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PALMPOWER BOOK-OF-THE-MONTH CLUB
The silver screen at 160 pixels: movie fun on your Palm organizer
By Craig Froehle and John Swain
| On February 20, 1999, film critic Gene Siskel died at age 53. While a cause of death hasn't been officially announced, some reports have attributed the death to complications after surgery he had to remove a brain tumor. The editors of PalmPower have long enjoyed the spirited banter between Gene Siskel and his "Siskel and Ebert" partner Roger Ebert. While this column was originally drafted before Mr. Siskel's death to celebrate the March Oscar Awards, we felt that we'd like to dedicate this issue to a gentleman who helped make one of our favorite passtimes much more rewarding. -- DG
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Not satisfied with merely covering a single medium, the written word, this month we decided to join the hallowed halls of the nationally syndicated columnists like Rex Reed, Janet Maslin, and Siskel and Ebert. The results are more like Pinky and the Brain or Dilbert. However, as you read along, you might be able to see the evil genius lurking behind our nefarious plot.
We hoped that if we provided some insight into the movie-related resources available for Palm organizer owners, PalmPower would agree to authorize our travel request to attend the March 21 Oscar Awards ceremony [Not! --DG]. Unfortunately, the editors said they liked the idea of this month's column, but would get more fun out of thinking of the two of us sitting at home, dressed in our rented tuxedos, wondering why the limousine hadn't arrived yet!
The short story on film
For years, Hollywood has embraced short fiction works as the foundation of numerous films, some successful and some of highly dubious critical and financial success. Palm device owners have a number of resources available to them to enjoy many of the short stories the Hollywood moguls have brought to the silver screen.
The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell
This is perhaps our favorite example of the short story as cinema. One has to be impressed that a true classic of the American short story form could inspire such a sheer variety of film adaptations. By our count there are no less than six versions. The original 1932 version starred Joel McCrea, Fay Wray and Robert Armstrong, but it's hard to ignore the variations on the theme. These include Surving the Game (1994) with Rap star Ice-T; a martial arts version called Death Ring (1993); and our personal favorite, Slave Girls from Beyond Infinity (1987). Connell's original story revolves around the bored big game hunter, Count Zaroff, who creates the ultimate challenge by arranging to hunt shipwrecked men on his private island. Slave Girls from Beyond Infinity manages, in the way that only Hollywood can, to turn this classic suspense tale into leather bikini clad women on a prison ship who escape by stealing a space ship only to be marooned on a planet with, you guessed it, an evil hunter who likes to use his robot guards to hunt people! [You know, I think I saw that one. -- DG] Only in Tinsel Town.
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