Sin City and SRL

In a busy night, I went to the movie Sin City at the Arclight, and also to a Survival Research Labs (SRL) show. I enjoyed Sin City a lot. Visually, it was stunning. Mostly filmed against a blue screen (which I think was green in this case), the movie is almost entirely black and white. There are a lot of digital effects, which mostly work, but when they don't, it's jarring. The snow scenes were staggeringly beautiful. The image above is from the graphic novel the movie is based on. The author was the co-director. The plot was overwrought, which I guess is what you get with noir. The actors were good, even the sexpots.

I saw the movie with PI at the Arclight. The Arclight is the pinnacle of movie experience. You buy tickets in advance online for no extra fee (although the tickets are at a premium: $11). Your ticket reserves a particular seat. There are people in the parking structure guiding you to open parking. When you arrive, there is a quick and easy way to obtain your tickets. In the theater, an usher shows you your seat. The seats are incredibly comfortable, with lots of leg room. You don't have to get up, or even move much, for someone to get by. We saw the movie digitally projected. I don't know if it made a difference, but the movie was luscious looking.


SRL is a pyrotechnic robotics group that likes to make interesting artistic robots and set things on fire. If you click on the picture above, you'll go to a gallery of pictures from the show. They are not great pictures.

I was alerted to the show by my daily read of boingboing. I love when I read international blogs, and they talk about stuff going on near me. I've been reading boingboing since I lived in San Francisco, but I've found it to be a good LA reference.

For the show they closed off a street in the warehouse district just east of downtown LA. People climbed up onto the top of many of the surrounding warehouses. Given the amount of drinking in the crowd, that made me nervous.

I had a good time there, although I would have enjoyed myself more if I could have seen more of the show. There were 4 or 5 rows of people in front of me, and people around me, all of whose conversations I was subjected to before the show started. After all my complaining about how mainstream LA is, I was reminded that mainstream people haven't cornered the market on insipid conversations.

The best robot in the show had a horizontal auger that spun as it moved. Unfortunately, I think the auger was not the actual wheel of the robot. The show was also really loud, which I liked (I had earplugs), and there was lots of fire, which everyone liked. I could feel the heat of flames that were 40 feet or so away.

A piece of something came flying in my direction at one point, probably a piece of wood flayed off wooden the horse by another robot. It bounced off the ground in front of the barrier, then came flying upward. I had plenty of time to duck, but it was exciting.

I've been wanting to see an SRL show for a while, but I wasn't entirely happy to be at the show. Was it because I was tired? Was it because of the company? (My own.) I think it was mostly because I was surrounded on all sides by a crowd. So here's my advice if you're going to a show: Get there early enough to climb a warehouse or annex some other comfortable viewing place. Don't drink while you're on top of the warehouse (GP excepted, well, maybe not), because you have to climb down afterward. Bring earplugs. Bring eye protection. Enjoy.

I had a weird interaction with him a guy who I'm pretty sure was breaking into cars parked on the street I had parked on. I left the show early, but it ended right as I was walking away. When I got to the street my car was on, there was a guy sitting in a car, looking around with a flashlight. He was a nervous-acting guy who looked like he could use a shower, shave, haircut and laundry, and I made certain assumptions. He told me he was keeping watch on the cars, and I asked if he wanted to sell me a bridge too. OK, I didn't do that. He kept one hand in his pocket, and I wasn't too happy about that either. By then I had committed to walking down the street, and there were other people coming from the show. As I was getting into my car, the guy asked me for money. Idiot.

Earlier in the night, a man had held a door open for me and asked me for money. I was really annoyed by that, and it reminded me of how my daily experience has changed. It didn't used to bug me.