On Satday, the 14th of April, UIUC hosted the first ever Google Games event over at the Siebel Center. It was intense. Google Games was comprised of three games, with 16 teams of five competing against each other. The first “game” was a series of puzzles, the second was a Wii sports competition, and the third was a Lego bridge building contest. Although anyone could participate, Google advertised only to the CS and Engineering departments.
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By yours truly. Shown during JAC meeting on 1/19. Took a long while to finish.

Watched ‘There Will Be Blood‘ over this past weekend at Boardman’s, the local art theatre.

Simply astounding. It was a great movie. It is a longer film than most, being over two and a half hours long, but the pacing is solid and the movie flows by quickly. The music is powerful, and maintains a perfect tension throughout the scenes. The camera work captures the scenes well and allows us to focus on important points while being able to portray the conditions and the time of the movie. All of these factors were great and all, but…

Daniel Day-Lewis. My goodness. What an amazing awe-inspiring performance. I don’t remember seeing him in too many movies besides ‘Gangs Of New York’ and ‘The Crucible’ (Bill the Butcher and John Proctor), but my goodness, he plays his role like no other. In this movie, he is an absolute master. You can feel his delight, his greed, and his rage as if you were standing right next to him in the scene. You will not like his character, but at the same time, you can not keep your eyes off of him. Godmode. That’s all I can say.

Watch it and believe. There will be blood.

In other news: while I was watching the movie, I sat next to Roger Ebert’s cousin Tim. Talked with him for a while before the movie started. Seemed like a nice guy but he was a bit show-offy with the fact that he was Ebert’s cousin. He was wearing an Ebert hat, and a Siskel and Ebert jacket. I enjoyed talking with him for the most part, except for the occasional blasts of halitosis.

For those of you who don’t know, Roger Ebert holds the “Overlooked Film Festival” here in Champaign, IL every year. This April, Ebert will host be the 10th one.