Hacker Cinema
New Rose Hotel
1999 · Film · 93 min
Directed by Abel Ferrara
A corporate raider and his henchman use a chanteuse to lure a scientific genius away from his employer and family.
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7 comments on Hacker News
TV series:
- Dark Angel. I somehow missed this during it's original broadcast run, and only just now went back and watched it. I don't think it's streaming anywhere legit, so I went the bittorrent route. I really enjoyed it. Season One is definitely stronger than Season Two, but it kept me pretty engaged for the entire series.
- Max Headroom. I'd seen the entire series before, but I went back for a re-watch. I love this show.
- Person of Interest. Same deal, I'd seen the entire run previously, but did a complete re-watch.
Movies:
I don't think I watched any contemporary movies this year. I mostly watched old cyberpunk movies and "cyberpunk adjacent" sci-fi. Not sure anything I watched was exactly great but a couple stood out as interesting at least (in various ways)
- 964 Pinocchio
- Tetsuo: The Iron Man
- New Rose Hotel
Also saw an interesting psychological horror / thriller titled "Open 24 Hours" that wasn't bad. And a movie titled "Synchronic" that was pretty good.
Informative / educational videos:
- N.J. Wildberger's "History of Mathematics" series
Graham Roland: https://m.imdb.com/name/nm3169366/
Enjoyed LOST and Fringe.
Jack Ryan seasons tended to start off strong, but then lose my interest as they got to the end. To be fair, that's also true of their source: the beginnings of Tom Clancy books are more interesting than their resolution.
We'll see.
Hopefully this doesn't go Altered Carbon and decide "This bit is too complicated for the audience, so we'll rewrite it." (Envoys were UN black ops used for civilian unrest suppression, some of whom defected, which was way more interesting than TV's "they're rebels")
Edit: What happened to Gibson being historically unwilling to sell media rights, after dissatisfaction with previous attempts?
And also, reference to the New Rose Hotel movie that was supposedly Gibson's fave: https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0133122/
Don't forget there's a trilogy: Neuromancer, Count Zero, and Mona Lisa Overdrive.
The other books are just as good, if not better.
Although be prepared that if you like it too much, there's no more. Gibson typically tires of writing in one style for more than three books.
PS: There's an excellent New Rose Hotel movie that no one has ever seen. Highly recommend reading the short story and watching it. https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0133122/
Perhaps my favorite piece of Gibson. It's echoed with me every time I travel for... 18 years now?
"Tuesday, February 04, 2003
OUT AND ABOUT, WITHOUT A LAPTOP
Day two, still not very far from home but starting to see that blogging on the fly and in internet cafes is probably not the best way to keep this updated. Though on the other hand I suspect I get to see more things because I don't travel with a camera. In the peculiar mobile fishbowl of a book tour, the only time I'd have to use a laptop would be the time I have to sit alone, staring blankly into space. I suspect that those moments serve some vital function."
Written on his blog [0] while he was touring for Pattern Recognition(?). His blog is still the most Gibson thing I've read, and I cannot recommend it enough.
Edit: Because I'd be doing a disservice if I didn't mention it. If you're a Gibson fan, read "New Rose Hotel" [1] and watch the film [2].
[0] http://williamgibsonblog.blogspot.com/2003/02/?m=1
[1] http://www.lib.ru/GIBSON/hotel.txt
[2] https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0133122/
I agree with a lot of this. He's said himself that when he got the contract for a novel, he didn't know how to write one, and was kind of panicked about being boring. That's why the first 60 pages or so of the book (through the Sense/Net strike to get the Dixie Flatline's cartridge) is like a nonstop adrenaline rush. It's so exciting! I had no idea science fiction could be like that, the first time I read it.
I strongly agree that his best work was in Burning Chrome. Unfortunately, the only film adaptations of his work we have are two stories from that collection, and they were both awful in different ways. Johnny Mnemonic misses all but the barest outlines of the story - where's Molly? I can't believe they gave up the fight on the "Killing Floor" with Molly vs the vatgrown ninja in favor of blowing up a bridge. Sigh. New Rose Hotel, on the other hand, hewed very close to the original story - which was fine, except the story was only six pages long.
As an aside, I have a band called The Gernsback Continuum, after the short story.
> I'm not aware of any motion picture adaptations of Stephenson's or Gibson's works.
Well, for what it's worth, there is Johnny Mnemonic, which wasn't very well received although I personally liked it. Another short story set in the Sprawl, New Rose Hotel, was also adapted to a film (I haven't seen it), and many other works, including Neuromancer, have been in various stages of development for a while. More details at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Gibson#Film_adaptations,_screenplays,_and_appearances
Actually, there is also a film adaptation of New Rose Hotel, which is in the same setting as Johnny Mnemonic and the Sprawl trilogy.
[1] http://imdb.com/title/tt0133122/