slaytonf
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Posts posted by slaytonf
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11 hours ago, NipkowDisc said:
and yet having fought and killed each other in a great war has brought us closer in spirit to the great Japanese people. no longer enemies but now friends and allies and comrades in arms.
so often those we have fought later become our brothers.
'Long as we beat 'em.
There still is a strong strain in Japanese society which is militaristic, denying the horrors they visited on the Koreans, Chinese, and others, and honoring the war criminals we hanged. But if individual people can be a confusing mass of contradictory elements, think what a nation of them would be.
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I've talked about how I admire this movie for the themes it explores, the somber mood it creates, and the tragic ending with its joyless victory (http://forums.tcm.com/topic/127760-sympathy-for-the-monster/). One thing I was oblivious to was the effect of this movie on Japanese audiences. Needless to say, it must have been stunning, touching a very raw and unhealed nerve in the common psyche. A large destructive force, radioactive, that lays waste to cities, destroys and maims people. Ben Mankiewicz in his comments called the monster a metaphor for the atomic age, but I'm sure audiences saw something else in addition. The association of the monster with the United States and it's defeat of Japan with nuclear weapons would be inescapable. No nation enjoys the sharp sting of defeat. It is akin to death, and desperate measures are resorted to for coping with the assault on self-worth. The Viet Nam War is still problematic with us, and it didn't involve any devastation to our country or government. Imagine the psychic wound the Japanese felt, a people and culture even more proud, if possible, than we are. Perhaps there was morbid fascination with a subject matter that hewed so closely to painful matters. But perhaps there was also a certain therapeutic effect, allowing people, if only metaphorically to achieve some sense of control over their world by defeating the monster, and doing it with a weapon of fearsome power that they willingly give up.
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Aw, gee. . . .
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9 hours ago, Dargo said:
Oooo. . . .fins. . .thas nice!
Sadly, according to IMCDB, one had never been in a movie.
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I will take the risk and say you will enjoy it a lot. It's a great forgotten comedy. Jean Arthur is fabulous.
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19 hours ago, Sepiatone said:
I recall reading somewhere that Godzilla's roar was created by stereophonic feedback.
Sound effects can be a funny business. When I first saw the first STAR WARS, a sound in the movie reminded me of a sound we(as kids) would create------
The sound of the storm troopers weapons, from an article I read, was made the same way WE created it.
By hitting the cables used as "guy-wires" for telephone poles with a hammer!
Anyway----
My Mother's cousin( and of course,my cousin too) used to have a job as tutor for GI kids living on a U.S. military base near Tokyo. When he came over here to MI for a visit, I couldn't resist----
I mentioned that he came to visit just in time!
He asked, "In time for what?" And I answered, "Well, I'm guessing it's nigh on time for GODZILLA season over there, eh?" He just closed his eyes and slowly shook his lowered head back and forth. 
Sepiatone
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It may be nice, but it is not a car.
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The movie might be The Devil and Miss Jones (1941), with Jean Arthur and Charles Coburn:
http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/72933/The-Devil-and-Miss-Jones/
Click on the READ THE FULL SYNOPSIS tab for a full description.
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1 hour ago, cigarjoe said:
76 Spitfire 😎
That's a nice. . . .car.
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11 hours ago, Dargo said:
Yes, a "1066" Jaguar Mark II.
And with THIS fine example of the marque shown above being the very automobile initially purchased by William the Conqueror as a gift to himself for his then recent victory at the Battle of Hastings and subsequent conquest of England.
(...sorry slayton, just couldn't resist)
Oops! Well, if you leave a door open, you should expect people to walk through it.
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You're welcome, jamesjazzguitar. I have to say part of the reason I don't go down any rabbit holes is that I don't have any formal education in music. What I know of jazz I've picked up mostly from reading CD booklets that came with the albums I bought. That and watching Leonard Bernstein shows, the Young People's Concerts and his The Unanswered Question.
When I hear someone express an interest in the music, I try to think of what thrills me about it to feed that interest. Jazz is America's classical music, and the people who wrote it and performed it were true masters and geniuses. And I'm sure I don't have the knowledge to appreciate them nearly as much as they should be.
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From the Antiques Road Trip front, the 1066 Jaguar Mark II:
I seem to be favoring Jaguars. I'm ok with that.
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Let me also recommend the Jazz at the Philharmonic series. This wasn't jazz players accompanied by an orchestra, but a series of concerts originally staged at the Philharmonic Auditorium in Los Angeles, but later in tours around the world. It featured a bewildering array of the most accomplished artists including--well, who didn't it include? There was Illinois Jacquet, Nat King Cole, Les Paul, Lionel Hamption, Stan Getz, Oscar Peterson, Coleman Hawkins, and on and on. Some of the cookinest music ever. Many of the concerts are available for purchase or listening on the Web.
Bud Powell was the most intense jazz pianist of all time. His playing is suffused with a frenetic energy that is dumbfounding when you first hear him. The notes pour out at an almost impossible rate, and yet under absolute control. One of the preeminent figures in the development of bebop, his contributions are as important as Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and Thelonius Monk. However, due to tragic events in his life, his later work, though superior of course, lacks the blazing fire of his early performances.
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All the people I mentioned, to whom I'd add, Lionel Hampton (the best vibraphonist), and Illinois Jacquet (a wialing saxophonist), worked in smaller groups at some point in their careers, also liking the freer atmosphere. You just have to search their names with the word live on YouTube or elsewhere to find examples, like this one:
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So you can record movies to DVDs from your DVR? Can you record movies to DVDs real-time as they are shown?
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Sergio Leone was a cinematic iconoclast in many ways. He's primarily known for the promotion of the anti-hero as protagonist in westerns and other movies. Though his 'man-with-no-name' is not truly amoral. Despite his readiness to rob the robbers, or game the system, he's not a real bad guy. In fact, he's the one who gets rid of them, and makes the world right again. His visual iconoclasm paralleled and complemented his themes, violating our expectations for how elements entered and appeared on the screen (e. g., his extreme close-ups), and how the camera moved. Your selection, cigarjoe, is one of the best examples of the latter. Coupled with Morricone's ecstatic music, it's a whirling, dizzying crescendo of greed and lust.
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What can you say for an action movie which has it's most exciting moment in it's first minute? Even though bungee jumping has past out of the spotlight (a recommendation against tying a movie to transient cultural phenomena), the opening sequence to Goldeneye (1995), is still stunning, even on a small screen. After that, it seems all a jumble, and I can only offer a jumble of thoughts.
I did make it all the way through, with the sound on. But I did have to take a couple of breaks when the improbability factor got too high. Like when the statue ended up on top of the tank hijacked by Bond, notwithstanding the implied political statement. I can only attribute my perseverance to Pierce Brosnan (a name for an international spy as good as James Bond). I had expected him to have even less Bondiness (Bondishness?) than Timothy Dalton, but was surprised to find he projected an image that echoed Connery's original. Not the same, but in the line.
The self-referential quips got to be tiring after a while. I got that the movie was spoofing/not spoofing itself and the Bond movies in general after the fifth one. Don't need any more.
Product placement still ranked high in the set of moviemaking techniques. It's crossed my mind if companies have to pay for the cost of the scene they are featured in. If so, a certain fizzy water company must've paid a bundle.
For all it's posing as smashing the shaken-not-stirred icons of the Bond franchise, the movie still transmits some strong conventional messages. That is, when it is consistent and coherent in its messages. It's a collection of old spy movie elements stitched together into a sort-of quilt. Like the old friend/comrade-in-arms turned baddie. The modern angle comes from Natalya Simonova who criticizes Bond and the others for their game-playing and their unconcern for it's lethal consequences. But that's the standard role of woman as culture bringer and civilizing force so often seen in movies. And M's comments, delivered by Dame Dench, about Bond being a misogynistic dinosaur are really unfair. Bond was never abusive, demeaning, or patronizing to the women he met in the movies. True, being near him could prove unhealthy for a number of them, as a body count could show, but when one had ability he valued it and relied on it. And when a woman saved his life--a not infrequent occurrence--he didn't dismiss it. (I can't believe I'm defending a movie character as if he were a real person).
Anyway, movie bad; Brosnan, not so bad.
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Sounds like some hot Chicago style jazz to me. King Oliver, Benny Goodman, Louis Armstrong, and Bix Beiderbeck are all exponents of the form. Try "Sing Sing Sing," by Benny Goodman. Gene Krupa thumps on the drums and Benny wails on the clarinet. There are other versions you can get on YouTube, but this snippet gives you the idea:
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The Living Daylights (1987), though not really good, seemed to be living up to what Ben Mankiewicz claimed as a reset to a less humorous mode. That is, up to the point where the movie has Bond drive onto a frozen lake in a chase. Drive onto a frozen lake, and take a shed with his Austin. 'Til then there had not been much to keep me watching, but not much to stop me. That's where I stopped. The fact is, Timothy Dalton, though good as a leading man, and even as an action hero, is not Bond. He doesn't have the screen presence for him.
I could say a few things about License to Kill (1989), but I wonder if it is worth the effort to organize my thoughts. Mmm, no. I made it as far as when the woman with the sawed-off shoots a hole in the side of a building. That's when my suspension of disbelief was overtaxed. But I also made a neat discovery. Instead of tuning to something else, for some reason I just turned the sound off. This, along with dividing my attention doing other things, allowed me to watch the whole movie. I found I could follow the story just as well, and it didn't irritate me nearly as much to watch. 'Course, I thought it was all about counterfeit money and not drugs, but that's not important. (Parenthetical note: It's surprising how sharks supply the source of danger and death in so many Bond movies. The go-to ontological dread inducer). The final chase with the tanker semis was good--not too many absurdities--and the semi tractor up on, um, three wheels was not shabby.
Remember the game guessing how many jelly beans are in a jar? A similar game occurred to me. Guessing how many rounds have been shot at BondJamesBond without hitting him. Are all international agents of evil such poor shots?
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The Devil and Miss Jones (1941):
Two more scenes from this delightful comedy. In the first, the undercover boss has been corralled by the police trying to pawn his watch for payphone money. The situation deteriorates for our protagonists until Bob Cummings as Joe enters to confound the cops and their use of technicalities to bully and intimidate. The comedy deftly conveys the message of the dangers of delegated power, and it's potential for corruption. It is no coincidence Joe recites excerpts from the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. This has greater implications for the general pro-worker, pro-labor tone of the movie. The only reason I can come up with for how this got into a hollywood studio movie is that, as Preston Sturges said, you can get away with anything in a movie, as long as it's a comedy.
In the second, Jean Arthur, as Mary, has discovered Merrick is not the unassuming employee she has been led to believe. But she mistakenly thinks he's a private investigator, not the owner of the department store. This leads her to fear for the jobs of the four hundred employees who've signed a petition for unionizing that Merrick has. And it's left to her to get it. There are many similar scenes in movies, where a person is faced with a daunting task and struggles to go through with it. But there are none so charmingly portrayed as here by Miss Arthur. This scene is all her, the director sensibly staying out of the way, allowing her to show her alternate drumming up her courage and shrinking from her urgent duty. The humor is compounded when, through no fault of her own, Merrick is knocked unconscious and she reflexively rushes to help him. She was in many more important movies, but nowhere do you see her wonderful ability on better display.
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What I mean is, when there is an abrupt proliferation of posts from one source, you must question the motives and sources.
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Considering the current takeover of these discussions, I'm kinda hankerin' after the old Korean kind. At least there were fun letters to look at.
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On September 21, 2019 at 8:22 AM, slaytonf said:
Made it all the way through View to a Kill (1985). Don't know how, or why, because I don't like it. Maybe there was something interesting enough, or nothing so intolerable as to keep me watching. I do have some observations.
*The 1980s was a strange time.
*The movie represents both an advance and a retreat for women. It has the first woman featured heavy (May Day). She spoils it by a noble last act. Guess Bond can't kill a woman. But the woman heroine (Satcey Sutton) is a character straight out of 40s or 50s movies. She's completely at the mercy of, or reliant on whatever male is around her. She's always getting pulled up or down by someone. But to be fair, she drives a mean fire truck.
*Christopher Walken makes a good heavy. He should pursue this for career opportunities.
I knew I was forgetting something:
*PRODUCT PLACEMENT!! I don't know what goes on in movies today, but I've never seen a movie that so blatantly pushes the unlikeliest of things on an unsuspecting audience. I expected the G**********r blimp to make and appearance at the end to pluck Bond and his lady off the Golden Gate.
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Eugene Pallette:
Not an intuitive choice for a movie cop. And he really wasn't. Almost none of his roles involved police work, except in a particular case, or set of cases. As Sgt. Ernest Heath he played the recurring professional foil to Philo Vance's amateur sleuthing. And he proved the most enduring feature of that series, appearing in more of them than even William Powell, the originator of the movie Vance.
Nobody needs a clip of him, right?
He asked, "In time for what?" And I answered, "Well, I'm guessing it's nigh on time for GODZILLA season over there, eh?" He just closed his eyes and slowly shook his lowered head back and forth. 
Do many of you like Shakespeare?
in General Discussions
Posted
Many of me like Shakespeare. Without a doubt the greatest author in the English language. And there are not many in other languages to compare. I read his plays every handful of years or so. The problem you and many others have in appreciating him is natural. His English is four hundred years old. Meanings and usages have changed. The best way to experience his work is to see it performed on stage. Even if you don't get all the words, the intent and power come through. Reading him takes time to accustom yourself to the language. I use an annotated version of his plays, which have introductory remarks on the content, and performance history of the plays, and footnotes explaining words and passages. Paradoxically, I recommend not referring to the notes, at least not at first. It breaks up the flow of the plays, and turns reading them into a chore, rather than a joy. The best annotated set of plays is called The Arden Shakespeare, but there are others.
As for that infamous canard about his works being written by some nobleman or other, it is simply another instance of thievery by the aristocracy. It is not enough for it to steal money, land, and labor of people to sate its rapacity, but it even needs to thieve their creativity. The answer to all the questions raised about the improbability of Shakespeare writing his works is simple. He was a genius.
Members of the aristocracy, most of whom being distinctly average in ability and who attain position and success because of their social status or inheritance cannot conceive of anybody creating what he did without all the educational advantages they had. Despite numerous and repeated examples of people rising out poverty and disadvantages through hard work and brilliance to attain success and create a lasting contribution to humanity, their greed leads them to begrudge anything of value to one not of their class.
As for why others of equal brilliance have not appeared, the answer is also simple. They have. But they either were in other kinds of art, or in other fields, like science, or politics. Other authors as brilliant have come around, but they could not hold the same position in our culture because Shakespeare already occupied it.