavik Mayor gives Rudy Giuliani a run for his money…

Reykjavik mayor opens gay pride festival in drag
BBC News
6 August 2010

The mayor of Reykjavik has dressed up in drag to mark the opening of the Icelandic capital’s gay pride festival.

Jon Gnarr, a top comedian who became mayor in June, appeared on stage on Thursday night in a floral-print dress, blonde wig and bright red lipstick.

“The mayor unfortunately could not attend himself,” he told the crowd.

Mr Gnarr’s Best Party won the council elections after running on a platform that included free towels in swimming pools and a polar bear for the zoo. (more…)

Roman Danylo, star of “Comedy Inc.” on CTV and the Comedy Network, in the Tantric Sex Seminar sketch

thanks Linda

Tokyo’s ‘oldest man’ had been dead for 30 years
BBC News
29 July 2010

He was thought to be the oldest man in Tokyo – but when officials went to congratulate Sogen Kato on his 111th birthday, they uncovered mummified skeletal remains lying in his bed.

Mr. Kato may have been dead for 30 years according to Japanese authorities.

They grew suspicious when they went to honour Mr Kato at his address in Adachi ward, but his granddaughter told them he “doesn’t want to see anybody”.

Police are now investigating the family on possible fraud charges.

‘Living Buddha’

Welfare officials had tried to meet Mr Kato since early this year. But when they went to visit, family members repeatedly chased them away, according to Tomoko Iwamatsu, an Adachi ward official.

Authorities grew suspicious and sought an investigation by police, who forced their way into the house on Wednesday.

They discovered a mummified body, believed to be Kato, lying in his bed, wearing underwear and pyjamas, covered with a blanket. (more…)

We were no longer “good society”…

Jane Austen’s Fight Club

Directed by Emily Janice Card & Keith Paugh, written by Emily Janice Card. © 2010 Relatively Badarse Productions

thanks Erin

John Callahan, Cartoonist, Dies at 59
by Bruce Weber
The New York Times
July 28, 2010

John Callahan, a quadriplegic, alcoholic cartoonist whose work in newspapers and magazines made irreverent, impolitic sport of both people with disabilities and diseases and those who would pity and condescend to them, died Saturday in Portland, Ore. He was 59 and lived in Portland.

The causes were complications of quadriplegia and respiratory problems, said his brother Tom.

Like his friend Gary Larson, the creator of “The Far Side,” Mr. Callahan made drawings with a gleeful appreciation of the macabre as it exists in everyday life. He was, however, a man who lived his whole life with disadvantages, some of them self-wrought, and he viewed the world through a dark and wicked lens.

“This is John, I’m a little too depressed to take your call today,” the message on his answering machine said. “Please leave your message at the gunshot.”

Bemused by the culture of confession and self-help fostered by the likes of Oprah Winfrey, Geraldo Rivera and others, he was uninclined, in his work, to be outwardly sympathetic to the afflicted or to respect the boundaries of racial and ethnic stereotyping, and his cartoons were often polarizing: some found them outrageously funny, others outrageously offensive.

“Shark” Eating Cardiff Surfer Statute is Removed
San Diego 6
July 27, 2010

Cardiff-by the-Sea – Encinitas city workers removed an artist’s addition to the city’s famed surfer statue Tuesday.

A bronze surfer statue has been the target of many gags.

Unknown predawn pranksters on Saturday surrounded the roadside statue in Cardiff-by-the-Sea with a papier mache model of a great white shark that appeared to be swallowing it whole.

Crowds of gawkers and photographers gathered around the 16-foot creation after the sun rose.

San Diego County sheriff’s Lt. Tony Ray said no criminal report was filed because there was no damage to the statue.

The $120,000 sculpture called “Magic Carpet Ride” was commissioned by the Cardiff Botanical Society in 2007.

The statue has been bedecked with bras, skirts and witch hats so many times that locals have come to call it “The Cardiff Kook.”

City workers showed up shortly before 8:00 Tuesday morning and started tearing down the shark addition.

photo: Chromotive

Street artists step it up with 3D
by Leslie Katz
CNET
July 26, 2010

You don’t need special glasses to view the 3D street art in the gallery below, but you do need to approach it from just the right vantage point to see or photograph the full effect.

The mind-bending images are inspired by anamorphism, a centuries-old technique used in frescoes and other drawings to create the illusion of height and width (as such, 3D street painting is sometimes called anamorphic or illusionistic).

Scroll through the pictures to view vivid imagery that turns 2D asphalt into amazing 3D art. (more…)

(more…)

The Good News About Mel Gibson
by Frank Rich
The New York Times
July 16, 2010

For Fourth of July weekend fireworks, even Macy’s couldn’t top the spittle-spangled eruptions of Mel Gibson. The clandestine recordings of his serial audio assaults on his gal pal were instant Web and cable-TV sensations — at once a worthy rival to Hollywood’s official holiday releases and a compelling sequel to his fabled anti- Semitic rant of 2006. A true showman, Gibson offered vitriol for nearly all tastes, aiming his profane fusillade at women, blacks and Latinos alike. The invective was tied together by a domestic violence subplot worthy of “Lethal Weapon.” There was even a surprise comic coda, courtesy of Whoopi Goldberg, who, alone among Gibson’s showbiz peers, used her television platform on “The View” to defend her buddy’s good character.

The Gibson tapes — in plain English and not requiring the subtitles of some of the star’s recent spectacles — are a particularly American form of schadenfreude. There’s little we enjoy more than watching a pampered zillionaire icon (Gibson’s production company is actually named Icon) brought low. The story would end there — just another tidy morality tale in the profuse annals of Hollywood self-destruction from Fatty Arbuckle to Lindsay Lohan — were it not for Gibson’s unique back story.

Six years ago he was not merely an A-list movie star with a penchant for drinking and boorish behavior but also a powerful and canonized figure in the political and cultural pantheon of American conservatism. That he has reached rock bottom tells us nothing new about Gibson. He was the same talented, nasty, bigoted blowhard then that he is today. But his fall says a lot about the changes in our country over the past six years. We shouldn’t take those changes for granted. We should take stock — and celebrate. They are good news.

Read the rest of this Op-Ed piece here.

thanks Linda

July 19, 2010 Updates:

Twitter Communiques From Fake French Foreign Ministry on Haiti Hoax
by Robert Mackey
The Lede Blog, NY Times
July 16, 2010

A group calling itself The Committee for the Immediate Reimbursement of Funds Taken From Haiti took credit on Friday for an elaborate hoax carried out this week in which an actor pretending to be a spokesperson for the French government announced that France would reimburse Haiti money it was forced to pay in exchange for its independence in the nineteenth century.

As The Lede explained on Thursday, the fake announcement was posted on a near replica of the French foreign ministry’s Web site on Wednesday in both video and text form.

In an update posted on a Twitter feed established this week, in the guise of France’s foreign ministry, the group, using the French form of its name, announced:

(more…)

What Women Want: Mel Gibson’s Recut Trailer
Slate
July 14, 2010

Following the release of Mel Gibson’s profane rants against his ex-girlfriend, Slate V conjures a new NSFW version of the trailer for “What Women Want.”