Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai

Category Archives: Media


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The Ministry of Thunder – Influence Map

I wanted to do a post on the movies and the books, and the comics, that I consider an influence on my novel.
Good way to do some publicity, and still maybe intrigue the readers of my blog.
But then I thought, what – post trailers and cover images?
That’s been done to death.

Then I remembered a nice meme tool created by fox-orian, on deviantart.
Why not draw/assemble an influence map for my novel, and let the punters divine its meaning and contents by themselves?

And so, here we go…

ministry of thunder influence map

Click on the image for a larger version

Did you catch all the references?
The comments are open for doubts and hypotheses…


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The lost Flash Gordon

294080There’s a strange story behind Flash Gordon, The Greatest Adventure of All – the movie I watched last week to counter the desert of Christmas-time TV.

Originally conceived in 1977 as a live-action adaptation of the classic Flash Gordon strips1, the project was deemed too expensive, and reworked as a feature-length animated movie, produced by Filmation (the same guys who did the Star Trek animated series, and …e hm, He-Man).
While working on the movie, the gentlemen at Filmation brought in Dino De Laurentiis as a financer – and he jumped at the opportunity of striking a deal that would allow him to make the “too expensive” live action flick, which duly premiered in 1980.
As a result, the movie being on its way, Filmation decided to rework yet again the animated feature, turning it into a Saturday Morning cartoon series, airing in 1979 and paving the way for the live action movie.
Finally, in 1982, the original Flash Gordon animated movie was released – but it did not get a wide circulation.
And that’s a pity. Continue reading →


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Party music for Aculeo & Amunet

On the 22nd of September 2014, we had a party, over at the Facebook place, to celebrate the launch of the first collection of Aculeo & Amunet stories, The Hand of Isfet.
It was great fun 1.

A&A collection banner text

I’ve been toying with the idea of making some of the music played at the party available to Aculeo & Amunet fans – especially to those that missed the party.
So here goes – a tape with some of the songs and music we danced to, way back in September.

Enjoy!

Screenshot from 2015-01-03 19:54:44

  1. so much fun, in fact, that I’d like to set up a Shanghai-nightclub-style launch party for The Ministry of Thunder. Might be even more fun – what do you think?
    Watch this space. ↩


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The first movie of 2015

The movie I’m expecting the most this year – but I doubt it will be distributed in my country.

The Taking of Tiger Mountain, historical adventure by the great Tsui Hark, based on a popular Chinese novel, and a revision of classic Maoist-era films.

Here’s the teaser, and the trailers.
Enjoy!

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