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Since everyone knows candy tastes good, manufacturers of such products have long been freed from the burden of explaining their product attributes in ads and instead have let their freak flag fly

Though Skittles arguably pioneered bizarre, stream-of-conscious marketing for the category, the approach has also caught on in Hong Kong

Here, a seemingly normal young couple share some Rio Mints. What might have been a tender moment in another ad here becomes an exercise in random titillation. (Warning: Contains puppet-based nipple-licking.) Read more...

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Molly Schuyler ate a 72 ounce steak in less than 3 minutes at Sayler’s in Portland, OR.

Thanks Andrew R

 

It will shock absolutely no one to hear that critical consensus and audience reaction often fail to match up. The divide between those opinions is why, every couple of months or so, we get another wave of thinkpieces wondering whether reviewers are out of touch and asking whether they even matter anymore.

But how much do the two groups differ in their reactions, really? After all, critics are moviegoers too — they’re just ones who happen to have more experience analyzing and discussing cinema. A fun new infographic examines that question by looking at some of the best known, best loved film trilogies of all time, and comparing each installment’s Metacritic score to its IMDb user score. Check it out after the jump.

Visually user jess posted the chart.

For the most part, IMDb users seem to be more forgiving of these films than the reviewers are. (The exceptions include the first Star Wars, the second Spider-Man, and the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy.) So to some extent, the data backs up the stereotype of the hard-to-please critic.

But as the chart shows, the two sides aren’t so different in their reactions to each movie relative to the others. Again, there are outliers. Critics apparently warmed to Austin Powers as the series went on, while moviegoers found that the series yielded diminishing returns.

However, everyone agrees that Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy peaked with The Dark Knight, for example, and that the Matrix saga got worse with each successive entry. It’s just that the professionals thought The Dark Knight was merely pretty good (82), instead of the best thing ever (90).

There are some mitigating circumstances, like the fact that critics tend to write their reviews right after watching a movie while IMDb voters have the benefit of hindsight. Or the fact that reviewers have to watch whatever they’re assigned, whereas a typical movie watcher can just avoid a film they expect to dislike.

In other words, this chart doesn’t “prove” anything. Still, it’s an interesting perspective on the question of whether critics are so wildly disconnected from moviegoers as a whole. Based on this data, the answer seems to be “not as much as you might think.”

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“Bootiful is one of the only 100% natural butt enhancement creams that uses a special blend of natural herbs, roots and vitamins to increase the volume of your buttocks, enhance curves & eliminate stretch marks.” — Bootiful

Over the past few weeks dozens of DVD screeners have leaked onto the Internet. This happens every year around the holiday season, when movie studios send out their entries for various awards, the Oscars included.

The pirated screeners are a thorn in the side of Hollywood, and over the years the movie studios have implemented strict security procedures to prevent leaks. These efforts have been moderately successful, but the problem remains.

Yesterday a pirated screener copy of The Secret Life of Walter Mitty leaked onto the internet via various BitTorrent sites. While this isn’t something out of the ordinary, the fact that the screener displays a watermark with a Hollywood star’s name on it is quite unique.

The pirated copy in question is linked to Ellen DeGeneres, which is all the more painful, since she is the host for the upcoming 2014 Oscars.

As can be seen below, the leaked screener clearly lists DeGeneres’ name, suggesting that the DVD was sent to her in November. The watermark is displayed right after the opening credits, around the one minute mark.

Property of Fox – Ellen DeGeneres 11/26/13

While it’s technically possible that someone edited the screener to implicate DeGeneres, this seems unlikely. All copies of the screener that are circulating on the Internet include the same watermark, suggesting that they came from the same source.

Property of Fox – Ellen DeGeneres 11/26/13

Thus far, there has been plenty of interest in the pirated screener. Data gathered by TorrentFreak suggests that within 24 hours of its release, an estimated 250,000 copies have been already been downloaded , all with DeGeneres’ name on it.

Neither Ellen DeGeneres nor Fox have commented on the leak thus far, and it also remains unclear what the screener was intended for.

Andy Baio suggests that it could be connected to Ben Stiller’s appearance on the Ellen DeGeneres show early December, for which she may have received an advance copy of the film.

This is not the first time that a celebrity has been linked to a leaked DVD screener. In 2011 a pirated copy of the Steven Spielberg movie ‘Super 8′ surfaced online with Howard Stern’s name all over it. This leak made plenty of headlines, but as far as we know Stern nor his colleagues were never investigated.

For Ellen DeGeneres the leak may perhaps serve as inspiration for a piracy joke or two at the Oscars ceremony later this year. That is, if she’s not in jail by then.

Update: Twentieth Century Fox confirmed that the copy was sent to the Ellen DeGeneres show.

Source: TorrentFreak, for the latest info on copyright, file-sharing and VPN services.

The strain, the concentrated effort and the energy behind that heavy ball of iron thrown across the field by shot putters during competitions make the moments right before the shot is put priceless when they’re captured on film. But unless you record every Olympic event on your DVR and play back the seconds before the toss frame by frame you're not likely to catch these fleeting moments of facial madness.

Thanks to some fine folks from Reddit you can bask in the glory of shot putter's facial expressions with a series of candid photos, taken at just the right moment to capture all the greatness of those who launch iron balls for the sake of glory.

Via 22 Words

A new Gallup poll is making me very jealous, because I still have VHS tapes lying around that I can’t watch because my roommate made me throw out my old TV/VCR combo. Anyway! It turns out that 58% of Americans still have a VCR, which yes, is down from the 88% in 2005, but is still remarkable in this age of HD and digital whatnots. Anyone want to watch old taped episodes of My So-Called Life? I’ve got the VHS, if you’ve got the VCR. [Gallup]

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California Moonbats Want Global Warming “Warning Labels” On Gas Pumps Similar To Those On Cigarettes… They really need warnings around San Francisco that say “Caution Entering Insane Asylum.”

 

This Sunday The Simpsons will pay tribute to retiring Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki with a brief sequence of Homer drunkenly stumbling past some of Studio Ghibli's most famous works. Have you ever seen Grave of the Fireflies? It wasn't directed by Miyazaki but it's definitely worth a watch if you're looking for a SOLID CRY.

"Married to the Blob", which will air on FOX, follows Comic Book Guy's attempts to date a Japanese woman who is writing an autobiographical manga. Having downed too much "snake wine", Homer stumbles into a hallucinatory haze populated by some of Miyazaki's best-loved characters. Otto appears as The Catbus from My Neighbor Totoro; drunken double vision produces two Kiki the witches from Kiki's Delivery Service in the forms of Patty and Selma; and Apu is "ruined by whimsy" as his Kwik-E-Mart morphs into Howl's Moving Castle. But the biggest nod goes to Spirited Away with reference after reverential reference.

Howl's Moving Castle is my favorite. Probably because I relate so much to Howl. You know how he turns into a bird-person and goes to interfere with the war at night? I do that. Well, I sleepwalk. Okay so I'm not actually asleep but I like to pretend I am so I don't feel bad for eating all those cookies in the middle of the night. Keep going for the worthwhile video.

In a show full of 3D printers, Solidoodle sets itself apart in one key area: affordability. The company has offered up a series of sub-$1,000 models, including, most recently, the Solidoodle 4, introduced a few months ago. January 10, 2014 1:00:00 ...

Before José Padilha's RoboCop remake hits theaters next month, a group of fan filmmakers are releasing their own tribute to the original film—a shot-for-shot remake created by 55 different fans in 55 different styles. Check out the trailer.

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BISMARCK, ND—Nine-year-old pee-wee hockey player Connor Griffin confirmed Thursday that he wishes his dad cared enough about him and his Falcons teammates to curse, threaten, or even physically assault other parents during games.

In a corner of Sony’s CES Booth, the company was demonstrating inspirational home electronics like a huge 147-inch projected 4K image, a projected table computer, or innocuous display art on the wall. While everything was interesting, the star of the show was this ultra short throw projector that can project a very nice 147 inch image on a nearby wall, from a distance of about 1 or 2 feet. (more…)

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Sony Ultra Short Throw Projector: Hands-On original content from Ubergizmo.

Oculus VR has been showing off a new version of its virtual reality technology at the Consumer Electronics Show. According to Vice President of Product Nate Mitchell, the “Crystal Cove” prototype features two big improvements — positional tracking and low persistence.

I have to admit that when Mitchell first said this, I started to worry that these were going to be minor changes, only relevant to hardcore gamers and serious virtual reality geeks. Then I tried out the new prototype and, well, it was kind of amazing.

You can see me trying out the prototype in the video above. Ignoring the fact that I look pretty goofy as I swerve around (or, fine, don’t ignore it) — I think it’s pretty clear that I’m having a great time.

The more noticeable change is the positional tracking. Basically, it means that in addition to responding to where you look, the Oculus headset can also track the position of your head — if you lean left or right or forward or backward. So in the first demo, a tower defense game, I could lean in and see the details of the individual figures running around the screen, or I could lean back and see the full scope of the playing field.

The other addition, low persistence, is supposed to eliminate motion blur — so when I shifted my head in the second demo, I could still read the text on the computer screens.

The bottom line is that the experience felt much, much more immersive and real than it was when I tried a much earlier prototype at last year’s CES. Granted, some of that is also because the demo involved more sophisticated and beautiful gameplay, but hey, some of that gameplay was enabled by the new features.

As for when you’ll get to try all of this out, Mitchell said the company isn’t ready to make any specific announcements, but he suggested that Oculus will probably want to ship one more round of kits out for developer testing before releasing a version for consumers. He also said that everything I tried out at CES will be available in the consumer version.

Oculus, by the way, recently raised a $75 million round led by Andreessen Horowitz.