French filmmaker Schoendoerffer, chronicler of war, dies

Oscar-winning French filmmaker, novelist and war correspondent Pierre Schoendoerffer, a renowned chronicler of conflict, especially in Vietnam, has died aged 83.

 

Oscar-winning French filmmaker, novelist and war reporter Pierre Schoendoerffer at his home in Paris in November 2007. Photo: AFP

According to a statement from his family, the writer and film director died in the early hours of Wednesday at the Percy military hospital outside Paris.

 

A founding member of the Cesars, the French equivalent of the Oscars, Schoendoerffer launched his career with the French military film service during the country's war in Indochina, following a brief stint as a merchant sailor.

 

In both novels and films, Schoendoerffer returned again and again to the conflict in Indochina, where he was held for four months as a prisoner of war and which was the subject of his best-known works, "Le Crabe-Tambour" (The Drummer Crab) and "La 317e Section" (The 317th Platoon).

 

President Nicolas Sarkozy hailed Schoendoerffer as a "legend" who helped the French "better understand our collective history".

 

"France will miss this man -- an aristocrat in his heart and soul -- whose life was inspired by heroes like Joseph Conrad and Jack London, who shaped his imagination," Sarkozy said.

 

Born in 1928 in the central French town of Chamalieres, Schoendoerffer was inspired to a life of adventure by writers such as Conrad and French adventurer and author Joseph Kessel, whose work on Afghanistan, "La Passe du Diable" (The Devil's Pass), he filmed in 1956.

 

After 18 months as a sailor in the Baltic Sea, Schoendoerffer arrived aged 19 in French Indochina, the colony comprising present-day Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos where French forces were fighting the independence-seeking Viet Minh.

 

Taken on as a cameraman by the French military's film service, he filmed the war's climactic battle, the 1954 defeat of French forces at Dien Bien Phu, and was afterward held as a prisoner of war for four months.

 

Schoendoerffer left the military following the war but remained in Vietnam to work as a reporter for French and US publications including Paris Match, Time and Life.

 

Returning to France in 1955, he set himself up as a roaming correspondent, writer and filmmaker, returning many times to Vietnam and covering conflicts such as the Algerian War.

 

His experiences during the Indochina War would mark "Le Crabe-Tambour", which won three Cesars in 1977 and "La 317e Section", based on his own novel and winner of best screenplay at the 1965 Cannes Film Festival.

 

He went back to Vietnam for his 1967 Oscar-winning documentary, "The Anderson Platoon", which looked at the lives of a platoon of US soldiers fighting in the country.

 

He returned to the conflict again in 1991 with the film "Dien Bien Phu", about a US war correspondent covering the fateful battle.

 

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon praised Schoendoerffer as "a great witness of our times" in a statement, saying "his images always went beyond the events."

 

Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand hailed him as a writer and filmmaker "haunted by war and its consequences on our humanity."

 

"He was a man of honour who believed in loyalty to his family and to his country," Mitterrand said in a statement.

 

Historian Benedicte Cheron said Schoendoerffer had shed much-needed light on difficult periods of French military history.

 

"He was a filmmaker and not a historian... but his work helped establish in the national imagination one period that was largely unknown, in the case of Indochina, and another that was difficult and traumatic, as in the case of the Algerian War," she said.

 

"His representation of war, of wartime heroism and of the tragedy of war, touched on the universal."

 

Schoendoerffer had three children, including filmmaker Frederic Schoendoerffer.

 

Source: Tuoi Tre

The best live action video game trailers

There’s a new trend in video game promotion. Before a major game is released, an over-the-top, big budget live action trailer appears to amplify its hype.

 

 

More often than not, these trailers have little to do with the game they portray. But who are we kidding? We love them anyway.

 

Who wouldn’t want to see their favourite video game franchise turned into a movie, even if it’s a bad movie? It gives gamers an unprecedented opportunity to see what their favourite video games would look like in the real world.

 

 

Mass Effect 3

Bioware’s final title in their epic space trilogy was released on Tuesday March 6th. This short trailer shows humans cowering in fear at the impending Reaper invasion. It then follows the game’s main character Shepard, as he fights for Earth’s freedom.

 

 

Halo: Reach

Less explosions and action and more atmosphere and scene-setting, Halo Reach’s live action launch trailer chronicles the creation of a super soldier. This trailer humanized the game’s characters and made gamers believe that there was a little more under their dark helmets.

 

 

Halo 3

Niel Blomkamp, the director of District 9, was supposed to helm the ill-fated Halo movie a few years ago. Although that movie was never made, these Blomkamp directed shorts surfaced a few years ago, leading up to the release of Halo 3.

 

 

 

Resistance 3

This western inspired live action trailer evokes a feeling of desperation and helplessness. It doesn’t totally represent the atmosphere of the final game, but it’s certainly compelling, dark and chock-full of violent imagery.

 

 

 

The Legend oF Zelda: A Link To The Past

 

This extremely Japanese live action commercial (it’s not really a trailer) for the classic Super Nintendo title, The Legend Of Zelda: A Link to The Past, is both amazing and ridiculous. Link, Princess Zelda, Ganon engage in a thriller-esque dance battle.

 

Insane? totally. But also ridiculously entertaining. This is something that could have only existed in the 90s.

 

canada.com

Crunchy Vietnamese Cabbage Salad With Pan-Seared Tofu

Time: 30 minutes

3 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce

 

2 teaspoons light brown sugar

 

2 teaspoons Asian fish sauce

 

Zest and juice of 1 lime

 

1/2 jalapeño, seeded and minced

 

1 garlic clove, minced

 

4 tablespoons peanut oil

 

1/2 pound extra-firm tofu, cut into slabs, 3/4 inch thick

 

6 cups shredded cabbage

 

1 large carrot, grated

 

1/3 cup coarsely chopped roasted, salted peanuts, plus more to serve

 

2 tablespoons chopped cilantro, plus more to serve.

 

1. To make vinaigrette, whisk together 2 tablespoons soy sauce, brown sugar,

 

1 1/2 teaspoons fish sauce, lime zest and juice, jalapeño and garlic. Whisk in 3 tablespoons peanut oil.

 

2. Pat the tofu dry with paper towels. Heat the remaining 1 tablespoon peanut oil in a large skillet, preferably nonstick. When it shimmers, add the tofu. Cook 3 minutes without moving, until golden brown on the bottom. Flip and cook 2 minutes more. Transfer to a paper towel-lined plate. In a small bowl, whisk together the remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce and 1/2 teaspoon fish sauce. Move the tofu to a cutting board, and brush both sides of each slice generously with this mixture. Cut tofu into bite-size pieces.

 

3. In a large bowl, toss together tofu, cabbage, carrot, peanuts, cilantro and vinaigrette. Garnish with more peanuts and cilantro.

 

Yield: 4 servings.

NEW YORK TIMES

‘Zeng’ weaving craft being revived by ethnic groups

Local authorities in the mountainous district of A Luoi in the central province of Thua Thien Hue are of late doing their utmost to restore the ‘Zeng’ weaving craft of minority groups in the area, so as to   preserve a traditional craft as well as to help the local community find a means to earn their livelihood.

 

Mai Thi Hop teaching ‘Zeng’ weaving to a young girl (Photo: SGGP)

 

Around the A Luoi region, stories abound of a wonderful woman named Mai Thi Hop of the Ta Oi minority group, who did her best to revitalise the traditional ‘Zeng’ weaving craft in her community.

 

‘Zeng’ cloth is a sophisticated marriage of colours in a wealth of motifs, using a black background with colored stripes and beads, woven into various artistic geometric patterns.

 

Having learnt the art of weaving ‘Zeng’ cloth from her mother since a child, to make clothes for her family or village people, Hop was not content that such a beautiful craft was being wasted and could be lost in the future.

 

She was determined to bring back to life this traditional craft form, despite encountering various problems, from explaining its usefulness to the young, to persuading Ta Oi elders into giving lessons to people from other ethnic groups, which actually goes against Ta Oi’s customs and rules.

 

By explaining that ‘Zeng’ weaving may disappear if no one attempted to save it and that it could help fight against poverty, she at last received unanimous approval from the village elders.

 

In 2004, Hop opened a small workshop in A Luoi Town for people of Co Tu, Pa Hi, Pa Ko, and Ta Oi ethnic groups to learn ‘Zeng’ weaving and earn a living by selling their own products. From only four people in the beginning, her workshop now has around 40 workers with an average income of VND1.2 to 1.5 million (US$58 to $72) per month, which is quite high in the area.

 

Mai Thi Tang from A Tin Hamlet of A Dot Commune in A Luoi District, a two-year weaver of ‘Zeng’ fabric, said that at first she did not known the craft, but watching many households in her hamlet generating such a high income, she and her mother turned to the craft.

 

Other ethnic groups like Co Tu, Pa Ko, Van Kieu, Pa Hi also came to learn and helped expand ‘Zeng’ weaving craft to neighboring areas. According to Ho Thi Loan, a Co Tu living in A Phu Vinh Commune, because of this craft her family now can earn an extra sum of VND1.5 to 2 million ($72 to 96) per month, making their financial state more stable.

 

At present, A Luoi District has three large-scale workshops for ‘Zeng’ weaving craft in Phu Vinh, A Dot Communes and A Luoi Town. It is the high quality and creativity that help A Luoi’s ‘Zeng’ cloth becoming much sought-after, said Hop.

 

In fact, ‘Zeng’ cloth is usually made with colorful patterns of legendary stories, plus it is quite fashionable and durable, hence the favourite of both residents as well as tourists, domestic and foreign alike.

 

Ho Van Ngoan, Head of A Luoi’s Office of Culture and Information, said that local authorities always encourage ethnic groups to preserve and develop this weaving craft. They have already approved of a fund to support training and expansion of ‘Zeng’ weaving, with a pattern preservation project also lined up in the near future.

 

By Phan Le

Source: SGGP

Microsoft cuts touchscreen lag to 1ms, makes other panels look silly (video)

Have you ever noticed that there is a serious amount of lag between when you move your finger on a touchscreen and when it actually registers that input? Perhaps you haven't, but most panels and controllers out there suffer from about a 100ms delay.

 

 

For taps and slow swipes that's not an issue but, as you wing your finger around the screen faster and faster (say, while quickly doodling in a painting app), the lag becomes quite apparent. The powerful minds over at Microsoft Research have figured out a way to get that delay down to a measly 1ms.

 

Of course, there's no guarantee this tech will ever make it into a product, and the video after the break shows little more than a glowing box following a finger. Still, it's always enjoyable to see where we are now versus where we could be.

 

 

TechCrunch

Microsoft Research (YouTube)

Windows 8 Survey: Half Who Have Tried the OS Wouldn't Recommend It

The most controversial aspect of Microsoft's new OS is the Metro interface. Fewer than half of the 2900 readers who answered our survey about the Consumer Preview said they were satisfied with the new interface.

People who have installed the Windows 8 Consumer Preview praise its speed and the changes to Internet Explorer and Windows Explorer, but most readers who answered a PCWorld survey aren't satisfied with the new Metro interface--and half indicate that they would be unlikely to recommend the new operating system to a friend.

Microsoft made the Consumer Preview available for a free download last week, and more than 2900 people who had installed the OS answered our survey.

By far the most divisive part of Windows 8 is the Metro interface, which replaces the traditional Start menu with a Start Screen filled with colorful, interactive tiles that show data and act as shortcuts to applications. Microsoft already uses the Metro UI in the Windows Phone 7 OS and on the Xbox 360 console.

Praise and Criticism

Some respondents praised the interface as fun and innovative.

"It takes some getting used to, but once you've learned it, it is easier to use, faster, more intuitive, and easy to customize," one respondent said. "It's shaping up to be not only the most radically different Windows ever, but also the best. We aren't in Kansas anymore, Toto."

"I am blown away. The PC just became fun to use again," another fan said.

But Metro's critics were sometimes scathing.

"I hate the new user interface and the lack of a Start button," one said. "The OS feels like it was designed for the tablet, with the desktop PC as a complete afterthought. Windows 8 will be the new Windows Vista."

"Windows 8 straddles the fence between being a touchscreen OS and a desktop OS, and anyone who's straddled a fence before knows it's rather uncomfortable," another detractor said.

Asked whether they were satisfied with Metro, the largest block of respondents, 26.2 percent, chose "extremely dissatisfied." An almost equal number, 23.2 percent, said they were extremely satisfied. All told, though, fewer than half of the respondents said they were satisfied with Metro.

Asked about their overall satisfaction with Windows 8, a majority, 52 percent, said they were satisfied. But when we asked if they would recommend the OS to a friend, 21.2 percent of respondents said they were highly unlikely to recommend it, and a little more than 50 percent chose responses on the bottom half of our 10-point scale.

By Edward N. Albro, PCWorld

A salute to female Vietnamese friends for Women’s Day

When I first came to Vietnam in 2006, almost accidently during a long journey though Southern Asia, I fell in love with the place in barely two weeks. I stood on a small bridge overlooking a quiet, winding river just before you get to Cua Dai Beach, Hoi An, and decided I wanted to live here.

A picture to be displayed at Delightful Vietnam exhibition Photo: Tuoi Tre

Why? Why would I want to give up a comfortable life in Australia for a rougher existence? One part of it, I suspect, was the women. I do not mean lust or love. I simply mean their niceness and beauty. I haven’t been married for a long time, but I didn’t come here looking for a wife or a wild time, so the attractiveness of the Vietnamese woman slowly grew on me over time.

Who could not feel something when they see high school girls riding bikes in long, perfect, shining white Ao Dai, looking like a slow motion movie of sea gulls flying across the rice fields…?

As I toured the countryside, I noticed more and more that women were working everywhere and doing jobs I’ve never seen Australian women do. Building houses and factories, roaring down the highway with the chickens on an old Honda, walking miles with bamboo baskets balanced across their shoulders, and quietly following their kids, hand feeding them.

It’s not immediately obvious just how tough even the smallest young high school girl is. You only really see this when you live in a local street and the teenage girls are helping dad by shoveling sand and carting wheelbarrows around the house, and all the while flashing the whitest, widest grins at the bemused foreigner.

I’m constantly amazed at the small, tough older women standing in the hot, humid sunshine in rubber boots, Non La Hats and face masks on building sites. One time a small grandmother carting some fruits on a bamboo pole was stopped by a large European man in front of the restaurant where I was sitting. He wanted his wife to take a picture of him lifting the fruit pole across his shoulders…he could barely lift it. The wife laughed and laughed. The old grandmother just produced one of those broad grins and promptly picked up the load and totted down the road.

As I teach around Hoi An, particularly in the hotels and Old Town area, I constantly notice how many women are the managers, organizers, sellers, buyers, owners, negotiators and labourers. The women are everywhere doing something, not simply at home or in the office. It’s often one of the first things tourists and Expats notice here. The participation of women is utterly critical to Vietnamese development.

I remember being shocked when some of my students, all young adults, but looking much younger, showed me a photo of them at a military firing range learning how to use a machine gun! There were young girls in green with long, flowing thick black hair, posing like cute fashion models for the camera with machine gun parts on a table.

Somehow Vietnamese women can project an image of innocence and fragility that is mesmerising, yet doesn’t often show the true power and intelligence that is emerging in modern Vietnam. Women are staying in schools longer, studying longer and slowly moving into more commanding positions in Vietnamese society.
It’s sometimes said by Expats that while the men will make the money the women will change the culture though fashion, art, creativity and moulding the children of the next generations.

The other thing I notice here is the staggering variety of beauty in face, body and character from the north to the centre to the south. Add to this the Vietnamese love of a joke and a more tolerant attitude towards us strange foreigners, and it becomes a powerful mix of attractiveness and personality.

A women’s life can be hard here in a country where most people still live in the countryside and traditional values are clashing with modern desires, yet I’ve rarely heard a woman complain about her life, still cherishing love, marriage and babies even if that means less opportunities for herself.

So on Women Day’s, I will think of all the wonderful, funny, graceful, kind, gentle and clever women I have met here… salute them…and buy flowers for them!

STIVI COOKE

Source: Tuoi Tre

Jessica Simpson strikes Demi-like nude pose for Elle

A pregnant Jessica Simpson has taken a page from Demi Moore's celebrity playbook in a nude cover photo for the April issue of Elle magazine, and the singer and actress has confirmed the baby will be a girl.

In the cover photo released by the magazine on Wednesday, Simpson can be seen covering her breasts with her right arm and hand, and cradling her full abdomen with her left.

She wears rings and dangling earrings, and her blond hair flows over her shoulder and chest.

A photo inside shows Simpson standing as her fiance and the father of her unborn child, pro football player Eric Johnson, kisses her belly.

Simpson, 31, revealed in October that she was pregnant with her first child, after dating Johnson since May 2010.

She first rose to fame at age 19 with her debut album "Sweet Kisses" in 1999. She married singer Nick Lachey of boy band 98 Degrees in 2002, and the two starred together in a reality TV show about being newlyweds. They divorced in 2006.

As it happens, Lachey revealed this week that his current wife, TV personality Vanessa Lachey (formerly Minnillo), is pregnant with the couple's first child.

Simpson's cover photo on Elle is similar to an attention-grabbing nude pose actress Demi Moore, who was pregnant at the time, struck on the cover of Vanity Fair in 1991. The Moore picture taken by renowned photographer Annie Leibovitz caused a controversy at the time, but since then a number of other pregnant stars have posed for similar shots.

The April issue of Elle featuring Simpson officially hits newsstands on March 20. Inside the magazine, she reveals that she is pregnant with a girl, confirming previous speculation.

Simpson, whose most famous acting role was in the 2005 film "The Dukes of Hazard," launched a highly successful clothing, handbag and shoes collection in 2007.

REUTERS