THOMAS PODVIN’S FREELANCE WORK
Freelance writer - translator - Editor

In a nation where anyone can carry a gun, it's not easy to distance oneself from violence. At least according to Canadian-born director David Cronenberg (The Fly, Dead Ringers). In this, the director's twentieth film, partially based on the eponymous graphic novel by John Wagner, Cronenberg focuses on the family, whereas Wagner focused on the mob. The film relates the story of the small town owner of a diner, who's thrust into the spotlight after killing (in self-defense) two thugs. In no time, his quiet home life becomes a cycle of ever-more-vicious ultra-violence. With the director posing the question (among others): how much carnage is necessary to protect one's family from harm? Though made with a relatively small budget, History is a prime example of Cronenberg's cinematic audacity and intelligence; he demonstrates the ease with which "normal" people can fall into a spiral of violence, and how it provides an all too easy answer to life's complications. The film itself is full of violence–excessive, quick and intimate, though never exploitative. This straight-forward modern tale, supported by a superb cast (Viggo Mortensen, Maria Bello, William Hurt), won several awards, from NY to LA, and the 63-year-old director's hometown (2005 Toronto Film Critics Association Awards for Best Director and Best Picture and Best Canadian Film).
New Line Cinema

(c) that's Shanghai Magazine
Chief editor: Steven Crane
May 2006 issue

(c) that's Guangzhou
Guanzhou Chief editor: Christopher Cottrell
May 2006 issue

Chinese electronic-music artist Zhu Jianhui (aka Double Fish), 25, is fond of contemporary global culture, hacker aesthetics, art, breakcore and IDM (intelligent dance music). In early 2002, he released his first experimental music single enclosed in the magazine I Love Rock ‘n Roll. In June 2004, he founded the independent-label Reconfiguration Records in Guangzhou, the aim of which is to promote avant-garde, independent and experimental arts, and provide a platform for artist collaborations. Since then, Zhu has released a series of EPs and LPs and organized a number of musical events to promote this unusual scene. In August 2004, he launched a conceptual electronic-music collection by artists from Hong Kong, the Chinese mainland and Poland called “The Sound of Silence Project”. In 2005, Zhu, who knows no boundaries, released the EP Hackers on the Polish label Audiotong Records, and participated in several compilations released under his own label (Hey!!! Let’s break, V.A landscape 2). On Inter Net, Zhu, uses virtual drum machine, synth, effect processors and sound loops, to create a piece of relaxing, atmospherical downtempo music timed precisely at 20:05-minute (the year of its release, 2005). With samples reminiscent of early 1990s videogames’ sound effects, Inter Net is a strangely easy-listening piece of avant-garde-ish electronica.
Reconfiguration Records/Bedzoo/available at www.reconfiguration-records.com

(c) that's Shanghai Magazine
Chief editor: Steven Crane
May 2006 issue

(c) that's Guangzhou
Guanzhou Chief editor: Christopher Cottrell
May 2006 issue

At 48, Madonna Ciccone has returned to her first love: catchy, uncontroversial dance numbers, the sort she might have heard early in her career as a dancer with French Disco King Patrick Hernandez. Confessions samples disco classics (“Hung” samples ABBA’s “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!”) and with the help of a number of talented collaborators, attempts to create what may just be some future classic pop-disco dance numbers. On her tenth studio album, Madonna has enrolled the services of France’s DJ Stuart Price and multi-talented electronic-music artist Mirwais Ahmadzai, as well as Sweden’s pop-music producers Bloodshy & Avant and Bagge & Peer. The result is surprisingly good: “Get Together”, “Hung” and “Sorry” are brilliant. And we’re not sorry Madonna has given up the pompous, political pose and prose of her previous album American Life. The CD’s facile lyrics are easy to remember, even for non-English speakers (“I Like New York”). What’s more, Madonna seems to have rediscovered her sense of humor. On “Like it or Not” she sings: ‘You can love me or leave me cause I never gonna stop.’ Yes, the Material Girl is back. And still fit. She literally and figuratively does the splits: from retro to neo, from disco’s glory days to futuristic electronica/pop music.
WEA international

(c) that's Shanghai Magazine
Chief editor: Steven Crane
May 2006 issue

(c) that's Guangzhou
Guanzhou Chief editor: Christopher Cottrell
May 2006 issue