The Times profiles Hyman Strachman, a WWII veteran who, at 92, copies bootlegged movies and sends them to troops overseas:

Originally, Mr. Strachman would use his desktop computer to copy the movies one tedious disc at a time. (“It was moyda,” he groaned.) So he got his hands on a $400 professional duplicator that made seven copies at once, grew his fingernails long to better separate the blank discs, and began copying hundreds a day.

[...]

In February, Mr. Strachman duplicated and shipped 1,100 movies. (“A slow month,” he said.) He has not kept an official count but estimates that he topped 80,000 discs a year during his heyday in 2007 and 2008, making his total more than 300,000 since he began in 2004. Postage of about $11 a box, and the blank discs themselves, would suggest a personal outlay of over $30,000.

Let’s hope that the MPAA and studios leave this guy alone.

After taking some ribbing from astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson about an error in the starry sky in ‘Titanic’, director James Cameron updated it for the rerelease.

Cameron described Tyson’s original message “quite snarky,” but conceded that the scientist had a point. “With my reputation as a perfectionist, I should have known that and I should have put the right star field in,” Cameron acknowledged. “So I said, ‘All right, send me the right stars for that exact time and I’ll put it in the movie.’”

I wonder if Mr. Tyson has seen the ceiling in Grand Central Terminal?

Famous Objects from Classic Movies is a game where they show you…wait for it…famous objects from classic movies. The objects are in silhouette, and get harder as you progress through the levels. The guessing is done hangman-style, so you can get some right if you guess letters well. If you see the Empire State Building and think “Sleepless in Seattle”, you might not do so well.

I finished it with a 74 and 48 record — not bad considering I’d never heard of some of them. I’m completely pissed that I missed “The Shinning”!

WARNING: Don’t start this game if you have work to do!

In a world full of novelty Twitter accounts, the T-800 pretty much wins.

@Sarah_PellePas Sarah Conner?

@xsarahjade Sarah Conner?

@sarahcation Sarah Conner?

Want to own The Dude’s sweater from “The Big Lebowski”? Well, it’s up for auction and only $11,000 right now.

If you want a similar version from the company that made the original, they’re a little cheaper.

UPDATE: The auction has disappeared.

If you have discomfort watching 3D movies, someone created 2D glasses for you.

About 10% of Americans experience some form of discomfort while watching 3D movies and television. Symptoms range from a mild headache to severe nausea.

Tens of millions of people are faced with the following options when they want to see a 3D movie:

1. Cover one of your eyes through the entire movie
2. Sit at home while your friends or family go to watch movies without you
3. Just deal with it

We thought that sucked, so we created 2D glasses. How they work is a bit complicated, but the end effect is that you get to watch a 3D movie as if it’s a normal 2D movie, eliminating eyeball strain. The glasses look just like 3D glasses, no one even has to know you’re not seeing the movie in 3D. Just make sure you don’t recycle them at the end of the movie!

I think wearing a pirate patch to the movie would be much more fun. Arr!

moviebarcode is a tumblr that takes every frame of a movie and stacks them side-by-side so you get a unique bar code.

Of course, The Matrix has large swaths of green, and Pulp Fiction almost looks like wood paneling.

The house that was used as the exterior of the Corleone’s compound in The Godfather is for sale.  Not bad for $2.9 million.

An original Darth Vader costume, most likely made for “The Empire Strikes Back”, is up for auction in London next month.

The jet-black helmet, mask and armor worn by the intergalactic villain are expected to sell for between 160,000 pounds and 230,000 pounds ($250,000 and $365,000) at a sale of pop culture memorabilia next month.

This would make a great Xmas gift for me.  Just saying.

The house that inspired ‘The Amityville Horror’ is up for sale. 5 bedrooms, 3 1/2 baths, finished basement, and “interesting history”. $1.15 million.

Speaking of awesome baseball movies, the farmhouse where ‘Field of Dreams’ was filmed is for sale. It has 193 acres, 7 buildings, and the home is 2 bedroom/1.5 bath/2400 sq. ft. It comes complete with the baseball field, corn field, and approximately 65,000 visitors per year. It’s a steal at only $5.4 million.

The intangible assets of the property are simply not measurable. The Field of Dreams owners have been honored to be a part of sports history these past 20 years and have played host to a variety of sports celebrities along the way.  Moments of peace and quiet, family togetherness and most of all, magic and wonder have been among their greatest and most cherished memories. It has been a destination for millions of visitors and may continue to be the place many find peace and quiet in our modern day existence.

Juan Pablo Bravo brings us a comparison of Pixar character sizes.

Netflix won’t offer new releases from Warner Brothers on DVD or Blu-ray until 28 days after they go on sale. In return, Netflix will get access to more of WB’s catalog for streaming over the Internet.

I’m not sure why people are upset over this. The only movies I buy are movies that I know I will watch over and over and over again—so-called “Josh’s classics”—and Hollywood produces maybe one of them a year. If there’s a movie that I want to see that I didn’t see in the theater, why would having to wait 28 additional days entice me to go purchase it? It took me 3+ years to get around to seeing “The Last King of Scotland”, and I really wanted to see that one.

The Hollywood Reporter lists the top 10 movie flops of the decade.

I’ve seen four of them and gave them an average rating of 1.875 stars out of five. I completely forgot that “Battlefield Earth” was part of this decade.

Vodkaster has produced the best movies of all time subway map. Each genre is a separate line, and I love how they were able to do a pretty good job of intersecting the lines with movies that straddle genres. Nicely done.