A Far Out Fantastic Site

Credit: Wikipedia I didn't know it until this week, but January 1st is Public Domain Day! This means that on the first day of the year any works of art or literature--paintings, movies, novels, music, etc.--that’s copyright has not been renewed are considered Public Domain works and so are free to use without acquiring permission from the creator or a license. However, Public Domain law does very between nations. So, always look at the public domain notice that's stated in the source where a copy of the work exists before using it. It was when I came across author Jacqui Murray 's blog post last week [link to interview] when I found out about this special day. So, thanks to her for letting us know about it and please take a look at her blog post on it if you get a chance; it's really interesting. To celebrate this day, even though it’s a little late, I thought I would provide a short list of science fiction and fantasy books that have gone into the Public Domain this y...

Credit: Wikimedia Commons It's the fourth weekend of the month and so time for another Book-To-Movie review! In a Book-To-Movie, we review a work of prose fiction and its movie adaptation. In an earlier  Book-To-Movie we reviewed Edgar Rice Burroughs' novella "The Land That Time Forgot" and its 1974 movie adaptation from American International Pictures (AIP). The novella is the first in the Caspak Trilogy of books. The second is "The People That Time Forgot" which AIP also released a movie of. That one was not as good as the first film, not even as good as other 1970s sci fi movies, and definitely not as good as the book. Although not a bad movie, the producers made several changes to the original story particularly in the worldbuilding, the plot and characterisation.  The Novella Published in 1918, "The People That Time Forgot" involves Tom Billings going on a rescue mission to search for his friend, Bowen Tyler, the protagonist of the first boo...

Credit: Wikimedia Commons It's the fourth weekend of the month and so it's time for another Book-To-Movie review! In a Book-To- Movie, we review a work of prose fiction and its movie adaptation. Tonight, we are reviewing Edgar Rice Burroughs’ novel, "The Land that Time Forgot", and its 1974 movie adaptation. I’ll tell you now that the movie was good but the novel is more developed and believable in its characterization and conflict.  The Book Burrough's novel is actually Book One of a trilogy. Published in 1918, it’s about shipwrecked survivors and a German crew whose U-boat they take over that get stranded on a lost continent in Antarctica. The British and one American, Bowen Tyler who is both the novel’s narrator and protagonist, and their German captives must ally in order to survive the dangers of the prehistoric continent of Caspak such as carnivorous dinosaurs and hostile ape men.  The characters in this novel are well-developed for it being pulp fiction and...

Credit: Pixabay For almost a year, Netflix has streamed Disney’s 2012 movie, ‘John Carter’. However, the movie, based on Edgar Rice Burroughs’ “A Princess of Mars” of his Barsoom series of novels, will be leaving Netflix and moving to Disney+ on May 2. Because this is a Disney movie it should be expected that the Disney Company would want it on its new streaming television platform that went live in November of last year. After all, Disney’s been buying up so many un-Disney properties, so why would it leave one of its own movies behind? This regardless of “John Carter” being one of its biggest flops?  While the movie did poorly at the box office, it’s one of Disney’s most underrated films. It had a lot of good things that went into it such as its creature designs, cinematography and special effects. Eric Francisco says in his article at Inverse that “the movie is colorful in ways so few modern blockbusters are . . .” So if you’re like me, and have Netflix but not Disne...

It’s the third weekend of the month and so it’s time for another Book-To-Movie review! [link] In a Book-To-Movie we review a work of prose fiction and its movie adaptation. This month’s Book-To-Movie is a review of Edgar Rice Burroughs’s A Princess of Mars and the Disney movie adaptation. And as I said I would in the previous blog post , I also have a mini movie review for you of Doctor Sleep , the new movie based on Stephen King’s novel of the same name! Book-To-Movie: ‘A Princess of Mars’/’John Carter’ Credit: Wikimedia Commons Warning: Potential spoilers. Even though it didn’t become the pop cultural icon that his Tarzan character did, Edgar Rice Burroughs’s John Carter series of books has influenced several of the best-known science fiction writers of all time, including Ray Bradbury . The first of this 11-book series, A Princess of Mars , was published in 1912 as a serial under the title of “The Moon of Mars” in All-Story Magazine . It was one of the ear...

Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons     I thought I was going to have an article at Examiner.com on the Centennial of Tarzan about a week from this Monday. It’s actually going to be a little earlier than that. Even though the downtown library in Sacramento originally scheduled the centennial event for Labor Day weekend they moved it to this weekend instead. This was apparently due to a recent decision to close the library for the entire Labor Day weekend due to lack of funds and so having to furlough the staff for that weekend.   Well, at least it gives the library staff a weekend off which they definitely deserve (aside from not being paid). Where would this country be without our public librarians and their supporting staff? Literacy would be a much more elitist activity, now wouldn’t it? So maybe library work isn’t laborious work (at least not for the librarians) but it’s still a lot of work with a lot of complications and they don’t get praised or appreciated ...