Happy New Year everyone!

And, here is a New Year's present for you! The finest concert film ever made, directed by Jonathan Demme, and starring Talking Heads! Play this at your party tonight, and you will truly be burning down the house.

Absolute ruddy brilliance.

All my love,
Mwah, ...













Happy New Year!

American Hustle

Was quite good, and the Wife and I both enjoyed it.  Plus, seeing the film on Xmas Day with a packed house made it even more fun.  (It sounded like one person tried to applaud when the credits began to roll, saw it was not on, and gave up.)

It is a film I think I would like to own, and Renee said she would like another crack at it, just so she can try and work out some kinks in the somewhat convoluted story line.  The film is kind of a mess, and seems rushed.  I think it definitely could have used an edit job, and I wished it was funnier.

"Christian, honey, there is something in your beard."

There were certainly some very funny moments in the picture.  I just wish they had gone more in the direction of, say, Lubitsch or Hitchcock.  More laughs.  More Champagne.

As a critic and viewer I am toughest on this genre than any other.  And, I have been personally searching for my personal Holy Grail of this type of film.  Moreover, now, I think I have made it even tougher after seeing American Hustle.  I want a major Hollywood production, loaded with star power that is an adult sexy thriller of a film, and is perfect all the way through, that truly merits applause in the theater.  Carlos is close.  Body Heat.  Chinatown.  But, like I said, after seeing this latest attempt, I think now I want the film to be really funny, too.

American Hustle came pretty dang close, though.

I would like to say that as much as I admire Christian Bale's formidable acting talents, I kind of have a hankering for him to start doing more comedies and 'personality actor' roles.  I am a little over the beards and the accents, and the massive weight fluctuations.  I would like to see him play Christian Bale in a movie, I think.  That is sort of what he did in Velvet Goldmine.  I want more of that.

************

Sorry I have not posted in a while. You know I love you all.  It has been a long crazy busy hectic holiday, natch, and I still have one more holiday to go, me being in the wine biz, and all.

My folks get in town today for the weekend! That is going to be a lot of fun.





Ciao!
Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year!
Ardent

Day 4 (Conversations with Nick C)

I am working seven days straight until I am off on Xmas Day.  This is day four.

Nick C and I have come up with another great idea.  What if we could hire surrogates to fill in for us in social situations? That way if I wanted to have a presence at a party that I did not personally want to attend (because I wanted stay home and watch movies, or whatever) then I would!

The surrogate would be obliged to inform everyone at the party, show, family gathering, what have you, that he (or she.  Why not a female surrogate for me to emphasize my more feminine leanings!) would be portraying the part of Michael Spitler for the evening.  Of course, the surrogate would have to live with me for an extended time, a training period, so that they could successfully convey the true spirit of me whenever they subbed for me.

I think this is a brilliant idea.

Have a great Saturday, everyone!

Mwah, ... 

Day 3 (Duck droppings)

I am working seven days straight, right up until Xmas Day when I will be off.  This is Day 3.

Thank you very much, driftglass.  You really nailed it.

Honestly, I was going to let this whole Duck Dynasty poop pass until I woke up to Fox News this morning.  My gosh, they are acting like this backwater redneck hillbilly preacher man is being sent to a gulag in Siberia.  They keep screaming about the First Amendment.

Folks, this ain't a First Amendment issue.  The network, A&E, can fire, suspend, or near pretty much do  whatever the hell they feel like to this homophobic racist moron.  Tough for him.  You can squawk about the hypocritical nature of A&E raking in the cash from the hillbillies and then pulling the rug out from underneath them  (they knew who they had hired.  He had been saying shit like this for years), but no body is denying anyone their Freedom of Speech.

But, let us back track:  Fox News (and the rest of Wingnuttia) has gotten its panties in a twist over this, yet they only ever talk about the gay stuff.  They do not ever seem to mention this:

"I never, with my eyes, saw the mistreatment of any black person. Not once," the reality star said of growing up in pre-Civil-Rights-era Louisiana. "Where we lived was all farmers. The blacks worked for the farmers. I hoed cotton with them. I'm with the blacks, because we're white trash. We're going across the field ... They're singing and happy. I never heard one of them, one black person, say, 'I tell you what: These doggone white people' — not a word!"

Robertson continued, "Pre-entitlement, pre-welfare, you say: Were they happy? They were godly; they were happy; no one was singing the blues."

Arguably, that is even worse than the rote know it by heart Leviticus bullshit about homosexuals! No wonder Fox News is not talking about that.

(There is an idiot GOP "Public Servant", however, who has compared Robertson to Rosa Parks. Favorably.  So there is that.)

Jeez Louise! UGH!












mds

Much of The Temptress (1926),

Starring Greta Garbo, is deliriously dopey.  But I love it anyway. I love it because of the swooning racy sexiness of the opening sequences, which were shot by the original director Mauritz Stiller; and because Garbo literally consumes the audience through the screen.  This was a new type of eroticism, and audiences ate it up.  She became one of the biggest stars in the world after the picture.

Garbo in The Temptress (1926)

Stiller was Garbo's very strict mentor.  He was the one who got caps for her teeth, and insisted she lose weight.  Louis B Mayer hired both of them from Sweden as a package deal, but it was really Garbo he had his eye on.  As soon as he possibly could, Mayer had Stiller removed from the director's chair for The Temptress, and replaced him with Fred Niblo.  The crew and cast were particularly cruel to Stiller on the set, and there was a definite language barrier problem.  Stiller was crushed, and returned back to Sweden post haste.  Two years later he was dead.

Garbo, of course, stayed and became Garbo.

The Temptress, as silly as it is, (bullwhip duels, dam building in the Argentine, Jesus in a Paris cafe) still comes highly recommended by me.  Heck, it is worth it alone for Stiller's amazing risque banquet sequence, which gives new meaning to the phrase Upstairs Downstairs.

Garbo

And, if you are interested in checking out Stiller's work, watch his 1920 Swedish silent masterpiece, Erotikon, which I have discussed, at length, in this space before.

Finally! I got to see Twenty Feet From Stardom last night.

And, I would strongly urge anyone who is reading this now to change their viewing plans for this week, and make some time for one of the best films of 2013.

It ain't perfect.  But, it is worth it alone for the video above.  That is Merry Clayton's isolated vocal track on Gimme Shelter.  She was pregnant, and rousted out of bed to take a couple of passes for the Stones' song.  She wore her pajamas to the session, with her hair in curlers, wrapped in a Chanel scarf.

In the film version, they include the Stones whooping in the studio to get her ready for her second take, and you gotta love Mick's whoo! during Clayton's pass.

Ms Clayton blew the fucking doors off that studio that night.  Mick who?











Mwah, ... 

NOLA, Tom Waits, Ellen Barkin, Down By Law, and Jim Jarmusch

I have just begun watching Scandal,

And I am near the end of the first season.  And, I like it a great deal.  The reasons I like it are:

• They almost always seem to get a STAX song in to an episode
• The snappy (mannered, but it's okay) His Girl Friday dialogue
• Joshua Malina
• The fact that Scandal displays so perfectly that everyone has skeletons in their closet, and that therefore everyone is vulnerable.  There is always room for compromise and negotiation (even if it involves blackmail) in the Scandal universe.  That is actually an old political truism that has been completely obliterated post-Watergate and post the advent of Cable News and the internet
• Huck
• How the mysteries are actually provided for you to solve (The Wife and I almost always figure them out, especially the Wife), and that they are not impenetrable or "closed", or so ridiculous as to defy explanation
• Much of the "inside baseball" stuff about how to run a political campaign, or spin as a press secretary would
• The fast-paced, good-natured popcorn munching quality of the whole enterprise.  It's fun! 
• Mimi Kennedy

Now, I am not so crazy about the whole love story (which is a lot of the point, I know), but if they keep providing fun juicy political mysteries for me, we will get on like a house on fire.

Plus, gosh dang it, it is just so good to see Paris from Gilmore Girls working again! (I know I know.  She's already dead.  I miss her already.)

I miss the Gilmore Girls.























Mwah, ... 

The Wife was wary

Of witnessing Dallas Buyer's Club.  And, I can not blame her for having those feelings.  It is the holidays.  We both work in retail, and her job is v stressful, and we do not get a whole lot of time together, just the two of us.  Plus, Dallas Buyer's Club is not by any stretch your typical holiday movie fare.

In addition to her worries about the sadness and "heaviosity" of such a film, I also suspect that she really did not want to see the beautiful Matthew McConaughey portraying a tragic wasting AIDS victim.  Or Jared Leto, for that matter.  I tried to suggest to her that regardless of the sadness and pain displayed, that ultimately this was a really very beautiful story about some frankly heroic people that educated themselves and fought for their survival, and others like them, and for the survival of all the others that would be afflicted long after they had passed away.  

And, even though I never mentioned it to her, it is one of the main points of the film that it was exactly that so many beautiful young men like McConaughey and Leto, who were not movie stars or rock stars, did die in the brutal first waves of this tragic pandemic.  

Yet, as moved as I was by sections and/or moments in Dallas Buyer's Club, it still ultimately fell prey to the problems with biopic filmmaking.  Sometimes the documentary footage is just bound to be more powerful.  Seeing documentary footage of the NAMES Project quilt being displayed on the Washington Mall in 1987, or "reading" the special November 1989 issue of the Bay Area Reporter wherein they provided photographs of all the San Franciscans that had died of AIDS that year, is heartbreakingly a much more potent and poignant experience than seeing Dallas Buyer's Club, for all its merits.

Bay Area Reporter, November 1989.

I had the same issue with Gus Van Sant's very fine film, Milk.  (And, I was extremely pleased to see Sean Penn win Best Actor, too.) But, the finest moment in Van Sant's biopic is the opening credits, which is pre-Stonewall documentary footage of gays being rousted out of gay bars; harassed and beaten.  The rest of the film was never as gripping or important.

Dallas Buyer's Club did do one very important thing, though.  It made Renee want to learn more about the pandemic in real time, so to speak.  She wanted to learn more about the early days of the pandemic and what was actually being done to fight it.

So, I played We Were Here for her last night.  I have already spoke of this masterful documentary in this space before.  Here, and here.  The Wife han't seen it before, so last night was a revelation for her.

Which is what makes Dallas Buyer's Club worth it in the end.  That this film can bring greater awareness and empathy to the awful AIDS pandemic, and tell the stories of the innumerable heroes that struggle every single day to vanquish this wretched blight, well, than that is enough.














All my love,
Michael

Good grief!

Could somebody at the NYT please please please help poor Bobo? Because his latest column is so bizarre, perverse, and unhinged that I fear he might self-harm.  I have not read drifty's take on this yet, or Tom Levinson's, but Charlie Pierce pretty much nailed it.







mds

Conversations with Nick C

In less than three weeks Downton Abbey will return with its fourth season.  Supposedly we will have a man of color enter those hallowed halls this year, and he will be a jazz musician, to boot. In fact, I imagine this season will be all about the "Jazz Age" and the "Roaring Twenties".  Lady Edith will start wearing colored tights, short skirts, and continue her muckraking feminist ways with her "blog" (newspaper column) in London; and Lady Mary will probably fall for the musician guy, infuriating everybody to no end.  It will all end with the stock market crash of 1929, and Downton Abbey and all its residents on the brink, facing financial ruin.

Shoulda said, "Spoilers!", hunh? Whatever.  I have not seen it yet.  And, I could be completely wrong.  (Although, I fear I am not.) And, do not get upset.  I love me some Downton Abbey.  I really do.  Really.

But that is merely tangential to what I would like to speak about.  You see, last year during the bloodbath that was Season Three of Downton Abbey, someone had the hilarious and perfect notion to post a picture of Lady Mary on friendface, with a caption that read something  to the effect of, "Donate to PBS or Lady Mary snuffs it!"

I shared this story with Nick C, and we came up with yet another one of our wonderful notions that will never come to pass.

Why not really do that? PBS is always struggling to make ends meet.  Heck, the GOP would love to see PBS abolished altogether except for Antiques Road Show.  Why not raise money for your programs by holding your most treasured characters for ransom?

Imagine the drama! Put a little picture of Lady Mary in the left hand bottom of the screen with a "Money Clock" as Downton Abbey plays.  The viewers would be given a deadline and a financial target they would have to meet to keep Lady Mary (or Lady Edith, or whoever) alive.  The phones would be ringing off the hooks! You would never have to run another dreaded Pledge Drive again!

But, it could work for commercial television, as well.  Take a show like Mad Men, par example. Mad Men is a cultural phenomenon that has a rabid cult like following, yet, does not really ever receive very high ratings, despite all the critical praise heaped upon it.

Mad Men and Matthew Weiner and AMC would be a perfect test case for our idea in the commercial teevee universe.  Instead of donating to the network, viewers would naturally be urged to buy the Mad Men's sponsors products!

Now Peggy Olson is pictured in the bottom left hand corner.  And, viewers know that if they do not purchase a certain amount of cases of Johnny Walker Red before the clock runs out, that Ms Olson's life is in severe danger.

In this way, perhaps Matthew Weiner could raise enough revenue for the program to get the network, AMC, off his back?

Nick C and I think this is a brilliant idea to really add spice and drama to our everyday television viewing.  Plus, it could get more money in to the hands of the artists who create all this great television.  Remember all the hullabaloo when Mittens said those nasty things about Big Bird at the 2012 Presidential debates? Well, imagine the support if Big Bird's neck truly was on the chopping block?

Food for thought.

************

And, now for fun, an entire episode of PBS' Miss Marple after viewers refused to donate enough money to keep her character alive:

(Credits finish, and we find ourselves EXT: DAYLIGHT at Tea Time in one of the many luxurious verdant gardens of LADY GERTRUDE's expansive manse.  Her husband, LORD NIGEL, is reading the Financial Times at the table, occasionally sipping at his tea.  Their restless bespectacled daughter, LADY GWENDOLEN, plays with her scones, and fusses with the buttons on her blouse.  LADY GERTRUDE, however, maintains a rigid imperious calm, presiding over the entire table, sipping tea, and reading Vogue Magazine.)

LADY GERTRUDE:

Really, Gwen darling, could you please stop fussing with those buttons? You are driving poor Mama to absolute distraction.

(LORD NIGEL sighs and casts a glance at his wife.)

LADY GWENDOLEN:

But, Mama, the ball is just a fortnight away, and I have yet to hear from Peter, what his intentions are.

LADY GERTRUDE:

I thought we had agreed you would be attending the ball with Sir Westley?

LADY GWENDOLEN:

(sadly, and with desperate quiet intensity) But, Mama, ... Sir Westley is ninety-four years old ...

(The Irish house servant, NIAMH, enters.)

NIAMH:

Your lady? The Vicar Leicester is here to see you.

LADY GERTRUDE:

Oh, dear.

(LORD NIGEL clears his throat and casts a glance at young NIAMH.)

LADY GERTRUDE:

(Exasperatingly) Thank you, Niamh.  Show him the way.

(NIAMH exits, and VICAR LEICESTER enters.  The VICAR stands to the left of LADY GERTRUDE, and says:)

VICAR LEICESTER:

Oh, that I would have the grace to visit you, Lady Gertrude, in better circumstances!

LORD NIGEL:

Good heavens, Man! What is the matter?

VICAR LEICESTER:

I can barely bring myself to speak of something so awful in your company.

LADY GERTRUDE:

Vicar, please.  Tell us your news.

VICAR LEICESTER:

It is that wanton lady, Miss Needlesham.  She has been murdered!

LORD NIGEL:

(Alarmed, dropping his paper, and sitting bolt-upright in his chair) My God!

VICAR LEICESTER:

Yes.  And, what is worse, with the dear Miss Marple passing away last year, I do not know how we should ever find the culprit.

LADY GERTRUDE:

(Brushing the crumbs of a scone off her lap) My dear Vicar, I am sure that St Mary Mead Constable Henley will be perfectly capable of finding out who would want to kill that vulgar woman.  (To her husband,) More tea, dear?

(Fade out, credits roll.)

THE END

The state of Michigan

Has come up with a dandy new law that essentially forces all its ladyparts citizens to purchase rape insurance.

Starting in March 2014, Michigan health insurers will not be allowed to offer abortion in their coverage except in cases where the woman's life is in danger.  Folks with ladyparts in Michigan instead will have to purchase a separate new policy (that does not exist yet) in anticipation that they might be raped, and/or would possibly want an abortion.

But it gets better.  Even in cases of rape or incest, if said ladypart lady wants her abortion covered but has not purchased said special insurance (that does not exist yet) beforehand, well, she is SOL.

Look.  This bill is dead in the water already.  It will be tested in the courts, and demolished.  And, the Michigan GOP know this.  This is a deliberate poke in the eye to all women across our country.  The GOP does not like women, and I do not see that attitude changing any time in our near future.  It is disgusting.  UGH!

************

Meanwhile, on a much lighter note, I had a good chuckle over tea last Friday, reading Jeremy W. Peters' NYT story about how Harry Reid has gone too far this time, what with his using the nuclear option, and finally getting so many of those backlogged presidential appointments confirmed.  Gosh dang it, if the Senate might have their holiday plans scuppered this year! The poor lambs!

The GOP blame Harry Reid, natch, whilst clutching their pearls.  The incivility! Yet, no one in the GOP Senate caucus think that using every single technicality they have at their disposal, including holding up every single confirmation for a day-long "debate" has anything to do with why they are still at the Senate, and not knocking back eggnog 'round the fire with their families.

Those day-long debates are awfully long, and the GOP have got to say a whole lot of really really stupid shit just to keep the lights on.  But the money quote for me has got to be (Ayn) Rand Paul, who said, “Senate Democrats have for petty partisan reasons taken away the power of Congress, taken away one of the checks and balances on a rogue presidency.” (Italics mine.)

I know he has time to fill.  He has got to keep obstructin' up a storm, and is liable to say just about anything, but, it would be nice if someone from the frickin' Courtier Press could please ask him exactly what he means by a "rogue presidency".

Does Paul mean Obama is not eligible to be president? Or, that the past two elections have been rigged? Please tell us what you mean, Senator.

These asshats are not public servants.  They are ... well ... asshats!





















mds

I first learned

About Carl Th Dreyer's La Passion de Jeanne D'Arc in Judy Jones and William Wilson's absolutely crucial and essential book, An Incomplete Education (which I will continue to link to, and gush about in this space until the whole world owns a copy.)

The Passion of Joan of Arc was one of a dozen films the authors spoke of as "Remedial Watching for the Baby-Boom Generation" in their chapter on film.  Still, as intrigued as I was, and what with being constantly reminded of not only the film's importance, but its greatness, as well, I was still reluctant to watch it.  Part of it is the old cynical prejudice most of us bear whenever we feel that something great is being forced upon us.  Also, there is the fact that until recently I had a normal modern red-blooded bias against silent films.  (Ernst Lubitsch, Sunrise, Greta Garbo, and David Thomson have cured me of that.) And, another part of it was the way the film was being described to me.  As many of you know, I am not a big guy for Passion in art.  Serious emotive feeling in art gives me the willies most of the time.  Although, of course there are exceptions.  I am a romantic at heart, who appreciates passion best through an armored window of irony.

“In matters of grave importance, style, not sincerity, is the vital thing.” Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest

So, I basically knew in 1987, when I first learned about this film, that this was probably not my kind of film.  

Yet, over this last year, there was a certain momentum building that finally brought us together.  I had conducted a movie poll; La Passion made the Sight & Sound's Top Ten list again in 2012 (#9); David Thomson wrote about it in a few different books; and most importantly, the scene in Godard's Vivre sa vie, where Anna Karina watches the film alone in a theater and cries with Falconetti as Joan of Arc.  

It was time.  TCM showed it on Silent Sundays a couple of days ago, and I made it the prime feature for the Wife and I on Monday evening.

Well, I had nothing to worry about, after all.  The key phrase from above in this case would be: "Although, of course there are exceptions." The folks is right.  The Passion of Joan of Arc is truly an absolute Masterpiece, and although it might never make my personal Top Ten List, it is one of the greatest motion pictures I have ever seen.

I understand now why Falconetti never acted again.  She appears to have been literally drained to a husk before being burned at the stake.  Watching her suffering throughout the film almost suggests that the crew and the director must have been verbally abusing her throughout the process.  

And, as nearly every single shot in the film is a close-up, it is in the close-ups of her face, where you can actually see bars reflected in her eyes, that her reality from seven centuries ago literally grabs you by the lapel and demands you pay attention.

Of course, the spare expressionistic sets (crosses everywhere!) by Hermann Warm (he worked on The Cabinet of Dr Caligari) and the white hot, crisp as a new sheet of paper lighting are essential to the story of why this film succeeds as it does.  The production design and lighting dictate a brutal (yet transparent) interrogational style that are keys to the film's greatness.

But, it is all those close-ups.  It is all those faces.  With warts and wrinkles and grimy fingernails, and flies being brushed aside by actors.  That is what brings home such an old story to a modern audience.  This film makes you Joan! All those nasty old men constantly berating you, and abusing you; so close to you that you feel the spit from their mouths as they speak.  You are a husk before being burned at the stake.

But, there are four little details about this film I would like to mention before signing off:  

1. In a few of the scenes, you can see the illustration of a dragon on one of the walls right outside the room Joan was held captive in.
2. I love the carnival outside the castle, that presumably is performing at the same time that Joan would be executed; all the freaks showing their 'wares', taking advantage of the situation, an opportunity to make money.
3. The mother nursing her child as Joan burns, and
4. Near the end of the picture, way in the back of one shot, there is a man, hanging dead from a scaffold.

Sometimes the folks is right, and there are exceptions to every rule.

Mwah, ... 

Yup.

Word.  And, for that matter, Word.

Do not ever forget that Reagan and all his young Republican acolytes all hated Mandela, and wanted to see him rot in prison forever.  It was the same old excuse they use every time:   Mandela was a dirty Commie Pinko, don't you see?

In fact, Jack Abramoff and Dana Rohrabacher and a whole bunch of  other Young Republicans held their own personal Freedom Woodstock with Angolan despot butcher, Jonas Savimbi, in 1985.

All those Young Republicans who completely supported Apartheid, and hated Mandela? They are the asshats still running the GOP today.

I am very proud to say

"This isn't Dallas, it's Nashville! They can't do this to us here in Nashville! Let's show them what we're made of. Come on everybody, sing! Somebody, sing!"

That I grew up in a Robert Altman household.  It is entirely possible that my parents have probably seen every single one of his films, even the bad ones.  And, it is also possible that some of the ones that I consider "bad", my parents do not think are bad, at all.  All three of us certainly agree on McCabe & Mrs Miller, which we all think one of the greatest films ever made.  

But I do not recall them ever talking about Nashville very much, and I am not sure how much either of them like it.

I had not seen it until a few weeks ago, and had always been intrigued.  I am here to state now just how wonderful and perfect this motion picture is.  There is so much to love about this film, and the last scene with Barbara Harris singing It Don't Worry Me is one of the most moving and touching things I have ever seen in cinema, and I hope one day to see it on a big screen.

Altman's grand idea of true ensemble filmmaking definitely hits some kind of peak here.  Altman was, of course, best known for the innovative way he recorded sound in his pictures. He could have as many as twenty four microphones recording in a single shot.  He would put mics on his actors, or hide the mics in lamps, or flower pots.  Afterwards, in post production, he would then, like a symphony conductor, meticulously mix and balance all the sound recorded from each shot, creating this astounding aural mosaic of such panache.  It was a seemingly artless realism that of course was built on artifice.

This type of sound production, innovative as it was, seems to have been lost on today's filmmakers.  I only occasionally get hints of it today in films like What Maisie Knew and Cary Joji Fukunaga's Jane Eyre (2011).

And, I must say, how refreshing it is to watch Altman's films today with multiple actors in single shots.  Something else which has vanished from the modern cinema.  Altman was a fantastic sculptor, if you will, and had a supreme eye for composition and blocking.  He was also known for using improvisational techniques with actors that preferred that style, but would stick with the script with actors that were uncomfortable doing that.

Altman also used a great deal of musicians and non actors in his films, and he loved and appreciated all different types of bodies and faces.  (I think of the magical bathing scene in McCabe & Mrs Miller.) Heck, he made a movie star out of Shelley Duvall! Altman worked in Hollywood, naturally, so there were still plenty of beautiful men and women, lovingly lit and shot in his films, too.

My favorite moments from Nashville would have to be the whole Sueleen Gay arc; the Godard inspired wreck on the highway; the political campaign; Karen Black making fun of Julie Christie; the vapid and so annoying BBC reporter; the Ronee Blakley breakdown scene; the performance at the Grand Ol' Opry; the nurse telling Keenan Wynn that his wife has died; Carradine's song, I'm Easy, and four different actresses thinking he is singing about them; Lily Tomlin's scene with her deaf child; the opening credits as a As Seen on TV record album; and, as I mentioned before, the ending of the film, one of my favorite cinema endings ever.

Gwen Welles as Sueleen Gay in Nashville

And, there are dozens of more things that I will pick up on, I am sure, every time I watch Nashville again.







All my love,
Ardent

This is all kinds of

Fun to play around with.  It is a World Cup Draw generator.  The draw for World Cup 2014 in Brazil will be this Friday.

In the past, supporters of the USMNT have always bemoaned their group draws, complaining of a rigged system, and that it always seemed that Mexico always got a much easier group.  The fact of the matter is that in the last World Cup the USMNT actually got a pretty easy group:  An underachieving England side, Slovenia, and Algeria.  The USMNT actually won the group, which was pretty impressive, but lost in the round of sixteen.

Meanwhile, many of my El Tri supporter friends are their usual humming confident selves again after thrashing the Kiwis to make it to Brazil, and are predicting great things for their nation in next year's tourney.

That is almost the kind of attitude I think USMNT supporters should have.  Frankly, I am completely over the whole "Poor little USA" schtick.  You know, the "We always get a crappy draw, and never get the calls" poop.

I do believe that the USA has been extremely unlikely in the past to get the benefit of the doubt in tournament matches (except when they play Mexico, strangely), and they have been screwed over in the draw, too.  But, now is the time to shut up, stop whinging, and play football.  The USMNT will never get any respect from FIFA until it wins a meaningful trophy.  And, you know what, they might not even get any respect then, either.

(I love to ruminate over a future football world dominated by the USMNT.  What drama! The nation and team that every other nation and team would hate! We would be like the Dick Cheney of world football, everyone desperate to beat us and destroy us.  Hey, FIFA! Think of the ratings for that?)

As I have played with the generator these past few weeks, and realized what our possible draws would look like, I have come to the conclusion that it is pretty darn silly to fret about what group the USMNT will get.  The fact of the matter is, it is going to be tough no matter what.  We are going to have to play at least two very good sides in the group, and possibly three.  And, it could be a hostile environment down there, as well.

Shut up.  Do not worry about it.  And play football.  Moreover, I am confident that that is the attitude that our brilliant coach, Jürgen Klinsmann, is instilling in to his players right now.

It is much more important to worry over which incendiary Brazilian supermodel will be pulling the names out of the tombola.

Will it be Gisele ... 

... or Adriana conducting the draw on Friday?

Tchau!

One of my fave personal XTC stories

Is when I was working at the Berkeley Food Hole and I saw a gentleman wearing a Swindon Town FC jersey. He was surprised to see that I recognized it, and asked how on earth I would know about Swindon Town.  I told him because of the band, XTC.  They were from Swindon.

He scrunched up his face, and in his thick English accent said, "Oy! I know Partridge [the singer/ main songwriter/guitarist of XTC].  He lives down the street from me.  He is a right cunt!"











Mwah, ... 

Thelma Todd's death is one of Hollywood's

Great mysteries.  It was ruled an "accidental death", although allowing for the possibility of suicide. There was  no note, though, and her friends had all said she had been in good spirits right before.

I prefer Simon Louvish's explanation from his sparklingly witty and wonderful 1999 Marx Brothers biography, Monkey Business.

To wit,

A 'well-informed' and impeccable Hollywood source informs me, however, that the entire affair had been a cover-up from the start:  Thelma had been giving her lover, director Roland West (1887-1952), oral attention in the car after a rumbustious night, but nipped his organ with her teeth, causing him to depart in high dudgeon and shut the garage door after him.  She fell asleep in the car with the engine left running, and suffocated in her drunken stupor ... 

Ms Todd has always been one of my favorite Pre-Code Goddesses, and somehow this salacious version of the tale, I think, would have satisfied her, too.

"You're a woman who's been getting nothing but dirty breaks.  Well, we can clean and tighten your brakes, but you'll have to stay in the garage all night."

Mwah, ...

I do not carry any baggage re John Mayer,

Or, I suppose I should say, I am ambivalent/ignorant of his music.  But, I really do like his introduction of Albert King in to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

(I did read somewhere though, that if you tell someone on a date that you love John Mayer, it probably means you are a virgin.)












Woo-hoo! Almost Thanksgiving, and two days off for Daddy.  I love you all!
xxxoooxxx

BWAHAHAHAHAHA!

Mang, I am so not going down that rabbit hole! I have learned my lesson, and will not depress myself by digging deep in to this latest Poptempestinateacuptroversy.  My sweet little pottymouth, Lily Allen, now has a controversial video out there that has many up in arms.  She has gone too far this time! I will not even get in to the details because it really ain't worth it.

"Put on your lucky white socks, and go on and try it out for yourself!"

I have heard the song, I have seen the video, and I think they are both great.  Plus, the hullabaloo is doing great business for Ms Allen, as this song and another one of hers are both currently in the UK Top Ten.

I am not going to provide the video.  You are on your own.  But, I will provide you with a Jazz Butcher Conspiracy video, Southern Mark Smith (Big Return), which has a line that pretty much sums up my feelings re these Pop Star Nothingburger Folderols, "Don't you know they only make pop records out of plastic?"

Mwah, ... 

I am very excited to see this, as well.

This film focuses on Chomsky's linguistics over his politics, which is fantastic for me because I am quite caught up, chapter and verse, with his political leanings, and do not know anything about his language studies.  Maybe once and for all Gondry and Chomsky can hep me to transformational grammar!

You know, I only know one person who has prob read Chomsky's Aspects of the Theory of Syntax.  Perhaps this film is a primer for that 1965 magnum opus.













Mwah, ... 

Russian Ark and Hannah Arendt

Working on a Sunday.  Which is still strange to me even though it probably shouldn't be.  But, before I trudge off to work in the cold, and whilst I try and get some laundry done, I will check in here at the old fauxluxe with scattershot opinions, crazy notions, mash notes, and whathaveyous.  

Still from Russian Ark  (Русский ковчег) 2002

Very excited to be owning the film Russian Ark soon.  It should arrive at my house by Tuesday. Russian Ark is a film made by Alexander Sokurov in 2002.  It was shot entirely at the Hermitage in Saint Petersburg, and is basically a review of three hundred years of Russian history, up until the point of the revolution.  The film has a cast of about two thousand people, uses three full symphony orchestras, and is ninety-nine minutes long.  Plus, it was shot in one take.  With a special digital camera that copied to a disc instead of tape.  I have yet to see Russian Ark, so as I mentioned before, I am very eager to check it out.  I will share my thoughts with you about the film later in the week.

Sticking with film, I recently saw Hannah Arendt.  I must say that I agree whole-heartedly with A.O. Scott of the NYT's assessment that the only problem with the film is that he wishes it were a mini-series instead.  Two hours honestly is not enough, and the film feels rushed and a bit cramped.  I seriously crave more of the Eichmann trial, which could have been two hours in itself, and was not dramatized but showed actual trial footage.  The film would have been perfect for a cable channel mini-series, although I am not sure it would do so well with the Nielsen ratings. Barbara Sukowa's performance as Ms Arendt is staggeringly great, with one of my favorite acting moments in years.  Sukowa is speaking on the phone with her editor at The New Yorker. The editor wants her copy about the Eichmann trial.  She is taking too long for the article she was hired to write.  And, in just a fraction of a second, in a scene where she is probably all by herself talking in to a dead phone, you can visualize Ms Arendt literally wrapping the editor around her little finger with her flirtatious charm.  I was charmed too.  The whole film is fantastic and comes extremely highly recommended by me.  It is a true chick film, as well.  It is a film about a great and important twentieth century woman, starring a woman (natch); directed by a woman (Margarethe von Trotta); written by two women (von Trotta again and Pam Katz); was shot by a woman (Caroline Champetier); edited by a woman; cast by a woman; produced by women, etc, ... Great stuff.

So, through watching Hannah Arendt, I have come to learn about Ms Sukowa, and am very interested in watching some of her earlier films, especially her work with Fassbinder.  I am also going to catch up with Ms von Trotta's career.  

Hannah Arendt

Love you all, 
xxxoooxxx,
Ardent

The Wife and I

Watched Three Shots That Changed America yesterday.  (And I watched the Am Experience JFK documentary yesterday, as well.)

Three Shots was really excellent.  So much to wonder at.  From flippant superstitious things like if JFK had put on the cowboy hat and boots in Fort Worth that morning, maybe it would be different, ... To the broadcast of As The World Turns being interrupted, the actor and actress speaking about an offstage character, worried that the character would have to spend Thanksgiving alone ... To the insane way that so much happened so quickly ... That Oswald was so swiftly apprehended and was proclaimed to the world a suspect ... And Oswald being shuttled back and forth between rooms at the courthouse that was right across the street from the scene of the crime ... And, that during all this room switching that Oswald was able to talk to the press numerous times ... That Oswald said he was a patsy, and that he was denied a lawyer, and that he felt the law entitled him to be able to have a shower (?!) ... That one of the press guys called Oswald's Soviet wife, "petite and pretty" ... That LBJ was sworn in so quickly ... That the Dallas Police so badly bungled Oswald's transfer to County.  They practically told the entire world when and how exactly they were going to transfer Oswald, and that moments before Ruby's fatal shots, the press continually harped on what a dangerous operation this transfer would be ... The armored car being switched out for an ambulance for Oswald ... That Oswald's murder happened as the funeral for JFK was happening ... That the press very quickly learned about Oswald's Communist leanings and all the FAIR Play for Cuba stuff ... That all this insane crazy stuff seemed to be wrapped up in less than forty eight hours total.

Even the Wife was riveted.

And poor Dallas.  This event is one of the main reasons that Dallas is still messed up, and suffers from such an inferiority complex.  Dallas, as Molly Ivins observed, is always trying just a little too hard, is always looking over its shoulder at what other cities are doing, does not seem comfortable in its own skin.  It is telling that for the longest time after 11/22/63 that Dealey Plaza and the Book Depository building were the number one tourist attractions in Dallas.

Dallas is horribly racist and is already difficult enough to love, but even sometimes I think that perhaps it did not deserve its title of The City of Hate after those forty eight hours played out.

************

The big takeaway for me from the Am Experience JFK doc was what a particularly awful president Kennedy was.  Just in order to achieve success as a politician, bankrolled big time from Pops, JFK took contrary positions in order to establish himself as a Maverick-y type.  He could not be relied upon to vote the party line, and LBJ as Senate Majority leader hated him.  JFK's first book was a wimpy apologist affair for Pops and Chamberlain.  Once he was President, it was disaster after disaster.  He preferred covert military actions over getting the country and congress involved.  The Bay of Pigs was just his first attempt to oust Castro. He and his brother were constantly trying to cook up ways to off him.  JFK and RFK did find a way to have Ngô Đình Diệm assassinated, though, just a few weeks before the Dallas trip.  JFK also cynically sold the Freedom Riders out for political purpose, and only 'stood up' to Wallace a year later with some platitude about a Civil Rights Bill that JFK knew would never get out of committee.

JFK's shining moment is the Cuban Missile Crisis.  Which prob would never have occurred if JFK had not kept trying to kill Castro and annex Cuba, and if he had not put those nuclear missiles in Turkey, aimed straight at the Soviet Union.  The press kept the secret of the negotiation that once the missiles in Turkey were promised to be removed that Nikita Khrushchev stood down and war was averted.  It is v difficult for me to give JFK much credit for averting a crisis that was of much his own doing, and that Kreushchev did not want either.

Facts is facts, JFK was one of the worst presidents this country has ever had, as far as I am concerned.

Fifty years ago today.  And fifty years ago it was a Friday, too.

Ciao,
mds

This one goes out to Nick C

And his History of Funk project.  This is Ernie K-Doe doing Here Comes the Girls.  Produced by Allen Toussant, and backed by The Meters.

Prime New Orleans funk.


















mds

They Call Me Mr Pitiful

Alright.  Here comes Mr Crab.  Here comes Mr Pitiful.  Here comes Mr No Fun.  I have just about finished watching The Sopranos with the Wife, and after watching over fifty or sixty hours of this legendary cable series, the series that ushered in the glorious new Golden Age of Scripted Television, I can report that I do not like it.  I do not like it one whit.  I really can not see what all the fuss is about.  I understand that it was the first.  That it was the (god)father of all the great television shows that came after it (although I disagree with some critics who insist that The Wire does not happen without The Sopranos.  I disagree because David Simon had already produced a groundbreaking television show on commercial teevee, Homicide:  Life on the Street), and that for that alone it deserves some serious respect.  But, to this reviewer, not respect enough to call The Sopranos a rich or rewarding or enjoyable or profound television experience.

Let us get down and dirty, here is why:

• None of these characters are likeable.  Okay, maybe Meadow.  Or, Ginny Sac.  But that is it.
• These asshole mope hoods are really just a bunch of screaming baby spoiled New Jersey Housewives, "He didn't invite me to the barbecue, I'm gonna blow his head off!"
• This show also inspired a whole crappy media blitz subculture of New Jersey shows about crappy spoiled New Jersey people.  Basta! I have had it up to here with New Jersey! Go away!
• My goodness, there is so much violence towards women on this show.  It seems that every other episode one of these spoiled baby hoods is beating the crap out of his goomar or wife.
• The heavy handed dream sequences and heavy handed metaphors about animals.  You know, the stuff with the bear and the coma dream.
• Honestly, The Sopranos has not aged well.  Not in a way that The Wire has, which seems as fresh upon rewatching as anything on television now.  Watch the first few seasons again of The Sopranos, and see if I am not right.
• Dr Melfi is an awful therapist.  Her character is totally a stretch for me to believe.  And, what is Bogdonavich doing in there? How annoying.
• That The Sopranos (and Mad Men, for that matter) owe as much to Twin Peaks as they do to the other obvious influences they have.  Twin Peaks is another insanely overrated program that was art for art's sake and ultimately a waste of everybody's time.  Heck, Chase, worked on The Rockford Files and Northern Exposure.  Why did he not take more from those programs?
• (By the way, Chase and I share a name.  Chase is the anglicized version of his real Italian name, DeCesare.  My ancestor peeps from Abruzzo in Italy were named DiCesare, which got pronounced in Oklahoma as DUH-sair.)
• That there was one brief stretch of programs in the sixth season where Vito was outed and we followed his arc for three episodes or such, where the show was so good.  Everything clicked.  The writing was great, the setups were gorgeous and thoughtfully composed, and it really appeared as if the show had finally found a voice, and spoke about issues that I cared about.  Then Vito gets whacked and the show went back to its crappy ways.  Live Free or Die from season six is the only episode of The Sopranos that I can say I would ever like to watch again.  The show's finest hour as far as I am concerned.  
• That Chase (and Matthew Weiner, too) oftentimes seem to have contempt for their audience.
• That the show is so depressing.  Everyone has cancer.  Everyone ends up in the hospital or the old folks home.  So much death.  Ugh.
• And, finally, that what it boils down to is, I do not like mafia stories.  I see no great nobility here.  I am a bit disgusted in the glorification of these murdering thieving philandering wife beating criminals.  Man, I am always cheering for the DA when I am watching these mafia tales.

So.  There you have it.  Had to get that off my chest.  Mr No Fun is done.  You can go back to your normally scheduled program.











Ciao,
Ardent

Man, The Big O was so dang good,

He coulda sung Mary Had a Little Lamb and woulda made it magical, ...



Oh, wait ... he did sing Mary Had a Little Lamb ...








And it is magical.
















Mwah, ... 

Stefanie Says

On her Facebook page, Lady Gaga wrote that “Artpop” would be released with an app that she described as “a musical and visual engineering system that combines music, art, fashion and technology with a new interactive worldwide community — ‘the auras.’ ” She went on, “Altering the human experience with social media, we bring art culture into pop in a reverse Warholian expedition.”

Even the Wife, a Lady Gaga fan, could not make head nor tails of that statement.  That quote is from Jon Pareles' article/review of Ms Germanotta's latest multimedia/social networking/album, Artpop.

Here is the link to that.

I also happened to notice that Ms Germanotta has collaborated with choreographer/director/performance artist legend, Robert Wilson.  Well, dang! I propose that Wilson and Ms Germanotta should one up Mr Wilson's the CIVIL warS:  a tree is best measured when it is down and do a twenty four hour long Mega ArtPopera!

That is what the world is waiting for.

************

Meanwhile, also in the the same NYT Sunday Arts & Leisure section, there was a marvelous article by Alistair Macaulay, celebrating the twenty fifth anniversary of Mark Morris' L'Allegro.  I have not had the good fortune to see the entire ballet, just pieces of it, and will make a point of seeing it the next time I get the opportunity.

Morris is a god to me, and I actually have met him before.  This would be about 2001 or 2002, and he was directing an opera in the City.  He came by the store and I sold him some Manchego cheese.  He was staying with a friend in Walnut Creek, he told me.

He was obviously very flattered to be recognized, and he was ever so sweet.

He is not really known for bringing art culture into pop in a reverse Warholian expedition, but I love him and his work just the same.

Mark Morris

Mwah, ...

Fantastic quote from the Wife

A couple of days ago.

I finally got to see my little Romcommedia Francaise, Populaire, and The Wife started talking about the predictability of such films, and I tried in vain to extol the peripheral virtues of period romantic comedies like this one.  That she should indulge and treat herself to the great period music, and the score, the fabulous hair and make up, production design, costumes, etc, and then I topped it off with a statement like this, "And besides, we are only five minutes in to this film.  You have not seen enough to pass any kind of judgement."

And, the Wife said, "Michael, I have already seen this film.  I have been watching this same film over and over again now for twelve years."

Ah, relationships, right? I love her so much.

************

Populaire is wonderful.  It is a Fleur de Sel Caramel.  It is Nougat de Montélimar.  It is all eye popping primary colors, and bouncy music, and as they say in Sullivan's Travels, "With a little sex in it."

The male lead, Romaine Duris, was alright, and he needs to stop smirking all the time, but the real stars were the peripheral things I spoke of earlier, and Déborah François.

Ms François is a legitimate comedic talent, and is about as fetching as is possible.  I sincerely hope to see her in many more movies to come.

(Also, Populaire has the best opening titles I have seen in years.  They should give out Oscars for best opening titles.  My faves recently have been this one and An Education.)

************

As for tonight,  I finished watching Barry Lyndon this morning, and I have already set up the dvd player for Ninotchka the minute I hit the couch, and pour myself a glass of Schramsberg Mirabelle Brut.

Everyone have a great and wonderful Saturday night.  I am starting to feel better now, and I love you all.


Mwah, 
Ardent

She is such a door bell!

Thanks, TBogg!

Seriously. I would advise to you to go down each rabbit hole and follow every link of a link of a link, etc, ... There is just so much never ending goodness all over TBogg's report yesterday.

And, as for you Patrick Howley:  Nobody thinks you're a bottom.  We all just think you are an arsehole.










UGH!

Senator Rafael Cruz is such a sensitive soul.

Thanks, Charlie.

You know, as we get closer to this grim fiftieth anniversary, I am going to write something in this space about Dallas.  Something about how the shadow of this "National Car Crash", as Martin Scorsese called it, still hangs over Big D.  Dallas will always have an inferiority complex, and to much of the country will always be known as The City of Hate.

Mr Cruz here, as a public servant of Texas, certainly is not helping matters.  Either for the reputation of his political party or the state he represents.

Sit the eff down, Tailgunner, and shut up for a minute.

mds

Nearly ten years ago,

Back before The Wife was The Wife, and we lived on Alpine Road, behind the Long's (which became a CVS), and across the street from the EMS depot, The Wife woke up one morning to discover her future husband talking in his sleep.  She engaged him (me) in conversation, asked him what he (me) was saying. Apparently I was muttering something like, "We're going to have to dance with the Baptists now," over and over again.

You see back in those days the Sooners football team was a juggernaut and was always in contention for the National Title.  Which could be very nerve wracking for fans like myself, because one loss could completely derail your entire season.  A quarterback injury, a fluke play, a bad call, and suddenly your national title hopes disappear.  Renee and I eventually came up a couple of phrases to sum up this fussballangst:  "What do you gotta do on Saturday?" "You gotta win." It did not matter how you did it back then, or how close the game was, you just had to win on Saturday.

And, what I was talking in my sleep about that morning was my worry about the Sooners playing the Baylor Bears that day.  (My subconscious was very clever, I think.  You see, Baylor is a Baptist University, and Baptists don't dance.)

Baylor was terrible then, and I am sure the Sooners hung a half a hundred on them, and breezed.  But, such was the fear for me back then, that every game was a potential land mine.

************

So, today, the Sooners are about to kick off against the Baptists any minute now.  And, the tables have turned.  The Sooners are still a national power, but have not been a part of the National Title conversation for years now.  Baylor is vying for the National Title this year, and today's game against Oklahoma is probably the biggest and most important game in their history to date.

As much as I would like to believe otherwise, I think it is going to be the Baptists dancing all over the Sooners tonight.  I am calling it:

Oklahoma 23

Baylor 48

************

PS:  There is another creature w/ a vested interest in tonight's game, our kitten, Nora.  I have promised Nora that everytime the Sooners win a Big Game this season she will get Double Dinner, and an extra can of wet food that day.  Sorry, Nora Charles.  I doubt there will be Double Dinner tonight.  (The Sooners are 2-1 in the previous three Big Games this year.)

Come on Sooners, don't deprive Nora Charles of Double Dinner.

Mwah, 
Go Sooners!

I just discovered this the other day.

Right now Quinn the Eskimo (The Mighty Quinn) by Manfred Mann is on heavy rotation with our Muzak stations, and it usually plays around six PM.  I love the song, and I love their performance, but it was bugging me because the singer's voice (Mike d'Abo) sounded so familiar to me, familiar to another more recent voice that I loved.

And, I figured it out! Mike d'Abo sounds like Tjinder Singh of the English group, Cornershop! I did some research, and they are not from the same part of England.  Singh is from the West Midlands (Wolverhampton) and Leicestershire.  D'Abo is from Surrey (Southwest of London.) Plus, Singh is of Indian ethnicity, while d'Abo's ancestry is Dutch.  

Anyhoo, I still think they are twins as far as singing.  Perhaps, Singh is a big fan? What do you think?

P.S.  Mike d'Abo later went on to write Build Me Up Buttercup, which was a massive hit for the Foundations.  

xxxoooxxx,

Ardent

I am sick.

I have been sick for about a week now, and I imagine I am going to stay sick for another four to seven days. That is why I have not posted in so long and why my friendface posts have been haphazard and pretty weak lately.

Stéphane Audran in her younger days before Babette's Feast

During my convalescence, over the previous two days, I have been fortunate to watch two great masterpieces of the cinema.  I am not going to go in to length about them right now.  I do not have the energy or the sharpness of mind essential to commenting on them, but I would like everyone to know that I am okay, just sick (no flu), and that soon, when I am ready, I will give you the full lowdown on Robert Altman's Nashville, and the exquisite magical fairy tale of 1987, Babette's Feast.  Both of which are films I had never seen before, even though I most certainly should have. Better late than never, I suppose.

Love you all, and I raise an imaginary glass of 1845 Clos de Vougeot to you,
mds