What's in the News

This could possibly be the greatest film ever produced. Violent simians vs Sammo Hung - pound for pound the superior to Jackie Chan and still making good movies, compared to Chan, who hasn't made a good film since Drunken Master II, back in 1994. The only thing that could top it would be filming it in 3-D and a score by Dick Dale:


http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/film/news/e3i8d7762ca1514653d6903a3d420eabdf2

'War Monkeys' feature in works
Sammo Hung eyes starring role in Dark Horse film

By Borys Kit

Nov 18, 2008, 12:00 AM ET
Sammo Hung is negotiations to star in "War Monkeys," a horror comedy shaping up to be the biggest feature yet from the independent arm of Dark Horse Films.

UTA-repped Kevin Munroe ("TMNT") is in negotiations to direct the film for Dark Horse Indie.

The horror comedy follows two janitors who, during a Christmas holiday, get trapped in an underground research facility after accidentally unleashing military-trained Rhesus monkeys. Hung is one of the janitors who battles the rabid simians.

Cleve Nettles wrote the script, based on a story by DHI producer Chris Patton. Robert Sanchez is also producing.

"Monkeys, guns, explosions. As a genre freak, I couldn't ask for anything more," said Munroe, who became obsessed with the project after initially agreeing to read a friend's work.

"Monkeys" is eying an early 2009 start. The monkeys will be a combination of real monkeys, animatronic puppets and CGI.

Ruben Arizpe with partner Faith Zuckerman of Infinite Filmed Entertainment/7 Renegades Entertainment will produce and finance the project in association with an Asian co-production entity.

DHI recently celebrated an Emmy win for its John Landis-directed documentary "Mr. Warmth," based on the life of Don Rickles, and is gearing up to release "My Name Is Bruce," starring and directed by Bruce Campbell.

Hung, repped Blue Stone Entertainment, is a veteran of the Hong Kong kung fu scene, directing, acting and choreographing dozens of movies.

....and if you can't make the opening of that one, try the back alley Cinema Feel Good just down the street, where "Whore Monkeys," a genuinely seminal work, starring Spurtin' Sammy Well Hung is playin' nightly to sold out, well raincoated  audiences. 

Scored by ---- who else? ---- Big Dick Dale!
The hits just keep a comin' ....

Any Diabetics out there?? A new hope, maybe??

"Garlic chemical tablet treats diabetes I and II orally
 -- A drug based on a chemical found in garlic can treat diabetes types I and II when taken as a tablet, a study in the new Royal Society of Chemistry journal Metallomics says.

When Hiromu Sakurai and colleagues from the Suzuka University of Medical Science, Japan, gave the drug orally to type I diabetic mice, they found it reduced blood glucose levels.

The drug is based on vanadium and allaxin, a compound found in garlic, and its action described in an Advance Article from Metallomics available free online from today. The first issue of the new journal will be published in 2009.

In previous work they had discovered the vanadium-allaxin compound treated both diabetes types when injected, but this new study shows the drug has promise as an oral treatment for the disease.

Type I diabetes (insulin dependent) is currently treated with daily injections of insulin, while type II (non-insulin dependent) is treated with drugs bearing undesirable side-effects – the authors note neither treatment is ideal.

The researchers aim to test the drug in humans in future work."

Original article: Makoto Hiromura, Metallomics, 2009, DOI: 10.1039/b815384c
http://www.rsc.org/Publishing/Journals/MT/article.asp?doi=b815384c

Interestin' possibilities here.  Thanks for sharing

I use garlic tablets for blood pressure control.  This info therefore doesn't surprise me at all.   

From Yahoo news:

BEIJING – China has acknowledged for the first time that more than 19,000 students died in the massive earthquake that struck Sichuan province in May.
The earthquake left nearly 90,000 people dead or missing, but the government had never said how many of the casualties were students. Their deaths caused protests and anger among parents, because of reports that many of the schools that collapsed had been built with substandard materials.
Wei Hong, the executive vice governor of Sichuan, announced the student death toll of 19,065 at a news conference Friday.

Too bad the panda didn't swallow him whole:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081122/ap_on_re_as/as_china_panda_bites_student

BEIJING – A college student in southern China was bitten by a panda after he broke into the bear's enclosure hoping to get a hug, state media and a park employee said Saturday.

The student was visiting Qixing Park with classmates on Friday when he jumped the 6.5-foot (2-meter) -high fence around the panda's habitat, said the park employee, who refused to give his name.

The park in Guilin, a popular tourist town in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, houses a small zoo and a panda exhibit. It was virtually deserted when the student scaled the fence surrounding the panda, named Yang Yang, the employee said.

He said the student was bitten in the arms and legs. Two foreign visitors who saw the attack ran to get help from workers at a nearby refreshment stand, who notified park officials, the employee said.

The student was pale as he was taken away by medics but appeared clear-headed, he said.

"Yang Yang was so cute and I just wanted to cuddle him. I didn't expect he would attack," the 20-year-old student, surnamed Liu, said in a local hospital, according to the official Xinhua News Agency.

Another of Mother Nature's attempts to skim the top of the gene pool derailed by bureaucracy.

That's the third panda attack I've read about since moving to China. I was really hoping it was the same panda from the first two attacks, but it's not. I have great respect for caged animals that maul idiots.

No more free lunches/dinners etc from your students!!

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008-11/25/content_7235701.htm

Oh dear!

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2008-11/26/content_7241165.htm

Television crew filming AIDS documentary attacked in Henan, China
Article from: Agence France-Presse

November 30, 2008 08:09am

MEMBERS of a Belgian television crew described how they were violently attacked in the central Chinese province of Henan while making a documentary about AIDS patients.

Tom Van de Weghe, a journalist with Flemish radio and TV station VRT, told AFP he, an Australian cameraman and a Belgian assistant were set upon by eight men late on Thursday who forced them out of their vehicle.

"It was dark, we were hit many times, sometimes violently. They acted like animals," he said, adding they had been followed all day by two cars.

They were able to get away and escape to the airport but their attackers had taken their video tapes, money and personal possessions including a mobile phone, the journalist said.

The crew was working on a report on AIDS in Henan, where in the 1990s thousands of peasants were infected after selling their blood in a lucrative scheme organised by local civil servants who, keen to make money quickly, hadn't put in place the correct medical precautions.

Residents in the area told the VRT crew the attackers were acting for local officials and they had targeted a Chinese journalist and anti-AIDS activists.

The Foreign Correspondents' Club of China (FCCC) condemned the attack.

"This illegal and brutal act is a disgrace to Henan and to China," said Jonathan Watts, president of the FCCC. "If the Government is serious about the rule of law and opening to the media, the culprits must be caught and punished.

"There is enough evidence to identify the perpetrators. The central authorities should send a clear message that local governments must not use thugs to intimidate journalists."

"If the Government is serious about the rule of law and opening to the media, the culprits must be caught and punished.

Therein lies the reality. Serious? Law? Opening? 

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24737368-25837,00.html

With a renewed focus on growth - does that mean that the already infinitesimal move towards environmental protection will be lost?

The call for a domestic consumer led recovery is being lost on most Chinese people i talk to.  They are talking about tightening their belts, saving more - not buying!

Dongguan's getting famous:

"Battle at Chinese Nerf Factory Does Not, Sadly, Involve Nerf Weaponry
By Jack Loftus, 4:00 PM on Sun Nov 30 2008

The global recession has sparked riots at the Nerf factory in Dongguan, South China, but there are as-of-yet no reports of anyVulcan GF-25 cannon discharges. In fact, no foam weaponry of any kind was brandished during the tussle, which came to a head following layoffs and unpaid wages.

And unlike the riots that took place in Wal-Mart and Toys R Us stores in the States last Friday, there were no reports of fatalities. Just general bedlam:

The workers battled security guards, turned over a police car, smashed the headlights of police motorcycles and forced their way through the factory's front gate, Guo said. They went on a rampage in the plant's offices, damaging 10 computers, the company said."