Great line-up of movies on TCM tonight:
Spike Lee, one of our most exciting contemporary producer-writer-directors, is a fan of great filmmakers of the past–to the point of collecting their autographs on movie posters. Joining TCM host Robert Osborne as this month’s Guest Programmer, Lee shows off original lobby cards for three of his movie picks: Ace in the Hole (1951), signed by writer-director Billy Wilder and star Kirk Douglas; On the Waterfront (1954), signed by screenwriter Budd Schulberg and director Elia Kazan; and A Face in the Crowd (1957), also signed by Schulberg (a close friend with whom Lee once worked on an unfilmed script about boxer Joe Louis). A lover of powerfully filmed black-and-white dramas with strong social messages, Lee also programs Charles Laughton’s thriller The Night of the Hunter (1955), an “amazing film” starring Robert Mitchum.
What is everyone up to?
jeffreyw
Washin’ puppehs.
cathyx
The name Elia Kazan is on crossword puzzles a lot.
lamh35
Last hour of work. Come on 7:30.
lamh35
President Obama Consoles Woman Whose Uninsured Sister Died Of Colon Cancer
DougJ
@lamh35:
That’s what it’s all about. Thanks for this.
Fucking disgrace that people die like that in this country.
MikeJ
@cathyx: On the Waterfront is a great movie on its own, but the theme of the right and wrongness of snitching coming from a guy who named names in front of HUAC is pretty sickening.
Anya
@DougJ: It’s even more of a disgrace that a political party is content to let people die like this and a tragedy that lots of people are blind to reality.
Patricia Kayden
@lamh35: Nice story. When the Repubs vote to repeal the ACA next week, they need to be told about Kelly Hines and others like her who suffer due to a lack of healthcare insurance.
Litlebritdifrnt
I have been thinking about this whole jobs thingy. (With the numbers coming out today and the official jobs numbers coming out tomorrow) and playing a little game with myself. What jobs have gone away and will never return? (A bit like the industrial revolution type of thing) Here is my list, please feel free to add to it or to completely and utterly trash my reasoning.
Jobs that have gone away never to return
1) Photo processing plants and outlets.
2) 35mm film making companies.
3) Video/DVD rental outlets (we have one Blockbuster left in town after having tons of them plus Moviegallery, and lots of mom and pops)
4) Bookstores (we have one Barnes and Noble left after having tons of booksellers)
5) Bank tellers.
6) Check printing companies (no one uses checks anymore)
7) Printing companies (everyone I know prints their own letterheads these days, there is no reason to have them pre-printed)
8) Accountants (for anything but the most complicated of tax returns Turbo tax can do it for $99.00)
9) Clothing and shoe repair companies, no one does that anymore, they throw stuff away and buy new stuff.
10) Lawyers to some degree, Legal Zoom has basically taken the entire will writing, power of attorney, and basic title writing out of a local lawyers hands.
Anyone think of anymore?
khead
Setting the DVD to record “On the Waterfront” and “A Face in the Crowd” now that some nice person told me about it…
So thanks for that.
Between now and bedtime it’s burgers and Bill Paxton screaming “Game over, man!” since Aliens is on one of the many MAX cable channels.
the Conster
@lamh35:
More similar shameful stories. As long as I live I will never understand the sturm und drang about offering people health care. Health care! Everyone needs health care! WTF?! Obama is on the side of the angels, and although it gripes my cookies no end to say this, so is John Roberts.
srv
I’m doing whatany damned red blooded American would be doing and watching Red Dawn tonight – it’s on netflix.
But have to finish some Wadada Leo Smith first.
Maude
Night of The Hunter has great cinematography.
Shelly Winter’s hair in the water after she’s dead.
The famous shot of the Love, Hate tattooed on the preacher’s hands.
The kids in the barn loft watching the preacher looking for them.
jnfr
Some of you looked at my pictures of our cat Jamey with his summer lion cut, so I wanted to let you know, with great sadness, that Jamey died yesterday, swiftly and without pain, apparently from a blood clot thrown off by a nearly undetectable genetic heart condition.
Mr J and I had one day of raving sad insanity, and now are trying hard to move on and take care of our other cats, including Jamey’s sister who is a little lost without him. (Though she is a cat of very little brain, so I’m sure she’ll be okay soon.)
Thanks for any good thoughts you can throw our way.
David Koch
@lamh35: Just words. No difference btwn Bush and Gore.
Scott S.
The only thing I really miss since getting rid of cable a few years ago is Turner Classic Movies. I used to love switching that on and spending the whole night watching old movies. Ain’t like you can get those at the freakin’ Redbox…
Scott S.
@Maude: That amazing duet with Mitchum and Lillian Gish.
“Leeeeaaaning, leeeeaaaning, leaning on the everlasting aaaarms…”
I wish Charles Laughton had directed more movies.
Anya
@jnfr: I am sorry for your loss>:D<
Maude
@Litlebritdifrnt:
We have a shoe repair place.
I use checks. A lot of people do use checks.
There is a printer on Main Street.
Accountants do small business taxes.
The county court is here. Lotsa lawyers.
Litlebritdifrnt
@jnfr:
No words will help, I know that. Anything I can say will be pointless, nothing will heal the pain. But you know and we all know that life with you was heaven. Scritch Jamey’s sister for me, for she will grieve. My darling Cadbury still misses her mother almost a year after her passing. All you can do is love them. My thoughts are with you.
Linda Featheringill
@lamh35:
President consoles . . .
I don’t remember having a president that people brought their grief to.
slag
@jnfr: Oh, I’m so sorry! Many condolences for the loss of your beautiful fluffball.
I’ll hug my own fluffball (Jamey’s identical twin) on Jamey’s behalf. Much love out to fluffballs here and gone!
Maude
@Scott S.:
Lillian Gish at the end: The children, they shall abide.
I think that’s the line.
In the loft, doesn’t the boy say, He don’t ever sleep?
Peter Graves.
Mouse Tolliver
Dr. No in four minutes.
NotMax
Ace In the Hole is an oft-overlooked gem, even with Douglas’ penchant for leaving saliva all over the scenery.
Mouse Tolliver
@Maude: Does Robert Mitchum ever utter the word Jesus when he’s singing that song? I’m pretty sure that he doesn’t.
daveNYC
@Mouse Tolliver: Good movie, but the threat posed by Dr. No doesn’t hold up well. Then again, Ursula Andress.
A Ghost To Most
Sorry about your cat, jfnr. As a long time butler to cats, I know how keenly their loss is felt.
Raven
@jnfr:
We who choose to surround ourselves
with lives even more temporary than our
own, live within a fragile circle;
easily and often breached.
Unable to accept its awful gaps,
we would still live no other way.
We cherish memory as the only
certain immortality, never fully
understanding the necessary plan.
— Irving Townsend
Keith G
Today, I am ordering these swell Obama Care tees. One for me in Texas and one each for the two sisters I have – one in Ohio and one in N. Carolina.
Becuse I am an incessant worrier, I am concerned that the GOP will be left alone to continually redefine the ACA with a never ending stream of Frank Lunz approved lies (It’s a job killing tax don’t ya know – The IRS will be knocking at your door to collect).
So we are going to do our part to confront the bastards.
Scott S.
@NotMax: I happen to enjoy an actor who can chew the scenery entertainingly.
@Mouse Tolliver: I don’t believe he does. I think Gish’s version is “Leaning on Jesus,” while Mitchum’s is just the long, drawn-out “Leeeaning.”
@daveNYC: Dr. No had some uncommonly dangerous tarantulas, didn’t he?
Maude
@Mouse Tolliver:
I don’t remember.
I’ve seen it at least four times, the first in film history, but it’s been some time since I viewed it.
A wonderful, strange movie.
Witness For The Prosecution, speaking of Charles Laughton.
Elizabelle
Doug: I was just popping by to tell folks “A Face in the Crowd” is on tonight.
Well done, Spike Lee and Doug J.
Litlebritdifrnt
@Maude:
You missed my point. Sure we still have a shoe repair place cause there are some people who buy very expensive shoes and get them re-heeled or whatever, however the majority of people do not, they throw away their $10.00 Wal Mart shoes and do not even worry about repair. Sure there are printing companies that do specialized work but in 1994 I would hire them to print up our letterhead and envelopes, I no longer have to do that because we can do that with the computer, it is not to say that the printing companies are not out there, they are, and they are hanging on by their fingernails. Small business taxes, I have done ours with Turbo Tax for the past ten years after discovering that the local accountant was charging us $2,000 to do what Turbo Tax does for $99.00. I stopped having the local accountant do our payroll taxes every quarter after discovering that I could do the same paperwork for nothing.
The County Court is still there but increasingly you have more and more lawyers competing for business. We have a lawyer in our town who is doing traffic tickets for $30.00 a piece plus court costs. Wills, POA, Deeds, etc., are no longer a lawyers bread and butter because Legal Zoom is putting them out of business in that area. We had a client who had been a client for 30 years come in with a lease dispute, turned out that they had done the lease on legal zoom and it did not protect our client from any wrongdoing by the lessee, he saved $50.00 on the lease writing, it cost him $5K to clean up the mess caused by the lessee operating an illegal business on the premises.
Mnemosyne
An amusing thing came up while G was making the arrangements for his dad — it turns out that the funeral home where the wake will be held is directly across the street from his dad’s favorite bar. So apparently we’re going to have a dry wake on one side of the street and an Irish wake on the other going on at the same time, which is exactly how G’s dad would have wanted it.
PeakVT
The $100 million fundraising haul for R-Money is hitting the MSM. If I turn down the radio I think I can hear the slurping from Politico headquarters.
Raven
@NotMax: Hey, I really appreciate the info, I’m so jacked up I’m bouncing off the walls. I do worry about the weather forecast, especially for fishing. A rule of thumb in the gulf is don’t go if there are winds greater than 20 and they are calling for gusts up to 35. Are the winds greater during the morning, noon or evening? Maybe part of leaving at 2:30 am is to beat that?
Mouse Tolliver
@daveNYC: He was pretty weak as villains go. And he never got to properly use those mechanical hands. I’m trying to remember if he was any better in the book, but all I can remember is that he died by getting buried in bird crap.
Wish they’d do a proper adaptation of Moonraker because Drax was a much better villain.
Spaghetti Lee
@Litlebritdifrnt:
That’s why I try to shop at real bookstores, movie places, etc. whenever I can, even though I know it’s not much. I just don’t think the “everyone gets everything from the internet” model is economically sustainable, despite what the tech-heads keep saying. Aside from that, it’s boring. I like having weird independent stores around. This sort of stuff matters to me. Pretty soon Wal-Mart’s gonna be the only store and Facebook’s gonna be the only website.
General Stuck
KISS MY A$$
Jim, Foolish Literalist
This is thinly sourced, but I hope it’s true:
I think Gregory is one of the worst of Villagers, maybe the worst of his generation.
Roger Moore
@Litlebritdifrnt:
Almost any kind of electronics repair. Nobody fixes TVs, DVD players, or the like anymore; you’re expected to throw it away and buy a new one. A lot of those things are even held together with glue or snap in place parts so it’s nearly impossible to get inside to fix them.
Another dying job is meter readers. They can just phone home now, so they don’t have to send somebody out to check them in person.
Raven
@Mouse Tolliver: Better than Simon Bar Sinister?
Mouse Tolliver
@Scott S.:
The tarantula scene is the first and only scene where Connery’s Bond actually looked scared.
lamh35
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: the rumor also says something about Joe Scar being the replacement. I don’t know what’s worse.
Either way, I dont’ watch Meet the Press and I will continue to not watch Meet the Press.
urlhix
@Litlebritdifrnt: Studio musicians and audio engineers, local radio programmers and DJ’s, A&R men, lots of entertainment business jobs. Not that that’s totally a bad thing, but they are gone for the most part. Shoot, I’d add small family farmer, even though I am one. The megafarms have crushed that segment.
Raven
@Roger Moore: Always a big demand for sports officials and what a joyful way to make a buck.
WereBear
@jnfr: I’m so sorry. What a shock.
Little-brained cats are often sweet, I hope that is the case with the bereft cat-sister.
pluege
Even Krugman misses the real story. He said this today:
“with income shifted away from ordinary workers and toward the Masters of the Universe”
Acquiring wealth and power is only a small part of the story. The complimentary action to all money going to the MOTU, and that which is the real story is the degradation of and downgrading of the average American worker to 3rd world status – no income, no safety net, no representation, no opportunity.
There comes a time somewhere in the multi-millions and billions where even the psychotically greed obsessed plutocrats can’t keep track of, and consequently lose interest in, all that they have – no one can feel the difference in being worth $600 million, $6 billion, or $60 billion. So what drives them, what excites them after all their riches become ho-hum? What keeps them dismantling the pittance of security and false hope of a better life the average American has? What drives them to take away every little scrap average Americans suffered and died to achieve? Why its their sadistic drive to make as many people miserable as possible; its their drive to widen the gap between themselves and most everyone else – first denigrating and then flattening others is all that is left to make them happy.
Raven
Or Snidely Whiplash!
Elizabelle
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Please please please let David Gregory be on the way out.
Why not just go with Frank Luntz and Mitch McConnell, NBC? You know you want to.
jwb
@PeakVT: What are the rumors of Obama’s fundraising numbers for June?
jwb
Delete double post
Mouse Tolliver
@Raven:
I dunno. Was Simon Bar Sinister both a Commie AND a Nazi hellbent on nuking London? Drax was pretty eeevil.
Scott S.
@Mouse Tolliver: “My god, he’sh got shhpidershh!”
jnfr
Thank you all, you are too kind.
@Raven:
Lovely, thank you.
@WereBear:
Yes, she really is, as Jamey was. Sweetest cats ever.
Raven
@Mouse Tolliver: But he wasn’t green!
cathyx
@jnfr: One of my cats had the exact same thing and died last month. Seemingly fine one minute, dead the next. I’m sorry.
kd bart
The Russert Spawn rises.
NotMax
No argument on that whatsoever, but Douglas’ perpetual intensity can be offputting to some.
One of my favorite more modern-day scenery-chewers (and a gloriously skilled actor) was Pete Postlethwaite. Watch him steal every scene he is in in Martin Chuzzlewit some time, his character portrayal adroitly dancing on the edge of the cliff of self-parody.
In much older films, I’d go with George Arliss, who managed to bring a passé style of stagecraft to film and make it work through sheer force of presence. TCM very occasionally shows The Green Goddess, a truly godawful film to look at today, except for Arliss, whom one cannot take one’s eyes off as he almost devours, rather than chews) the scenery (and a role which garnered him an Oscar nomination – he did win the Oscar that same year, but for a different film).
urlhix
@42, yep, that’s another one. My turntable guy passed away a few years ago and there is no one else in the country that can do what he did.
cckids
@Maude: Yes! I caught just that shot (of Shelly Winter’s hair), walking through somewhere close to 25 years ago & just based on that, tracked down the movie (had no idea of its name). And Mitchum’s singing as he tracks the kids . . . eerie, & really one of the creepiest movies ever.
PeakVT
@Litlebritdifrnt: There’s been various jobs disappearing since the beginning of the industrial revolution. Generally that’s been a good thing. One can make the argument that we’ve reach a point where new types of jobs will never be created fast enough to replace the ones that are disappearing, but 1) I’m not convinced that’s true, and 2) that could in part be mitigated by letting (or forcing) people to take more of that increased productivity as leisure time, in the form of shorter working weeks, longer vacations, earlier retirements, or all of the above. (Admittedly there’s no way of making that happen right now, but it could happen.)
WereBear
It is part of what keeps Wal-Mart the monolithic monster that it is: a lot of people have lost the ability to discriminate properly.
The jeans they sell there for cheaper have half the heft and a tenth of the life of the real deal elsewhere; but people think “jeans are jeans” and buy them anyway, though they won’t last six washes.
Your client learned that the hard way. But next time… will he go back to LegalZoom?
PeakVT
@jwb: Dunno, but the facts aren’t all that important to our media. There’s a narrative to propagate, dontchaknow.
Hill Dweller
@PeakVT: As was the case last month, I suspect most of it will be from the RNC, which can take up to $35,000 per person, as opposed to $2500 per person when given to the candidate’s campaign.
The wingnuts are all about propaganda. Nevertheless, they can give Romney two billion dollars, but it won’t change the fact he is an awful candidate running an inept campaign.
Roger Moore
@Mouse Tolliver:
Drax was either insane or an incredibly bad chemist. He built a hydrogen/fluorine powered rocket. If you need a higher specific impulse than hydrogen/oxygen, you could at least try going with hydrogen/ozone, which is also insane but wouldn’t tend to kill everyone within a mile or two of the launchpad with the toxic exhaust.
gogol's wife
@jnfr:
I am so, so sorry. I admired Jamey when you posted that picture. We recently lost our Masha so I know the deep sadness. Just remember the love.
David Koch
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: yeah, they lost their long time ratings lead to the 75 year old Bob Schieffer. that’s pretty pathetic. They had this big, big lead and they fumbled it away to Casper the Ghost.
And NBC doesn’t fuck around. the moment The Today Show lost their long time ratings lead, they fired Ann Curry in a new yawk second.
John O
‘Bout time you saw “A Face in the Crowd,” Doug.
Took me until I was 50, but I was glad I watched it. Put Andy in a whole new light for me.
Also, too, David Gregory is shit’s version of shit. He can take his money and go, IMHO.
daveNYC
Speaking of jobs that are gone and aren’t coming back, there used to be tens of thousands of support staff for the stock exchanges and brokers. Computers and electronic settlement axed them all.
WereBear
@cckids: Unfortunately, Night of the Hunter bombed at the box office; its eventual cult success and critical appreciation came too late to pull Laughton back into the film director’s chair ever again.
I adore it; each major role filled by an actor at the top of their form, and the film has wonderful mise en scène in every frame; Laughton did have extensive stage experience as a director as well as an actor.
SPOILER ALERT
And… another great job by Shelly Winters getting murdered. Happened a lot.
END SPOILER
It was based on an equally excellent book by the somewhat obscure Davis Grudd; well worth seeking out.
Raven
@WereBear: The De Niro version was pretty damn intense.
NotMax
@Raven
The winds can show up at anytime, but I have little doubt the captain will adjust his route to go to more placid areas, so wouldn’t worry much about that.
Winds were blowing like nobody’s business for about the last 2 hours, but have now calmed down. It’s been odd weather for summertime, being so windy and with some rain (this may turn out to be the first summer in a long, long while in which water restrictions are not announced).
Not to beat it to death, but realized I never mentioned why sunrise at the crater is a quantum improvement in awe over sunset.
All the viewing areas overlooking the crater which one can drive to are on the western lip of the crater, so one is facing east for sunrise, watching the Sun come over the horizon way out on the ocean, then climb enough to light the eastern lip and slowly illuminate the moonscape-like crater.
At 7½ miles long and 2½ miles wide, with depths up to 3000 feet, one could fit Manhattan island into the crater proper.
gelfling545
@Mnemosyne: Sure and ’tis a grand thing.
Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason
@Litlebritdifrnt: Not a disappearing job, but a disappearing product: USA-made Craftsman (and other reasonably priced) tools.
Professional grade still gets bought by professional mechanics.
Cheap offshore crappy tools are good enough for most people.
The middle ground is going. There are so few things fixable by DIYers any more that the market niche of good tools for home handymen is disappearing.
cckids
@WereBear: I had no idea it was based on a book, I’m off to my library’s web site to find & reserve.
Showed Night of the Hunter to my kids one Halloween season to illustrate the difference between true eerie creepiness & screamy gore-fests as which is really haunting. (they were 12-ish) Started with the eye-rolls & muttered complaints; they were hooked soon & stayed that way. Slept with the lights on, too.
David Koch
@lamh35:
Oh, that would be hilarious and goobs of good. Scarborough actually guested hosted the show a couple of weeks ago, so that may have been a dry run.
It would be tasty humiliation of Gregory to be replaced by a hack like Joe.
The gobs of good: Joe would have to leave his morning show, and he would essentially be exiled to Sunday morning, when nobody is watching.
David Koch
This guys think they can do anything and get away with it.
Maybe that was true once, 40 years ago, when there were only 3 channels on your set, but not in the internet age.
Gregory was such an ass he alienated everyone at work and literally turned off all the progressive who used to watch the show.
Maude
@WereBear:
I’ve read the book. The movie didn’t depart from it.
NotMax
re: MTP
Why not throw in the towel and have John McCain host the damn thing?
He’s on it practically every week anyway.
/snark
Raven
@NotMax: Yea, I’m really good at listening to people who know the score. I was settled on sunrise until I hit that one article but I’m back on for sunrise. I also understand that there is always a chance things won’t be as spectacular as one hopes. Same with the fishing, I am totally prepared to get skunked but if they go, I’ll go. Two years ago down on the gulf I went on a headboat. It was really blowing and they told everyone at the dock “money back no questions because it’s going to be really rough. Almost everyone got sick but I plugged in the iPod and Tom Petty rocked me through.
Litlebritdifrnt
Have to say that “The Haunting” was pretty much one of the best films of all time, after seeing it I remember keeping my hands inside the covers at all times when I was sleeping, because that bit when the woman is holding someone’s hand and there is no one there freaked me the fuck out, and I could NEVER sleep with my hand outside the bed ever again.
The only other film that had the same effect on me was “Don’t look now” I slept with the light on for months after I saw that film, the dwarf scared the shit out of me. I mean seriously, I had a drawstring that put the light on in my bedroom and I literally slept with that thing wrapped around my hand every time I went to sleep for months.
cmorenc
@Litlebritdifrnt:
I think you underestimate the ability of lawyers to create new areas of work for themselves to replace areas that are shrinking. EVER HEAR of the classic phrase:
– if only one lawyer moves to a town without lawyers, he’ll starve.
– if a second lawyer moves to that town, they’ll both thrive splendidly.
The biggest problem lawyers have is that at the more humble, mundane levels, there are too many law schools producing too many of them, and a huge portion of them will end up doing something where a law degree is either helpful but not required, or else largely unrelated altogether. And so relatively small towns of five to twenty thousand which used to have half a dozen to a dozen lawyers now have five times that number or more.
David Koch
Dead Man Walking
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I don’t watch Scarborough’s show, and I know he can be a nasty demagogue, but from what I’ve I think he’s less of a partisan than most conservatives on TeeVee, and about ten times smarter than David Gregory.
Of course both of those things are also true of my mop.
I wouldn’t bet on itt, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see David Gregory working for Chris Christie 2016
Joseph Nobles
Norma Rae is also on tonight after the Spike Lee joints. I’m surprised it’s not in Spike Lee’s lineup. Story-wise, it seemed to fit, but I guess cinematically it’s not in the same league as the four he did pick.
burnspbesq
@srv:
New stuff?
Listened to the new Henry Threadgill’s Zooid record last night on NPR First Listen. Sorry to say I don’t like it as much as the last couple of outings.
Just finished listening to the new Vienna Philharmonic/Dudamel recording of the Mendelssohn Third Symphony, Very nice.
SiubhanDuinne
@jnfr:
What a beautiful cat he was, and what a lovely tribute you wrote. I am so terribly sorry for your lion-sized loss.
{{hugs}} to you and Fabrice and the sibling and the adversary.
arguingwithsignposts
Night of the Hunter and a Face in the Crowd were both produced over 40 years ago and yet neither is available on streaming services (you can rent/buy NotH on amazon). Why? It’s stupid. Seems they’d want to make great art that nobody’s watching available to more people. I hate hollywood.
Raven
@arguingwithsignposts: Horrywood!
honus
@Maude: Fun fact: Night of the Hunter was written by West Virginia native Davis Grubb and filmed on location in Proctor, West Virginia, about thirty miles down the Ohio River from where John Cole lives.
Litlebritdifrnt
@cmorenc:
Except they can’t, there are only so many speeding tickets that they can handle cause there are only so many people that can afford the attorney fee on top of the court costs. At some point (as we have seen here in our County) attorneys are going to be handling tickets for a price that will just cover their overhead, there is no profit involved. There is going to be a huge amount of lawyers crashing and burning in the near future, it is just a matter of when.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Maude: Shelly Winter’s hair in the water after she’s dead.
Freaked me out six ways of Sunday when I was a kid.
Is that when Mitchum is singing, “Chiiiiildren….. Chiiiiildren…..” Damn he was as a scary fuck in the part.
SiubhanDuinne
@Mnemosyne:
Ha! I love that! Condolences and cheers!!
NotMax
@Raven
National Weather Service forecast line (toll-free) includes info specific to Haleakala:
(866) 944-5025
Hypatia's Momma
If those wretched sevenkittens become any cuter, I might need a new pancreas. The girl-kittens are so darling that I keep jumping up to cuddly my own little Fluffer-Hog.
Raven
@NotMax: cool, thx
SiubhanDuinne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I thought that sounded familiar.
WereBear
@Raven: DeNiro in Night of the Hunter? I missed that one?
SiubhanDuinne
@NotMax:
One of my favorites too. Loved him in Brassed Off.
Raven
@WereBear: I’m sorry, it was Cape Fear. Mitchum was in it as well.
Text and Texture: A comparative analysis of The Night of the Hunter, Cape Fear (1962) and Cape Fear (1991)
Steeplejack
Just got back from checking the man-cave, where the power is now back on (after six days). Still hot as balls–it got up to 100° today–so I retreated to bro’ man’s air-conditioned house for another night. Celebrating the return of power with pizza from Pie-Tanza. (I know somebody has to be last; I didn’t think it would be me.)
May extend my stay here, based on projected highs of 100°, 104° and 98° for the next three days. ¡Caramba!
burnspbesq
@ urlhix:
If your turntable croaks, get a new one. The entry-level tables from Rega and Pro-Ject are as good as mid-fi tables from the 80s and before. And the quality of what you can buy for $1-1.5K will blow your mind.
Raven
@SiubhanDuinne: He was awesome in “The Name of the Father”.
jnfr
@cathyx:
I’m so sorry to hear you suffered a similar loss. It’s always hard, but such a shock when they go suddenly.
@gogol’s wife:
Maybe Masha and Jamey can play together somewhere. I think he’ll be looking for friends, wherever he is.
@SiubhanDuinne:
You are so kind. Thank you.
urlhix
@efgoldman: It’s not a lot, but those jobs added up in ways much larger than one person picking the songs. Nothing like a good local station and your favorite DJ. Clear Channel, station consolidation and getting rid of the fairness doctrine really screwed everyone and most don’t even know it. I mean, radio programming is ultimately cultural programming and the right is winning that battle right now. Podcasts might be helping to bridge that gap, but they don’t have that local effect that great radio had.
/just my two cents
KS in MA
@cckids: So true! For me the definitive scary movie is the Frederic March version of “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.”
NotMax
@Raven
No prob.
Oh, just so you don’t come across as a rube, it’s pronounced hah-lay-ah-kah-LAH, emphasis on the final ‘a.’ :)
(switches to pedantic mode)
Some pidgin you’ll commonly hear here:
akamai – clever, smart
pau hana – done working; after work
da kine – an all-purpose term referring to anything. Resembles the English whatchamacallit.
Steeplejack
@khead:
Don’t leave out The Night of the Hunter. That is a seriously creepy movie–Robert Mitchum at his menacing best.
Steeplejack
@jnfr:
My condolences to you.
urlhix
@107, Thanks for the tip, I’ll check ’em out. But I have a feeling that for sentimental reasons we’ll have to keep my father-in-laws Thorens as our main turntable, even if I have to fix it myself. Fortunately that bad boy sounds great.
Raven
@NotMax: Cool, I actually have pidgin English book I bought years ago. I always thought Da Kine was a strain of the wowie till someone straightened me out. I have a buddy from the Nam that lives on the Big Island. I wrote a big documentation for his PTSD case a few years back and then slowly lost touch. I goggled him and came up with the DUI conviction so he may just be avoiding me out of some kind of shame or something.
The prophet Nostradumbass
@Raven: Are you talking about Cape Fear?
Raven
@The prophet Nostradumbass: Yea, I posted and apology and link to an article about the three films above @ 105.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
I was a classical DJ for 12 years on two NPR stations. The one in Michigan Is now “Flint’s Hit Country Station.” They had been on the air since 1953, licensed to the Board of Ed, with a high number (95.1). I have no love for Flint, but it makes me sad.
Mouse Tolliver
@Litlebritdifrnt: The book is great too with one of the best opening paragraphs.
Spoooooky.
burnspbesq
@urlhix:
Send an email to Michael Fremer, the vinyl columnist for Stereophile. I’ll bet he can name somebody who rehabs old Thorenses. There’s a guy in SoCal who rehabs old ARs and Linn Sondeks.
Raven
@SiubhanDuinne: Huh, do you know T-Rex? He was the nightime classic dude on WUGA for a long time.
Gus
@Maude: You forgot the view of the kids floating down the river through the spider web. And the side shot of Mitchum with his arms extended up, running up the stairs after the children. And the shot of Shelley Winters and Mitchum in the bedroom (can’t remember exactly what that shot looks like, but I remember it being amazing). Some of the coolest cinematography ever, and a wonderfully evil performance by Mitchum. Fantastic film. It’s a damn shame Laughton never directed another.
WereBear
@Raven: Actually, what I thought you might be referencing was the remake of Cape Fear; both had great strengths.
However, gotta admit the moral ambiguity of the remake undercut the motivations for me. Also, DeNiro was damn near supernatural in his abilities; while Mitchum was just stone-mean.
But still, so much better than the usual remake.
Raven
@WereBear: I was. I got them mixed up.
NotMax
@Raven
Excellent.
BTW, if you’re in or near Lahaina and need a respite, there’s a tranquil Buddhist temple right on the ocean which most tourists know nothing about.
Huge statue of placid Buddha, framed behind by the West Maui mountains, and often a rainbow as well.
Keep driving down Main Street heading west out of Lahaina until a fork in the road (big Jesus Saves sign on building at fork). Take the left fork a couple of hundred yards to a dirt parking area by the sea.
I’ll now take off my tour director hat before I bore everyone to distraction.
Hypatia's Momma
@jnfr:
I’m so sorry.
SiubhanDuinne
@Raven: Thanks, that’s one I haven’t seen. I’ll look for it.
Steeplejack
@General Stuck:
Didn’t realize it before, but Denis Leary looks like Mitt Romney! He could play him in the movie.
Raven
@NotMax: Namaste. . .and much more boring stuff gets discussed here day-in-and-day-out. There is also a very nice Buddhist Temple in the Jungle Gardens on the Tobasco property in New Iberia LA!
Brachiator
@Litlebritdifrnt:
A useful variation might be to ask what would have to happen for your job to go away and never return? Or how many customers do you have to lose before your business is no longer viable.
I worked for a newspaper (before the Internet hit) and saw changes even then. Computers helped eliminate the old heavy presses, throwing a lot of men out of work who used to lug the heavy lead plates. Spreadsheets eliminated the need for legions of accounting clerks and entire departments. Currently, the demise of newspapers and magazines eliminates thousands of jobs, including transportation drivers, delivery people, admin and marketing staff, and all of the mobility as people got promoted. In short, the demise of an industry, from entry level jobs to careers.
Over the past 20 or so years, I have known of more people who have slowly fallen into lower paying jobs despite skills and training and re-education than any other time I am aware of. A woman I know who was a programmer has not had a full time job in 5 years. Another woman, previously a VP, helps her sister run a struggling child care business.
The decline that hit the rust belt is now happening in other cities and states even areas that previously were doing well. Yep, there are new jobs, but wages are still stagnant and household incomes still at historic lows.
BTW, funny thing about TurboTax. The tax laws are getting more complex, and the software is having a hard time keeping up at a low purchase point The IRS is finding that people who do their own taxes either make big mistakes or miss credits and deductions. HR Block is making some money with their second look program, going over returns prepared elsewhere for missed items. And Intuit and other tax software companies are hiring unemployed tax people (at relatively low wages) to serve as customer service type clerks to answer tax questions for people who need assistance with complex issues.
It is going to take some serious creativity and innovation to come up with new good jobs to replace what is rapidly disappearing.
ETA. For movie buffs, digital systems are eliminating projectionist jobs. You just need one guy to push a button. Add in all the jobs related to producing and transporting film cans.
Raven
@SiubhanDuinne: IRA film, Daniel Day Lewis and Pete both were nominated for Academy Awards for it. The opening scene with the cops chasing Lewis and Voodoo Child playing will stay with you.
urlhix
@burnspbesq: Awesome, great idea, thanks!
burnspbesq
@SiubhanDuinne:
David is still the night guy at WUGA. 10-midnight, Monday – Thursday.
Those were the glory days of FDL, when his late night T-Rex post dropped at 11:00 Eastern and Suzanne’s late late night post dropped at 11:00 Pacific. When Hamsher ran him off, at least a couple of thousand people followed him to iamTRex, and never went back.
Steeplejack
Deleted for superfluity.
honus
@arguingwithsignposts: both films were actually produced well over 50 years ago, but good point.
Raven
@burnspbesq: Oh, I see him around now and then but I thought they cleaned house over there. I’m not a classical person.
urlhix
@Brachiator: Ah, the newspaper gigs, knew I was missing something. I’ll throw in magazine work. My wife is a freelance magazine writer, mostly business and trade publications. It’s been steady as she goes with her existing clients (thank FSM) but trying to find new ones is an uphill climb.
Raven
@burnspbesq: Yea, the just banned me outright.
SiubhanDuinne
@Raven: Don’t think so. But I left the biz in 1981 and moved back to Atlanta in ’84, and it’s been all WABE since then. Did T-Rex have a civilian name I might know (from conferences, say)?
burnspbesq
@SiubhanDuinne:
David Ferguson.
SiubhanDuinne
I@Raven: @SiubhanDuinne:
FYWP for not letting me edit. It’s been all WABE since 1984 as a listener, not as an announcer. Didn’t want you to think I was Lois Reitzes in disguise.
WereBear
@Brachiator: It’s true.
And on the other hand, I’m part of an enterprise that used to print up a bunch of stuff to hand out, only now, only a decade later, we can’t afford to do that any more. Everything from postage to printing has doubled in price.
We’ve shifted more and more to digital; not only does the market demand that it show up on their smartphone, that is what we can afford to do.
Still, I see a glimmer of hope in the reversals; like economy of scale has been turned upside down. What’s the point in making thousands of couches… and no one buys them? The giant corporations are cheating to stay in business because that model is breaking down; and they are not nimble enough to change.
Dinosaurs; only it really was the meteor.
SiubhanDuinne
@burnspbesq:
That sounds vaguely familiar but I’m pretty sure I don’t know him.
Raven
@SiubhanDuinne: How about Daryl Blue, I think he’s in Oregon?
Maude
@honus:
I had forgotten that.
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
That’s it. Remember him in the moonlight?
Maude
@Gus:
I had forgotten.
The ice cream parlor.
The movie was so full of incredible scenes.
@arguingwithsignposts:
Depends who owns them.
Raven
@burnspbesq: He did get in some pretty nasty racial conflicts if memory serves.
SiubhanDuinne
@Raven: Yup, I know the film you’re talking about and know it was/is highly regarded, but for some reason I have never seen it. I’ll do my best to remedy that (although I’m beginning to creak under the weight of all the books I want to read, films I want to see, p,aces I want to go….)
BGinCHI
Is no one going to remember that I suggested to DougJ that he pair Face in the Crowd with Night of the Hunter the other day?
Give BG some love.
Roger Moore
@Brachiator:
I thought a lot of those jobs had been eliminated when they figured out how to fit a feature film onto one reel.
Raven
@SiubhanDuinne: It’s nasty, the scene with Di Niro and Juliette (SP) Lewis is very disturbing.
Raven
@BGinCHI: TCM paired them, not DJ.
SiubhanDuinne
@Raven: Nope, sorry. What era are you talkin’ ’bout? Nearly everyone I knew was with an NPR affiliate (or one of the BIG classical commercial stations in major markets, and they usually turned up their noses at the likes of us).
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman: My two NPR stations were hundreds of miles apart, sorry I wasn’t very clear. First with WUSF in Tampa, then WFBE in Flint. WUSF is still going strong AFAIK, and I believe UM-Flint picked up the NPR franchise when WFBE went country. But I’m in Atlanta now and have lost touch with anyone who would know, or care.
burnspbesq
Mets win with two in the ninth!
NotMax
Talk about projectionists got me thinking about the movie theater I worked in way, way, way back in high school.
Still maintain it was one of a kind.
No popcorn, and a portable candy cart which was only wheeled out to the lobby between showings.
Free coffee also available between showings, served in china cups and saucers.
Ushers all wore tuxedos. Those working the ticket line outside also were provided ankle-length capes (100% wool, which was handy during winter).
And perhaps oddest of all, they never, ever used posters or other materials provided by the studios. Rather, they had an in-house artist who made those specifically for each film.
urlhix
@efgoldman:I just said I was going to check them out. Back when I was in the biz I spent a lot of money on mics, preamps and studio monitors, as was the custom at the time. But these days I get most everything I buy, except socks and underwear, at the thrift stores down at Lake Oconee. Rich old people get rid of a lot of really nice things if you know what to look for and don’t mind waiting a week or three.
Brachiator
From the 1957 review of A Face In The Crowd:
In a way, it is not surprising that this flamboyant Lonesome Rhodes dominates the other characters in the story and consequently the show. For Mr. Schulberg has penned a powerful person of the raw, vulgar, roughneck, cornball breed, and Mr. Griffith plays him with thunderous vigor, under the guidance of Mr. Kazan.
You know you are in the vicinity of someone who has white-lightning for blood when Mr. Griffith first hits old “Mama Git-tar” and howls his “Free Man in the Morning” song. And you know you are up against a trickster when he starts spouting amiable lies. Mr. Schulberg and Mr. Kazan spawn a monster not unlike the one of Dr. Frankenstein.
But so hypnotized are they by his presence that he runs away not only with the show but with intellectual reason and with the potentiality of their theme. Lonesome Rhodes builds up so swiftly that it is never made properly clear that he is a creature of the television mechanism and the public’s own gullibility. He swings in an ever-widening orbit, as it were by his own energy and not by the recognized attraction and governance of a new magnetic field.
Everyone condescends to him—in the script of Mr. Schulberg, that is—instead of taking positive positions that would better represent reality. Patricia Neal as his doting discoverer, Paul McGrath as an advertising man, Percy Waram as a big manufacturer, Marshall Neilan as a scheming Senator and Anthony Franciosa as a wise guy—all play their roles capably, but they’re forced to behave as awed observers, not as flexible factors in the scheme of things.
ETA: the movie critic Bosley Crowther thought that the public would ultimately see through a fake like Lonesome Rhodes, but I see the character as a prescient hint of things to come in enduring vileness of people like Rush Limbaugh.
fasteddie9318
Tonight? Trying to find a tattoo parlor that will do Velociraptor Reagan on my back.
Maude
@NotMax:
The way it should be. How wonderful.
Projectionists are powerful. They can lock the door to the projection booth and no one can enter. It’s because in the days of silver nitrate film, there were explosions.
urlhix
@efgoldman:It’s so funny to me to work out in the field in a super fancy 100% cotton long-sleeved shirt from Polo, Brooks Brothers or Izod that I got for $3 at the Goodwill. Just get them filthy with my labor and it don’t matter. A tiny protest, if you will. They really are much better fabrics, though, I gotta give them that.
Brachiator
I forgot to add that the review I quoted is from the 1957 New York Times. They had a link to their original review of A Face In The Crowd as a supplement to their obituary for Andy Griffith.
srv
@burnspbesq: Spiritual Dimensions
I have Yesternow as a training track in Pandora and his newer stuff has been popping up. Didn’t know he was still kicking.
Maude
@efgoldman:
heh
SiubhanDuinne
@Raven if you’re still up, and @JPL and @SIA if you’re around: Here in Duluth we are suddenly getting some crazy-ass Donner und Blitzen. It doesn’t feel like rain is on the way (oh, how I would hope to be wrong!) but it is noisy and flashy. You getting anything similar?
Brachiator
A great piece from the Guardian on 10 lesser known Hitchcock films. Good essay with video clips.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2012/jul/04/alfred-hitchcock-genius-bfi-retrospective
Some gems here, especially Young and Innocent, from 1937.
Sawgrass Stan
I’m hoping I can get TPM on ComCast’s iPad app–
“Night of the Hunter” one of the most beautifully shot bw movies ever–kudos to the great Stanley Cortez, who also shot “The Magnificent Ambersons” and… ah… “They Saved Hitler’s Brain.” Also the kid that plays Joey (think that’s the name, the kid with the pigeons and the attitude about Marlon) really IS a longshoreman today. There was a story in the New Yorker a few years back about the Longshoreman’s union and I think he’s a shop steward. Big changes, though– container cranes, no hooks anymore.
jnfr
Thanks again, everyone. It helps a lot to talk about it.
BGinCHI
@efgoldman: But I thought this blog was where all the nice people came to share their feelings.
I’m shocked. Shocked I tell you.
FlipYrWhig
@jnfr: I’m so sorry for you. We’ve been doing our damnedest to keep two aging sick cats going, and we feel like the bell is close to tolling.
RadioOne
I don’t care who Romney picks in the Veepstakes, they all suck and probably won’t help him at all, but I’m bewildered by the medias love of Rob Portman as top pick. As Bush’s budget director, he was directly responsible for blowing up the deficit to trillions of dollars, and would be an instant liability in the campaign of a party screaming that they want to reduce the deficit.
He won’t be picked.
FlipYrWhig
@RadioOne: I think the logic is supposed to be that Romney needs A Numbers Guy, a policy wonk. The problem is, as you said, that his track record as numbers guy/policy wonk blows chunks.
Death Panel Truck
Getting smashed and listening to Ogdens’ Nut Gone Flake. I now own No. 1860 of a limited release of 5000 copies. Three discs in a circular container mirroring the original release – the stereo version, the mono version, and a disc of outtakes and rarities. I’ve loved this record for 30 years.
Mono sounds better, as always.
+4
(or maybe 5 – I don’t really keep track after two. ;)
ETA: This is what sucks about living in the Pacific time zone – by the time I get here, everyone’s already gone to bed.
tworivers
@Scott S.:
Yeah, based on Night of the Hunter, it does seem a shame that Laughton didn’t direct any more movies. Such was/is Hollywood. The fact that Citizen Kane didn’t make much money led Hollywood to ask Robert Wise to edit The Magnificent Ambersons behind Welles’s back.
My favorite part about Night of the Hunter is the overall dreamlike quality of the whole movie, and the the weird sets (e.g., when the kids are on the river). And of course, Mitchum, Shelley Winters and Lillian Gish are all fantastic too. Lillian Gish is like a grandmother from a fairytale. A grandmother with a shotgun.
satby
@jnfr: so sorry to hear that! He went out as a cherished member of the family, the greatest gift we can give out furry companions.