Links For 7-1-2008

THE GODFATHER TRILOGY heads to Blu-ray in a big way. Too bad they can't come out with a box set that ignores the first one.

Wall Street Journal: GTA IV's no GODFATHER. The part of this that I thought was the most important is how the article points out that certain movies (that you don't hear about anybody protesting) are far more violent than GTA IV.

The Political Game: NY video game bill barks, doesn't bite. Essentially the law wants things that are already in existance like parental locking controls on consoles, an advisory council (which are redundant considering there's already the ESRB), and content ratings on the packaging. All of those things are already in place, and again, the ratings on video game boxes are much larger and more clearly worded about the content than those on DVD and Blu-Ray movies. So basically this law is absolutely useless and waste of time and taxpayer money.

RIAA 'making available' argument: file sharers 'freeload' and RIAA's ACTA wishlist includes gutted DMCA, mandatory filters. On the day that the RIAA finally disappear, they should make that an international holiday.

Meanwhile overseas they're taking a step in the right direction: Europe looks to get rid of monopoly on royalty collection societies. I guess the days of trying to sue police stations for listening to music without a license could come to an end.

Who will be the first to sue Girl Talk over music samples? I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet since the album (which I downloaded and enjoy a bit) consists of nothing but samples of other peoples' work.

THE PRISONER is back. So the remake is officially going forward. Looks like this one will be via ITV in the UK and AMC here in the US. I'm looking forward to this one much much less than I was the one rumored a few years back with Christopher Eccleston.

Lee hits out at 'ageist' movie bosses. Who are these idiot focus audiences that think Christopher Lee is "too old" to be on the screen? Shit, he was in two of the biggest blockbuster movie series of the last few years, THE LORD OF THE RINGS and the STAR WARS prequels. (Not to mention his long screen legacy.) His presence in those films certainly didn't harm their box office grosses in the least.