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> > Can you please "copy & paste" it onto a reply?
I put it in the brackets.
Gary
Here it is:
[[[It was not until the recent holiday shopping season that Lego Systems
Inc. rolled out the Lego & Steven Spielberg MovieMaker Set, a $180 kit meant
to turn children into makers of short digital films featuring Lego
characters and props. But online, where Lego fandom rages, such films are
nothing new.
"Brick films," as they are sometimes called in reference to the term Lego
uses for its construction pieces, have been available on the Web for several
years, according to Todd Lehman, co-founder of Lugnet.com, the online Lego
users group.
The films, which so far have generally been made by adults for adults, tend
to be stop-motion animations that range in length from a few seconds of
jerky, silent action to movies of 10 minutes or more with complex scenes and
soundtracks. Many take their inspiration from Lego's theme construction
sets, like the vastly popular Star Wars series. Others mimic or parody
big-budget films, as with "2001: A Lego Odyssey" and "Titanic Legos at Sea."
A new Web site (at http://brickfilms .topcities.com) offers a growing
directory of these online films. The site's founder, a computer consultant
named Jason Rowoldt, said the arrival of inexpensive digital cameras in the
last year had helped spur the brick-film boomlet.
Mr. Rowoldt predicted that Lego's MovieMaker kit, which includes a digital
camera and editing software, would expand the genre. But he criticized the
kit's dearth of special effects.
"This is a kids' product, and I like the camera," he said. "But a lot of
adults are buying it, too, and they're finding it's too limited in what it
can do."
A spokeswoman for Lego Systems, Shannon Hartnett, said the company was still
trying to determine how many buyers of the kit were adults.
Lego Systems is having a contest to reward the best films made with
MovieMaker by people 18 and under (www.lego.com /studios). The company plans
a Web-based Lego film festival with an adult category for later this year.
Mr. Rowoldt said he welcomed the idea of a company-sponsored film festival.
"It is hard to handle serious subject matter in a brick film; you're dealing
with little smiling plastic figures," he said. "But people have done some
amazing things on adult themes."
He points to an eight-minute film called "Rick & Steve: The Happiest Gay
Couple in All The World," a satire of gay life in the suburbs that was
selected by more than 80 film festivals last year, including Sundance.
"Rick & Steve," directed by Q. Allan Brocka, contains simulated sex scenes
(using Lego figures). Some other brick films depict risqué situations.
But Ms. Hartnett said Lego was meant for all ages. "You can do whatever you
want with Lego bricks," she said.
PAMELA LiCALZI O'CONNELL ]]]
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