Movies | dual personalities

September 28, 2015

Exercise daily: walk with Jesus*

by chuckofish

I finally made it back to church this weekend and was a lay reader. I read a good long piece from Numbers about Moses having a “Kill me now, Lord” moment when his whiney brethren were remembering the good times back in Egypt. “We remember the fish we used to eat in Egypt for nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic…but now there is nothing at all but this manna to look at.” People never change, do they? It is good to go to church and be reminded of this. We also received a finger-shaking piece of the assisting priest’s mind during the announcements. She scolded us for not singing loudly enough. This annoyed me somewhat, but I also know from whence she comes. Some people just never sing; they never even open their hymnals and pretend. C’mon now. Sing out.

The OM and I planted twelve iris bulbs that someone had given me in the hopes that they will be blooming when my birthday swings around in April. Wasn’t that thoughtful? The least we could do was plant them! We indulged ourselves afterwards with a trip to Shake ‘N Shake.

I watched Seven Seas to Calais (see Friday’s post)–having paid $1.99 on Amazon to do so. It was not as terrible as I feared, but it was pretty bad. I tried to watch some of those old James Dean television shows (see Thursday’s post) and they were basically unwatchable. Mostly I continued with The Wire season one, which I started watching when daughter #2 was home last weekend, despite the boy’s admonition not to. I am really enjoying it.

I think Bal’more and my flyover hometown are very similar, so it is kind of fascinating to me. It is very well done, and once you get over the fact that every other word is the f-word or the mf-word, it’s okay. (It is important to cleanse the palate so to speak by listening to something like the above youtube video after each episode.)

The Cardinals continue to get closer to winning the division, but yesterday’s game was a debacle! Don’t get cocky, redbirds! Onward and upward. Have a good week!

*Seen on a church sign this weekend.

6 Comments

September 25, 2015

True glory

by chuckofish

On this day in 1580 Sir Francis Drake completed his circumnavigation of the Earth.

Can you even imagine such a thing? In the sixteenth century?

Drake’s expedition was the second circumnavigation of the world in a single expedition, from 1577 to 1580, and was the first to be completed with the same captain and leader of the expedition throughout the entire circumnavigation. (Ferdinand Magellan died in the Philippines and the Magellan-Elcano circumnavigation did not make it up to North America.)

Yes, Sir Francis Drake was quite a guy. Why, I ask, didn’t they make a movie about him starring Errol Flynn?

Well, according to IMDB.com, there is a movie called Seven Seas to Calais (1962) starring Rod Taylor as Drake, which was Italian-produced and originally called “Il dominatore dei 7 mari”.

In this dubious flick “Sir Francis Drake goes on an expedition to the New World and steals gold from the Spaniards. After making a daring getaway, he returns to England where he protects Queen Elizabeth I from a network of spies who are plotting to overthrow her.” You can see the whole movie on Amazon and I may have to check it out this weekend.

Meanwhile, let us not forget that there is a new show debuting on Sunday night starring Don Johnson.

I’m sure it is terrible, accent on really bad, but I have to give it a try. I mean c’mon. Don Johnson.

I will close with this great prayer by Drake which I know I have quoted before, but it certainly bears repeating:

“Disturb us, Lord, when we are too well pleased with ourselves,
when our dreams have come true because we have dreamed too little,
when we arrive safely because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when with the abundance of things we possess,
we have lost our thirst for the waters of life,  having fallen in love with life, we have ceased to dream of eternity,  and in our efforts to build a new earth,
we have allowed our vision of the new heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly, to venture on wider seas,  where storms will show your mastery,  where losing sight of land, we shall find the stars.  We ask you to push back the horizon of our hopes,  and to push us into the future in strength, courage, hope, and love.  This we ask in the name of our Captain, who is Jesus Christ. ”

Have a great weekend!

4 Comments

September 24, 2015

“Oh he’s real abstract. He’s…different.”*

by chuckofish

Tomorrow (Friday) is James Dean day on TCM–so set your DVR! And wait–they aren’t showing the usual three movies–the only ones he made before dying at age 24. They are presenting a selection of performances that he gave on live television that are rarely seen. All the programs are TCM premieres.

Born in Indiana, Dean moved to New York City in 1951 to study at the Actors Studio. While in NYC he performed in stage and TV dramas, and these are the roles to be showcased. They include a thief who finds redemption in Something for an Empty Briefcase (1953) for NBC’s “Campbell Soundstage”; an accused murderer in Sentence of Death (1953) for CBS’s “Studio One”; an ex-convict struggling for a new life in the Rod Serling teleplay, A Long Time Till Dawn (1953) for NBC’s “Kraft Theatre”; the restless son of a farm couple (Dorothy Gish and Ed Begley) in Harvest (1953) for NBC’s “Robert Montgomery Presents”; a waiter suspected of stealing in Run Like a Thief (1954) for NBC’s “The Philco-Goodyear Playhouse”; a lovestruck stable boy in Sherwood Anderson’s I’m a Fool(1954), with Natalie Wood, for CBS’s “General Electric Theater”; a “hepcat” killer in The Dark, Dark Hours (1954), with Ronald Reagan, for the “General Electric Theater”; and a wealthy man accused of robbing his family in The Thief (1955), with Diana Lynn and Mary Astor, for the ABC “United States Steel Hour.”

I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait! (My apologies and regrets to those of you who do not get TCM or have DVR capabilities. So it goes. Why not watch Rebel Without a Cause–always a fine idea!)

*Buzz Gunderson in Rebel Without a Cause

3 Comments

September 17, 2015

The world is more than we know

by chuckofish

Once again I learned something interesting in an email from my flyover university about the death of an illustrious alum. William Becker, who was the head of Janus Films, was the uncle of one of my best friends growing up. I had no idea. I knew her aunt was a famous choreographer and I remember when her family went to NYC for spring break one year. ( You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown had opened on Broadway. Her next show was Grease.)

Eighth grade pre-contact lenses

But I did not know her uncle was so connected to the movies.

My friend was never particularly interested in the movies. Not like I was anyway.

Well, regardless, I am grateful to Janus Films for making La Belle et La Bete (1946), The Seventh Seal (1957), La Strada (1954), Rashomon (1950), Seven Samurai (1954), Tunes of Glory (1960)…and so on available to us all–first in American theaters and then on DVD.

It is a small world.

2 Comments

August 21, 2015

“I am a border ruffian from the State of Missouri.”*

by chuckofish

Today is the 152nd anniversary of the massacre in Lawrence, Kansas perpetrated by Colonel Quantrill and his Confederate Raiders. I won’t go into all that dark history, but I will suggest that we watch Ang Lee’s very good movie Ride With the Devil (1999).

Considered to be a box-office bomb, it is, I would assert, a very good movie. Why people didn’t line up to see it, I have no idea. There are lots of very good actors in it. It is an exciting, romantic and historically accurate movie filmed beautifully on location in Missouri. Furthermore, it is based on a very good book (Woe to Live On) by Daniel Woodrell, who is from right here in the Missouri Ozarks and knows whereof he writes.

“Our mode of war was an irregular one. We were as likely to be guided by an aged farmer’s breathless recounting of a definite rumor, or by the moods of our horses, as we were by logic. It was a situation where logic made no sense. So we slouched about in wooded areas, our eyes on main roads and cow paths, watching for our foe to pass in reasonable numbers. They often did.”

As the screenwriter prefaces the film, “On the western frontier of Missouri, the American Civil War was fought not by armies, but by neighbors. Informal gangs of local southern Bushwhackers fought a bloody and desperate guerrilla war against the occupying Union Army and pro-Union Jayhawkers. Allegiance to either side was dangerous. But it was more dangerous still to find oneself caught in the middle.”

Indeed, Louis Vogel, the 17-year old half-brother of my great-great-grandmother Mary Prowers Hough, was beaten to death in Westport in 1863 by Jayhawkers or Bushwackers (nobody seems to know which) who wanted his horse.

This movie is a good reminder of how rough it was back then.

As usual, I have no Big Plans for the weekend, but the OM and I are planning to take a pile of old computers to a recycling event in O’Fallon, MO. As you know, old computers are not so easy to dispose of, so when there is one of these free drop-off events, it is good to take advantage of it. Since we’ll be out and about, we may venture up to Clarksville (population 442) in Pike County.

This little city on the Mississippi River was platted in 1819 and named for the then governor of the territory, William Clark. Maybe we will drive up there and have lunch and look at old man river.

I can’t think of anything better to do, can you?

*”I am a border ruffian from the State of Missouri. I am a Connecticut Yankee by adoption. In me you have Missouri morals, Connecticut culture; this, gentlemen, is the combination which makes the perfect man.”
-Mark Twain (“Plymouth Rock and the Pilgrims”) on December 22, 1881

9 Comments

August 19, 2015

“Yes, ma’am, just as hard as I could.”*

by chuckofish

John Wayne and some old coots in “Tall in the Saddle”

Well, the films of John Wayne are featured on TCM all day today, so set your DVR!

I am especially looking forward to Tall in the Saddle (1944) which I have not seen in quite a while.

My mother always liked Tall in the Saddle, because she liked Ella Raines who plays the female lead. I think she thought she was more “normal” looking than a lot of the stars of the 1940s–i.e. pretty without the need for elaborate hair, extensive makeup and penciled on eyebrows.

She also has a good part to play in this western–a tomboy who gets to ride around on horseback and kick symbolic dust at the goody-two-shoes who is competition for John Wayne’s affection, Audrey Long.

The reviewer for the New York Times called the film “a regulation rough-and-tumble Western”, complete with a thundering stage coach ride through sagebrush country, fist fights, shootings, and “the customary romantic clinch”. The reviewer acknowledged that Wayne saves the film from its predictability:

Mr. Wayne has to fight his way through every inch of this film, against toughies like Ward Bond, a crooked judge; Harry Woods, a no-account rustler, and Russell Wade, a weakling gun-happy young rancher. Even Ella Raines sends some bullets whizzing perilously close to our hero’s head … Mr. Wayne walks into a mess of trouble in Red Rock, but in eighty-seven noisy minutes he bowls over the opposition, turns up the murderer of his cousin and has Miss Raines purring in his arms. Just take Tall in the Saddle for what it is, a rousing old-fashioned Western, and you won’t go wrong.

Yes, Mr. Wayne saves the day and the movie.

All the movies showing today are worth viewing for their star. That cannot be said for a lot of the movies shown this month on TCM’s Summer Under the Stars.

Anyway, The Quiet Man (1955) is on tonight, followed by The Searchers (1956) and Rio Bravo (1959). So enjoy!

Here is the schedule.

*John Wayne in response to the statement, “I saw you hit that poor man!”

5 Comments

August 14, 2015

Soul on fire

by chuckofish

Okay, I admit it. Sometimes I listen to Christian radio in the morning. Yesterday they played one of my favorites, “Soul on Fire” by Third Day, as I was driving into work.

Did you listen? Not a bad way to rev your engine for the day ahead.

Anyway, this song put me in mind of the great movie The Apostle (1997) starring Robert Duvall in the role for which he should have won the Academy Award.

He also wrote the screenplay, directed the movie and financed it with 5 million dollars of his own money. It is pretty awesome as I recall. I saw it at the movies back when it was released and then when it came out on DVD, but not since.

The Apostle is an unflattering but realistic portrayal of Pentecostal minister Euless “Sonny” Dewey who is searching for redemption amidst personal torment and anger issues. I was impressed with Duvall and indeed everyone in the film–Farrah Fawsett, Billy Bob Thornton, June Carter Cash et al. I was impressed that he made this film with its Christian theme and that it was actually reviewed favorably by the mainstream media. Duvall’s minister is not perfect but he is not a fake. He is the real deal.

So it is my Friday movie pick. “I’m a genuine, Holy Ghost, Jesus-filled preachin’ machine this mornin’!”

4 Comments

August 6, 2015

“Build my gallows high, baby.”*

by chuckofish

Today is Robert Mitchum’s birthday.

Even as a child, I knew he was sexy. I mean really.

And he was a little scary too.

Finally he was paired with John Wayne. Perfect.

Indeed, he made some really good movies and some not so great ones. He played two of my favorite characters in fiction: Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe (twice) and A.B. Guthrie’s Dick Summers in The Way West (1967)–none of them very good movies. But Robert Mitchum was one of those actors who made even a terrible movie (like The Way West) worth watching.

So let’s toast Robert Mitchum tonight and watch one of his good movies: His Kind of Woman (1951), Out of the Past (1947), The Enemy Below (1957), or one of my all-time faves El Dorado (1966).

Bonus Point: Who knows what movie it is in which Robert Mitchum utters the immortal line: “Go on, tell me some more about that time when you were Queen of the Veiled Prophet’s Ball”?

*The title quote is Jeff Bailey in Out of the Past

7 Comments

July 24, 2015

Guilty pleasures

by chuckofish

Okay, I admit it. I liked Paul Blart: Mall Cop (2009).

And so when Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 was released on DVD, I was first in line at Netflix.

I guess I love a fat guy on a segway.

Yes, Kevin James is pretty darn funny as the nerdly guy who takes his unglamorous job super-seriously and works hard “to protect the people of the West Orange Pavilion Mall.” When he goes to a mall cop convention in Las Vegas, hilarity ensues.

And there is no bad language in this movie! Yes, you heard me right: No. Bad. Language. There is no bathroom humor. No sex. When was the last time you saw a comedy that didn’t rely on vulgarity for laughs? I didn’t think they still made PG-rated films!

Well, they do. And Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2 is funny. I laughed out loud throughout the movie.

(I will say that the OM walked out of the room in disgust after 5 minutes, but what does he know?)

So it may be stupid and low-brow, but sometimes you just need a good laugh at the expense of a fat guy on a segway. My Friday movie pick is Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2! Check it out at your corner Red Box.

7 Comments

July 7, 2015

Note to self

by chuckofish

Today we are reminded again how tempus, indeed, fugits! TCM is celebrating the 100th anniversary of a company whose technology defined the look of movie color for decades. Technicolor™ was incorporated in 1915 by Herbert T. Kalmus, Daniel F. Comstock and W. Burton Wescott and offered the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952.

The 48-hour salute includes the greatest of all technicolor films, The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), which will be shown today at 4:30 p.m. and again on August 2 at 8 p.m. so set your DVR.

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949)–which I watched this past weekend–is on tomorrow night at 8 p.m.–don’t miss it! The color cinematography in this movie is fantastic. Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard (1963), a landmark of Italian cinema, is also on tomorrow at 3:30 a.m. Any movie with Claudia Cardinale is worth watching if you ask me.

We must also note that 600 years ago yesterday (July 6, 1415) Jan Hus was burned at the stake for heresy by the Roman Catholic Church. Hus was a Czech priest, philosopher, early Christian reformer and Master at Charles University in Prague. He dared to preach in Czech and tried to reform the Church by calling out the moral failings of clergy, bishops, and even the papacy from his pulpit. In 1999 Pope John Paul II expressed regret for his death. Well.

The monument in Konstanz, where reformer Jan Hus was executed (1862)

Hus is honored with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church.

Faithful God, who didst give Jan Hus the courage to confess thy truth and recall thy Church to the image of Christ: Enable us, inspired by his example, to bear witness against corruption and never cease to pray for our enemies, that we may prove faithful followers of our Savior Jesus Christ; who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

On Sunday the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, conducted the baptism of Princess Charlotte at St. Mary Magdalene Church in Sandringham.