IMDb-BEWERTUNG
7,1/10
3982
IHRE BEWERTUNG
Füge eine Handlung in deiner Sprache hinzuAn exploration of the careers of four unrelated professionals: a lion tamer, a robotics expert, a topiary gardener, and a naked mole rat specialist.An exploration of the careers of four unrelated professionals: a lion tamer, a robotics expert, a topiary gardener, and a naked mole rat specialist.An exploration of the careers of four unrelated professionals: a lion tamer, a robotics expert, a topiary gardener, and a naked mole rat specialist.
- Auszeichnungen
- 11 Gewinne & 2 Nominierungen
Handlung
WUSSTEST DU SCHON:
- WissenswertesIncluded among the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die", edited by Steven Schneider.
- Zitate
Rodney Brooks, Robot Scientist: If you analyze it too much, life becomes almost meaningless.
Ausgewählte Rezension
Architecture Machine
My small survey of documentary types has brought me to this, and what a celebration!
This is complex, meaningful cinema that just happens to be a documentary. It is intelligent, complex, deliberate and deeply thought provoking. I think it communicates something that isn't quite right, but the thing is communicated in the most effective way — by folding the idea being explained into the form of the explanation, the film itself.
The core of this is the work of Rodney Brooks. He is a celebrated researcher in robotics and now the founder of the most promising company making these things. He is smart, articulate and the things he makes work as advertised. I've encountered him and his work professionally over the last 30 years. He makes machines that walk, and have some cognitive navigation skills. Walking is hard.
While there are many research centers working on robotics, there are only two universities working on the underlying theories. MIT is the least shallow of these. Add in the fact that Brooks has manufactured thousands of graduates in his style of thinking, and you may appreciate why he may be one of the most influential thinkers on the planet.
The theory here is that instead of thinking about a single brain, it makes sense to think in terms of a society of collaborating miniminds, agents. As a metaphor, bees, ants, termites are usual. And as usual, the metaphor in most quarters is taken too literally. Brooks does not quite do so, but this is the first compromise made by the filmmaker. Making agents systems that have the behavior you want is impossible without some structure in the society. A promising approach is to go deep and restructure logic. Instead, Brooks structures the agents into "subsumptive" layers. This mirrors special purpose roles of termites and molerats in colonies.
Okay, here is an idea, an interesting one, and one that is already embedded in the general intellectual economy. Around this, Morris builds a film. Nominally, there are four "geniuses." One is our robotics theorist. We have an obsessive expert in molerats, so we have our metaphor made whole. We have a lion tamer. Now he fits into the idea architecture by explaining how he repeatedly risks his life to figure out and superficially control inscrutable animals. And finally we have a guy who reverses the metaphor; he takes living things with their natural agent system that wants to behave one way, and he forces it to look like larger living things. The resemblance is superficial and fragile.
Two of these form the cinematic spine: the circus and the robots. Most of what we see apart from the four individuals themselves is a collage of circus footage and splices from old robot movies. We also have the synthesis of old "circus" movies with robotic influence.
Peppered in are the two other guys and their cinematic expression. With the molerats, we have — well film of molerats. With the topiarist, we have some artistically photographed scenes of him working in the garden. The score is important in Morris films; here the composer tries to build subsumptive music, taking themes from movies and other recognizable sources, assigning them to types of clips we see, and subsuming them into a klezmer- inspired circus score where we are the audience.
This really is a carefully structured piece of cinema, visually conveying ideas much deeper than one normally allows.
The problem is that like the four men we are shown, the approach is still discrete, reductionist. It assumes that great sweeps of life can be logical, explained. We go to the circus and topiary garden to see this narrative. An influential professor treats grad students like so many ants, incrementally evolving "the system." A fellow "explains" the colony, as if observations equals insights.
So here is the quandary with film and ideas. Film is about showing. The best ideas are about abstracting away distracting (and often false) appearances. A long form narrative film takes you places where you can invent your insights, with some guidance. A documentary feeds insights, but has to stick more with the "sight" than the "in."
Still, the structure here and the ambition! It isn't real, but it does not have to be to warm us.
Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.
This is complex, meaningful cinema that just happens to be a documentary. It is intelligent, complex, deliberate and deeply thought provoking. I think it communicates something that isn't quite right, but the thing is communicated in the most effective way — by folding the idea being explained into the form of the explanation, the film itself.
The core of this is the work of Rodney Brooks. He is a celebrated researcher in robotics and now the founder of the most promising company making these things. He is smart, articulate and the things he makes work as advertised. I've encountered him and his work professionally over the last 30 years. He makes machines that walk, and have some cognitive navigation skills. Walking is hard.
While there are many research centers working on robotics, there are only two universities working on the underlying theories. MIT is the least shallow of these. Add in the fact that Brooks has manufactured thousands of graduates in his style of thinking, and you may appreciate why he may be one of the most influential thinkers on the planet.
The theory here is that instead of thinking about a single brain, it makes sense to think in terms of a society of collaborating miniminds, agents. As a metaphor, bees, ants, termites are usual. And as usual, the metaphor in most quarters is taken too literally. Brooks does not quite do so, but this is the first compromise made by the filmmaker. Making agents systems that have the behavior you want is impossible without some structure in the society. A promising approach is to go deep and restructure logic. Instead, Brooks structures the agents into "subsumptive" layers. This mirrors special purpose roles of termites and molerats in colonies.
Okay, here is an idea, an interesting one, and one that is already embedded in the general intellectual economy. Around this, Morris builds a film. Nominally, there are four "geniuses." One is our robotics theorist. We have an obsessive expert in molerats, so we have our metaphor made whole. We have a lion tamer. Now he fits into the idea architecture by explaining how he repeatedly risks his life to figure out and superficially control inscrutable animals. And finally we have a guy who reverses the metaphor; he takes living things with their natural agent system that wants to behave one way, and he forces it to look like larger living things. The resemblance is superficial and fragile.
Two of these form the cinematic spine: the circus and the robots. Most of what we see apart from the four individuals themselves is a collage of circus footage and splices from old robot movies. We also have the synthesis of old "circus" movies with robotic influence.
Peppered in are the two other guys and their cinematic expression. With the molerats, we have — well film of molerats. With the topiarist, we have some artistically photographed scenes of him working in the garden. The score is important in Morris films; here the composer tries to build subsumptive music, taking themes from movies and other recognizable sources, assigning them to types of clips we see, and subsuming them into a klezmer- inspired circus score where we are the audience.
This really is a carefully structured piece of cinema, visually conveying ideas much deeper than one normally allows.
The problem is that like the four men we are shown, the approach is still discrete, reductionist. It assumes that great sweeps of life can be logical, explained. We go to the circus and topiary garden to see this narrative. An influential professor treats grad students like so many ants, incrementally evolving "the system." A fellow "explains" the colony, as if observations equals insights.
So here is the quandary with film and ideas. Film is about showing. The best ideas are about abstracting away distracting (and often false) appearances. A long form narrative film takes you places where you can invent your insights, with some guidance. A documentary feeds insights, but has to stick more with the "sight" than the "in."
Still, the structure here and the ambition! It isn't real, but it does not have to be to warm us.
Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.
hilfreich•21
- tedg
- 17. Juni 2010
Top-Auswahl
Melden Sie sich zum Bewerten an und greifen Sie auf die Watchlist für personalisierte Empfehlungen zu
- How long is Fast, Cheap & Out of Control?Powered by Alexa
Details
- Erscheinungsdatum
- Herkunftsland
- Sprache
- Auch bekannt als
- Fast, Cheap & Out of Control
- Drehorte
- Produktionsfirmen
- Weitere beteiligte Unternehmen bei IMDbPro anzeigen
Box Office
- Bruttoertrag in den USA und Kanada
- 878.960 $
- Eröffnungswochenende in den USA und in Kanada
- 23.665 $
- 5. Okt. 1997
- Weltweiter Bruttoertrag
- 878.960 $
- Laufzeit1 Stunde 20 Minuten
- Farbe
- Sound-Mix
- Seitenverhältnis
- 1.85 : 1
Zu dieser Seite beitragen
Bearbeitung vorschlagen oder fehlenden Inhalt hinzufügen
Oberste Lücke
By what name was Schnell, billig und außer Kontrolle (1997) officially released in Canada in English?
Antwort