"Creation" finds US distributor

[realthog]

It was from Greg Laden's Blog that I got the good news this morning that I'm going to be allowed to see this movie on the big screen rather than having to wait for the DVD, thanks to distributor Newmarket, the company that had the commercial acumen a few years back to pick up Memento.

Laden's writeup referred me to the report on the National Center for Science Education website, which in turn led me to the relevant news report by Hollywood Reporter. The latter claims that it was merely the movie's "period aspects" that led to its finding a "slightly tougher acquisitions market" -- to which one can respond only by invoking the way US movie distributors have for years timorously declined to plaster our eyeballs with English (and occasionally Scottish) historical pieces, no matter how dire some of them might be.

Yeah, right.

I like the NCSE report's para on some of the reviews the movie has been picking up:

In her review of Creation at The Panda's Thumb blog, NCSE's executive director Eugenie C. Scott described it as "a thoughtful, well-made film that will change many views of Darwin held by the public — for the good." It also received praise from Steve Jones in Time Out London (September 22, 2009), who called it "a great film about a great man and a greater theory" and by Adam Rutherford in his Guardian blog (September 23, 2009), where he wrote, "we should ... be grateful that this film is moving and beautiful, just like the creation Darwin so luminously untangled," adding, "Creationists the world over deserve to see it."

Me, I'm desperate to see it. Movies and novels about scientists and the process of science are right up my street; I may be the only person I know who currently has, near the top of his To Be Read pile, a novel about Alfred Wegener, the first serious modern proponent of what was then called the Continental Drift hypothesis -- and as such flatly rejected by most geophysicists -- and is now called, er, fact.

(An aside: It's largely because of becoming interested in Wegener through my work as one of the editors of the geology encyclopedia Planet Earth that in due course I wrote my early book A Directory of Discarded Ideas, which eventually, a quarter of a century later -- my, how time does fly -- led to me writing books like Discarded Science, Corrupted Science and the imminent Bogus Science. Funny the way these things work out. Had it not been for my thinking that I really should get round to writing A Directory of Discarded Ideas, I might never have read a godawful poleshift novel called The Hab Effect -- whose hero, I years later [re]discovered, is called John Grant!)

Other stuff: I've been quiet here lately because I've been working on a short story -- well, longish story, to be more accurate -- that's been requiring me to actually, well, think. There have been monologues going on around the house not too dissimilar from those you hear from guys on Manhattan sidewalks who use the f-word and point at the sky a lot. Meanwhile I've been declining an anthology invitation and turning my soggy apology for a brain toward a story comp that's worth, gulp, about $40,000.

Trouble is, the story I'm currently working on cannot be done within the wordcount limit of the competition, so . . .

Comments

[txtriffidranch.livejournal.com]

By the way, speaking of Corrupted Science, I thought I'd share some local news. It's now to the point where even the Dallas Morning News is admitting that most "expert testimony" concerning arson cases is ridiculous. (It's not all good news, as Ennis's current unbearable cross in the US House, Joe Barton, is apparently lobbying to be appointed Senator if Rick Perry loses the Texas gubernatorial race in 2010. Considering that Barton is one of the big climate change deniers in the House, this should be interesting: there's an old joke out here that the best way to hit an ExxonMobil exec in the nuts is to punch Joe Barton in the mouth.)

[realthog.livejournal.com]

Barton is one of the big climate change deniers in the House

Funny how scum always floats upward, innit?

[txtriffidranch.livejournal.com]

Considering that Barton's actively petitioning Perry for the spot, it's closer than you know. Sadly, once he's in the Senate, he'd be impossible to dislodge, and he's amazingly even dumber and more vindictive than John Cornyn.

[deliabarry.livejournal.com]

This is fantastic news about Creation! Thanks so much for sharing it. I expect that I'll have to head to either NYC or Philly to see it, since most NJ multiplexes only want the teenage boys, but it'll be more than worth it. :)

And ... a novel about Wegener? Really? Care to share the title and author? It sounds like a must-read.

[realthog.livejournal.com]

I'll have to head to either NYC or Philly to see it, since most NJ multiplexes only want the teenage boys

We were thinking one of the cinemas at Montclair might carry it, or even at Kinnelon.

The Wegener novel is Clare Dudman: One Day the Ice Will Reveal All its Dead.

[realthog.livejournal.com]

"And ... a novel about Wegener? Really? Care to share the title and author? It sounds like a must-read."

I'm about a quarter of the way through now and enjoying it a lot. (Her narrative mode would cause most genre editors to clutch their heads and scream, though!) If you can't find a copy elsewhere and would like to borrow this one after I'm done, lemme know.

[sarcobatus.livejournal.com]

I am so relieved to hear you are working on something that's been requiring you to actually, well, think . . .

(You may now call me a fill in the blank.)

xxoo

[realthog.livejournal.com]

(You may now call me a fill in the blank.)

A sweet old lady?

*bolts for hills as fast as legs will carry him*

[sarcobatus.livejournal.com]

"A sweet old lady?"

Now, that's funny.

Honey, there ain't nothin' sweet about this old lady.