Movie Monday: Short and sweet...and funny

I'm having a really crappy day today. In fact, I've had a really crappy few days, which is why I haven't been around here.

Since it's Movie Monday, I decided I needed to see something funny. This clip, from "What's Up, Doc?" (1972) is really, really funny:




"What's Up, Doc?", which was directed by Peter Bogdanovich, starred Barbra Streisand, Ryan O'Neal and, in her first screen role, Madeline Kahn. It is an old-fashioned screwball comedy about musical rocks, a convention of musicologists, mistaken identities, and all manner of silliness. It was the third highest-grossing film in the US in 1972. The writing is top-notch, which is why it earned the 1973 Writers Guild of America award for Best Comedy Written Directly for the Screen.

The film doesn't seem to be around much any more, but it should be. If you get a chance, you really should see it.

Movie Monday: The "Gotta See Movies" Edition

I found a really nifty book at the library the other day, "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die", edited by Steven Jay Schneider. This particular copy is the 5th anniversary edition, which is, according to Wikipedia, actually the 3rd edition (yeah, it was confusing for me, too), published by Quintessence books in 2008. There are updated editions, the most recent being the 5th edition, published in 2012. It would be interesting to get hold of that and see what's been added since the edition my library has. But, you know, when you're dependent on the library for books, as I am, you learn to work with what you've got.

At any rate, it's a fun book, not necessarily the kind you read straight through (although you can), and certainly not the kind you tote around with you in the print edition (this edition is 960 pages and weighs a lot). But, you can dip into it if you're looking for a good movie to watch, and you can use it as a reference to see if the movies you like best made the list. Or, you can do as I did and sit down and count how many of the listed movies you've already seen.

I won't list all the films on the list that I've seen, because it turns out that I've seen precisely 221 of them, starting on the first movie included(they're listed chronologically), Georges Melies 1902 classic "A Trip to the Moon", and ending with Martin Scorsese's "The Departed" (2006). That's not the last movie listed in this edition; that distinction belongs to 2007's "The Atonement", which I have not seen.

This is not necessarily a "best of" list, at least as far as I'm concerned; certainly, there are films that I've seen on the list that are not among my favorites: 1997's "Titanic"; "The Rapture", from 1991; "Drugstore Cowboy", from 1989; "The Princess Bride" and "Moonstruck", both from 1987; 1984's "The Natural"; "The Sting", from 1973. You'll notice that there are Academy Award winners and nominees among those. "Titanic", "Moonstruck", and "The Sting" were all nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards; "Titanic" and "The Sting" both won the Best Picture Oscar, and while "Moonstruck" didn't win Best Picture, it did win several awards, including Best Actress for Cher. Additionally, "The Princess Bride" has become a cult favorite. I thought others on the list that I've seen were very well-made films, but I didn't personally like them for specific reasons. Hayao Miyazaki's anime classic "Spirited Away" (2001) and Martin Scorsese's "Raging Bull" (1980) are among those. "Spirited Away" bothered me for reasons that I can't quite put my finger on, even today; it was beautiful but I found it very disturbing. I don't like boxing, so "Raging Bull" wasn't really my cup of tea.

But, some of my favorite films are also on the list. Starting with the silents, "The Unknown" (1927) and "The Passion of Joan of Arc" (1928) are both on the list. So is Dreyer's "Vampyr" (1932), which is one of the most spookily atmospheric films I've ever seen. "King Kong" (1933), "Casablanca" (1942), "Double Indemnity" (1944), "The Ghost and Mrs. Muir" (1947), and "White Heat" (1949) are all there, too. So are "Rebel Without a Cause" (1955), "Goldfinger" (1964), "A Hard Day's Night" (1964), "Harold and Maude" (1971), "The Godfather" (1972), "Chinatown" (1974), "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" (1975), and a whole lot of other films I love. All three "Star Wars" films made the list, and so did all three installments of "Lord of the Rings".

One of the cool things about the book is that it (or at least the edition I'm looking at) has a checklist of all the films included at the front of the book, so you can keep track as you see films on the list. This is appropriate; just since I checked the book out of the library, I've seen three films on the list that I hadn't seen previously - 1949's "The Third Man", directed by Carol Reed and starring Joseph Cotton and Orson Welles, the Lana Turner/John Garfield noir classic "The Postman Always Rings Twice" (1946), and Alfred Hitchcock's "Rope" (1948), which starred James Stewart, John Dall, and Farley Granger. "Rope" was especially interesting. It is an experimental film that Hitchcock filmed in long takes and then edited to appear as if nearly the whole film was done in one long take. Based partly on the Leopold and Loeb murder case from 1924, the mystery isn't much of a mystery - it's more a case of whether or not the murderers will be found out - and the acting isn't always that great, but it is nonetheless fascinating for the techniques that Hitchcock used to make the film.

Well, since I've seen 221 of the films listed in the book, I guess that means I've got 780 left to go. This is not to say that I plan to plow through the whole book and see every movie listed. I just can't see any reason why I'd be interested in seeing "Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!" (1965) or "The Evil Dead" (1982). And as many times I've tried to sit through "Blade Runner" (1982), I've fallen asleep that many times, despite the fact that I'm definitely a Harrison Ford fan and I love science fiction. Still, this book is a good place to find suggestions if you're looking for a good movie to watch.

It is also a good place to discover film trivia. I didn't know until I started looking through this book, for example, that the first sound film in Britain was directed by Alfred Hitchcock. I also didn't realize that artist Salvador Dali was involved for a time in writing screenplays in collaboration with Luis Bunuel. And there's a lot more information where that came from.

As I said at the beginning of this post, the first "must see" film listed in "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die" is "A Trip to the Moon". As it turns out, the full film is available on You Tube. This print is just under 13 minutes long (and its length can differ depending on projection speed), which doesn't seem like much to the modern viewer, but when you think that this was made at the dawn of filmmaking ("A Trip to the Moon" was made just six years after the first public exhibition of motion pictures) and that even at the time it was made, most films were not more than two or three minutes long, it becomes clearer how ground-breaking this film is:



All I can say is, try to find this book if you love films. And then, go watch a movie.

Those "I've got to watch this" movies...

I might well have covered this ground before, but since I'm sitting here and watching "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" on SyFy, I figured I'd bring it up.

I'm a movie fan. Those of you who follow along here enough to know that I do a Movie Monday post every Monday already know that. I love most kinds of movies - old, new, most genres, black & white or color, doesn't matter. And I like good movies.

The thing is, there are certain movies that I will sit down and watch every time I come across them, whether or not the qualify as "good". There's just something about those movies that I like and will watch an infinite number of times, even if I should be doing other things (right now, I really should be working on my book project). One of those movies is "Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull", even though the critics didn't like it very well, and some people seem to be offended that it involves "aliens" and "woo-woo stuff".

I'm not even really sure why I like this one so much, although I find myself endlessly entertained by the completely unbelievable refrigerator scene near the beginning of the film:



Only Indy would be able to pull that off. And, you know, in reality there isn't anything entertaining at all about nuclear explosions. But in this case, an exception has to be made. And, really? The prairie dog is just perfect.

Two of the other three Indiana Jones movies also fall in the category of anytime, anywhere movies. Not "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom", though. I didn't like that one when I first saw it, and I tend to avoid it if at all possible.

Other movies on my "anytime, anywhere" list...

"The Day the Earth Stood Still". The original, from 1951. I've honestly lost track of the number of times I've seen this, partly due to the fact that they used to show it a lot on Channel 9 in Los Angeles when I was growing up. This is the ultimate science fiction film, and particularly the ultimate "first contact" movie, and I love it a lot. Here's the trailer (there's fifteen or twenty seconds of blank screen at the beginning, but hang with it):



And then there's "The Thomas Crown Affair" (1968). Yes, again the original. I didn't actually see this film until three or four years ago. And I will admit that I'm kind of obsessed by it. It's a caper film and stars Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway, and it's very, very good. The same year, another McQueen film, "Bullitt" also appeared in theaters. I saw it when if first came out, and I'll still stop and watch if I come across it. Of course, there's the chase scene in "Bullitt", but that isn't the only attraction in the film. I believe I might have mentioned these when I wrote about how good a year 1968 was for films.

In a completely different vein, I'll also stop what I'm doing to watch "Empire Records" (1995). Yeah, it's aimed at a much younger demographic than I belong in. That's okay. The writer, who I understand worked in a record store at one time, managed to write characters that are sympathetic, and that always goes a long way to making a watchable film:



There are others. "Zoolander". Another '50s science fiction film, "Invaders From Mars". "Road House". "A Hard Day's Night". I've probably mentioned all of these around here at some time or another, and so I won't go on about them now.

What I am interested in, because I think most people have a list like this, is: what are the movies on your "anytime, anywhere" list? Which movies do you stop to watch whenever you get the opportunity? Leave your thoughts in the comments.

Movie Monday: The "The Movies Love Musicians" Edition

"Rhapsody in Blue" is one of my favorite pieces of music. It is also the title of a film that purports to tell the life story of George Gershwin, the composer of that piece of music and many others, who died way too young (at age 38) of a brain tumor. What the film is, unfortunately, is a highly fictionalized account of Gershwin's life, including the addition of two romances that never actually happened. The film, which was made in 1943 but not released until 1945, stars Robert Alda (yes, that would be Alan Alda's father) as George Gershwin, in his first screen role after a career in vaudeville. While it takes huge liberties with the story of Gershwin's life, it also has several of the people Gershwin knew and worked with playing themselves. These folks include Oscar Levant and Al Jolson, who - equally unfortunately - reprises his blackface rendition of "Swannee", as you can see in the trailer from the time of the film's original release:



One of these days we'll have to discuss all the ramifications of performing in blackface, but today is not that day. "Rhapsody in Blue" actually got two Academy Award nominations, for Best Musical Score and for Best Sound, and while it did not win either award, it was also nominated for the Grand Prize at the 1946 Cannes Film Festival.

Well, Hollywood has a tendency to make shit up, and it also likes to make movies about musicians. This means that the films that result can be very good, but can also go very wrong. So, I think, you can't go into a film biography of a performer and expect to get the full, unadulterated, true story from Hollywood. But you might still get a good film. Maybe even an award-winning film.

Certainly that's what we get with "Amadeus" (1984), which starred Tom Hulce as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and F. Murray Abraham as Antonio Salieri. The story is actually framed as Salieri telling the story of Mozart and his own rivalry with the more famous composer. Originally a stage play, "Amadeus" is a really good movie that was nominated for 11 Academy Awards and won 8 of them, including Best Picture and Best Actor in a Leading Role for Abraham's portrayal of Salieri. It also won, among others, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Art Direction.

Now, I have to confess that when I first saw "Amadeus", my response was that its thesis was that if Mozart was alive today, he would be David Lee Roth. And who knows how close the film is to the truth of Mozart's personality. I don't know enough about the composer's life to be able to say. In this clip, where Mozart meets with the Emperor and with Salieri, who is the court composer, Mozart is shown as supremely talented and equally tactless:



My favorite scene though, is when Mozart is told by the Emperor that one of his compositions has "too many notes":



Really? How do you tell someone as talented as Mozart that there are too many notes in his work? Well, apparently, easily if you're the Emperor. This is one of those scenes that, if it didn't really happen, should have, just to make history more interesting.

"Coal Miner's Daughter" (1980) is another one of those great movies that, even if it does take some liberties with reality, is still a great, great movie. The story of country singer Loretta Lynn, it was nominated for but did not win Best Picture. However, Sissy Spacek, who portrayed Lynn, did win Best Actress in a Leading Role. I suspect that, along with her usual wonderful performance, the fact that Spacek did her own singing in the film helped her win the award. Tommy Lee Jones played Lynn's husband, Doolittle, and Levon Helm made his acting debut as Loretta's father. Also in the film and playing themselves were several country entertainers, including Ernest Tubb, Roy Acuff, and the wonderful Minnie Pearl. If you don't know Pearl's country comedy, you really need to explore that.

Here are a couple of short scenes from near the beginning of the film:



And here is Sissy Spacek singing "Coal Miner's Daughter" on "The Midnight Special" in 1980, with Levon Helm on drums. You'll notice that the song references one of the scenes in the clip above:



But then there are film biographies of musicians that, well, aren't so great. Take Oliver Stone's film "The Doors", for example. No, really. Please, take it. Although two of the three members of the band surviving at the time the film was made, made cameo appearances, all three later criticized the film for showing a one-dimensional portrait of Jim Morrison, with the remaining band members agreeing that the Morrison on the screen was not the man they knew. On the other hand, all three said that they had difficulty distinguishing Kilmer's voice (he did part of his own singing, which was blended with recordings of Morrison) from Morrison's in the final product. I think the problem here is that Oliver Stone has his view of the world and he has a tendency sometimes to not let the facts get in the way of what he sees as a good story. At any rate, here are some scenes from the opening of the film:



At any rate, despite mixed reviews for the film itself, Val Kilmer got rave reviews for his portrayal of Morrison. And he does manage to capture the physicality of the man, based on films and photos I've seen of Morrison. Still, it would have been nice if Stone had made a movie about the band and about what people who knew him said was the real Morrison, rather than playing up the legend and the myths about him that have grown up since the singer's death in 1971.

Which brings us to the end of Movie Monday's for 2013. Please tune in next week to see what 2014 will bring.

Movie Extra: The "Back to the Beginning" Edition

We all do it at least once in a while. We go to the theater, put down our ten bucks (or whatever it is these days; I haven't been in much too long), go inside, and sit and watch moving pictures projected onto a screen. The pictures, and the sound that goes with them, makes us laugh or cry, or both; make us cheer or boo and hiss; at any rate, if they're done right, those moving pictures (which, of course, don't move at all but simply create the illusion of motion) entertain us.

We don't generally stop to think, though, that there was a first time - the first time that people put their money down and went inside and watched pictures projected on a wall move. But there was such a day, in Paris, on December 28, 1895. That was the day the Lumiere brothers showed ten snippets of film, none over 50 seconds long. Each clip was a simple "slice of life" scene - workers leaving a factory, two blacksmiths at work, one horseback rider showing another how to do trick riding, a baby fishing for goldfish in a fishbowl, a man sneaking up behind a gardener and stepping on the hose he was using to water plants, several people playing in the ocean:



Seeing those short clips, it's sort of amazing to think that this new form of entertainment ever went anywhere. The Lumiere brothers - Auguste and Louis - weren't trying to tell a story with these clips, but had just been playing with materials from the family business; their father ran a photographic business. The next year, the brothers took their show on the road to London, Montreal, New York, Buenos Aires, and Bombay.

One of those present at the first showing in Paris was Georges Melies, an illusionist, who saw past the specific content of those ten short films to the possibilities for creating illusions and telling stories. One of his first films, made in 1896, was "The Haunted Castle", which was first shown on Christmas Eve of that year, just a few days short of a year since he had been present at the Lumiere brothers' first showing. And there Melies was, already trying to tell a story and producing special effects:



True, the film was only just over three minutes long, but the moving pictures were already beginning to show their potential. And also already starting to explore genres that still entertain audiences today: the horror film (although this one wasn't very frightening) and the vampire film. As with so many early films, "The Haunted Castle" was presumed to be lost for many years until a copy was found in the New Zealand Film Archive in 1988. Melies made 531 films between 1896 and 1913, including the landmark "A Trip to the Moon" in 1902.

Others also took up the challenge, and the art of filmmaking advanced to where it is today. Yes, there are probably way too many slasher films and chase films and sparkly vampire films. But there are also surpassing works of art, and it all started on that evening in 1895. Yes, there were others who were working at the same time, and even earlier, but the Lumiere brothers were the first to solicit a paying audience to look at the films they had made, thus setting the template for the movie-going experience we all enjoy to this day, 118 years later.

Movie Monday: The "Not Your Normal Christmas Movie" Edition

Yes, I know. It's almost Christmas. I wasn't going to do this, because I mostly don't like Christmas movies. But, you know, I was in a store earlier today (no, not Christmas shopping - I needed toilet paper), and found myself singing along to the Christmas music they were playing. So, here are a few movies that have something to do with Christmas. Maybe not much, but you get what you get, and I despise movies like "It's a Wonderful Life".

I wasn't aware of the existence of "It Happened on Fifth Avenue" (1947) until I saw it a few weeks ago on The Hallmark Channel (I think) as part of a package of Christmas-themed movies they began showing in November. I don't even know that I would really call it a Christmas movie, except that it extolls extending all those Christmas-like good things like reaching out and helping one another, and that the story resolves around the Christmas holiday. The story revolves around a hobo who takes up residence in a boarded-up mansion on Fifth Avenue in New York City and ends up taking in several people who have nowhere else to go (including, it turns out, the rebellious daughter of the rich man who owns the home). After the usual convolutions, which I will not describe here because I don't want to spoil the film for any of you who might decide to watch it, a happy ending ensues for all.

It's kind of a sappy movie as only a 1940s movie can be, but it kept me watching. The film stars Don DeFore, Charles Ruggles, Ann Harding, Gale Storm, and Victor Moore. This clip contains a scene from the beginning of the movie and shows how one of the less-than-legal residents of the mansion ends up homeless before meeting the man who has made a habit of squatting in the mansion:



Another movie that isn't really, exactly an Christmas movie but takes place around the holiday season is "Bachelor Mother" (1939), which stars Ginger Rogers as a department-store salesgirl who loses her job at the end of the Christmas rush. She rescues an abandoned baby, is mistakenly assumed to be the baby's mother, after which a whole series of mistaken identities and the complications that arise lead to an eventual happy ending. The film also stars David Niven and Charles Coburn, and is a sweet little comedy with a Christmas connection, making it perfect for viewing this time of year. Here's the trailer from the film's original release:



"Bachelor Mother" was remade as "Bundle of Joy" in 1956, starring Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher. With those two in the film, of course they made it into a musical, which I don't really think served the story that well, but that might just be me. Otherwise, you can see from the trailer, the story from the 1939 movie, and even some of the lines, were kept pretty much intact:



A more recent movie that, while not a Christmas movie takes place during the Christmas season and takes advantage of that, is 1987's "Lethal Weapon". Yeah, I know. Mel Gibson. But this film was made before the extent of his...issues...were known. It's a good action movie, though. And, hey, how often do you find a good Christmas-connected action flick? It also stars Danny Glover, which is a good thing.

Another movie that really has nothing to do with Christmas, although a child's Christmas gift provides the central mystery of the film's story, is the 1941 classic "Citizen Kane" which, of course, starred Orson Welles. I'm not going to argue, as some do, that this is the best movie ever made, because I don't really think it is. However, it is very, very good, and if you haven't seen it, you should. In case you haven't, I won't clue you in about the gift. Here's the trailer from the time of the film's original release. It really doesn't tell you much about the movie, but I think that was the whole point:



And here's a scene from the movie, to give a little bit of a better hint about it:



I wrote a little bit about "The Lion In Winter" last week, in connection with the death of Peter O'Toole, one of its stars. What I didn't mention is that the movie takes place during the holiday season and shows the holiday reunion of a dysfunctional family in the 1100s probably wasn't all that different than Christmas with your own dysfunctional family today, except that the father of that dysfunctional family was the king, and so the dysfunction assumes a whole other level of consequence. Again, "The Lion in Winter" is a good movie, and if you haven't seen it you should.

In Threes?...

There's this thing that is sometimes called the "Rule of Three", which states that celebrities die in groups of three. People are always pointing this out, and sometimes it seems to really be a thing. But is it, really?

I've always figured that this mostly has to do with the human habit of finding patterns in things, and to impose them even when they aren't really there. There are lots of examples of this; constellations of stars and seeing images in places like tree bark and grilled cheese sandwiches are only two of many.

In Western culture, the number three has assumed a certain significance, and so we tend to see patterns of three. We list things in threes - morning, noon, and night, for example. We've got "The Three Bears" in fairy tales, "Three Blind Mice" in children's rhymes, and the Triple Crown in horse racing. In the Christian religion, there is the Trinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Among Wiccans, there is the Threefold Law that states that whatever you put out to the universe, good or bad, will come back to you three times. I could go on. "Three" is a really big thing, culturally speaking, and that probably has transferred to the Rule of Three.

But, there are problems with the rule of three. How do you define who counts as a celebrity? Does the person have to have actually done something to earn their celebrity, or do you count people who are famous for being famous? Can the person be someone who has been famous for Warhol's fifteen minutes, or do they have to have been famous over a particular period of time? How long does that have to be? Do you only count entertainers, and are athletes considered entertainers or not? Or, do people like politicians and famous scientists and people famous in other fields count as well?

What about time frame? Do the three celebrities have to have died on the same day? Within a few days? If so, how many? Is three days too long? Is a week too long?

As you can see, it can be complicated to analyze whether the Rule of Three is valid, and if it is in operation in any particular circumstance.

And what in the world brought this up, you might be thinking right about now.

In reading the news from the past few days, it seems as if the Rule of Three - if you believe in it - has been in operation once again, specifically in the film community. In the past few days, three actors have died: Peter O'Toole, Joan Fontaine, and Tom Laughlin. Depending on how old you are and what kinds of films you watch, you might or might not be asking "Who?" about one or more of these names. All of them have made a mark, however, of some kind in film. Fontaine was an Academy Award-winning actress, the only person to have won an acting Academy Award for work in an Alfred Hitchcock film, and also one-half of the only sisters to have both won Academy Awards (her sister is Olivia de Haviland). Peter O'Toole holds the record for the number of times he was nominated for an Academy Award without winning one (he was nominated eight times in his career), but he was awarded an honorary Oscar in 2003 for his body of work. And Tom Laughlin...well, his film work never won any awards; his films generally didn't even get that many positive reviews, but how he marketed some of them are credited for changing the way films are marketed and one of his films, "Billy Jack" was, as of 2007 at least, the highest-grossing independent film in history.

So, do these deaths count as fulfilling the Rule of Three? All three have clearly made their mark in the film industry. But their deaths came over four days, with Laughlin passing first, on December 12 at age 82, followed by O'Toole on December 14 at age 81, and Fontaine on December 15 at age 96. Or are we once again, just creating a pattern where there really isn't one?

Here is a trailer for Suspicion (1941) which starred Fontaine and Cary Grant and was directed by Alfred Hitchcock:



Although she continued to do television until the mid 1990s, one of Fontaine's last film roles came in the science fiction film "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" (1961), in which she played a doctor studying stress on the crew of the nuclear submarine Seaview. Here is the trailer:



One of O'Toole's Academy Award nominations came for 1968's "The Lion in Winter", a brilliant film with brilliant performances from both O'Toole and his co-star, Katharine Hepburn.



In "A Lion in Winter", O'Toole plays Henry II, the same role he had played four years earlier in "Becket" (1964). Since "The Lion in Winter" is one of my favorite historical dramas, here is another scene:



O'Toole also played the title role in the 1962 epic "Lawrence of Arabia", which is considered by many to be one of the most influential films ever made. It was one of O'Toole's first film roles, and it brought him his first Academy Award nomination, although he lost the award to Gregory Peck, who won for his role as Atticus Finch in "To Kill a Mockingbird":



In "Billy Jack", Laughlin played a half-Native American Vietnam veteran who has taken on the task of protecting an alternative school that the local powers-that-be want closed. Although the school is all about love and peace and non-violence, Billy Jack isn't shy about using violence to defend the students and the school's headmistress, played by his real-life wife, Delores Taylor. This scene shows some of that violence, which came in for a lot of criticism from critics at the time the film was released in 1971:



Made for a budget of just $800,000, "Billy Jack" had earned $32.5 million as of 2005, largely due to Laughlin's innovative marketing of the film after he won back the rights to the film after Warner Brothers' marketing of it didn't please him on it's first release, which had come after American International Pictures had reneged on its agreement to distribute it because Laughlin wouldn't de-politicize the film.

Looking back now, "Billy Jack" was a naïve film in many ways, a product of its times. It probably wasn't a "good" film, however one assess and defines that. But, I have to admit that when I saw it as the second feature with another film that I can't even recall now, when I was in high school, I went back to see it twice more in the week before it moved on to the next theater, back in the days when most films only played for a week in any one theater.

So, I guess the question of the day is, what do you think? Is the "Rule of Three" a thing, or is it an artifact of our culture and our human need to impose patters, and meaning, on the universe?

Where I've been, and a movie recommendation...

Yeah. It's been very busy around here for the past few days.

Which is why I haven't posted since, oh, Monday or so.

I've written posts in my head every day, but I've not been in the house much to sit down and write them. And when I've had time to sit down, I've been so tired that anything I would have written would have probably been incoherent.

However...I did want to mention a movie I watched this evening while I was sitting and trying to get up the energy to fix some dinner. It was a documentary from 2004 called "Riding Giants", that focuses on surfers that started "riding the big waves" in the 1950s and those who followed them.

I have never surfed, despite having grown up in Southern California. I've never even really had the desire to surf. But I love a good surfing documentary (and I think I've written about my love for "The Endless Summer" and it's sequel here before). This is a great surfing documentary. The photography is amazing, but not as amazing as seeing surfers riding the huge waves - mostly in Hawaii and off Northern California (where it was thought for a long time that there were no big waves).

Be aware - this is not a film of all fun and games. Surfing is a dangerous sport, and surfing the big waves is especially so. People have died doing this, and one of the points the film makes is that it takes a special kind of person to do so. Yeah, these men (and women) might be crazy. But they also love what they do. The world would be a lot better off if more people loved what they do, I think.

Here's the trailer. Really, I recommend this film:

Movie Monday: The Books into Movies Edition

I spent a good bit of time over the holiday weekend watching the later films in the Harry Potter series, and my roommate spent a good bit of that time explaining things in the plot that didn't quite make sense to me because I've never read the books. Well, I read the first book, "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone", and liked it a lot, but I've just never gotten around to reading the other books. Finally, I asked her, "Will I understand the movies more if I read the books?"

Her answer, of course, was "Yes". So I guess I'm going to have to do that soon.

The whole experience got me to thinking about movies made from books, and how they can be frustrating sometimes. From what I understand, the Harry Potter series is a case in point. I've heard a certain amount of discussion about things that were left out of the films, and how that has displeased some fans of the books. But it makes sense. There is a lot of stuff in a story that takes seven books, some of them very long books, to tell. There is no possible way that everything in the books could have been portrayed in eight movies, even eight relatively long movies (the shortest, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2" (2011)is 130 minutes long, while the longest, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" (2002), runs 160 minutes).

This is reminiscent of "Gone with the Wind" (1939), which runs 220 minutes (excluding the overture, intermission, and other add-ons), while the book is 1,037 pages long in it's original (1936) edition. Now, I had read the book before I saw the film in this case, and I found it the most amazing thing - although there were clearly whole pieces of the book missing from the film, it felt like everything was there, very much as in the book. It will be interesting to see what is missing and switched around in the Harry Potter books as opposed to those films. I have no clue how the filmmakers managed to do that, but they did in the case of GWTW.

"Gone with the Wind", with its story of the Civil War and it's aftermath, told from the perspective of those who ultimately lost the war, has become controversial for its portrayals of some ugly realities of the time and for what are now recognized as simplistic portrayals of the conditions of those held as slaves during that time. But it remains a remarkable film, just as it was remarkable when it was made. This also actually reminds me of the Harry Potter films in a way, for in its time, GWTW was as eagerly anticipated as each of the Potter movies before they were released. Here is a trailer for "Gone with the Wind", prepared after it won multiple Academy Awards:



Another film that I found the same sort of apparent completeness was "Silence of the Lambs" (1991). I had read Thomas Harris's novel of the same name, which was published in 1988, and liked it a lot. So, when the film came out I went to see it, not with very high hopes that it would live up to the book's suspense. However, it seemed like the film followed the book as closely as films ever do follow their source material. The film also managed to keep me on the edge of the theater seat right to the end, even though I knew what was going to happen. That's some pretty good filmmaking there..

Of course, you can disagree, as Siskel and Ebert did, about "The Silence of the Lambs", as evidenced in this clip from their old movie review show. Siskel did not like it, while Ebert said that it mostly worked on its own terms. I do find it interesting that, toward the end of the clip, Siskel criticizes Jodie Foster's work in the film, considering that she went on to win a Best Leading Actress Academy Award for the role:



When I saw "The Trouble with Angels" (1966), I had no clue that it was based on a book. It probably said so somewhere in the credits, but when I was ten years old, I didn't really pay that much attention to the beginning and ending credits of films. As a matter of fact, I didn't know that it was based on a book until earlier this year. I was curious about the book, which was published in 1962 but takes place in the 1930s (it is a memoir, not a novel), so I requested it from the library and read it. I was amazed that the movie, although updated to the 1960s, followed the events in the book and even played down some of the events as reported by the book's author, Jane Trahey. Here is a scene from near the beginning of the film:



So, although films that originated as books can be very different from their source material, I've had some good experiences with films that seemed to follow their source material faithfully enough to be recognizable and to be nearly as good, if not as good, as the book. Sometimes, as was the case with "The Godfather" (film, 1972; based on the novel of the same name by Mario Puzo, 1969), the film is much better than the book. Certainly, it contains what might well be the most effective opening scene in any film, ever:



On the other hand, there is "Raise the Titanic" (1980). When I read the book "Raise the Titanic!" (1976), by Clive Cussler, I spent nearly the whole time I was reading thinking, "This is going to make a great movie." It was a very good book that I stayed up all night reading because I just could not put it down. When I heard it was being made into a film, I was very happy - until I went to the theater and saw it.

It is one of the worst movies ever made. There were something like 17 writers who worked on the script, which is a sign that things are not going to go well. It was horribly miscast - I will refrain from naming the cast to protect the innocent actors who got roped into making this thing. And it was just, well, awful. As proof, I offer this trailer, from the original release:



Just in case you don't believe me, even on the evidence of the trailer, that this movie is really bad, the fill film is available on YouTube. But if you go there, don't say I didn't warn you.

Movie Monday: The Richard Matheson Edition

I had planned on writing about movie trivia today. And I'll still get to some of that eventually.

However, when I started to do some research on one of the bits of trivia that I intended to write about, it came to my attention that writer Richard Matheson died earlier this year. One of the legends in the field of fantasy, science fiction, and horror, Matheson wrote novels, screenplays, and teleplays that have entered the larger cultural consciousness. Mention "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet", and even people who are not fans of the genre probably know what you're talking about. Bring up "The Incredible Shrinking Man", and even more people will know exactly the film you are referring to. Even people who claim not to "do" fantasy have probably seen "Somewhere in Time."

Matheson had a hand in the creation of all these films and television episodes and many, many more. In several cases, he wrote both the novels and the screenplays for the films they were based on. Others of his novels have been filmed more than once.

"I Am Legend" is an example of how Hollywood has felt that Matheson's work bears repeating. He published "I Am Legend" in 1954. In 1964, it was filmed as "The Last Man on Earth" and starred Vincent Price as the only man left on Earth who hasn't been affected by a plague that has turned the rest of humanity into zombie/vampires. Hollywood revisited the story in 1971, this time calling it "The Omega Man" and with the Vincent Price role taken over by Charlton Heston. More recently, the story reclaimed its original title, "I Am Legend" (2007), with a new star, Will Smith.

Matheson also wrote "The Shrinking Man" (1956), which became "The Incredible Shrinking Man" on screen in 1957 and then transmuted into "The Incredible Shrinking Woman" in 1981. "The Incredible Shrinking Man" is a classic science fiction/horror film that follows the 1950s convention of blaming the horrible fate of some unfortunate human on radioactivity. Here is the trailer from when the 1957 film was released:



Other films that were made from Matheson's work, some with the screenplay also written by him and some not, include but are not limited to "What Dreams May Come (novel, 1978; film, 1998); "Stir of Echoes" (1999), from the novel "A Stir of Echoes"; and "Hell House" (1971), which was filmed as "The Legend of Hell House" in 1973). "Somewhere in Time" (1980), the great romantic time-travel fantasy starring Christopher Reeve, Jane Seymour, and Christopher Plummer, was adapted by Matheson from his 1975 novel "Bid Time Return". The made-for-TV film "Duel" (1971), directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Dennis Weaver, was adapted by Matheson from one of his short stories. We'll be back to "Duel" in a little bit. Here is the trailer for "Somewhere in Time":



Matheson also adapted classic science fiction and horror stories by other writers for the screen. In 1961, he adapted two Jules Verne novels, "Robur the Conqueror" and "Master of the World", into a film, also called "Master of the World". This film, which starred Vincent Price and Charles Bronson, featured a flying ship, fascinated me when I saw it as a child. Here is the trailer:



Matheson also adapted several Edgar Allen Poe stories for the screen, including "The Fall of the House of Usher", which became "House of Usher" (1960) onscreen; "The Pit and the Pendulum" (1961); "Tales of Terror" (1962) which included "Morella", an amalgam of "The Black Cat" and "The Cask of Amontillado", and "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar"; and "The Raven" (1963), the cast for which included not only Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, and Boris Karloff, but also a very young Jack Nicholson. All of these films were directed by Roger Corman."

In addition to his film work and his novels, Matheson also wrote for television, including several episodes for the original "Twilight Zone" and a classic episode of "Star Trek", "The Enemy Within" (1966). One of the episodes he wrote for "The Twilight Zone" was actually filmed twice, once for the original series in 1963 and again as the fourth segment of "Twilight Zone: The Movie", in 1983). Matheson also wrote what is, for my money, the most frightening episode of "The Twilight Zone" ever filmed, "Little Girl Lost" (1962). This story concerns a little girl who disappears from her bedroom one night. Her parents can't find her, but they can hear her. I won't say more, because if you haven't seen this episode, you really need to, and I don't want to spoil it for you. I first saw this episode when I was maybe six years old, and it scared me more than anything in any film or TV show ever has. Ever. And really, you need to see it. Go search for it on YouTube. The whole episode is available there.

Matheson had such a long and rich career, it would take days to review everything he wrote. And so I won't do that. However, I do want to return to the whole idea of movie trivia for a moment because one of my favorite pieces of trivia concerns the TV film "Duel" which I mentioned before. According to several sources I've come across, Matheson discussed at various times how he came to write the short story that the film was based on. It is an interesting story for anyone who has ever been tempted to ask a writer the question all writers dread: "Where do you get your ideas?"

Turns out, Matheson got the idea for the story that became "Duel" on November 22, 1963, the day that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Apparently, Matheson and a friend of his were in Simi Valley, California, playing golf, when they heard that Kennedy had been killed. They decided that they needed to get back to Los Angeles, so they packed up and drove back toward L.A. At that time, the only road between Simi Valley and the San Fernando Valley and L.A. was the narrow, winding, two-lane road over Santa Susana Pass. The road was a dangerous one, with sheer drop-offs in several places. As the two men navigated the road, a truck came up behind them and tailgated them for a fair distance. It was apparently a fairly nerve-wracking experience, and a story, and then the screenplay, came out of it.

This story is interesting to me for a few reasons. First of all, I'm always fascinated by writers describing their process. Second of all, I know that road and traveled along it frequently all through my childhood because I grew up in Simi Valley and when I was young it was a small enough town that one had to travel to San Fernando Valley or Los Angeles to do most shopping. I can picture being tailgated by a truck on that road, where the truck couldn't pass because the road is too winding and there are no shoulders large enough for a car to pull over and let it by. It would be an extremely frightening experience. The other reason that this particular story intrigues me is that it is dated so accurately. I know, as most of us who were alive and old enough to remember do, exactly where I was on the day Kennedy was shot. And because I know where I was, I know that I was within a few miles of the area where the event that gave rise to the story happened to Matheson and his companion at the time it happened to them. Which tickles my senses of proximity and synchronicity.

Yeah, I know. I'm a geek.

Anyway, I thought I'd leave you with the trailer for "Duel", which was, by the way not filmed on the road where Matheson got the idea for the original story. It would have been a lot more frightening if it had been.

Movie Monday: The "Reel Life vs. Real Life" Edition

So, I'm behind.

Yesterday was Music Sunday, and I fully intended to get a post written and up here, but Blogger decided not to cooperate (it was having trouble loading), and so that didn't happen. And now it's Movie Monday. So, I suppose some sort of mash-up is probably the way to go.

I can do that. And I can start of by saying that I watched "Grand Theft Parsons" (2003) over the weekend. Again.

It isn't really a biography of musician Gram Parsons, but a semi-faithful re-creation of the days after Parsons's death, when his road manager, Phil Kaufman, set out to fulfil the promise they had made to each other that, whoever died first, the other would take their body out to Joshua Tree Nation Park in the California desert and cremate it in the place they both loved.

This really happened. I can remember hearing the reports of the incident in 1973. For many years after, the only thing I knew about Gram Parsons was that he died and some wild friend of his had hauled his body out to Joshua Tree and torched it. And so, when I first became aware of the movie and its premise, I was skeptical that it would make any kind of a movie, let alone a watchable one.

And, actually, the critics are split on whether or not it is actually watchable. Some found it "tasteless" and "stale", without "soul or imagination." But others described it as "a delight, a comic tragedy" and said it has "tremendous charm." It is a black comedy. What else could it be, with the subject matter involved?

But, after I learned more about Parsons's music (I've written about Parsons here before), I watched the film. It isn't for everybody. I'll grant you that. But I see in it a sweet core, a story about real friendship and real regret on Kaufman's part (as portrayed by Johnny Knoxville) that he wasn't there when his friend needed him most. Yes, it takes liberties with the facts. Most movies based on real events do.

Here is the trailer. This is one you really need to judge for yourself:



The thing is, though, if you see "Grand Theft Parsons", you should also see "Gram Parsons: Fallen Angel", a 2006 documentary about Parsons that tells the real story of his life. It isn't always a pretty story, but pretty much everyone who knew him gets to contribute their thoughts, good, bad, or indifferent, and I found it to be a pretty complete treatment of his life, his talents and his foibles, and his death.

Here is the trailer for the documentary:

Movie Monday: The "Charlie Wilson's War" Edition

Not much time today; I've been busy doing CVP stuff, getting ready for Practice Interviews later this week and doing other real-life stuff.

However, I got a chance to re-watch one of my favorite movies of the last few years, "Charlie Wilson's War" (2007), directed by Mike Nichols and starring starring Tom Hanks, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, and Julia Roberts. No matter which side you come down on regarding the politics of the time involved - and it is based on actual events, so there are sides to come down on - it is a great movie, very well written by Aaron Sorkin.

First, a trailer for the film, which I think relates the flavor of the film very well, and gives context:



If you get the feeling that one of the messages of the film is that the lunatics are running the asylum, I don't think you would be too far off. Sadly, I also don't think the film is too far from the truth in that respect.

I also thought that I'd leave a couple of scenes with you, rather than try to summarize the events.

First, my favorite scene from the film is this one, featuring Philip Seymour Hoffman, who is an amazing actor. This scene shows why, I think, as he completely disappears into his role as a CIA agent. He is very unhappy with his immediate boss in this scene. I do have to WARN you that there is LANGUAGE in this clip that you might not want your kids to hear:



And then there's this scene, where Hanks's character, Congressman Charlie Wilson, finds out that he is in danger of being indicted over misconduct at the same time as he is trying to make a deal with Hoffman's character to obtain funding for the Mujahideen fighting Soviet troops in Afghanistan. This scene contains my favorite quote in the film:



I mean, really. "I wasn't listening at the door. Don't be an idiot. I bugged the scotch bottle." How great a line is that?

So. See "Charlie Wilson's War" if you have the chance. I'm a sucker for movies that are serious and funny at the same time. I recommend this one highly.

Live fast...

Had he lived, James Dean would have turned 82 years old today.

Of course, had he lived to see his birthday this year, he would probably not be the acting legend he is. He would have gone on to appear in many more films than he did, and some of them would have been bad films, and probably some of his performances would not have lived up to the standard he set in the three roles he is famous for: Cal Trask in "East of Eden", Jim Stark in "Rebel Without a Cause", and Jett Rink in "Giant". I say this not to discount the obvious talent he displayed in those roles; it's just the law of averages.

Those three roles, of course, are not the only ones Dean played in his short, legendary career. He played (mostly minor) roles in a fairly lengthy list of television dramas in the early fifties. However, some of those performances have been lost, and most of the ones that aren't lost are rarely seen. He also appeared on Broadway twice, in "See the Jaguar" in 1952 and in "The Immoralist" in 1954, and in three off-Broadway productions. In films, besides the three he is famous for, there were uncredited roles for him in four other films during 1951 through 1953.

And then there is this (very silly) Pepsi commercial, which was made in 1950:



But, these are the films, the performances, that will stand as James Dean's legacy. First, a scene from "East of Eden":



And from "Rebel Without a Cause", along with Natalie Wood:



And, from "Giant", with Elizabeth Taylor and Rock Hudson:



James Dean received posthumous Academy Award nominations for his performances in both "East of Eden" and "Giant".

While, had he lived, James Dean would undoubtedly, as I said earlier, turned in performances that would not have been anywhere near award-calibre. But, I wonder, what would he have done with his talent, had he managed to survive to act another day.

I think it's interesting. I avoided seeing any of James Dean's movies for years simply because I had heard so many glowing descriptions of his work in them, and I didn't think anyone could live up to those kinds of accolades. But, then, one night "Rebel Without a Cause" was on, and I watched it. And, yes, the movie is definitely a part of it's time, and seems dated in a lot of ways. But still, Dean's performance in it is compulsively watchable. So I sought out "East of Eden" and "Giant" as well, still expecting to be disappointed on some level. But I wasn't.

If you haven't seen these three films, you should. I'll confess that "Giant" is not my favorite of the three, and I don't recommend it as highly. But "East of Eden" and "Rebel Without a Cause" are both worth watching, and James Dean's performances in them are a major reason why they are so watchable.

Movie Monday: "The Devil Wears Prada" Edition

I watched "The Devil Wears Prada" again last night.

It's a good movie, with good performances from its stars - Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway. But its one of those movies that I have a sort of love/hate relationship with, for a number of reasons which, I must warn you now, must contain spoilers for me to discuss them here.

In other words: BEWARE, FOR HERE THERE BE SPOILERS.

The first reason that I can't completely love this movie, and came close to hating it on first viewing it, is that I could not care less about fashion. Although Andy Sachs, Hathaway's character also claims to not care about fashion, she ends up conforming to the fashion sense apparently required to work at the magazine where she works as an assistant to the editor of the fashion magazine Runway (said to be based on Vogue, and on its editor). Additionally, there is this scene, in which Streep's character, Miranda Priestly, proselytizes for the control of the fashion industry over what everyone wears:



I guess the movers and shakers in the fashion industry really believe this. I think it is a load of crap. Sure, choices are made by clothing manufacturers of what to make and what not to make, and what colors to use, but the implied attitude that we all follow blindly along is, well, overblown, as far as I'm concerned.

Another thing I don't like about the movie is that, while Andy is supposed to stand in for all of us who ultimately do not drink the corporate Kool-Aid, the whole model of being married to one's work, being available 24/7, and being willing to do anything to advance, up to and including lying, stealing, and being vicious, is presented - on the surface, at least, and for most of the movie - as acceptable to all but the misfit. The noble misfit, whom we are expected to root for, to be sure, but the misfit all the same. The recurring line in the film, variations on "A million girls would kill for your job" emphasizes this over and over.

But then there is the scene at the end of the movie, where Miranda tells Andy that she sees much of herself in her and that the two of them are really very much alike. Andy objects to this idea, and asks, "I mean what if I don't wanna live the way you live?" Miranda replies, "Oh, don't be ridiculous. Everybody wants this. Everybody wants to be us."

There are clearly people who really believe this. That they are so fabulous that everyone wants to be a slave to their job, work hours that make it next to impossible to have a life, be expected to be rude and ruthless and cold-hearted, and who have no problem stepping on whomever they have to, to claw their way to the riches and acclaim at the top.

I don't want to be that. And this is where I love "The Devil Wears Prada" and movies like it, that masquerade as a bit of fluff but actually present issues that are important to think about in today's world. Movies that are promoted as comedies, films that promise a couple of hours of escape from the real world, but that really do make a point beyond the surface of points that someone who doesn't view thoughtfully might miss.

What saves the movie, for me, is that Andy does walk away, leaving Miranda alone in a crush of photographers and reporters and having to fend for herself for the first time in many years, puzzled that Andy, in the final analysis, did not want to be her.

Some movies never manage to get over their surface message. One example I can think of is "Phenomenon", which starred John Travolta as an average man who suddenly becomes super-intelligent and, as an extra-special bonus, suddenly also has telekinetic powers (he can move things with his mind). Except that it turns out that the quantum leap in his intelligence and the other powers are the result of a brain tumor that is killing him. Intelligence, therefore, is presented as a pathological condition, unnatural and dangerous.

This plot could have served as a springboard to think about what intelligence really is, and the ways in which those with great intellects can both help and harm society, depending on how it is used. But the opportunity is missed, and "Phenomenon" becomes just a story, and one that manages to marginalize the intellectually gifted.

Fortunately, "The Devil Wears Prada" manages to overcome its surface to become not only entertainment, but something to think about as well. Although I'm sure that there are those who see the film and think that Andy is a fool to walk away from what could be a promising and lucrative career, but those are the people who are not looking beyond the surface of the film.

Movie Monday: The I Can't Not Watch Edition

Over the weekend, I ran across a discussion online regarding the movies that we just can't seem to resist watching whenever we find them on television, be it broadcast, cable, or on demand.

I think it is true that we all a list like this if we like movies at all. If you're like me, and you love movies, you probably have a long list of them. They're those movies that you love and will watch whenever you can, not because they are necessarily good movies but just because there is something in them or something about them that speaks to you, one way or another.

In the discussion online, participants were asked to stick to a list of ten movies. There is no way I can do that, but I managed to limit my first list to thirteen, and then added another to that after stumbling on That Thing You Do! (1996) late last night on cable. It's one of those movies that I've loved ever since the first time I saw it in the theater when it first came out.

Thinking about it this morning, I added a few other movies to the list. I can't rank them from best to worst, or most liked to least liked but will watch any time, and so here is my list in order of when they were first released. They are:

The Mummy (1932)
The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)
Rear Window (1954)
Rebel Without a Cause (1955)
A Hard Day's Night (1964)
The Trouble With Angels (1966)
The Doberman Gang (1972)
The Turning Point (1977)
Grease 2 (1982)
The Right Stuff (1983)
Road House (1989)
Empire Records (1995)
Twister (1996)
That Thing You Do! (1996)
Almost Famous (2000)
Zoolander (2001)
The Princess Diaries (2001)

As you can see, some of the movies on this list are not what anyone would consider great cinema. Those are the movies that I will watch because of some personal or locational connection I have to them. For example, the reason I will watch The Doberman Gang anytime, anywhere is that it was filmed in the town where I grew up. It's a bank-heist movie, and the bank branch that was robbed in the film was the branch where I had my savings account as a child and teenager. The theater shown at one point in the movie was the theater where I went to the movies on a weekly basis for years. In fact, it was the theater where the premiere of the movie was held, and which I attended. It was kind of funny, because they had used the real tellers from the bank to play the tellers in the film, and they were sitting right behind me at the premiere. Every once in awhile I'd hear an astonished, or a gleeful, "There I am," as one or another of them came on the screen. There are several other places I knew well growing up that appear in the movie, including a quick glimpse down the street I lived on at the time and an equally fast look at the side and back yard of the house where I babysat regularly.

I've also got a personal stake in viewing Grease 2, which really is a pretty bad movie. However, it was filmed at the campus where my high school graduation was held. It was not the school I attended my senior year, but my school didn't have any facilities to hold graduation ceremonies, and so we used the football field at the "other" high school in town. So, whenever I want to see where I graduated, all I have to do is pull out the DVD of Grease 2 and it's there, in the scenes that take place on the football field and track.

The other movie on the list that I have a locational tie to is Road House, part of which was filmed in and around the town I lived in and the town where I went to college for awhile. While I never saw any of the filming or ran into any of the cast or crew, I got a lot of laughs from the women in the small central California town I lived in who, for the duration, were intent on tracking down Patrick Swayze, who starred in the film. Personally, I would have been much more excited to meet Sam Elliot, who was also in the movie, but that's just me.

I also noticed as I was keyboarding the list here, that there are several films that center around music one way or another. A Hard Day's Night, That Thing You Do!, and Almost Famous all center around bands, while Empire Records chronicles a day in the life of an indie record store. This should be no surprise, since anyone who reads this blog regularly knows that I love music.

There are also some classics on the list, of course. I'm sure you can pick them out. And the others? Well, I just like them. Sometimes I'm not quite sure why. The Princess Diaries is really a movie meant for teenage girls but, although I can't put my finger on why, there is just something about it that makes me go back to it again and again. With Zoolander, on the other hand, I know exactly why I like it enough to see it again and again: it is possibly the most absurdly funny thing I've ever seen. It is the performances and the fact that I love the ballet that brings me back to The Turning Point again and again.

So. Now you know which movies I cannot resist seeing over and over again. My question to you, readers, is what does your list look like? Feel free to share in the comments section.

Tis the season...movies and more movies

I apparently spent part of the past week contributing to the success of the two biggest money-making films of the weekend. Which means either that my tastes have gotten way more mainstream lately, or that my sometimes quirky taste in movies is spreading.

Although, it truth, I didn’t choose either movie, relying on friends to make the choices. As it turns out, both choices were very, very good.

On the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, we went to see the newest Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I’ve seen the previous films in the series, but I’m not nearly as big a fan as the friends I went to the movie with, and this is the first of the films I’ve seen in a theater since the first one came out several years ago. I went in expecting to like the film, but not to like it as much as I did.

The main actors are growing into adults, and into really good performers. The effects were very nice, and the story was involving (with the exception of the first of J. Rowling’s novels, I have not yet read the books, so I did not go in knowing already what was going to happen). I think the franchise went in the right direction with this film after a couple of missteps with earlier episodes. While the subject matter in the films keeps getting darker and darker, for example, the photography in this most recent film is significantly lighter than in the previous one, which was so dark sometimes that there was nearly nothing visible on-screen. I don’t like films that I can’t actually see. There were also more outdoor scenes in this film, which (possible spoiler alert, but only for those who don‘t know much of anything about the films) has Harry, Ron and Hermione on the run from You-Know-Who, which helped with the lighting issue. And even in the indoor scenes, the film seemed considerably more open than the previous films, which took place largely at Hogwarts School.

Then, on Thanksgiving Day, some of us went to see Tangled. Tangled is a Disney animated film (according to a card at the beginning of the film, the 50th animated film from the studio), targeted squarely at a younger audience, that retells the story of Rapunzel with some significant twists. Those of us who went to see the film ranged in age from 30 to 54, much older than the intended audience. But you know what? We all liked the film a lot. For one thing, it continues the new tradition of Disney heroines who find their power rather than just being traditionally submissive women. That is all to the good. Yes, there is a love story, and a fairly syrupy ending that will not, in the end, leave the kiddies traumatized…although Mother Gothel, the character who has locked Rapunzel in her tower, is farily scary, and I expect her to take her place in the pantheon of Disney villains. Still in all, Rapunzel does not have to sell out her newfound power and confidence in order to get her happy ending.

A very good indication of how good Tangled is, is the fact that in an audience made up largely of kids below the age of ten, there was no talking, no running about. There were essentially none of the usual signs that there were a lot of children in the theater. The film held their attention for the entire 92 minute running time of the film, a significant achievement in a time when kids’ attention spans seem to get shorter and shorter with each passing year.

Just a word about the animation in Tangled: This is not traditional Disney animation. I expected that to bother me, because I love traditional animation. Instead, this animation is in a sort of 3-D, in that it rounds characters and landscape out rather than being a series of moving flat drawings. But it isn’t the kind of 3-D that throws things out of the screen at the audience, nor does it require any kind of glasses to view correctly. And it works quite nicely. Although I really wouldn’t like to see Disney abandon traditional animation completely.

Anyway, for those of you who are interested in such things, the preliminary reports for the weekend box office at US theatres reports that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows came in in first place, earning an estimated $50.3 million dollars over the weekend, while Tangled came in a close second at $49.1 million. In third place, another animated film, Megamind, took in an estimated $12.9 million. Cher’s new film, Burlesque, came fourth with estimated earnings of $11.8 million, and Unstoppable (about which I know absolutely nothing), made around $11.75 million.

In sixth through tenth place, Love & Other Drugs made $9.9 million, Faster took in around $8.7 million, Due Date made $7.3 million, The Next Three Days took in $4.8 million, and Morning Glory made an estimated $4 million.

I told you I recognized that rock...

It is amazing, some of the things you find when you channel-surf late at night.

Amazing, and occasionally frightening.

A couple of nights ago, I had just finished watching “Capote” (fabulous film, by the way…you should see it if you haven’t), and wasn’t quite ready to go to bed yet, so I started flipping through the channels, looking for something interesting.

I landed on a secondary cable version of one of our local TV stations, where there was a movie that looked oldish and like something that used to show up on Creature Features, which I loved when I was growing up. Because my father taught me from a young age to appreciate truly bad movies, I decided to watch for awhile.

It took a few minutes to find out that it was a little thing from 1966 called “Jesse James Meets Frankenstein”.

Yeah. I know. Still, with a line like, “You should have stayed in Europe and given pink pills to little old ladies”, I just couldn’t resist spending a little time with it.

But, it was getting late and I was getting cold, so I went to bed instead of watching to the end.

When I got up the next morning, however, I was still curious about the film. This was mostly because I thought I recognized the rocks I saw in several scenes. Well, not the exact rocks, but they looked like the rocks in the hills around where I grew up. That was in Southern California, so it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that I did know those rocks.

So, I clicked over to IMDb and looked the film up, half expecting that I had heard the title of the film wrong.

But there it was, so I checked the list of filming locations and, sure enough, the movie had been filmed at Corriganville, a movie ranch a few miles from where I grew up.

Discovering that piqued my interest further, and I did a little more research.

I found out that the movie had been made in 8 days (which is six days longer than Hollywood legend claims it took to make the original, Roger Corman-directed production of “Little Shop of Horrors”). Based on the general quality of the acting, among other things. I also discovered that the lab equipment in the film was the same equipment used in the original Frankenstein films, made years earlier by Universal. The equipment was also used later on, in “Young Frankenstein”. Which almost gives “Jesse James Meets Frankenstein’s Daughter” a little legitimacy. A little.

The acting was so bad…really stinky, in fact…I looked to see if any of the cast ever worked again.

Well, yes, as it turned out. The marshal was played by Jim Davis, who became better known for his portrayal of the Ewing family patriarch, Jock, in the prime-time soap opera “Dallas”. And the title role of Jesse James was played by John Lupton, a name that was familiar but that I couldn’t quite place.

Lupton, it turns out, might possibly have been in every TV series ever made. Well, maybe not every one, but the list of shows he did parts on was quite long. And before this movie, he had been in, among other productions, the 1953 version of “Julius Caesar”, the one in which Marlon Brando played Mark Antony and James Mason played Brutus. Lupton only had a small part in that, but he had been in it. One of the interesting things (to me) was that “Julius Caesar” was partly filmed at the Iversosn Ranch, another movie ranch that was at the other end of Santa Susana Pass Road from Corriganville.

Lupton is also an August 23rd person, which means nothing to any of you. But my birthday is also August 23rd, so I get to add him to the list of people who share my birthday, something I’ve been putting together for a long time and is probably far more interesting to me than it should be.

And then there was Narda Onyx, who played Frankenstein’s daughter, Dr. Maria Frankenstein, who was looking to recreate her father’s experiments in the Old West. According to IMDb, this was her last film.

And so you see how easily amused I am, that I can write over 700 words about a B-movie (well, maybe a D-movie, when you get down to it) after actually taking the time to do research on it.

All because I recognized those rocks.