When humans lived on the outer space, when countries are as big as planets, when the government are as large as the Milky Way and when pirates aren’t satisfied on what they have.

My first story is about Ed. That lives in a planet called Proelio,a living battlefield, where everyone is greedy, and corrupt. That’s why it’s been on the ‘Extermination Spots’ of the FUSe (Federation of United Sectors, they act as the government of the Universe). But not only FUSe wants to conquer Proelio. There’s also a group called, UniPi UnOF (Union of Pirates Under One Flag, they act as the vast group of criminals of the Universe). But would not concentrate on them, but Ed.

Ed is a small brownish teenager (Maybe around 13 to 14 years of age), but don’t be fooled by this kid because he is as smart as a intelligent adult guy. He had no formal education (Can anyone had if you’re living in a battlefield?) Yet it didn’t stopped him from learning, until one day he decided that living in Proelio wouldn’t be as fulfilling as he wanted, that living in the outer space would be more.

He realized that in order to do this, he must have a sidekick (or friend). In also that same time, a friend named Drake came and started bragging. Then Ed told Drake that he wants to travel to the Universe.

“Travel? Really? How awesome! Can I join?”

“That’s what I’m thinking right now, Drake…” Ed said

“Please! Let me join! I want to go to the outer space!” Drake insisted

“(Damn it! I have no choice!) Fine! Fine! Just give me some ship scraps for us to make the ship that we will use…”

After hours of scavenging and building, Ed and Drake made the ship they called ‘Zomin’ (Even though it really do not look like a ship… It more look like a sports car without wheels)

“Ready to go away in this horrid place?” Ed asked

“READY!”

Screened Out of Competition at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival, Gilles Marchand’s technology-laced mystery Black Heaven now makes its US bow courtesy of IFC’s Midnight label. Mixing elements of classic film noir and online alternate realities ala The Matrix and Tron, Black Heaven shows the real world danger and allure of relinquishing one’s identity in the real world and plunging down into the cyber rabbit hole. Opening innocently enough in the French countryside, teenagers Gaspard (Gregoire Leprince-Ringuet) and Marion (Pauline Etienne) discover an abandoned cell phone while strolling down the beach flirtatiously. They playfully answer a call on it and intrigued by the situation, decide to track down the owner themselves.

After some amateur sleuthing, they discover the identity of the phone’s owner Audrey (Louise Bourgoin) and her caller, a mysterious young man going by the handle of ‘Dragon’. The teens follow the pair to an isolated quarry and come upon the young man’s corpse and Audrey barely clinging to life. While there, Gaspard snatches a video camera the duo had setup in their car before the police arrive. After watching the tape, which records an apparent suicide pact between Audrey and Dragon, Gaspard becomes fixated on her and is compelled to investigate further. He soon learns of her involvement in a Second Life-esque online game known as “Black Hole”. Draped in sinister shadows, the game resembles a classic film noir landscape with tinges of sadomasochism as the virtual city explores the seedy underbelly of urban life. Knowing Audrey’s avatar, Sam, is within the game, Gaspard creates his own avatar and explores Black Hole seeking to learn more about this mysteriously seductive blonde and what exactly happened the night he found her in the quarry.

In a secondary plot thread, Gaspard is introduced via his buddies to Vincent (Melvin Poupaud), who is Audrey’s brother and a local gangster. Aware of Audrey’s online obsession, he seeks to prevent Gaspard from learning his sister’s secret and the dark plot it holds. As reality and virtual reality begin collapsing together, Gaspard’s mood and personality grow increasing dark as he is sucked into Black Hole’s allure and risks becoming a victim like Dragon. Not unlike Sion Sono’s creepy online horror film Suicide Club, Black Heaven highlights the allure of losing one’s self in the anonymity of online life, crafting a whole new existence on your own terms but how quickly that freedom can be turned against you.

Marchand and fellow filmmaker/screenwriter Dominik Moll have fashioned a simple, moody thriller that does not bludgeon the viewer with shocks but unfolds slowly and efficiently. The transitions between Black Hole’s shadow world and reality slowly blur as Gaspard descends into an underground of online gaming where players seek to lose themselves to fantasy no matter the cost. Audrey becomes the living symbol of this desire, uncomfortable and anti-social offline, online she blooms into a comfortable and confident avatar sure of the world and her place in it.

From a certain perspective, Black Heaven can be seen as a 21st century update of Blue Velvet, given its focus on obsession and using film noir elements (dark underbelly of society, femme fatale) as guide posts along the journey. In this regard, Louise Bourgoin’s turn as Audrey is perfectly modulated although less meaty than Isabella Rossellini’s Dorothy Valens. Given relatively little backstory, Bourgoin instead relies on her looks and comfortable sexuality to lure Gaspard and the viewer into this online world while exuding a broken doll innocence. Gaspard wants to help her but he desires her as well; this struggle between good and evil is comfortably handled by Ringuet whose fresh face communicates intelligence and innocence while hiding from his baser desires.

His transformation is not nearly as radical as Jeffrey Beaumont’s but it is still believable enough to maintain credibility. While the final plot itself does not entirely hold up to scrutiny and its languorous build-up, it does lead to a credibly climax and wraps the film up in a satisfactory manner. Leaning more on style and mood than sheer substance at times, Black Heaven is nonetheless beautiful to watch, held by an intriguing story and performances that serve the film’s intentions nearly perfectly.

To learn more about this film and screening information, go to www.ifcfilms.com

YYYYYYYYEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

To those who don’t know, the video uses different clips from the anime Black Heaven (a.k.a Oji: Section Chief).
Jonathan Coulton, who wrote and sang the song (not sure) and Kagatoamv, who made the video, well done sirs.

Well-fucking-done.

P.S. Thanks to Fred for sharing the link.

M83′s latest work was contributing a soundtrack to a French film L’Ature Mondem or Black Heaven. As it turns out, that wasn’t the best experience.

M83 (Anthony Gonzalez) told Pitchfork that it was a “shitty soundtrack” for a “shitty movie” that left him “pissed” in France.

Luckily for him (and us), he moved back to L.A. earlier this year and has been working hard on a follow-up to the 2008 hit Saturdays=Youth. He told Pitchfork that he already had more than 20 demos ready for the studio and that he looks to record with Vocalist Morgan Kibby and Bassist Justin Medal-Johnsen.

Gonzalez is shooting for a spring release for his latest album. Oh, he’s also working on another movie soundtrack. No word on whether this one will be described as “shitty.”

El director francés Gilles Marchand vuelve a las pantallas con Black Heaven. Un thriller de manual con algunos elementos interesantes pero que, al final, se queda en entretenido y poco más.

Gaspard (Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet) es un adolescente que está pasando el verano en el Sur de Francia. Sus padres no están y puede hacer lo que le venga en gana. Eso incluye salir de fiesta con sus amigos Yann (Pierre Niney) y Ludo (Ali Marhyar) y descubrir el amor con Marion (Pauline Etienne).

La joven pareja de adolescentes parece estar viviendo el verano de sus vidas. Pero por cosas del destino dan con un teléfono abandonado en unas duchas y ahí empiezan su particular aventura. Esta será la puerta al oscuro universo de Audrey (Louise Bourgoin) y su hermano Vincent (Melvil Poupaud) y el videojuego online Black Hole.

Gaspard quiere contactar con Audrey y decide hacerlo a través del juego. Por su parte Audrey (Sam en el videojuego) parece estar cada vez más cerca de conseguir su deseo de morir con una pareja. Pero Gaspard siente algo por ella y decide ayudarla.

La historia no es el colmo de la originalidad pero el film esconde varios puntos positivos. El uso de las imágenes digitales para representar el vidojuego son todo un acierto, además el gusto visual del director es evidente y hay alguna escena con juegos de cámara muy destacables.

Una película ideal para pasar un domingo por la tarde en el que no se tenga anda mejor que hacer. Correcta, con pinzeladas inteligentes pero que peca de previsible en demasiados momentos.

Our hapless hero.

Legend of Black Heaven (aka Hard Rock save the Space)  was produced in 1999 by AIC, so it has a nostalgic quality to the art style that rather worked for me, as it tells the story of an older protagonist who is wistful about his “salad days“. As might be expected from that setup, the show is loaded with black humor. I thought the show was pretty funny, and it is notable in that it is the story of an older protagonist. The review that follows is designed for minimal spoilers.

Memories of glory days.

When our hero, Oji Tanaka, was younger, he was a guitar hero. Now he’s married and has a kid. He works as a salaryman and he has lost the feeling of wonder in life. When his wife throws out his beloved Flying V model guitar, he heads out to a roadside food booth and drinks sake.

According to anime, these places are everywhere in Tokyo, and tying your tie on your head like that seems to be pretty common, too.

While Oji is crying into his fish cake, a beautiful woman slides in to the booth and buys a glass of sake for herself. She knows of Oji’s past, and claims she still sees in him the musician of his younger days.

Layla.

What Oji doesn’t know is that Layla has been observing him all day, she and several other operatives seem to believe he is “the messiah”. What do these people want from him? Does it have anything to do with the news reports of space battles?

Of course! It would be un-gentleman-like to brag.

Layla gives Oji something he needed, and rekindles his interest, not only in living, but in the others around him as well. Of course keeping the details of his relationship with Layla a secret is no easy matter. In particular there is the thorny issue of his wife.

Stairway to Heaven.

But what exactly does he have with Layla? Is it all a dream? Given how drunk he was, how much of it was real at all?

Once he has been reawakened, Oji becomes an interesting figure. That’s not to say he is perfect, and one could just as easily look upon his re-engagement as selfish indulgence that is paid at the price of attention to his family responsibilities. This is made clear directly by the sub-narratives related to his wife and child.

Did someone say space battles?

These laser beams are so powerful, they have actual arrowheads!

Without giving anything away, the story shows the foolishness of taking actions without considering the true consequences of those actions.

Layla, again.

Well, this was just weird.

This is a 13-episode series that uses the common technique of bringing about a conclusion with a more focused story over the final 3 or so episodes. Before then, the series provides an effective (if at times metaphoric) descriptions of the ups and downs of trying to be a musician.

In summary it was an interesting short series. While it isn’t entirely coherent, it does make the point that

Nothing in life is a waste. There are things you can only realize when you are drunk.

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2. Black Heaven encodes coming soon
a quote from TheProfileth “I am gonna do the black heaven encodes before I get back to Slayers”

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3. Dragon Half will be up very soon. You will be able to get it from our [Dual-Duality] Downloads page or from BakaBT (should hopefully be approved soon)

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4. The Donate button is not working but is being worked on, we are so broke our donate button don’t work, plz help us…

The AW look is concentrated on black  as the label calls it “Black Heaven” featuring a trendy outlook on black clothing. As black is a safe and versatile colour, Popissue brought it to another level by giving it an edgy outlook from casual to formal outfits. The different textures of black is apparent and they blend nicely together providing a softer look towards a sharp cut.

The harem pants is one of the focus in this collection as it can be seen here being styled with casual and formal outfits. The pants is done well by Popissue as the cut itself is flattering and the fabric flows well as it’s easily matched with a tuxedo top or just a t-shirt on a casual day out.

If you’re planning to go down south anytime soon, do not miss going to visit Popissue as it is available in most major cities around Australia.

My fascination with it started with watching tons of Anime. They always had such cool opening and ending themes not unlike American cartoons wherein most of them are just keyboard-ish instrumentals.

Of course, cute japanese girl vocalists are an added plus as well. LOL

Although I was really into mainstream J-Rock at the time. Listening to those who were internationally known [at the time it was L~arc En-Ciel]. It fully blossomed when I started watching Rorouni Kenshin/Samurai X and simply loved all the opening and ending themes, especially Fourth Avenue Cafe by L~arc. 

Unfortunately, I wasn’t really that much of a web surfer then and got cut off with the Jrock trend during college. When I did start hanging out on the net, I discovered my 2nd favorite Jrock band, High and Mighty Color. Although, I did hear them first watching Gundam Seed and Bleach where their songs where opening themes.

Jrock has a different allure for me than the usual rock. I dunno, even if i hardly understand Japanese or their “Engrish”, I still enjoy listening to them and I would love to see my fave bands/artists perform live.

I guess there was a time where the local and international music scene was dry for me and listening to Jrock was just fresh I needed. So here’s a few names you should check out. ;]

Fave Bands/Artists: High and Mighty Color, L~Arc En Ciel, Beat Crusaders, Leah Dizon, Kylee, Teriyaki Boyz, Aqua Timez, Maximum the Hormone..urgh! there’re too many to mention..LOL

Music Inspiring Anime’s[watch them subbed and NOT dubbed]: Black Heaven/Kacho Oji/Section Chief Oji, BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad [FAVE!]

I’m Currently Listening to: Kylee – Vacancy, Boom Boom Satellites – Shut Up and Explode!, Aqua Timez – Velonica, BECK OST

Hard Rock Save the Space

Thematisch dringt man, wie der Titel „Negativ“ vermuten lässt, in die tiefen Abgründe der Seele vor und beschäftigt sich mit den essentiellen Randbereichen menschlicher Existenz.Das Album erscheint in einer limitierten Erstauflage im Digipack und beinhaltet als besonderes Special eine Multimedia Sektion (inkl. 3 Bonustracks) und ein herausnehmbares Poster. Das gesamte Artwork wurde von „Mira Lob“ stilsicher in Szene gesetzt und so schließt sich das Albumkonzept zu einem außergewöhnlichem Gesamtkunstwerk.

Diskographie BLACK HEAVEN:

Chapter one (Trisol / EFA / 2001)
Obscurity (Trisol / EFA / 2002)
End of the world EP (Trisol / EFA / 2003)
Trugbild feat. MANTUS (DCD / Trisol / Soulfood / 2004)
Kunstwerk (Scanner / Soulfood / 2007)
Negativ (Scanner / Soulfood / 2008)

Martin – Music, Lyrics and Vocals
Tina – Vocals

BLACK HEAVEN / MANTUS / SEPIA Fanpage
www.schwarze-schatten.de

Release-Date: 12.09.2008

BandWebsite
Band @ Myspace