The Dream Machine: A Point & Click Adventure Game (made out of cardboard and clay)

The Dream Machine is a point and click adventure game that gives players the opportunity to explore beautiful surrealist dream worlds, solving puzzles and interacting with fascinating- and funny- characters. You play as Victor Neff, a refreshingly subdued protagonist, who has just moved to a new city with his pregnant wife.

The game is released in chapters, the first of which is largely set in Victor’s new apartment. After waking from a pleasantly strange dream (a taste of things to come) the beginning of your adventure is satisfyingly mellow, from finding the right plug socket for your telephone to piecing together a burnt up letter, your quest is fairly mundane, giving you a chance to connect with the heavily stylized world. Once you become used to the artistic look of the game, it starts to feel oddly realistic, more so than any game I can remember.

Perhaps this is due to the wonderful writing, which feels natural and gives the characters a genuine depth, or perhaps it’s in the choice of the location; a new home, big empty rooms with dust on the carpet and sunshine streaming through the windows, where lights don’t work and a cardboard box makes a breakfast table. While the first chapter of the game is free, the rest of the series is available at a small price, with a discount for anyone who pre-orders the full game.

Interestingly, The Dream Machine is an online game, you can play it from the website and save your progress, and new chapters become available as soon as they’re ready. The makers of the game also have a system running that notices if players have difficulty with any of the puzzles, so that they can update the game to add clues and give appropriate in-game responses. This means the game is being continuously updated to be as good as it can be, so that every possible path is explored and every response feels natural.

The most exciting thing about The Dream Machine is it’s independence, the beautiful visuals are created by two men, sculpting every environment in a workshop. The world is built from cardboard and clay, and the fantastic roughness of it makes it feel tangible and exciting. The imaginative artistic style, and the funny, clever writing, gives the game a real weight and lifts it far above the bland blockbuster titles that dominate the industry.

The principal crew behind The Dream Machine consists of Erik Zaring and Anders Gustafsson. Their company is called Cockroach Inc.

To play the game and show your support, visit the website.

The Dream Machine also has a blog, which chronicles the progress of the game. It’s full of great pictures of the sets being built, and the characters being sculpted, and the makers of the game explain the reasons for all of their decisions, including why they decided to make the game playable online and why they have to charge you to play it (clue: they need to eat too, y’know). Remember, if you support this sort of thing, you’ll help artists provide an alternative to all those dull, corporate games that give the industry a bad name.

Evolution of a Comic Book Villain

Meet Bane, a comic book villain and opponent of Batman, most famous for snapping the caped crusader’s spine. Although Bane’s arms resemble fleshy  tree trunks, he’s apparently one of the more intellectual bad guys, famously outwitting Batman (and breaking his goddamn spine). The hulking juggernaught of brains and brawn got his first big screen outing in Joel Schumacher’s Batman and Robin, and he looked like this:

How could anyone have doubted Joel Schumacher? The man was a genius. But hey, a lot has changed since the 90′s, by 2009 Bane was ready for a comeback, and Arkham Asylum was about to prove that the character could be portrayed in a far more subtle light:

There is nothing ridiculous about this image. Superheroes and villains are brilliantly flexible in their design, and are often changed in both look and personality when they make that transcendental leap to the big screen. However, very few filmmakers can pull off the real spirit of the character, and I should know, having read literally two Batman comic books (this one and this one) and skimmed through a few issues of Spider-Man. With Christopher Nolan taking Batman bat-to-basics, and cementing the outlandish characters in a kind of tangible reality, how will such an absurdly comic-book character like Bane fit into The Dark Knight Rises, the last instalment of the reboot trilogy? It would be great to get a glimpse of Tom Hardy’s doubtlessly brilliant portrayal of Bane. Oh wait, let’s just do that now:

Huh, so he looks a bit like Bronson.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Triumph of the Corporate Machine

Big blockbusters have dominated the world market of cinema, drawing huge crowds world wide. The massive revenues that these films create for the studios make Hollywood one of the most lucrative businesses in the world, a system in which films are created for financial gain- Pirates of the Caribbean is no exception.

The production is orchestrated by Jerry Bruckheimer, one of the most prolific producers today; having created a long line of financially successful blockbusters such as Bad Boys and Bad Boys 2, he’s clearly a man who knows how to make money in the business.

despite mixed critical reviews, the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise has been very successful with the public. It’s a fantastical spectacle with precious little substance, more of a display of technical virtuosity than good storytelling. So given that cinema is largely regarded as an ‘art form’ and Pirates of the Caribbean, which is based on a Disneyland attraction, seems to be a franchise produced primarily for capital gain over artistic integrity, why is it so popular and what are the pleasures for the audience?

Pirates of the Caribbean relies first and foremost on it’s stars to entertain the audience, particularly Johnny Depp (who seems to be having more fun than the audience), then it’s impressive spectacle – digital effects, epic landscapes – whereas  traditional structures such as narrative are of much less importance in it’s construction.

Pirates of the Caribbean appeals to a specific viewing pleasure that relies heavily upon it’s high production values. In this way it seems to be conforming to, if not taking advantage of, our natural desire for spectatorship. The franchise’s ability to appeal to this desire and deliver a form of fantastical escapism on a simplistic level has made it easily accessible to a wide audience, as they are dazzled by spectacle after spectacle in every frame.

Hollywood, as a corporate machine, uses vast amounts of money to create a form of entertainment designed to inspire awe in the audience. The primary concern is financial gain and mass profit, which is usually a certainty, by being unchallenging in its ideas, the film focuses’ on the visual and audio pleasures of viewing, making up for its lack of meaningful substance. Despite it’s lack of depth, the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise does deliver on it’s promise, by stimulating our senses with it’s box of tricks, it’s really no less valid an art form than any other filmic experience.

Pirates of the Caribbean may be a money making machine, but it triumphs by conforming to the audiences expectations, by giving them what they want. And without films like it, feeding the movie business and keeping it strong, the smaller, more interesting films wouldn’t exist at all.

Pirate of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides was released on the 18th of May and will doubtlessly be reviewed by someone, if not us. Also, the film is number five in our Top Five Alternatives to Summer Blockbusters, in issue 3 of Gorilla Film Magazine. Here’s an excerpt:

‘Put on your fancy dress costume, applying make-up generously, and drink your first bottle of rum (this should be done before you leave the house). Now wander aimlessly around muttering inanely to yourself and occasionally winking at people’

There’s also plans for an article on the Pirates of the Caribbean films, which might make it’s way into our pages by issue 4, the essay would explore the similarities between the family friendly franchise and pornography. No really.

Semantics for the Deranged

Peter Millard is a director and animator from Great Malvern (Worcestershire) in England and is currently studying an MA in animation at the Royal College of Art in London.

His first film Bluuuurgh was part of the travelling Spike & Mike’s Sick & Twisted Show where it was played in cinemas across America including Comic Con in San Diego. His graduation film Custard has been screened at various different screenings and short film evenings across London and Bristol and has been in competition at animation and short film festivals in the UK and Europe. Gorilla Film Magazine reviewed Custard in Issue 2, here’s an excerpt:

‘Custard is semantics for the deranged, a blur of strange images and misplaced sounds that form a narrative of nonsense. The childish scribbles zoom and whiz all over the screen, confident and purposeful, only occasionally pausing to observe one another with ponderous expressions, as if these characters acknowledge the chaotic nature of the animation, if only for a brief moment.’

Peter Millard has kindly made a little promotional video for us, to help spread the word, I think it sums us up rather nicely.

You can find out more about Peter Millard by clicking on this link.

The world’s first film festival run by, and for, people with a learning disability

Oska Bright is a film festival for people with learning disabilities, not only do they celebrate filmmkaers who are otherwise segregated, they have a master class to teach more disabled people the art of making movies. Gorilla Film Magazine is super interested in the festival, and is working with Oska Bright to spread the word and put these filmmakers in the spotlight. In issue 3 (coming soon) we have an article on the festival written by Tilley Harris as well as a review of My Bloody Valentine (no, not that one) a truly fantastic short film by the Shyster Shadows. In the future, we hope to interview some of the filmmakers, and perhaps even get them to write some articles of their own, about their feelings on the film industry.

The films that we’ve seen are all massively different, but share certain similarities, such as an emphasis on telling the story through visuals, and a carefree attitude towards film-making. It’s refreshing to see, and we hope to see more soon.

Visit the Oska Bright website by clicking on this link.

Monkey With a Movie Camera at Look Mum No Hands!

Not contented with being merely amazing, we decided to expand Gorilla Film Magazine as a community by hosting a short film night, hopefully the first of many. Monkey With a Movie Camera was held at the Look Mum No Hands  cafe on Old Street. We showed a bunch of great films, most of which we’ve reviewed either in the magazine or on the website.

We had our designer mock up a black and white poster (it’s cheaper than colour) and he made this wonderful piece of promotional material.

The night in question was a huge success, lots of eager people turned up to the free event and said lots of nice things about the short, low-budget films we showed. Obviously, these film nights are common place in London, and there’s a load of great places you should check out (we’ll post about them some time. Probably) but consider this as our hat in the ring, Gorilla Film Magazine is not just a magazine, it’s other stuff as well.

Mayday, Monkeys, Monsters and Maps

A while back we got in touch with the East End Film Festival, looking for advertisements for our publication. We had a chat and they seemed interested in some sort of cross promotion, suggesting we get involved with Monday Mayday, a street party celebrating the EEFFs 10th year anniversary.

We had ourselves a good long think about how best to promote the medium of film, from shorts to low-budget filmmaking, and decided the logical thing to do was to host a treasure hunt.

For more videos click on this link.

And so, on the 2nd of May, Gorilla Film Magazine set up our stall in the Vibe Bar, on Bricklane, and told anyone who would listen about how we’d run in to a spot of trouble involving a pirate, a monster, a monkey and a map.

For more pictures visit our Facebook page, oh and we’ll have a video up soon.

Why hello there, stranger. Come, warm yourself by the fire

Behold our first Blog post! Greetings human, I hope you appreciate the reason for why we put that first bit in bold, we’re quite excited about this opportunity to update you, loyal person, with all the latest information necessary to obtain magazine-related euphoria.

Gorilla Film Magazine is a magazine. We focus on the independent film world, reviewing the little films you might not have heard of, and trying to raise awareness for low-to-no-budget filmmakers. We’re kind of like a filmmaker’s guidebook, with How to’s and DIY articles. We’re here to encourage people to get out there and make films (plus a helpful kick up the arse for people who already do).

Issue 2 of Gorilla Film Magazine is swirling around London, totally free of course, and awaiting the caress of your eyes. Meanwhile our writers are busy, locked in dark rooms with heads like smashed plates, eating bowls of paracetamol and working their fingers to the bone, building the sentences and paragraphs of words that will, eventually, become the content for the new issue.