Welcome to Pages of Fun!

This is the personal Web site of Robert Wm. Gomez. I am an artist, musician and nerd living in Chicago, Illinois who has been maintaining this site (in one form or another) since 1996. Enjoy your visit!

Red Dead Redemption on PC (7/10)

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You play as John Marston, a reformed cowboy outlaw whose family is being held hostage in order to get him to kill his old gang partners. There’s not much more to it than that. Kill the first guy and then there’s another boss to hunt down. This all plays out in a massive open-world with tons of desert scruff to explore.

The problem I have with the Rockstar Games’ open-world formula is that, despite the freedom you are given, you are pinned into playing the missions exactly as designed. This is as opposed to a game like Fallout where you can approach obstacles with violence, stealth or intelligence. In essence, this is a middling movie western story in which you perform tasks just to see the next cutscene.

While there is an “honor” system, the story almost demands you play as the good guy. I was less inclined to just instigate mayhem like I would in GTA. Even though you are forced to align with obviously corrupt characters and kill peasants, etc., you remain the virtuous hero trying to save his family.

Yet, despite all my criticisms, I enjoyed the various shootouts and the simple bullet-time gun mechanics. The world is big and beautiful and exactly the environment you’d see in a classic western. Much of the side challenges amount to collectable quests or gambling simulations. Each is fun for a while, but I didn’t have the time or energy to go through the game 100%. I’m wondering if the sequel offers more depth.

RSPK (Recurrent Spontaneous Psychokinesis) - Wood Engraving

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RSPK (Recurrent Spontaneous Psychokinesis) is a parapsychological term for “poltergeist” activity, describing the involuntary, repeated movement of objects or noises attributed to the unconscious mental influence of a living person. It is usually tied to rebellious teenagers or disgruntled employees. So, yes, it’s complete nonsense.

The Police Are Blundering in the Dark (3/10)

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The most stomach churning thing about this Italian thriller is the mid-seventies fashion and hairstyles. A couple of models have gone missing and a journalist arrives on the scene to do nothing. The wheelchair-bound, afro-luxe photographer has found a way to photograph people’s minds and then solves the crime. The end. There’s about thirty minutes of movie here and the rest is boring filler.

City on Fire (8/10)

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So, yes, Reservoir Dogs shares a lot with this movie. And by a lot I mean the last ten minutes. The remaining ninety minutes are more about police tactics and Chow Yun Fat’s relationship troubles. It all flows together nicely, but doesn’t feel as imminently re-watchable as a John Woo film from the same era.

Stranglehold on PC (7/10)

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Stranglehold is the video game sequel to John Woo’s Hard-boiled. What it actually is is a Max Payne clone. That’s not all that bad because Max Payne’s bullet-time mechanic was one of the most fun innovations in gaming and it was itself a rip-off of everything John Woo. What’s missing is the themes of brotherhood and honor that permeated all of Woo’s gun-fu masterpieces. Instead we get a forgettable “rescue the damsel in distress” plot. That said, the action mechanics were enough to hold me through the relatively short single player campaign.

Mysteries of the Unknown: The UFO Phenomenon by Time-Life Books (7/10)

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Turns out that people recounting their UFO sightings is not terribly interesting reading. Much of this book is dedicated to such accounts without any visual proof. Fortunately there is a bit more here than that. You do get a pretty detailed history of the various government departments charged with researching these stories.

No, The Case Is Happily Resolved (8/10)

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The final disc in the Years of Lead box set is not so much a poliziotteschi as it is a noir film or even a giallo. The plot is as follows: an average, middle class guy who witnesses a murder. The murderer is a revered intellectual and he goes to the police first to accuse our hero of the crime. The rest of the movie is the hero bumbling around and trying to cover up for a murder he didn’t commit. The lead is played in a comic/tragic way in which you are both rooting for him and angered by his stupid decisions. Unfortunately, the producers forced a “happy” ending which kinda ruins everything. On the disc the original, ambiguous ending is included which I wish they kept. Highly recommended.

La Califfa (5/10)

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Add this one to the growing list of Italian movies about middle-aged men whose lives are reinvigorated by cheating on their wives with women half their age. The soundtrack to this movie is one of Ennio Morricone’s best and I’ve been seeking this out for quite some time. The story is about a rich factory owner who begins to empathize with his striking workers after having an affair with the wife of a killed striker. He ends up in between the two sides and yadda yadda, love story, boom, dead. This is just thinly veiled commie gobbledygook and, worse than that, it’s dull.