The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood . The floor was of varnished wood, with stripes and circles painted on it, for the games that were formerly played there; the hoops for the basketball nets were still in place, though the nets were gone. A balcony ran around the room, for the spectators, and I thought I could smell, faintly like an afterimage, the pungent scent of sweat, shot through with the sweet taint of chewing gum and perfume from the watching girls, felt- skirted as I knew from pictures, later in miniskirts, then pants, then in one earring, spiky green- streaked hair. Dances would have been held there; the music lingered, a palimpsest of unheard sound, style upon style, an undercurrent of drums, a forlorn wail, garlands made of tissue- paper flowers, cardboard devils, a revolving ball of mirrors, powdering the dancers with a snow of light. There was old sex in the room and loneliness, and expectation, of something without a shape or name. I remember that yearning, for something that was always about to happen and was never the same as the hands that were on us there and then, in the small of the back, or out back, in the parking lot, or in the television room with the sound turned down and only the pictures flickering over lifting flesh. IBooks top ebook best seller list for the iPad and iPhone at the Apple iBookstore. Chart of the best selling ebooks 2017 updated daily.We yearned for the future. How did we learn it, that talent for insatiability? It was in the air; and it was still in the air, an afterthought, as we tried to sleep, in the army cots that had been set up in rows, with spaces between so we could not talk. We had flannelette sheets, like children's, and army- issue blankets, old ones that still said U. The Birds (1963) is a modern Hitchcock thriller/masterpiece, his first film with Universal Studios. It is the apocalyptic story of a northern California coastal. No is the sixth novel by the English author Ian Fleming to feature his British Secret Service agent James Bond. Fleming wrote the novel in early 1957 at his. Read all the hottest movie news. Get all the latest updates on your favorite movies - from new releases to timeless classics, get the scoop on Moviefone. Humanity aims for constant progress; movement towards a superior standard of living. But what happens when everything goes wrong instead? A mainstay of science. Echoes of DeLillo. The Good Father by Noah Hawley. A gripping novel, with echoes of Don DeLillo, about a father’s reaction to his son’s act of homicide. Battle Royale ( Rebecca (1940) is the classic Hitchcock gothic thriller and a compelling mystery (and haunting ghost story) about a tortured romance. S. We folded our clothes neatly and laid them on the stools at the ends of the beds. The lights were turned down but not out. Aunt Sara and Aunt Elizabeth patrolled; they had electric cattle prods slung on thongs from their leather belts. No guns though, even they could not be trusted with guns. Guns were for the guards, specially picked from the Angels. The guards weren't allowed inside the building except when called, and we weren't allowed out, except for our walks, twice daily, two by two around the football field, which was enclosed now by a chain- link fence topped with barbed wire. The Angels stood outside it with their backs to us. They were objects of fear to us, but of something else as well. If only they would look. If only we could talk to them. Something could be exchanged, we thought, some deal made, some tradeoff, we still had our bodies. That was our fantasy. We learned to whisper almost without sound. In the semidarkness we could stretch out our arms, when the Aunts weren't looking, and touch each other's hands across space. We learned to lip- read, our heads flat on the beds, turned sideways, watching each other's mouths. In this way we exchanged names, from bed to bed: Alma. June. IIShopping. A chair, a table, a lamp. Above, on the white ceiling, a relief ornament in the shape of a wreath, and in the center of it a blank space, plastered over, like the place in a face where the eye has been taken out. There must have been a chandelier, once. They've removed anything you could tie a rope to. A window, two white curtains. Under the window, a window seat with a little cushion. When the window is partly open- -it only opens partly- -the air can come in and make the curtains move. I can sit in the chair, or on the window seat, hands folded, and watch this. Sunlight comes in through the window too, and falls on the floor, which is made of wood, in narrow strips, highly polished. I can smell the polish. There's a rug on the floor, oval, of braided rags. This is the kind of touch they like: folk art, archaic, made by women, in their spare time, from things that have no further use. A return to traditional values. Waste not want not. I am not being wasted. Why do I want? On the wall above the chair, a picture, framed but with no glass: a print of flowers, blue irises, watercolor. Flowers are still allowed. Does each of us have the same print, the same chair, the same white curtains, I wonder? Government issue? Think of it as being in the army, said Aunt Lydia. A bed. Single, mattress medium- hard, covered with a flocked white spread. Nothing takes place in the bed but sleep; or no sleep. I try not to think too much. Like other things now, thought must be rationed. There's a lot that doesn't bear thinking about. Thinking can hurt your chances, and I intend to last. I know why there is no glass, in front of the watercolor picture of blue irises, and why the window opens only partly and why the glass in it is shatterproof. It isn't running away they're afraid of. We wouldn't get far. It's those other escapes, the ones you can open in yourself, given a cutting edge. So. Apart from these details, this could be a college guest room, for the less distinguished visitors; or a room in a rooming house, of former times, for ladies in reduced circumstances. That is what we are now. The circumstances have been reduced; for those of us who still have circumstances. But a chair, sunlight, flowers: these are not to be dismissed. I am alive, I live, I breathe, I put my hand out, unfolded, into the sunlight. Where I am is not a prison but a privilege, as Aunt Lydia said, who was in love with either/or. The bell that measures time is ringing. Time here is measured by bells, as once in nunneries. As in a nunnery too, there are few mirrors. I get up out of the chair, advance my feet into the sunlight, in their red shoes, flat- heeled to save the spine and not for dancing. The red gloves are lying on the bed. I pick them up, pull them onto my hands, finger by finger. Everything except the wings around my face is red: the color of blood, which defines us. The skirt is ankle- length, full, gathered to a flat yoke that extends over the breasts, the sleeves are full. The white wings too are prescribed issue; they are to keep us from seeing, but also from being seen. I never looked good in red, it's not my color. I pick up the shopping basket, put it over my arm. The door of the room- -not my room, I refuse to say my- -is not locked. In fact it doesn't shut properly. I go out into the polished hallway, which has a runner down the center, dusty pink. Like a path through the forest, like a carpet for royalty, it shows me the way. The carpet bends and goes down the front staircase and I go with it, one hand on the banister, once a tree, turned in another century, rubbed to a warm gloss. Late Victorian, the house is, a family house, built for a large rich family. There's a grandfather clock in the hallway, which doles out time, and then the door to the motherly front sitting room, with its flesh tones and hints. A sitting room in which I never sit, but stand or kneel only. At the end of the hallway, above the front door, is a fanlight of colored glass: flowers, red and blue. There remains a mirror, on the hall wall. If I turn my head so that the white wings framing my face direct my vision towards it, I can see it as I go down the stairs, round, convex, a pier glass, like the eye of a fish, and myself in it like a distorted shadow, a parody of something, some fairy- tale figure in a red cloak, descending towards a moment of carelessness that is the same as danger. A Sister, dipped in blood. At the bottom of the stairs there's a hat- and- umbrella stand, the bentwood kind, long rounded rungs of wood curving gently up into hooks shaped like the opening fronds of a fern. There are several umbrellas in it: black, for the Commander, blue, for the Commander's Wife, and the one assigned to me, which is red. I leave the red umbrella where it is, because I know from the window that the day is sunny. I wonder whether or not the Commander's Wife is in the sitting room. She doesn't always sit. Sometimes I can hear her pacing back and forth, a heavy step and then a light one, and the soft tap of her cane on the dusty- rose carpet. I walk along the hallway, past the sitting room door and the door that leads into the dining room, and open the door at the end of the hall and go through into the kitchen. Here the smell is no longer of furniture polish. Rita is in here, standing at the kitchen table, which has a top of chipped white enamel. She's in her usual Martha's dress, which is dull green, like a surgeon's gown of the time before. The dress is much like mine in shape, long and concealing, but with a bib apron over it and without the white wings and the veil. She puts on the veil to go outside, but nobody much cares who sees the face of a Martha. Her sleeves are rolled to the elbow, showing her brown arms. She's making bread, throwing the loaves for the final brief kneading and then the shaping. Rita sees me and nods, whether in greeting or in simple acknowledgment of my presence it's hard to say, and wipes her floury hands on her apron and rummages in the kitchen drawer for the token book. Frowning, she tears out three tokens and hands them to me. Her face might be kindly if she would smile. But the frown isn't personal: it's the red dress she disapproves of, and what it stands for. She thinks I may be catching, like a disease or any form of bad luck. Sometimes I listen outside closed doors, a thing I never would have done in the time before. I don't listen long, because I don't want to be caught doing it. Once, though, I heard Rita say to Cora that she wouldn't debase herself like that. Nobody asking you, Cora said. Anyways, what could you do, supposing? Go to the Colonies, Rita said. They have the choice. With the Unwomen, and starve to death and Lord knows what all? Catch you. They were shelling peas; even through the almost- closed door I could hear the light clink of the hard peas falling into the metal bowl. I heard Rita, a grunt or a sigh, of protest or agreement. Anyways, they're doing it for us all, said Cora, or so they say. If I hadn't of got my tubes tied, it could of been me, say I was ten years younger. It's not that bad. It's not what you'd call hard work. Better her than me, Rita said, and I opened the door. Battle Royale (film) - Wikipedia. Battle Royale(. It is the final film directed by Kinji Fukasaku, the screenplay written by his son Kenta, and stars Takeshi Kitano. The film takes place in a dystopian Japan and it follows the story of Shuya Nanahara, a high- school student, and his classmates. Their class has been chosen by the government to take part in an annual game where all the students of the class must fight to the death until only one remains alive. The film aroused both domestic and international controversy and was either banned outright or deliberately excluded from distribution in several countries. Fukasaku started working on a sequel, Battle Royale II: Requiem, but he died of prostate cancer on January 1. Takeshi Kitano. His son, Kenta Fukasaku, completed the film in 2. Japanese middle school student Shuya Nanahara copes with life after his father's suicide. Meanwhile, schoolmate Noriko Nakagawa is the only student attending class 3- B. Their teacher, Kitano, resigns after being impulsively attacked by a student. One year later, class 3- B takes a field trip, but they are gassed, fitted with electronic collars, and sent to a . Kitano explains that the class has been chosen to participate in the annual Battle Royale as a result of the BR Act, which was passed after 8. A cheerful orientation video instructs the class they have three days to kill each other until only one remains. The explosive collars will kill any uncooperative students or those within daily . Kitano kills two students, Fumiyo Fujiyoshi and Yoshitoki Kuninobu (Shuya's best friend), for misbehavior during the video. Each student is provided a bag of food and water, map of the island, compass, and a weapon ranging in efficiency from firearms to a paper fan. The first six hours see twelve deaths, four by suicide. Mitsuko Souma and mute transfer student Kazuo Kiriyama soon become the most dangerous players. Another transfer student, Shogo Kawada, seems somewhat more merciful, and Shinji Mimura plots to hack into the military's computer system. Amid shifting loyalties and violent confrontations, Shuya promises to keep Noriko safe, because his friend secretly loved her. Shuya carries Noriko to a clinic after she collapses, where they encounter Kawada, who reveals that he won a previous Battle Royale at the cost of his girlfriend, Keiko Onuki, whose death he seeks to avenge. When Kiriyama attacks, Shuya entrusts Kawada to protect Noriko and runs off as a distraction. Although saved by Hiroki Sugimura, he is wounded. Shuya awakens in the island's lighthouse, bandaged by female class representative Yukie Utsumi, who has a crush on him. Five other girls from her clique have also been hiding out in the building, including Yuko Sakaki, who attempts to poison Shuya only for Yuka Nakagawa to accidentally eat the food. Yuko is the only survivor of the ensuing shootout; despondent, she apologises to Shuya and commits suicide. Shuya returns to Noriko and Kawada, and they set out to find Mimura. Of the seven students remaining, all except Kiriyama are attempting or willing to subvert the game. Mimura and two others, Yutaka Seto and Keita Iijima, infiltrate the military's computer system, but Kiriyama finds and kills them. When Kawada, Noriko and Shuya arrive at the hackers' burning base, Kawada confronts and kills Kiriyama, who had been blinded by an explosion rigged by Mimura as he was killed. On the morning of the final day, Kawada, aware of the collars' internal microphones, takes Shuya and Noriko aside and fakes their deaths. Suspicious, Kitano ends the game and dismisses the troops, intent on personally killing the supposed victor. Kitano realizes that Kawada had hacked into the game's system months beforehand, and has now disabled Shuya and Noriko's tracking devices. The three survivors confront Kitano in the headquarters, and he unveils a disturbing homemade painting of the massacred class that depicts Noriko as sole survivor. He reveals that he was unable to bear the hatred between him and his students, having been rejected by his daughter. He confesses that he always thought of Noriko as a daughter and asks her to kill him, but Shuya shoots Kitano after he threatens Noriko with a gun. As he falls, Kitano shoots, revealing the gun to be a water pistol. As he dies, Kitano angrily takes a call from his daughter and rebukes her, before shooting the phone with a real hand gun he had kept hidden in his pocket. Shuya, Noriko and Kawada leave the island on a boat, but Kawada dies from injuries sustained in his gunfight with Kiriyama, happy that in the end, he . Noriko gives Shuya a Seto Dragon Claw balisong butterfly knife before they run off together. Main characters. These finalists were subjected to a 6- month period of physical fitness training under supervision of the director, Kinji Fukasaku, who eventually cast 4. The other members of the cast had all graduated from secondary education, and Tar. At that time, his class was made to work in a munitions factory. In July 1. 94. 5, the factory came under artillery fire. The children could not escape so they dived under each other for cover. The surviving members of the class had to dispose of the corpses. At that point, Fukasaku realised that the Japanese government was lying about World War II, and he developed a burning hatred of adults in general that he maintained for a long time afterwards. I move the way I'm told to. I try to look the way I'm told to. I don't know much about the emotional side. Fukasaku told me to play myself. I did not really understand, but he told me to play myself, as I ordinarily would be! I'm just trying to do what he tells me. When the interviewer told Fukasaku that he asked the question specifically because of the word . Fukasaku interpreted the interviewer's question as having . The choral movement used in the film's overture and original trailer is the . D Major (Bach). After he submitted an appeal and before Eiga Rinri Kanri Iinkai could rule on the appeal, members of the Diet of Japan said that the film harmed teenagers; the Diet members also criticised the film industry ratings, which were a part of self- regulation by the Japanese film industry. Fukasaku dropped the appeal to appease the Japanese Diet in hopes they would not pursue increasing film regulation further. At one point, director Kinji Fukasaku allegedly gave a press statement directed at the age group of the film's characters, saying . Ilya Garger of TIME magazine said that Battle Royale received . Toei representative Hideyuki Baba stated that the reason for . If you cut it enough to get an R rating there'd be nothing left. As of June 2. 01. Projection Booth Theatre, site of the former Gerrard Cinema in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Unusually, the extra material includes scenes newly filmed after the release of the original. Inserted scenes include (but are not limited to): Flashbacks to a basketball game which is used as a framework for the entire story. A flashback that expands on a likely contributor to Mitsuko Souma's mental illness or sociopathy. She comes home from school to find her mother drunk with a strange man, who tries to molest her. She then pushes him down the staircase to his death. Three epilogues (referred to as . The first is an extension of the basketball scene, showing the students of Class 3- B winning their game. It also spotlights Mitsuko's apparent social anxiety and alienation from the classmates in 3- B. The second is a vision of Nobu telling Shuya to take care of Noriko (a replay of a hallucination seen earlier in the special version of the film). The third is a scene between Kitano and Noriko, who talk casually by a riverbank; parts of this scene (a dream sequence) also appear in the original version of the film, but with the dialogue muted whereas in the requiem it is audible and reveals a friendship or other relationship may or may not have existed between Noriko and Kitano. Added shots of the lighthouse after the shoot- out. Added reaction shots in the classroom, and extensions to existing shots. Extra CGI throughout the film. D theatrical re- release. Fukasaku's son and the film's screenwriter, Kenta Fukasaku, oversaw the conversion. The DVD version was limited to 5,0. The Blu- ray version was initially being released as limited to 5,0. The Limited Edition Blu- ray is region- free, meaning it can play on Blu- ray players worldwide. A Special Edition DVD of the film was carried to a limited extent by retailers such as HMV and Starstruck Entertainment in Canada and Tower Records in the United States; the legal status of this edition is not clear. Also, the film's UK distributor, Tartan Films, released an all- region NTSC DVD version of the film that is available in North America from specialty outlets. One widely available Hong Kong import is a special edition without English subtitles that contains both films. Battle Royale and its sequel are available on Netflix, a major home- entertainment distributor in the United States, and it has been aired uncut on Showtime. An official DVD and Blu- ray edition of the film (and its sequel) was released in North America on March 2. Anchor Bay Entertainment. The site's consensus was . Production is exceedingly handsome and vigorous, offering no sign that Fukasaku is slowing down. He compared it to Lord of the Flies in how it makes audiences . And, seriously, what would you do? He praised Takeshi Kitano's performance as the teacher and some of the scenes as . It is as if the violence of Battle Royale is not a satire of society at all, but simply a metaphor for the anguish of adolescent existence. Its steely candour, and weird, passionate urgency make it compelling. Chris Nashawaty of Entertainment Weekly rates the film as . Scott of The New York Times gave the film a positive review, stating . It is a lot uglier and also, perversely, a lot more fun. Anderson of Combustible Celluloid gave the film 4 out of 4 stars, calling it a . Shaffer of IGN gave the film a score of 8 out of 1. Hurtado of Twitch Film noted that many .
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