Loving "The Joy of Books"

A delightful stop-motion animated ballet of books at Type bookstore in Toronto (883 Queen Street West, (416) 366-8973)

Torontoist has a post on how it took 50 hours of labour to bring this film to life:

Torontoist: Making His Ode to Joy of Books

Joel Plaskett - Through & Through & Through

"You're a wrecking ball, in a summer dress"

Celebrate Joel Plaskett's inclusion on the Polaris Prize long-list with this new video for Through & Through & Through, off his triple-album "Three". Great summertime music and harmony, travelling through the Nova Scotian scenery with Rose Cousins and Ana Egge. Where do I sign up for that vacation package?

Ron Howard's Call To Action

See more Ron Howard videos at Funny or Die

The funniest thing I've seen all week, and reminding me how funny Ron was as the narrator on "Arrested Development"

Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog

What's a writer, like say Buffy the Vampire/Angel/firefly creator Joss Whedon, to do with spare time during a writer's strike? Why, you put on a musical comic book video thingie. Presenting Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog, starring Neil Patrick Harris, Nathan Fillion, and Felicia Day. It's over the top and wonderfully funny - NPH makes a villain the hero of his own story, and Nathan Fillion is great as the brash and oblivious hero Captain Hammer. If they ever made a Futurama movie, Nathan Fillion is Zap Brannigan.

Joss's Master Plan

ONE WEEK ONLY! AN INTERNET MINISERIES EVENT!

"Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog" will be streamed, LIVE (that part’s not true), FREE (sadly, that part is) right on Drhorrible.com, in mid-July. Specifically:

ACT ONE (Wheee!) will go up Tuesday July 15th.

ACT TWO (OMG!) will go up Thursday July 17th.

ACT THREE (Denouement!) will go up Saturday July 19th.

All acts will stay up until midnight Sunday July 20th. Then they will vanish into the night, like a phantom (but not THE Phantom – that’s still playing. Like, everywhere.)

The videos are available on iTunes for a nominal fee for keepsies.

Feist on Sesame Street

Take kittens, roll them in fluffy bunnies and let them loose in a cupcake store, and it wouldn't be half as adorable as this appearance by Feist on Sesame Street. She looks like she's having a ball, and check out the expression on her face at the end of the clip after the song ends.

Feist announced at Canada's Juno awards earlier this year that the day she spent taping the segment was the best of her life.

"I mean, c'mon please, it's the Muppets we're talking about," she said.

"('1234') brought me two days ago to Sesame Street and it was the Muppets and it was the best day of my life. I'm sorry Junos, but the Muppets trump everything!"

Happy

Happy
Created by Vancouver Film School student Michael Lewicki through the VFS Digital Character Animation program.

Spider-Man 3 - How It Should Have Ended

I've had no time to write or blog this week. I'm just too busy this week, so here's fun video from the folks at How It Should Have Ended to keep you occupied until I get back on track here this weekend.

Emmy Highlights

My Emmy highlights (let's see how long these links last):
Steve Colbert and Jon Stewart give the award for best male performance in a comedy. Winner Ricky Gervais is absent so....



And the highlight of every year, the videos announcing the nominees for Best Writing for a Comedy or Variety Show:



And the rap battle between Kanye West and Rainn Wilson (The Office):



Best line of the night:
Kanye West "I never win."

Robot grooves in new Spoon video

I introduced you to Keepon the Robot last April. Inventors Marek Michalowski of Carnegie Mellon University and Hideki Kozima of Japan's National Institute of Communications Technology programmed Keepon to react to stimuli through body language. Keepon "extracts extract the pulse of rhythm from music and move its silicone body in time", which was demonstrated in this demo video of Keepon grooving to a song by Spoon. The little guy's popularity has taken off, as he's the star of Spoon's new video for "Don't You Evah", along with his programmer Hideki Kozima.

BoingBoing - Dancing Robot in Spoon video

A Filipino Jailhouse Thriller

I may be the last person on the internet to not have watched this yet. I certainly heard about it, it's been on the news and all over the web, but now I've finally watched it. Ladies and Gentlemen: 1,500 inmates of the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center, Cebu, Philippines doing the dance from Michael Jackson's "Thriller".

This is apparently part of their exercise routine. I wonder if they drew straws to pick who played the girl or just held auditions.

In addition to this, we have them performing Queen's "Radio Ga Ga" and "I Will Follow Him" from the movie Sister Act.

This is the reason the internet was created.

'Kill da wabbit?'

It's the 50th Anniversary of one of the most beloved pieces of animation:

What's Opera Doc? (YouTube)

50 glorious years of 'kill da wabbit' (Toronto Star)

"The evening gown competition is usually the most boring part of any beauty pageant. Usually. At last night's Miss Universe competition, Miss USA Rachel Smith demonstrated just how difficult it can be. You may want to watch this over and over again."

From ALOTT5MA