Double ration aujourd’hui, avec ce petit dessin qui était initialement prévu pour un magazine.

Sans même entrer dans le vif du sujet, Bottomless Belly Button, roman graphique de Dash Shaw, en impose par ses mensurations : 720 pages, un dos de 5,5 cm sur lequel on trouve une foultitude d’infos, bref, une sacrée bête. Acclamé meilleure bande dessinée indépendante de l’année aux USA, le pavé édité par Fantagraphics arrive aux éditions Çà et là pour 30 €, un an après la sortie du tout aussi imposant Château l’Attente.

Mais rien à voir ici avec de la fantasy médiévale, Bottomless Belly Button flirte du côté de la chronique sociale iconoclaste à travers les aventures de la famille Loony, qu’on croirait presque sortie d’un film de Wes Anderson, genre Famille Tenenbaum. Il faut dire qu’après 40 ans de mariage, les parents Loony annoncent leur divorce, et réunissent tout le monde dans la maison familiale. Fantaisie parmi d’autres, Peter, le cadet de la famille, apparaît la quasi-totalité du bouquin sous les traits d’une grenouille – même s’il nous a fallu un quart du livre pour comprendre que ses narines n’étaient pas ses yeux ! –, en écho à sa position de loser que ce soit sur le plan professionnel ou sentimental. Lui, comme les autres, va vivre un séjour riche en rebondissements tapant au cÅ“ur de ses complexes. À la fin, tous les personnages auront évolué de façon perceptible.

Varié et hétéroclite, tant sur les thèmes que sur le plan visuel, avec des mises en pages éclatées pour rythmer les différentes parties et de nombreux jeux graphiques avec des onomatopées d’ambiances “musique à fond” et de mouvements “emmêle”, les 720 pages se lisent d’une traite. Pourtant, Bottomless Belly Button aura du mal à séduire ceux pour qui les histoires qui mènent en voyage dans la psyché des personnages ne font ni chaud ni froid. Reste qu’en la matière, grâce à ses trouvailles graphiques et à sa façon de traiter de façon simple les choses complexes, le roman graphique de Dash Shaw est ce qui s’est fait de mieux cette année !

Les images sont © Dash Shaw.

Un peu de poésie pour commencer ce joli mois de décembre avec un dessin que j’avais déjà diffusé il y a quelques années.

While teaching the defensive web app security classes with SANS, I often hear I have been filt ...(more)...

While the deals might not be as OMG awesome as Black Friday, there's a lot to be said for its nerdier brother Cyber Monday, when online retailers unleash their best bargains of the season. Mainly,...

India summons Pakistan's high commissioner to protest over groups it claims carried out attacks in Mumbai that killed nearly 200 people.

In its most recent episode, popular animated sitcom The Simpsons has parodied a variety of aspects of Apple culture, including its marketing, high prices and cult-like following. The plot sees the opening of the first Springfield Mapple store, stocked with products such as MyPhones and MyPods, and services such as the Brainiac Bar. Though Lisa finds she cannot afford even MyPhonies earbuds, by f...

Verizon on Monday has already dropped the price on the Samsung Omnia less than a week after its introduction. Originally priced at $250 with a contract and a $70 rebate, the device will now cost $200 with the same discount and now almost matches the pricing of both the BlackBerry Storm as well as the iPhone 3G, which has an inferior two-megapixel camera but shares a similar 8GB of built-in storag...

Foss Boss: "Many utilities nowadays are implementing D-Bus connectivity. It is especially interesting (well for me anyway) to script some GUI elements like for example my KDE-4 desktop from the command line. This would help automate some tasks and is cool anyways. Let's see how to begin talking on the D-Bus."

I think critics should start boycotting the yearly Christmas Family Comedy. It's amazing: these movies are never good. I can't think of another distinct subgenre with such a poor track record over the last decade. And of course, I went and saw Four Christmases, of my own free will. I'm an idiot.

In any event, it was silly of me to imply that Four Christmases didn't have the muscle to win the weekend; high-profile Christmas movies almost always do well. The $31.7 million three-day is one of the best openings ever for a movie of this kind; last year's Fred Claus, also starring Vince Vaughn, only managed $18.5 million in early November. Four Christmases even squeaked out Elf. Its five-day gross was an impressive $46.7 million.

Australia, on the other hand: oh boy. Baz Luhrmann's ultra-expensive, ultra-long epic made $20 million over the five days, which is less than inspiring -- especially considering it has now basically exited the Oscar race. Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge! only ended up with around $57 million at the end of its domestic run -- but it didn't cost $130 million, either.

Transporter 3 -- the weekend's best new offering, for my money -- did okay with $12.3 million over three days and $18.5 over five. The three-day is a slight decline from what Transporter 2 did three years ago, but overall I'd put them even. This franchise continues to be profitable.

Twilight fell considerably, which isn't too surprising given the rabid-fan phenomenon that packs theaters opening weekend. Around $160 million is looking like the endgame. Meanwhile, Bolt, facing no new kid-centric competition over the weekend, held up almost miraculously well, actually gaining slightly over the three-day weekend. The folks at Disney have surely turned last weekend's frown upside down.

Slots 10 and 11 on the weekend's chart are occupied by limited releases: Milk and Slumdog Millionaire, on 36 and 49 screens, respectively. Their success bodes well for their Oscar chances.

The full five-day estimates after the jump.

Filed under: New Releases, Box Office

Continue reading Weekend Box Office: Christmas Takes Thanksgiving

Permalink | Email this | Comments

To be built by Europol, the system will pool reports of crimes such as ID or financial theft online, and spot and track illegal activity, from across the 27 EU member states.

pFiled under: a href="http://www.autoblog.com/category/aftermarket/" rel="tag"Aftermarket/a, a href="http://www.autoblog.com/category/tunertuesdays/" rel="tag"Tuners/a, a href="http://www.autoblog.com/category/supercars/" rel="tag"Supercars/a, a href="http://www.autoblog.com/category/audi/" rel="tag"Audi/a/pp align="center"a href="http://www.autoblog.com/photos/ppi-razor-gtr/1194242/"img vspace="4" hspace="4" border="1" src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog.com/media/2008/12/ppi_razor_gtr_audi_r8_live_001-1130-950x673_450op.jpg" alt="" //abr /strongemsmallClick above for a high-res gallery of the PPI Razor GTR/small/em/strong/p pThe a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2008/11/28/gt3-spec-audi-r8-lms-formally-unveiled-at-essen/"GT3-spec LMS racecar/a wasn't the only a href="http://www.autoblog.com/tag/AudiR8/"Audi R8/a to grace the show floor in Essen. PPI Design brought their latest version of the Audi supercar dubbed the Razor GTR. The a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2008/02/06/ppi-puts-porsche-on-notice-with-audi-r8-razor/"standard version of the Razor/a made its debut at the show last year, featuring an additional 40 horsepower, 19-inch wheels, custom leather interior, and a full carbon fiber aero kit. The GTR takes the R8 to yet another level, with more power, reduced weight, and improved aerodynamics./p pPPI has fitted a supercharger to the 4.2L V8 which now puts out 580 horsepower and 443 lb-ft torque, good for a 3.7-second sprint to 100 km/h and a top speed of 206 mph. The widebody kit is constructed completely of carbon fiber and feeds cool air to the brakes and radiators, while the engine cover, also constructed of the lightweight material, includes integrated ram air inlets. The wider body also allows for wider rims and tires -- lightweight MAG11 forged wheels wrapped with Michelin Pilot Sport 2 rubber. Other performance upgrades include a KW coilover suspension, and larger brakes: 15-inch discs with six-piston calipers in the front, and 14-inch discs in the rear. Carbon fiber also coats the interior, alongside custom leather seats and a PPI steering wheel. Follow the jump for the PR from PPI, and be sure to indulge in the gallery below. /p pdiv class="postgallery"pstrongGallery: a href="http://www.autoblog.com/photos/ppi-razor-gtr/"PPI Razor GTR/a/strong/pa href="http://www.autoblog.com/photos/ppi-razor-gtr/1194242/"img src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog.com/media/2008/12/ppi_razor_gtr_audi_r8_live_001-1130-950x673_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //aa href="http://www.autoblog.com/photos/ppi-razor-gtr/1193898/"img src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog.com/media/2008/11/ppirazorgtr_01_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //aa href="http://www.autoblog.com/photos/ppi-razor-gtr/1193899/"img src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog.com/media/2008/11/ppirazorgtr_02_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //aa href="http://www.autoblog.com/photos/ppi-razor-gtr/1193900/"img src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog.com/media/2008/11/ppirazorgtr_03_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //aa href="http://www.autoblog.com/photos/ppi-razor-gtr/1193897/"img src="http://www.blogcdn.com/www.autoblog.com/media/2008/11/ppirazorgtr_04_thumbnail.jpg" alt="" title="" //a/div/p p[Source: PPI via a href="http://www.motorauthority.com/ppi-previews-new-razor-gtr-audi-r8.html"MotorAuthority.com/a]/ppa href="http://www.autoblog.com/2008/12/01/ppi-unleashes-razor-gtr-in-essen/" rel="bookmark"Continue reading emPPI unleashes Razor GTR in Essen/em/a/pp style="padding:5px;background:#ddd;border:1px solid #ccc;clear:both;"a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2008/12/01/ppi-unleashes-razor-gtr-in-essen/"PPI unleashes Razor GTR in Essen/a originally appeared on a href="http://www.autoblog.com"Autoblog/a on Mon, 01 Dec 2008 10:01:00 EST. Please see our a href="http://www.weblogsinc.com/feed-terms/"terms for use of feeds/a./ph6 style="clear: both; padding: 8px 0 0 0; height: 2px; font-size: 1px; border: 0; margin: 0; padding: 0;"/h6a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2008/12/01/ppi-unleashes-razor-gtr-in-essen/" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent link to this entry"Permalink/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.autoblog.com/forward/1386737/" title="Send this entry to a friend via email"Email this/anbsp;|nbsp;a href="http://www.autoblog.com/2008/12/01/ppi-unleashes-razor-gtr-in-essen/#comments" title="View reader comments on this entry"Comments/a pa href="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/MD8uGvSk-eTJGdUarWZriy_roA8/a"img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~at/MD8uGvSk-eTJGdUarWZriy_roA8/i" border="0" ismap="true"/img/a/pdiv class="feedflare" a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/autoblog?a=A5YJUIhN"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/autoblog?i=A5YJUIhN" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/autoblog?a=ESc9JKWO"img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~f/weblogsinc/autoblog?i=ESc9JKWO" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/weblogsinc/autoblog/~4/HNiRShJrwMU" height="1" width="1"/

President-elect Barack Obama is filling his Cabinet at record speed, choosing loyal friends and one-time foes to guide his wartime foreign policy decisions.div class="feedflare" a href="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?a=06Fpo"img src="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?i=06Fpo" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?a=RU2oO"img src="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?i=RU2oO" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?a=WcTho"img src="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?i=WcTho" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?a=5m4Xo"img src="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?i=5m4Xo" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?a=5NCEO"img src="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?i=5NCEO" border="0"/img/a a href="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?a=IXO3O"img src="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~f/CBSNewsMain?i=IXO3O" border="0"/img/a /divimg src="http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~r/CBSNewsMain/~4/471358047" height="1" width="1"/

An online security center in Hanoi offers products and services that redefine online protection.

Windows only: The Giveaway of the Day web site is featuring a small, simple, but effective macro recording tool for free until 3 a.m. EST on Dec. 2. Windows Automation Macro Recorder (WAMR), normally...

Hear ye, hear ye games reviews wanters: The Guardian has magically collated all of its games reviews onto one handy site for your consuming pleasure. Does it bother you that we don't do enough on the gamesblog? Head here instead

If this thing were coming from any source other than the legendary Eldar Murtazin of mobile-review, we'd go ahead and assume this was a knockoff nabbed off eBay for a few bucks -- but amazingly, we think it's the real deal. The dead-on-arrival burgundy slider with gold accents looks like it could've been part of a reinvigorated l'Amour series (or something along those lines), clearly putting styling at or near the top of its priorities -- but it also steals the 6260 slide's totally capable guts, which means it features a 5-megapixel camera, tri-band 3G, and a 480 x 320 display. If they had to choose between this and the 6260, the right model came out on top -- but we gotta admit, it's so far outside Nokia's styling comfort zone that we find it tolerable in a really sick, twisted way.

[Via Daily Mobile]

Filed under: Cellphones

Canceled 5-megapixel Nokia slider almost looks like a fake originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 01 Dec 2008 09:55:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

It's a fight that's been raging for a while: games publishers shaking their fists at retailers for selling second-hand games (and coming up with bizarre counter measures), retailers shaking their fists at the publishers for threatening to crack down on one of their revenue streams (and coming out with debatable statistics). But the recent surge in public laundry-airing from both camps has taken many by surprise. Notably, the consumers - often the lost souls in this debate - have begun to take an interest in the outcome, and with their dollar-might on the side of the retailers (and the current status quo), how likely is it that the publishers will win their battle and enforce registration on players?

The Iridium satellite network has just released its third generation handset. It is smaller, lighter, and more functional than any of its predecessors.

Look, I'm for the right to bear arms as much as the next guymdash;I just don't like ducks. While we were born a few generations too late for Wild West gun-slinging and a few generations too early...

Church bells tolled, workers put down their tools and court proceedings stopped Monday as South Africa marked a minute of silence for AIDS victims and ended a decade of denial about the epidemic.

Read full story for latest details.img src="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/rss/money_latest/~4/GQLssdbvSMg" height="1" width="1"/