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Balloon Juice

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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Excellent Links / Once Again, the Onion Was There First

Once Again, the Onion Was There First

by John Cole|  June 6, 20148:21 pm| 94 Comments

This post is in: Excellent Links, Humorous, Military

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Speaking of Bernard Jordan featured in the last post, this link showed up in the comments:

lifeimitatesart

That’s a picture of him on the Ferry to Normandy soaking up the babes.

Obligatory Onion link:

After applying several spritzes of cologne to his freshly shaven face, 87-year-old World War II veteran Roger Sarlo confidently left his home Thursday to go reel in some top-shelf D-Day anniversary pussy, the grandfather of five confirmed. “I have my garrison cap nice and pressed with all the pins on the sides, so now it’s time to head out and get me some of that sweet I-stormed-the-beach-at-Normandy snatch,” said Sarlo, claiming that he expects to be “positively drenched in cooch” by mid-afternoon. “Plus, I dusted off my old military jacket and put my medals right there on the breast pocket. That’s usually guaranteed to get at least one or two pairs of panties sopping.” At press time, Sarlo was saluting an American flag in a local park and “waiting for the beaver train to come rolling in.”

Love it. I wonder if the people who started the Onion would realize competing with reality would be so hard.

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Reader Interactions

94Comments

  1. 1.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 8:24 pm

    I wonder what he has in his duty free bag.

  2. 2.

    jl

    June 6, 2014 at 8:25 pm

    I dunno. Sterling claims it took him awhile but he could, since his lady was hot hot hot and young young young.

    Maybe the Onion gave up and is reporting news?

  3. 3.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 8:28 pm

    That is the best picture ever. I love this guy. Look at those hot women hanging on him and the smile on his face.

  4. 4.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 8:29 pm

    @jl:

    Maybe the Onion gave up and is reporting news?

    Well, the MSM isn’t, so the opportunity is there.

  5. 5.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 8:29 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): Probably gifts for his wife Irene who is also in the nursing home with him. Awww….

  6. 6.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 8:31 pm

    @Violet: From this photo, it looks like he might be in trouble when he gets home.

  7. 7.

    Baud

    June 6, 2014 at 8:32 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    It’s ok. They’re swingers.

  8. 8.

    LanceThruster

    June 6, 2014 at 8:34 pm

    Shag ’em if you got ’em.

  9. 9.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 6, 2014 at 8:34 pm

    The linked article mentions his wife Irene (back at the home). Wonder if she knew his plans and was a co-conspirator. Also wonder what her reaction is/was/will be to this photo. I’m guessing if he’s as sprightly as he appears, she’s been a pretty happy woman for many years and is probably all “That’s my Bernie.”

  10. 10.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 8:35 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): I bet his wife would be happy for him. If you’ve been together that long you know how to roll with things like that.

  11. 11.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 8:36 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: That’s my guess. She’s probably loving the whole escapade.

  12. 12.

    Ash Can

    June 6, 2014 at 8:41 pm

    I can’t look at that picture and not hear “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” playing in the background.

  13. 13.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 8:41 pm

    @Violet: Or she’s just happy to have a couple quiet days to herself with her damned Bernie getting up to something in the common room.

  14. 14.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    June 6, 2014 at 8:45 pm

    @Baud: It’s ok. They’re swingers.

    my shit, it is cracked up. Nice

    @Ash Can: I was wondering if the one on the right was going for some kind of salute to forties hair. I heard the Andrews Sisters’ BWBB on one of the we-play-anything stations on Sirius, kind of surprised that I liked it.

  15. 15.

    Schlemizel

    June 6, 2014 at 8:46 pm

    @Ash Can:

    I was thinking of “When the Lights Go On Again”. More bittersweet.

  16. 16.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 8:50 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yeah, I wondered if they were doing a tribute thing too. Love the Andrews Sisters. Such great music and harmonies.

  17. 17.

    Uncle Cosmo

    June 6, 2014 at 8:52 pm

    –Meanwhile, over in the sidebar, the following lede leads the Noisemax dishonor roll:

    Obama’s D-Day Gum Chewing Sparks Anger

    Jesus Fucking Christ, is there nothing too petty for the pinheaded Teanderthals to go a-frothing over??

  18. 18.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 8:56 pm

    @Uncle Cosmo: Followed by:

    Reagan’s Normandy Speech 30 Years On

    Of course. Because St. Ronnie gave a Real Speech, unlike that gum chewing Muslim Kenyan Usurper.

  19. 19.

    JenJen

    June 6, 2014 at 8:56 pm

    Goddamn that photo is awesome.

    I had the great pleasure and honor of visiting the Normandy Beaches in 2000. It was a very frigid winter day and uncomfortable, but you know what? You don’t complain about your comfort at Normandy.

    Someone had written “Merci” in the sand, and although I’ve lost the photo, I’ll never forget seeing it. I imagine it happens often, but for me, it was my Big Emotional Moment Where It All Came Together.

  20. 20.

    Schlemizel

    June 6, 2014 at 8:56 pm

    @Uncle Cosmo: Bet ya a quarter it was nicorette to calm the cravings for a smoke. They would have been ok with him lighting one up of course.

  21. 21.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 6, 2014 at 8:56 pm

    I can’t remember if this really happened or if it was a piece of a dream* but I was recently inundated with Vera Lynn songs, including of course the biggies, “White Cliffs of Dover” and “We’ll Meet Again.”

    *Not at all unlikely

  22. 22.

    lamh36

    June 6, 2014 at 8:57 pm

    @Uncle Cosmo: It never ceases to amaze me how people still believe that Obama really isn’t like the world over.

    Case in point, just antcedotal, but here is the CSPAN footage of both POTUS and Putin at the D Day ceremony. Whenever Obama was on screen, applause, once Putin on the screen…not so much.

    http://www.c-span.org/video/?c4500151/president-obama-vladimir-putin-d-day-ceremony

  23. 23.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 8:59 pm

    @Uncle Cosmo: He was staying touch with the styles of the time. “Got any gum, chum?”

  24. 24.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 6, 2014 at 9:00 pm

    @Schlemizel:

    That is exactly what I was thinking. Exactly.

    Am not sure whether someone actually caught sight of a wad of gum, but the other thing that occurred to me was that he might have a slight dental problem and was worrying it with his tongue. Anyone who’s had a chipped tooth or loose filling or abscess knows all about that.

    At any rate, Gumghazi at D-Day is about as stupid as Selfiegate at Mandela Memorial. These people are pathetic.

  25. 25.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 9:06 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: It helps if you just remember that, on their best days, they are very small, petty people.

  26. 26.

    lamh36

    June 6, 2014 at 9:09 pm

    @Uncle Cosmo: And here in this video, at about the 2:16 mark Amanpour in an act of journalism says the obvious, that Obama is “extremely popular” overseas. If you listen she even says that Putin in NOT getting a particularly warm welcome there

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6uCXwC3VX4

  27. 27.

    scav

    June 6, 2014 at 9:09 pm

    @Uncle Cosmo: Spur any memories of similar angst at Snow-Blower Cheney at the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz?

  28. 28.

    Ash Can

    June 6, 2014 at 9:12 pm

    @lamh36: They got smacked in the face right off the bat with his popularity abroad, with the huge cheering crowds in Europe right after the election followed by the Nobel Peace Prize. They’ve been in frantic denial over it ever since.

  29. 29.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    June 6, 2014 at 9:13 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: “Gumgazi” (again, nice) does suggest that The Taliban Five story may be losing some steam already.

    I heard some Tweety in the car earlier, and he seems to think Saxby Chambliss, the draft-dodger who morphed Max Cleland in to Saddam Hussein to sell himself and Bush’s war, Tweety thinks Saxby nailed it by calling the T-5 “Mullah Omar’s Board of Directors”. Apparently they’re going to give him some very dangerous advice, or something. This was a good week to give Tweety a pass.

  30. 30.

    rikyrah

    June 6, 2014 at 9:13 pm

    this was the only way this story could get any better…LOL

  31. 31.

    Suffern ACE

    June 6, 2014 at 9:13 pm

    @Schlemizel: no. They’ve been trying to catch him smoking for six years now, so they can call him and his “fat”, burger-eating wife out for promoting healthy lifestyles.

  32. 32.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    June 6, 2014 at 9:15 pm

    @lamh36: Obama is “extremely popular” overseas

    Yup, Peter Beinart’s got some numbers.

  33. 33.

    Suffern ACE

    June 6, 2014 at 9:17 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: the hoi polloi only like him because he’s weak. Also, he has no foreign leader friends!

  34. 34.

    lamh36

    June 6, 2014 at 9:21 pm

    @InlawsOutlaws 22m
    What did the D-Day Vet Tell Obama at the 70th Anniversary? http://thebea.st/1i9zM4W “I thanked him for keeping us out of war.” #amen

  35. 35.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 6, 2014 at 9:21 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I’ve accidentally caught Tweety two or three time this week, and within a minute or so each time had to change channels. He has been en fuego* and not in a good way.

    *Combine en fuego with the large amounts of spittle he generates, and it’s all just steam. Noisy, incoherent steam, I grant you, but steam nonetheless,

  36. 36.

    kindness

    June 6, 2014 at 9:24 pm

    What Obama really should have done is whip out a vape pen, take several large hits and then ask the press ‘Guess what I’m smoking?’. And not tell them. Let the DEA go nuts.

  37. 37.

    gbear

    June 6, 2014 at 9:26 pm

    Somebody dropped this gif into the comments at LGF, and now I’m going to drop it here.

  38. 38.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 6, 2014 at 9:27 pm

    @kindness:

    Hahaha, love that idea. I hope during his last couple of months as President he will just let the freak flag fly high and do/say all kinds of things guaranteed to piss off the GOP and the Village.

    And then write some truly awesome Presidential memoirs.

  39. 39.

    lamh36

    June 6, 2014 at 9:29 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Fron the link

    74 points isn’t Obama’s approval rating in Germany. It’s the gap between his approval rating and Bush’s.<

  40. 40.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 6, 2014 at 9:32 pm

    Meanwhile, the worthless offal of Noisemax are ignoring today and looking back 30 years to a speech by the shitty grade Z movie star.

  41. 41.

    Poopyman

    June 6, 2014 at 9:35 pm

    @Schlemizel:

    They would have been ok with him lighting one up of course.

    A blunt, you surely mean.

  42. 42.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 9:36 pm

    @lamh36: Well aside from Bibi, Putin, and the right wing neo-con types in Poland, what country wouldn’t feel better with Obama rather than the Dim Son? They may disagree with Obama on particular issues, but I swear the sense of relief that I sensed from friends and contacts overseas when Obama was first elected and then reelected was palpable.

  43. 43.

    gogol's wife

    June 6, 2014 at 9:36 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    When I saw that NewsMax headline earlier today, I thought, “They got nothing.”

    And I would have needed gum to get me through that interpretive dance, too.

  44. 44.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 9:37 pm

    @gogol’s wife: Philistine. I quite liked it.

  45. 45.

    Baud

    June 6, 2014 at 9:40 pm

    @lamh36:

    But the internet told me he was hated there because NSA.

  46. 46.

    rikyrah

    June 6, 2014 at 9:43 pm

    Hero Teen Breaks High School Volunteer Record

    Eboni Stevenson, a senior at Thomas Jefferson High School in Denver, won an award recently for devoting more than 3,000 hours of her time to volunteer work – a new record.

    Her enthusiasm for helping other students and the community was sparked in middle school when she was paired with a mentor from the Metro Denver Partners.

    When she got older, she came back to the group as a peer leader, logging hours working with girls, and also on volunteer projects there, like the annual food drive.

    Eboni exceeded her school’s standard for community service by logging 3,840 volunteer hours. She will attend Colorado State University after graduation and is already planning a major in social work.

    http://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/hero-teen-breaks-high-school-volunteer-record/

  47. 47.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    June 6, 2014 at 9:44 pm

    @Suffern ACE: Also, he has no foreign leader friends!

    Did you see Christopher Buckley on BookTV last week? Thurston Howell IV was Very Concerned about Obama’s aloofness

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): You remembered Poland! but you forgot Tony Blair. I wonder if he and Shrub are still “friends”

  48. 48.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 9:46 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Blair is no longer in power, but, yeah, he would be another.

    ETA: Maybe not, though. He would probably back the play of whoever was President in order to be perceived as relevant and important.

  49. 49.

    max

    June 6, 2014 at 9:49 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: This was a good week to give Tweety a pass.

    Every week is a good week to give Tweety a pass. Well, to skip him. Screw the pass.

    max
    [‘Why the hell is he on TV again?’]

  50. 50.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 9:50 pm

    @max: Black and white, silent pirate movies on TCM.

  51. 51.

    scav

    June 6, 2014 at 9:52 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): ETA by a mile. Toady Blair for a reason.

  52. 52.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 6, 2014 at 9:53 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    If the pirates are silent, how are we expected to hear them say “Arrrrrrgh”?

  53. 53.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    June 6, 2014 at 9:59 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): I was thinking more along the lines of what it means for people in that/those positions to be friends. Other than Bibi Netanyahu, who probably found him a useful idiot, I can’t think of any others supposed friends of GWB in that club. From my reading, Churchill and FDR had sincere appreciation and even affection for one another personally, but they also had their own agendas which were often parallel, and neither ever thought otherwise. I can’t imagine Reagan and Thatcher ever got much beyond polite small talk, unless she really liked anecdotes about RKO studios in the ’40s.

    @max: Tweety is the window I use to see what the Village is thinking, and he can be amusing, sometimes intentionally.

  54. 54.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 9:59 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: They just mouth it. The great thing is our hero is an English gentleman wrongly accused of a crime who, through a series of events, becomes a Muslim and fights as a corsair. Sabatini novels sometimes take weird turns.

  55. 55.

    gogol's wife

    June 6, 2014 at 10:01 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    I was watching the Dave Clark 5 special yet again. Big dose of 1960s this week.

  56. 56.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:04 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Oh, I can’t imagine that anyone ever thought much of Bush or had any affection for him. Of course, that could be my own bias showing through.

  57. 57.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 6, 2014 at 10:05 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    Sabatini novels sometimes take weird turns.

    What can you expect of someone who came up with the opening line “He was born with the gift of laughter, and a sense that the world was mad.”? (from Scaramouche).

    (Did we have a favourite-first-lines-of-novels thread here within the past few months? I have a strong feeling I typed those same words rather recently.)

  58. 58.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:07 pm

    @gogol’s wife: I like pirate moves. And TCM is all pirate movie all night. I might get to bed late, but that is fine and I have nothing on my plans for tomorrow but a long cycle ride and getting the Saab to a car wash.

  59. 59.

    Matt McIrvin

    June 6, 2014 at 10:07 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: That article pretty much gives the key partway down: when Dick Cheney talks about world opinion souring on Obama, what he means by “world opinion” is “Bibi Netanyahu”.

  60. 60.

    rikyrah

    June 6, 2014 at 10:07 pm

    Youth Flag Football Admin Claims Commish Spent League Fees On “Pussy”

    Below you’ll find an email from one of the administrators of an Atlanta-area youth flag football league sponsored by the NFL. Sent to a number of league parents, it contains a whole host of bizarre accusations against the commissioner. One of those parents shared it with us. Now we share it with you.

    The parent who forwarded it along said the league’s first season of existence was rocky, but overall a good experience. Then, out of the blue, the email. (The commissioner’s name has been redacted. To keep things straight, the administrator is female; the commissioner is male.

    http://deadspin.com/youth-flag-football-admin-claims-commish-spent-league-f-1585558549

  61. 61.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:09 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: Do you think that I don’t know the opening line to Scaramouche*? A childhood favorite and something I reread at least once a year.

    *Note my ‘nym.

  62. 62.

    gogol's wife

    June 6, 2014 at 10:11 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    It’s written in stone over one of the doors at the Hall of Graduate Studies at Yale.

    Great Stewart Granger-Mel Ferrer movie.

  63. 63.

    tybee

    June 6, 2014 at 10:12 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    i thought you liked gladiator movies.

  64. 64.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:13 pm

    @gogol’s wife: I have trouble with Grainger in the role. He doesn’t fit Andre-Louis at all.

  65. 65.

    gogol's wife

    June 6, 2014 at 10:14 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    I only read the book once, many years ago, so I have no mental image of the hero other than Granger.

  66. 66.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:14 pm

    @tybee: You seem to have confused me with Captain Oveur.

  67. 67.

    Mnemosyne

    June 6, 2014 at 10:16 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    Believe it or not, they’ve figured out that the “pirate accent” probably originates with Disney movies of the 1950s.

  68. 68.

    gogol's wife

    June 6, 2014 at 10:17 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Yeah, it’s definitely Robert Newton. I didn’t know that was a Disney film.

  69. 69.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:19 pm

    @gogol’s wife: That’s completely reasonable, but, having read the book more than 20 times before I saw the movie, I could not make the mental leap. When I read, I sort of play a movie in my head, so when I see a movie based on a book and a character doesn’t match my inner movie, it can be a bit jarring.

  70. 70.

    gogol's wife

    June 6, 2014 at 10:20 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    Which is why I will probably never watch Anna Karenina starring Keira Knightley.

  71. 71.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:24 pm

    @gogol’s wife: Ah, but I will because Keira Kneightly She fits well enough with my intenal Anna. Of course, that is a book where I saw a movie version before I read it. I came late to the Russians (and only in translation).

  72. 72.

    Suffern ACE

    June 6, 2014 at 10:29 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): they aren’t silent. There was an annoying organ playing so I had to turn it off.

  73. 73.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:30 pm

    @efgoldman: The human imagination is an amazing thing. As kid I used prefer having some read to me to reading until I could read fast enough to play the movies myself. Once I reached that point, I read constantly and my reading speed and level increased almost exponentially.

  74. 74.

    Mnemosyne

    June 6, 2014 at 10:46 pm

    @Suffern ACE:

    “Silent” movies were never actually shown silent. It could be anything from a full orchestra to one guy improvising on a piano depending on the theater, but there was always some kind of musical accompaniment.

  75. 75.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 10:48 pm

    @Mnemosyne: One of the most fun movie going experiences I have had was seeing a restored print of the original Lon Chaney Phantom of the Opera in a vintage theater with a live orchestra playing the score.

  76. 76.

    Mnemosyne

    June 6, 2014 at 11:05 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    I’ve gotten to hear Robert Israel play the organ and direct a (small) orchestra a couple of times. The Club Foot Orchestra comes down here relatively often, though I haven’t seen them in years. I got to meet Eleanor Keaton (widow of Buster) at their “Sherlock Jr.” show and still have her business card (she was about 30 years younger than he was, so she was still going strong in the 1990s).

  77. 77.

    Steeplejack

    June 6, 2014 at 11:10 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    The Sea Hawk was great, although I kept hoping someone would dope-slap the utterly clueless Rosamund.

  78. 78.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 11:16 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): If you ever have a chance to see Abel Gance’s 1927 film “Napoleon” with live orchestra, don’t miss it. Here’s an article about a recent screening.

    Kevin Brownlow’s acclaimed restoration of Abel Gance’s 1927 cinematic masterpiece, Napoleon, with a score by Carl Davis, will be given a rare screening when it is played, to a live orchestral accompaniment by the Philharmonia Orchestra, at the Royal Festival Hall on Saturday 30 November.

    British Academy Award-winning historian, documentarian and archivist Kevin Brownlow’s restored version of Napoleon was first screened in 1980 and was last screened in the UK in 2004 at the Royal Festival Hall. A new restoration, completed in 2000 subsequently reclaimed more than 30 minutes of additional footage discovered since the very first 1979 screening and visually upgraded much of the film. The score, written over 30 years ago by noted film composer Carl Davis, has been expanded twice since. Napoleon received its American premiere last March 2012. It has been a lifelong quest for both Brownlow and Davis to give Napoleon a greater audience.

    The “Polyvision” with three screens at the end is really great.

  79. 79.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 11:17 pm

    @Steeplejack: On a different topic, Graceland was entertaining for a few episodes, but it spiraled into soap opera.

  80. 80.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 6, 2014 at 11:19 pm

    @Violet: Sounds wicked cool.

  81. 81.

    Steeplejack

    June 6, 2014 at 11:25 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):

    Too bad. Thanks for reporting back.

  82. 82.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 11:26 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): Here’s a Roger Ebert article about the 1981 tour of it. Carmine Coppola wrote the score and conducted it.

    Film historian Kevin Brownlow plundered the film archives of Europe for all the “Napoleon” footage he could find and made some lucky discoveries of scenes that were thought to be completely lost. Then he rebuilt “Napoleon” into a reasonable facsimile of its original version, complete with the famous three-screen, hand-tinted triptych that ended it – an effect that anticipated Cinerama.

    This version played to great acclaim at various small film festivals, and then movie director Francis Ford Coppola got the idea of presenting it properly, with a full orchestral score. He commissioned his 71-year-old father, Carmine, to compose the score, and in January the Coppolas presented “Napoleon” in Radio City Music Hall with Carmine conducting the American Symphony Orchestra.

    It’s Ebert and it’s a wonderful article. Worth reading the whole thing. Gloria Swanson was “Enthralled!” by the film. Just great.

  83. 83.

    Joel

    June 6, 2014 at 11:28 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: Elmer Gantry was drunk.

  84. 84.

    Steeplejack

    June 6, 2014 at 11:32 pm

    @Violet:

    I saw Napoleon sometime in the ’90s at the Fox Theater in Atlanta, on the occasion of its restoration and limited theatrical release. Polyvision, live orchestra (Carmine Coppola conducting the Atlanta Symphony), beautiful print, in a classic 1929 movie palace. Sublime.

    ETA: I guess it was in the ’80s, based on your later comment.

  85. 85.

    Steeplejack

    June 6, 2014 at 11:40 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    “It was a dark and stormy night.”

    Back in the day New York magazine would have little literary contests each issue (collected in the book Thank You for the Giant Sea Tortoise*), and two of the funniest were (paraphrasing) “openings of novels that didn’t quite make it” and “endings of novels that didn’t quite make it.” Lots of riffs on classic novels and some great purple prose. “Call me a shlemiel.”

    * “Readers are invited to submit the text for an improbable greeting card.”

  86. 86.

    Violet

    June 6, 2014 at 11:44 pm

    @Steeplejack: Saw it on the same tour. My parents took me to see it. Mesmerizing. Loved it. Worth seeing it if it ever gets screened again. The live orchestra accompanying it is magical. The Polyvision is breathtaking.

    You’d probably enjoy the Ebert article I linked. It’s from that era and really wonderful–Ebert is such a great writer.

  87. 87.

    Anoniminous

    June 6, 2014 at 11:51 pm

    @Violet:

    I saw it in LA, with a full orchestra, in 1981. A friend who worked for Disney got tickets and took me as her date.

  88. 88.

    max

    June 7, 2014 at 12:00 am

    Moi: max
    [‘Why the hell is he on TV again?’]

    @Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name): @max: Black and white, silent pirate movies on TCM.

    I must have dug too many holes in the goddamn ground today. What?

    Anyways. Tim Powers – On Stranger Tides.

    max
    [‘Careful readers of that book will note that Pirates of the Caribbean was a direct lift from the book, which they forgot to pay any money for until the fourth movie.’]

  89. 89.

    Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)

    June 7, 2014 at 12:04 am

    @max: You said this: [‘Why the hell is he on TV again?’]

    I said what was on my TV.

  90. 90.

    pseudonymous in nc

    June 7, 2014 at 12:14 am

    It’s nice that the ferry staff got to dress up as WAAFs.

    One of my pipe-dreams is to set up a cafe in the motherland that looks like a RAF canteen, complete with tea urn.

  91. 91.

    Mnemosyne

    June 7, 2014 at 1:51 am

    @pseudonymous in nc:

    I stumbled across a really fascinating person from your WAAF link: Noor Inayat Khan. Sadly, she did not survive the war, but damn!

  92. 92.

    WaterGirl

    June 7, 2014 at 7:45 am

    @Steeplejack: I like Graceland. For what that’s worth.

  93. 93.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    June 7, 2014 at 9:37 am

    hehe the guy in the picture is probably thinking “back when I was these ladies age women like them would have never given me the day of time, but now ,..”

  94. 94.

    Steeplejack

    June 7, 2014 at 10:35 am

    @WaterGirl:

    What do you like about it? In a thread a few days ago I told Omnes that the promos made it look like NCIS: L.A. meets one of those MTV “sexy idiots in a group house” shows.

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