Movies

NICASIO, Calif. -- Growing up in the 1960s, Ben Burtt was such a big "Star Trek" fan that when he went off to college at a school where he had no TV, he had his father record the audio from each week's episode and mail it to him.

Sitting in his dorm room, Burtt would listen to the shows with headphones on, taking in each new episode with no pictures. But he didn't need the video to understand what was going on. "It was so vividly portrayed with excellent sound effects," Burtt said, "… Read more

'Ij, eartHlIngh, veng SuvwI' Hol chu' tu'lu'. I'm not sure how accurate that really is, but, according to Bing, it means, "Listen up, earthling, there's a new language in town."

Bing is so excited about the new "Star Trek Into Darkness" movie that it added Klingon to Bing Translator, the translation service that usually handles Earth languages like Bulgarian, Turkish, and Polish.

Bing didn't just throw together some guttural sounds and call it done. Microsoft got together with "Star Trek" studio Paramount, the Klingon Language Institute, and Marc Okrand, the creator of the Klingon language, to do it up right.… Read more

Any fan of "Star Wars" will immediately recognize the Lars Homestead, where Luke Skywalker grew up. But they may not realize that the sets used to film those scenes in the 1970s were left essentially untouched after George Lucas and his crew departed Tunisia.

Thanks to Laughing Squid, I stumbled across the beautiful and haunting photographs by visual artist Ra di Martino, who visited the location in Chott el Gharsa, Tunisia, where Lucas filmed those scenes, and captured their decrepit state years later.

Of course, there are a lot of people who want to keep the Lars Homestead … Read more

One my biggest disappointments with Peter Jackson's "The Lord of the Rings" was its failure to include Tom Bombadil, the immortal woodsman who is immune to the One Ring.

The character has a small but intriguing part in J.R.R. Tolkien's trilogy, but of course there's no room for him in a blockbuster film. Not so, however, with this very cool Periodic Table of Middle Earth, which replaces elements with earthly characters from LOTR and "The Hobbit." … Read more

SAN FRANCISCO--What I'm about to tell you is 100 percent true, no matter how much you will want to tell me I'm full of it: there are American adults who have never seen "Star Wars."

The 1977 George Lucas film is a timeless global phenomenon and may be one of the most embedded of all our cultural artifacts. It spawned an empire that Disney ended up buying for $4 billion, in large part because of the passion and commitment of its worldwide audience. But still some people, even those who watch other movies, and are part of mainstream society, managed to make it to 2013 without ever seeing it.

For one group of "Star Wars" newbies, though, their lifelong exclusion from one of the biggest clubs on Earth is over. … Read more

Spark your sabers, feed your Rancor, and fire up the X-Wing. It's May 4, a fabulous makeshift holiday that plays off the saying "May the Force be with you" and gives fans of the sci-fi saga yet another reason to openly celebrate "Star Wars" films and culture.

To commemorate the occasion, check out an incredible collection of conceptual drawings for "Return of the Jedi" by legendary artist Ralph McQuarrie.

The illustrations, which hugely influenced the aesthetics of the sets, characters, and vehicles in the movie -- astounds due to McQuarrie's sensational use … Read more

Getting the straight word about the next "Star Wars" movie might be tougher than trying to escape out of a Sarlacc pit, but director J.J. Abrams has let loose a juicy tidbit about who may compose the score -- John Williams.

The impromptu revelation occurred during a "Star Trek: Into Darkness" press conference in Berlin on Monday, as Abrams fielded a question about the possibility of composer Michael Giacchino -- who has worked extensively with Abrams on previous ventures -- taking on "Star Wars." After speaking a few sentences about Giacchino's brilliance, Abrams threw everyone a curve ball and name-dropped Williams. … Read more

iTunes tops the charts in online video sales, according to market research firm The NPD Group.

Apple claimed 66 percent of all TV shows sold and 65 percent of all movies sold online last year. In second place, Amazon took home 14 percent of all TV shows sold in cyberspace. Amazon and Xbox Video each grabbed a 10 percent chunk of all feature-length films sold over the Internet in 2012.

iTunes also scored the lead in the video-on-demand market, biting off a 45 percent share of all online movie rentals. Amazon Instant Video accounted for 18 percent, leaving Vudu with … Read more

If you happen to meet a BlabDroid in public, the smiling cardboard-headed robot may roll up to you and ask a question like, "Who do you love most in the world?" or "What's the worst thing you've ever done to someone?" These bots are making a documentary about human-robot relationships, but you may be able get a BlabDroid of your very own.

BlabDroid is the creation of artist and roboticist Alexander Reben. Filmmaker Brent Hoff is using them for a documentary about how humans interact with robots. Versions of the little bots with a camera and speaker onboard are traveling around to international film festivals, where they ask preset questions and film the results. That footage will be edited into a movie. A new Kickstarter project is offering them to the world. The robot can connect to your phone via Bluetooth, so it will be able to work with apps and features like Siri.… Read more