“Amélie” (2001) is a French film (yes, there are subtitles) about a shy waitress who decides to help others while fighting her own sense of isolation. Let’s summarize “Amélie”… In 10 Screencaps Or Less!™

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Key plotpoints are pictured below. You have been warned!
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Amélie Poulain is the daughter of an anti-social doctor and a neurotic schoolteacher. Isolated from other children and lacking any emotional support from her parents, Amélie develops a very active imagination.

Yesterday we summarized “Matango: Attack Of The Mushroom People” In 10 Screencaps Or Less™. Now, let’s extract a product management lesson from this bleak, “Gilligan’s Island” gone horribly, horribly wrong.

In Matango, disaster strikes when sound advice from the captain is dismissed by the nouveau riche. Soon the shipwrecked survivors are eating irradiated mushrooms and literally devolving back to the primordial ooze.

Many of us have been to office holiday parties that followed that same trajectory.

With an economic crisis churning all around us, corporate holiday parties are downsizing this year.

In an odd way, this may come as a relief to some people.…

“Matango, Attack of the Mushroom People” (1963) is a trippy, creepy, bleak, thought-provoking sci-fi movie from the mind of Ishiro “Godzilla” Honda. Let’s summarize “Matango”… In 10 Screencaps Or Less!™

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Key plotpoints are pictured below. You have been warned!
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Decadent, white-collar professionals relax aboard a yacht. Privately, the captain and his crewman complain about their passengers–about their idleness, their almost parasitic nature.

A storm starts brewing. The captain wants to turn back, but the businessman who hired the boat rejects the idea. The ensuing storm blows the ship off course. After days of drifting…

Yesterday we summarized BBC’s “Jekyll” In 10 Screencaps Or Less™. Now let’s extract a product management lesson from this creepy “sequel” to the classic novella written by Robert Louis Stevenson.

When the protagonist of the story learns that his entire life is a lie, his faux friend Peter tries to justify a lifetime of manipulations by stating it was for the greater good if the end result leads to cures for disease. That, my friends, is a logical fallacy.

I haven’t conducted a formal survey to determine how many of you are involved with shadowy corporations breeding armies of clones of fictional…

Yesterday we summarized “Reign Of Fire” In 10 Screencaps Or Less™. Now let’s extract a product management lesson from 2002’s most dragontastic action/sci-fi film.

One of Reign’s big conflicts is between Quinn (played by Christian Bale) and Van Zan (played by Matthew McConaughey). Quinn is trying to keep innocent people alive; Van Zan wants to kill the sole male dragon and drive the dragons to extinction.

The ongoing argument between product management and agile development is pretty similar, just minus all the incinerating.

To make sure we’re on the same page, we should first describe agile development:

The tenets of agile development are basically…

“Reign Of Fire” is a 2002 sci-fi film about dragons taking over the world and humanity’s struggle to survive. Let’s summarize “Reign Of Fire”… In 10 Screencaps Or Less!™

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Key plotpoints of this film are pictured below. You have been warned!
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Young Quinn Abercromby visits his mother at work. She’s the chief of a construction crew working on the Underground in London.

Proving that it’s never a good idea to dig TOO far underground, the construction works accidentally awaken an enormous, hibernating dragon which quickly kills everyone except for Quinn.

Over the course of twenty…

Yesterday we summarized “Time After Time” In 10 Screencaps Or Less™. Today, we extract a product management lesson from that 1970’s time travel mash-up.

In the opening scenes of Time After Time, H.G. Wells introduces his dinner guests to the new Time Machine that he’s invented. Unfortunately, one of his guests is secretly Jack The Ripper who promptly steals the Time Machine to continue his serial killings in modern-day San Francisco.

To the best of my knowledge, no product that I’ve ever worked on has been linked to time traveling serial killings. However, I have been involved in at least one strategic…

“Time After Time” is a 1979 sci-fi feature film about H.G. Wells traveling across time and space in pursuit of Jack the Ripper. Let’s summarize “Time After Time”… In 10 Screencaps Or Less!™

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Key plotpoints of this film are pictured below. You have been warned!
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Author H.G. Wells invites his friends over for a dinner party. After supper, one thing leads to another, and he unveils his brand new TIME MACHINE to them.

Unfortunately, one of the dinner guests is actually Jack The Ripper–and the police are hot on his trail.

Jack takes off in H.G.’s fancy new…

Yesterday we summarized “The Blob” In 10 Screencaps Or Less™. Today, we extract a product management lesson from that classic 1950’s sci-fi flick.

According to its theme song, The Blob is a gelatinous creature that “creeps and leaps and glides and slides across the floor, right through the door and all around the wall”. It consumes everything in its path, growing ever larger and more dangerous.

Product manager and project managers routinely encounter features creeping up on them in a Blob-like fashion . . . attaching themselves to the work at hand, often with the best of intentions, and inadvertently endangering or…

“The Blob” is a 1958 sci-fi film starring Steve McQueen and Aneta Corsaut as lovestruck teens who discover a gooey alien threat to Downingtown, Pennsylvania. Let’s summarize “The Blob”… In 10 Screencaps Or Less!™

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Key plotpoints of this film are pictured below. You have been warned!
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The movie opens with a kooky theme song that completely mischaracterizes the story to follow. On the other hand, it is quite catchy.

Steve Andrews (McQueen) and Jane Martin (Corsaut) spot something crash down near Steve’s favorite buss stop.

Meanwhile, an old man discovers the strange meteor near his house and decides…