2026-04-22 06:11:29
Is the best literary film adaptation of the last 50 years: a) The Silence of the Lambs, b) The Princess Bride, c) The Return of the King (LoTR), d) Apocalypse Now, or e) Jurassic Park?
2026-04-22 05:06:34
A French corporation was recently found criminally liable for enabling terrorism. “The court in Paris has just ruled that cynicism and an exclusive focus on profits can constitute a crime.”
2026-04-22 03:45:00
This is an animal called the leaf sheep:
It’s a species of slug that is partially solar-powered, like a plant. Leaf sheep are kleptoplastic organisms that steal chloroplasts from algae, store them in their bodies, and then can rely on photosynthesis for their energy needs:
The Costasiella sea slug not only looks like a succulent—it acts like one, too. One of the few animals able to photosynthesize, this tiny invertebrate (also known as the leaf slug or leaf sheep) acquires chloroplasts by munching on Avrainvillea, a paddle-shaped seaweed with a velvety texture. It then stores those chloroplasts in its own body, which enables the slug to soak up sunlight and transform it into energy—a process that also gives the mollusk its green color.
The chloroplasts are stored in the horn-shaped structures called cerata located on the slugs’ backs. Cerata evolved to increase the surface area of these animals for use in respiration and surface area is very helpful if you run on solar panels.
And they’re also cute as a button! I mean, look at these things:
2026-04-22 03:00:19
Everyone Is Blaming AI for the Water Crisis. We’re Looking at the Wrong Culprit. “One drive to the work I do on the Colorado River used more than 20 times the water of everything I did with AI in 11 weeks.”
2026-04-22 02:26:48
The Accursèd Alphabetical Clock. “This clock displays the current time alphabetically.” Totally deranged…I love it.
2026-04-22 01:15:00
Every Frame a Painting’s Taylor Ramos & Tony Zhou are back with a video essay about pushing the boundaries of genre in Tsui Hark’s 1995 film The Blade.
One reason filmmakers like to work in a genre is that it gives us a pre-made box: a set of expectations, tropes, and boundaries. On the one hand, we want to play within that box, and on the other, we want to push against its edges. Tsui Hark’s The Blade is an exploration and a deconstruction of the box that is wuxia.
If you’re not familiar with wuxia, the video explains the genre; it’s basically Chinese martial arts fantasy — think Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon or Hero. (thx, neil)
Tags: film school · movies · Taylor Ramos · The Blade · Tony Zhou · video