Saturday, May 30, 2009

The New York Citty Ballet's "Romeo + Juliet"

I was only able to watch Peter Martin's "Romeo + Juliet" on television. Most of it in HD via WGBH, the rest through a lower res version sent out via DirecTV. Both versions suffered from a maddening tick on the right channel.

I could kvetch a full pages worth, but here it is in a few sentences. The best dancing happens well before the interlude. The lead's are entirely believable, but I'm afraid there's just not enough pretty dancing, and most of the group dancing scenes were choreographed "loosely." What I mean is that most group dance numbers were very individualized. It would have been nice to see this fine troupe doing at least a couple of really tightly synchronized pieces.

If you love ballet for ballet's sake, this R&J will leave you feeling like you just had Chinese food. Full, yet hungry. On the other hand, if you are looking for an experience that will sate your hunger for drama and moves at a good clip, this may be just the ticket!

Saturday, May 9, 2009

Theta: We're not dead yet!

Finally we see 1 piece of evidence from Theta that they're not dead yet and are actually doing something customer facing. The Theta Digital website has been completely redone, though there's precious little new useful content in it.

Even if they manage to revive the brand, I think any current Theta owner is going to be better served by selling their current units and getting other processors if BluRay is your thing. Whatever business Theta gets in their next product cycle will probably be built on entirely new customer base. I hope their ready to start from scratch.