GER 494/598; ENG 494/549; HUM
494
Spring 2003, Daniel Gilfillan
Linkography
A listing of not-so-random links
to information that you may find useful for class. Websites
devoted to some of our primary authors, dictionaries
of philosophy for those 2 a.m. readings of Deleuze,
interesting oddities attempting to make sense of the
world. Send me any URLs that you think will fit into
this linkography, and I will add them.
Evaluating and Citing
Online Resources
There are many guidelines for citing online resources
within the scholarly work that you will produce for
this class. I will require you to follow the MLA style
for all bibliographic citations (print, electronic,
and online sources).
- The Transcriptions
Project at UC-Santa Barbara has put together an
excellent source guide for citing online resources,
with examples and activities for finding the information
you need for a proper citation.
- They also have a criteria
and checklist for evaluating online resources.
I will ask you throughout the course to evaluate certain
websites, particularly those produced as teaching
resources and for scholarly research purposes. Check
here for a printable version of their checklist.
Calvino MOO Discussion
Follow this link
for a transcript of our MOO-based discussion of Calvino's
if on a winter's night a traveller.
Writing Reviews
Writing a critical review is an art, but it is not
an artform that is unattainable. Check out these Guidelines
for Writing Reviews for some ideas on what to think
about as you are reading, and as you begin writing.
Filmography
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Videodrome
(1983), dir. David Cronenberg
Lowlife
cable TV operator Max Renn discovers a "snuff
TV" broadcast called Videodrome. But Videodrome
is more than a TV show; it's an experiment that
uses regular TV transmissions to permanently alter
the viewer's perceptions by giving them brain
damage. Max is caught in the middle of the forces
that created and the forces that want to control
Videodrome, his body itself turning into the ultimate
weapon to fight them. |
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Brazil
(1985), dir. Terry Gilliam
Sam
Lowry is a harried technocrat in a futuristic
society that is needlessly convoluted and inefficient.
He dreams of a life where he can fly away from
technology and overpowering bureaucracy, and spend
eternity with the woman of his dreams. While trying
to rectify the wrongful arrest of one Harry Buttle,
Lowry meets the woman he is always chasing in
his dreams, Jill Layton. Meanwhile, the bureaucracy
has fingered him responsible for a rash of terrorist
bombings, and both Sam and Jill's lives are put
in danger |
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Tetsuo
(1988), dir. Shinya Tsukamoto
A
strange man known only as the "metal fetishist",
who seems to have an insane compulsion to stick
scrap metal into his body, is hit and possibly
killed by a Japanese "salaryman", out
for a drive with his girlfriend. The salaryman
then notices that he is being slowly overtaken
by some kind of disease that is turning his body
into scrap metal, and that his nemesis is not
in fact dead but is somehow masterminding and
guiding his rage and frustration-fueled transformation. |
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Strange
Days (1995), dir. Kathyrn Bigelow
Set
in the year 1999 during the last days of the old
millenium, the movie tells the story of Lenny
Nero, an ex-cop who now deals with data-discs
containing recorded memories and emotions. One
day he receives a disc which contains the memories
of a murderer killing a prostitute. Lenny investigates
and is pulled deeper and deeper in a whirl of
blackmail, murder and rape. Will he survive and
solve the case? |
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Twelve
Monkeys (1995), dir. Terry Gilliam
An
unknown and lethal virus has wiped out five billion
people in 1996. Only 1% of the population has
survived by the year 2035, and is forced to live
underground. A convict (James Cole) reluctantly
volunteers to be sent back in time to 1996 to
gather information about the origin of the epidemy
(who he's told was spread by a mysterious "Army
of the Twelve Monkeys") and locate the virus
before it mutates so that scientists can study
it. Unfortunately Cole is mistakenly sent to 1990,
six years earlier than expected, and is arrested
and locked up in a mental institution, where he
meets Dr. Kathryn Railly, a psychiatrist, and
Jeffrey Goines, the insane son of a famous scientist
and virus expert |
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Johnny
Mnemonic (1995), dir. Robert Longo. Screenplay
by William Gibson.
In
2021, the whole world is connected by the gigantic
Internet, and almost a half of the population
is suffering from the Nerve Attenuation Syndrome
(NAS).Johnny with an inplanted memory chip in
his brain was ordered to transport the over loaded
information from Beijing to Newark. While Pharmakom
Industries supported by yakuza tries to capture
him to get the informaiton back, the Low-tech
group led by J-Bone tries to break the missing
code to download the cure of NAS which Johnny
carries |
|
The
Matrix (1999), dir. Andy and Larry Wachowski
Computer
hacker Thomas Anderson has lived a relatively
ordinary life--in what he thinks is the year 1999--until
he is contacted by the enigmatic Morpheus who
leads him into the real world. In reality, it
is 200 years later, and the world has been laid
waste and taken over by advanced artificial intelligence
machines. The computers have created a false version
of 20th-century life--the "Matrix"--to
keep the human slaves satisfied, while the AI
machines draw power from the humans. Anderson,
pursued constantly by "Agents" (computers
who take on human form and infiltrate the Matrix),
is hailed as "The One" who will lead
the humans to overthrow the machines and reclaim
the Earth. |
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eXistenZ
(1999), dir. David Cronenberg
Allegra
Geller, the leading game designer in the world,
is testing her new virtual reality game, eXistenZ
with a focus group. As they begin, she is attacked
by a fanatic assassin employing a bizarre organic
gun. She flees with a young marketing trainee,
Ted Pikul, who is suddenly assigned as her bodyguard.
Unfortunately, her pod, an organic gaming device
that contains the only copy of the eXistenZ game
program, is damaged. To inspect it, she talks
Ted into accepting a gameport in his own body
so he can play the game with her. The events leading
up to this, and the resulting game lead the pair
on a strange adventure where reality and their
actions are impossible to determine from either
their own or the game's perspective. |
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