I have to give Rock credit for his great descriptions here. I’m not always a fan but he shows great wit and depth here.

Via Mir.

In honour of the end of this year’s fantastic TED conference, here’s one of my favourite talks posted on their site in the last few months: Virginia Postrel’s excellent take on the true meaning of glamour.

This is the poster for the Czech version of Ghostbusters. There are lots more here.

Check out this neat animation done entirely by lighting and extinguishing candles. I’m extremely impressed by the effort and ambition in the execution. See also the Making Of.

Via 6ix Passions.

NFB.ca has finally launched, allowing some of its great catalog of films to be available to the world. Above is Norman McLaren’s Pas de Deux, one of many great ones on the site. Another must-see is Lonely Boy, which I’ve posted here before, but in a sloppily-segmented YouTube version. The high-quality version here seems closer to DVD quality than I would have expected.

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Montréalers might also be interested in Montreal by Night, a portrait of the city in the 40’s; 23 Skidoo, a bizarre post-apocalyptic view of the city, and Our Street was Paved with Gold, about St. Laurent Blvd in the 70’s.

Thanks to Montreal City Weblog and Said the Gramophone for these selections.

Hedgehog in the fog is one of the masterworks of Russian animator Yuri Norstein, who did most of his most well-known pieces under the Soviet-controlled Soyuzmultfilm. Some of the animators films are still available in the Masters Of Russian Animation series on DVD.

He has apparently been working on a feature-length film based on the Nikolai Gogol short-story the overcoat since 1981, and from the sound of the Wikipedia article, he isn’t even half done yet, which makes me feel better about my blogging pace of late.

The Mittenstrings are a band, but that’s not their whole story. Though they play the occasional live show, they were originally conceived as a TV show of sorts—a show starring foam-core cut-outs and filmed in a style dubbed “Inanimation”. Over the summer I helped put the video episodes together along with the directors Lily and Sylvan Lanken.

The music (which is the real star), has been listenable on their MySpace page for a while now.

I’m very happy to announce that the videos are now up too. I did much of the editing, and some voicework, though I am not a professional at either of these things. I hope you enjoy it.

This is not at all what I expected when I first stumbled across the title. This short film from Current is not the usual sort of sensationalist ridicule I would have expected. The Tron guy, famous for his geeky costume, comes across as a wholly likable and decent guy with a good sense of humour. This is a surprisingly thoughtful little character piece about fame.

This is my last post before I head down to New York for a few days. Sean from Said the Gramophone will be filling-in. I’m looking forward to seeing what he posts.

Yeasayer’s new video is very pretty. Something about the look of it reminds me of this.

Via Indyish.

More of this year’s music videos are up on Pitchfork’s just-released Top 40 Music Videos of 2008.

This has to be one of the most amazing feats of construction I’ve ever seen, even more amazing because of how routine it is for them.