This third part concludes my three-part, in-depth conversation with Viggo Mortensen, in conjunction with him receving the Coolidge Award in Boston. [Note: Read Part 1 here and Part 2 here.] In this final installment, he and I discuss what drives …
Continue ReadingSince the one-two-three punch of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Viggo Mortensen has largely avoided the limelight. Aside from 2004′s Hidalgo, Mortensen has mostly shied away from swarthy, swoon-worthy action hero types. His only roles that touch Aragorn/Strider: He …
Continue ReadingGilsdorf: There was a story that you had a run-in with the police who saw you wielding your sword in public and, uh, had a problem with that. Mortensen: It is true that I once was asked by local law …
Continue ReadingViggo Mortensen, in Boston on March 5 to accept the Coolidge Corner Theatre’s Coolidge Award, leads the audience in an impromptu sing-along of a song in another language. No, not Spanish or Danish (two languages he happens to speak). Elvish. …
Continue ReadingThe industry’s biggest awards still won’t recognize the amazing work being done by actors and effects people who are changing the face of movies.
Continue ReadingPicture a world where the man inside the C-3PO suit, and the man providing his voice, is Alan Rickman. Now imagine a warped universe where Anthony Daniels plays not just endless spin-offs of his famous golden protocol droid designed to serve humans, but …
Continue ReadingEver wish you had something to write about when your brain goes dead? The Storymatic is here to the rescue. Part writing prompt, part teaching tool, part parlor game, The Storymatic is a clever little box packed with 500+ cards. Open the …
Continue ReadingAs previously reported by GeekDad’s MJ Harnish, Wizards of the Coast announced last month that, as a fundraiser for the Gygax Memorial Fund, they’d be releasing reprints of the original Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D) Players Handbook, Dungeon Masters Guide, and Monster Manual. They’re coming out in …
Continue ReadingUpdated seafloor imaging on Google Earth cleans up the artifacts that had people worked up about finding the lost continent.
Continue ReadingI was excited as the next Star Wars fan to get a sneak peek this week of the new “The Dog Strikes Back” Volkswagen ad that’s set to debut at the Super Bowl. Like the big hit of last year, “The …
Continue ReadingPeople sometimes ask if I have advice about writing. What works? What tips and tricks can you teach me? “Do you know what you’re going to say before you sit down to say it?” they ask. “Do you know where …
Continue ReadingRecently, I uncovered this movie — one that I hadn’t seen in probably 30 years. Yes, this is an actual (and silent) movie from a real Dungeons & Dragons session, shot by me, on a Super 8 camera, in Lee, …
Continue ReadingAs reported on TheOneRing.net and elsewhere, a handwritten note written by J.R.R. Tolkien that he’d addressed to a couple he and his wife Edith had met on an unfortunate holiday just sold to an anonymous internet bidder for £1,700, or about $2,700. …
Continue ReadingGrowing up in the suburbs of Boston, and raised on secular Judaism, Cocoa Puffs and Gilligan’s Island, Peter Bebergal found himself on a quest. A spiritual quest that, as a teen, led him through comic books, Dungeons & Dragons and …
Continue ReadingSo what if the expression is a cliché? For one small-town kid suffering from a disease, dreams — even medieval-themed dreams of knighthood, chivalry and adventure — do come true. As reported by WMUR, a New Hampshire TV station, a …
Continue ReadingUnable to shoot straight. Weak in the knees. Apt to fall for Jedi mind tricks, and fall over at the weakest of laser blasts. In the Lucas universe, the typical stormtrooper is portrayed as a hapless soldier in service of …
Continue ReadingA teen center called The Game Loft that teaches Dungeons & Dragons as a path towards leadership, socialization and community service needs the help of the geek community. In tiny Belfast, Maine, you’ll find this unique after-school program for middle …
Continue ReadingNew show in NYC will celebrate the effect of Dungeons & Dragons on art and culture.
Continue ReadingDerek Van Gorder and Otto Stockmeier have a dream: To create a science fiction film, but without the space-age effects. In other words, to eschew the digital, and favor the analog. Their movie C, which follows the story of an idealistic …
Continue ReadingGrowing up in the weird, post-Hippie-era, anything-goes 1970s, I don’t remember my parents passing down sage advice to me. I more or less had to find my own words of wisdom. So, in my pagan, skeptical, non-religious household, the words of …
Continue ReadingInterview with girl gamer evangelist Shelly Mazzanoble, whose new book explains how lessons learned playing Dungeons & Dragons can apply to life in general.
Continue ReadingEver since I devoured all those Choose Your Own Adventure books — mine were actually Endless Quest books put out by the folks who gave us Dungeons & Dragons — I’ve been intrigued by the idea of interactive storytelling. Here was …
Continue ReadingHave you always dreamed of being a knight? Imagined you were in a Tolkien story? Wished you were armed with more than dice? If you have a killer costume on the drawing board, in the works, or in your head, …
Continue Reading“I wish the bottle had never come to me…” “A plastic type-1 bottle to rule them all. It must be destroyed. Go to Mount Dump and dispose of it…” “Trash-riders!” Yes, another spoof trailer, but this one’s a hoot — …
Continue ReadingYou probably know Gary Gygax was one of the masterminds behind Dungeons & Dragons. But what about his collaborator? Can you even name him? “Fantasy role-playing games essentially begin with Dave Arneson’s Blackmoor campaign,” says Tavis Allison, organizer of the …
Continue ReadingNeal Stephenson’s Reamde opens with a target practice session at the Forthrast clan’s annual Thanksgiving gathering. Various firearms — shotguns, Glocks, assault rifles — are discharged by uncles, nephews, nieces and boyfriends into an Iowa pasture. Fun for the whole family. …
Continue ReadingOur friends over at TheOneRing.net report on a German art student named Benjamin Harff who spent a year and a half creating a one-of-a-kind, hand-made version of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Silmarillion. Harff’s gorgeous book contains hundreds of illustrations, illuminated pages, and calligraphic pages; the …
Continue ReadingHere’s Part II of my conversation with Guillermo del Toro, director of Cronos, The Devil’s Backbone, Mimic, Pan’s Labyrinth, Blade II, and the two Hellboy films. [Read Part I of the interview here.] Del Toro, a former special effects makeup designer, has …
Continue ReadingIt’s the 25th anniversary of Pixar Animation Studios, the obscenely-successful cartoon company that has pretty much revolutionized the animation business. The company began in 1979 as the humble Graphics Group, once part of Lucasfilm; then it was snagged by Steve Jobs over …
Continue ReadingGuillermo Del Toro, the director behind personal, vision-driven films like Cronos, The Devil’s Backbone, and Pan’s Labyrinth, plus commercial blockbuster action vehicles like Blade II and two Hellboy films, has been involved in more than his share of film projects …
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