Jan. 20, 1994: “Time Out From a Higher Calling,” read a title on this photograph alongside a story about a group of East Harlem nuns originally from France. Sister Marie Chantal, leaping, and Sister Marie Francesca worked out at the Tae Kwon Do Academy at 828 Ninth Avenue. “The fact that we know tae kwon do doesn’t change anything,” Mother Marie Martha, the group’s mother superior told David Gonzalez, the reporter. “It’s just a sport.” Photo: Jack Manning/The New York Times Photo: Jack Manning/The New York Times
Kickass Cabbie of the Day: Christopher Fulkerson is a modernist classical composer with a Ph.D. and an impressive body of work. But for the past 23 years, he has worked as cab driver in San Francisco. What gives?
By now, most Quentin Tarantino fans are aware of the connections interlaced throughout all of his films. John Travolta’s Vincent Vega in Pulp Fiction is the brother of Michael Madsen’s Vic Vega in Reservoir Dogs, Harvey Keitel’s Mr. White worked with Alabama from True Romance, the plot basis for Kill Bill is described as the synopsis for a TV series in Pulp Fiction, etc.
Now the epiphany that Eli Roth’s character of Donny Donowitz aka “The Bear Jew” in Inglourious Basterds is the father of the movie producer Lee Donowitz in True Romance has inspired a truly mind-blowing theory that the rest of the films (chronologically speaking) in Tarantino’s filmography take place in a world where [Inglorious Basterds spoiler] World War II came to an end when Adolf Hitler was brutally murdered in a movie theater by the Basterds.
This initial connection was brought up in an article on Cracked, but a poster on Reddit (via David Chen’s Twitter) has more eloquently summed up what this means for Tarantino’s movieverse:
As it turns out, Donny Donowitz, ‘The Bear Jew’, is the father of movie producer Lee Donowitz from True Romance – which means that, in Tarantino’s universe, everybody grew up learning about how a bunch of commando Jews machine gunned Hitler to death in a burning movie theater, as opposed to quietly killing himself in a bunker. Because World War 2 ended in a movie theater, everybody lends greater significance to pop culture, hence why seemingly everybody has Abed-level knowledge of movies and TV. Likewise, because America won World War 2 in one concentrated act of hyperviolent slaughter, Americans as a whole are more desensitized to that sort of thing. Hence why Butch is unfazed by killing two people, Mr. White and Mr. Pink take a pragmatic approach to killing in their line of work, Esmerelda the cab driver is obsessed with death, etc. You can extrapolate this further when you realize that Tarantino’s movies are technically two universes – he’s gone on record as saying that Kill Bill and From Dusk ‘Til Dawn take place in a ‘movie movie universe’; that is, they’re movies that characters from the Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs, True Romance, and Death Proof universe would go to see in theaters. (Kill Bill, after all, is basically Fox Force Five, right on down to Mia Wallace playing the title role.) What immediately springs to mind about Kill Bill and From Dusk ‘Til Dawn? That they’re crazy violent, even by Tarantino standards. These are the movies produced in a world where America’s crowning victory was locking a bunch of people in a movie theater and blowing it to bits – and keep in mind, Lee Donowitz, son of one of the people on the suicide mission to kill Hitler, is a very successful movie producer. Basically, it turns every Tarantino movie into alternate reality sci fi. I love it so hard.
Heartwarming Tearjerker of the Day: Watch as a cochlear implant allows deaf 2-year-old Cooper to hear his mother’s voice for the first time. OMG.
How a Virus Conquers the World, Animated
A truly fun animated look at how viruses mutate, jump species, cause pandemics, and what simple things we can all do to help prevent them. Check out more contagion-readiness tips at TakePart.
I’ve researched this myself (meaning “seen some movies”), and I think that as long as we keep Gwyneth Paltrow away from Chinese casinos, we should be fine.
In all seriousness, so-called “animal reservoirs” are a huge danger. That is where virus (or bacteria) populations are passed animal-to-animal for a long time, mutating slowly and building up a huge number of variants before jumping to humans, where they can wreak havoc. Our factory farms might just be pandemic incubators.
Previously: Let Robert Krulwich tell you the story of how a virus invades your body, along with a fantastic animation. This would normally be scary, but it’s Krulwich, so it’s almost fun.
Even with a journalism-lite approach to the news, where reporters post as many as 15 news stories a day based largely on work by rival reporters - there’s not much money to be made. It’s a poor way to make a living.
Mr Blodget is not lighting cigars with hundred dollar bills and stubbing them out on the backs of hard working journalists doing original reporting elsewhere.
In 2010, Business Insider had its first profitable year, it made $2,127 on revenues of $5 million. Even by rewriting other people’s news stories there is barely any money to be made - so how can quality journalism be supported?
First off, we recommend you read The New York Times’ piece on Weisenthal — that guy has more obsessive work habits than all of us, combined. (Then, when you’re done, read Blodget schooling a college professor.) Weisenthal’s habits show an issue with modern journalism in general. It’s all about getting as many pageviews as possible, no matter how stressful that proves to be in practice and how much that limits your quality control. “Henry Blodget and the Business Insider editorial team aren’t the ones responsible for the poor state of journalism today,” Foremski says, “they are merely the expression of what’s currently possible given the means available - which isn’t much, a whole lot of nothing much (about 250 news stories a day at Business Insider).” Foremski suggests the current model of advertising — obsessed with pageviews over quality — is the problem.
Soviet Luna 24 probe found water on the Moon in 1976, researcher says
Was Moon water actually found two decades before the Clementine probe?
