Palmerin

FRENCH CONNECTION II: Doyle, having recovered from his addiction to heroin, is taken through Marseilles to identify the hideout of Charnier. A splendid brunette eating an ice cream catches D's attention, and he says: Man, that's what I need now. Inspector Barthelemy replies: Are you crazy? A woman now would kill you! To which D replies: Not the woman, dummy; what she is eating.

Is this the start of the answer to my question about the fat cow years and lean cow years of cinema? GREAT!: so 1945 was a fat cow year; which others would you nominate?

Yes; thank you very much.

My stepfather and his brothers served in the Puerto Rican based 65th Regiment. He was nearly killed by a bayonet stab that almost got him in the heart, and was awarded the Purple Heart. For a long time he suffered from what would eventually be diagnosed as PTSD; he finally got treatment, and enjoyed the last years of his life attending American Legion activities. The PR National Guard now uses the insignia of the 65th Regiment: a white Maltese Cross on black that symbolizes Saint John the Baptist, patron saint of PR.

I suppose that you are wondering about the taste and mindset of someone who, freely and of his own will, watched the atrocities enumerated here. One of my strengths/weaknesses is a curiosity that has to be constantly reminded of the truth of CURIOSITY KILLED THE CAT. You must understand that, all too often, I find nice respectable movies to be as bland and uninteresting as Diet Coke; instead I like movies that are like German, Polish and Spanish sausage: tangy, savory and well seasoned. Obscenities like PINK FLAMINGOS, on the other hand, are nothing but f---s, and why anybody thought they deserved to be made and distributed to the blameless unsuspecting public is a mystery that only God Himself could satisfactorily explain.

I read his WIKI bio, and it certainly seems that Cohn is the man I asked about. My deepfelt thanks to all.

A great topic of discussion would be why film lovers remain loyal to classics that have been remade. After watching the MIGHTY JOE YOUNG of 1998, I overheard a lady say IT WAS NICE, BUT I STILL PREFER THE 1949 CLASSIC. That was so sweet!

... and WITCHFINDER GENERAL was too violent for your liking. What do you think of the following?: CALIGULA (1979) EL TOPO I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE THE NIGHT PORTER PINK FLAMINGOS SALO, OR THE 120 NIGHTS OF SODOM THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (1974)

Not all classical music is classic; there is plenty of it that has only historical value, and no artistic interest at all. The same applies to all the other arts, and that obviously applies to cinema. That is why I find it necessary to watch some movies strictly for their value as historical documents, because their value as art has faded.

For their historical interest, which is a value even commonplace movies share with the greats. It's fascinating--albeit sometimes painful--to witness what people of the past regarded as fashionable and sexy; even more fascinating, and even more painful, is what movie makers of the past regarded as riveting and absorbing entertainment.

During the big studio era there was a producer who had a true Midas Touch when it came to making great movies. As a person, however, he was so unlikable and widely detested that Hedda Hopper said of him that YOU HAD TO GET IN LINE TO HATE HIM.

Some seriousness, please! The Oscar has not been around for even a century, so it should be relatively easy to pick and choose between memorable years and years that were totally forgettable. 1967, the year TCM salutes in this month: is it really the most noteworthy year of the 1961-1970 decade?

I love Reynolds in DELIVERANCE, a very powerful performance in a most powerful movie.

COF was not released in PR until 1982, after it had been awarded the Oscar; it had a busy box office for two weeks, then it dwindled sharply. The critics were respectful, but not enthusiastic, all of them sharing the opinion that the good intentions of Hugh Hudson were not matched by the quality of his finished product.

If I were scoring a comedy, I would use the whimsical and perky music of that most delightful French composer, Francois Poulenc; just listen to his delicious ballet, LES BICHES.

When I complained that CHARIOTS OF FIRE was a bore that did not deserve its Oscars, some of you pointed out that 1981 was a very poor year with little of value. In other discussions about other Oscar movies it has been hinted that some years were so poor that the honest thing to do would have been to award no Oscars at all. Obviously there are years like 1939, abundant with great movies, and others where there is really nothing from which to choose. So I ask you: which years were years of fat sleek cows, and which years were years of gaunt starved cows?

David Letterman's beard reminds me of a journalist (?!) who made the unbelievable claim that all bearded men look alike. I'll bet this nearsighted doofus could not tell the difference between Charles Darwin and US Grant, or tell Sigmund Freud apart from GB Shaw.

It vexes me terribly that, in science fiction, the alien civilizations only have one language; all the Vulcans speak Vulcan, and all the Klingons speak Klingon. Is there such a thing as a single Earthling language!!!???

Tomorrow, 21 May 2017, SUNDANCE will present together the Guillermin and Jackson versions of KING KONG. The former has the most idiotic statement I have ever witnessed in a movie. The Jeff Bridges character--all full of politically correct attitudes before that term was even conceived--scolds Charles Grodin for having deprived the inhabitants of Skull Island of the symbol of their religion. Yeah, some religion, based on human sacrifice! I bet he would have disapproved of Hernan Cortes depriving the Aztecs of a religion based, not only on constant human sacrifice, but also on cannibalism. As for real life, back in 1973, the Archbishop of San Juan, Luis Aponte Martinez, was appointed a cardinal by HH Paul VI; immediately there was speculation about his chances to succeed to the Papacy. A smart **** posted a letter in the now defunct THE SAN JUAN STAR--a beggar's NY TIMES--in which he scornfully affirmed that a quick look at the history of the Papacy proved that a Pope had to be born a country bumpkin who grew up in the countryside of Italy--id est, someone whose biography was identical to that of John XXIII. If that jackass had bothered to take a LONG AND CAREFUL look at the history of the Papacy, he would have found out that almost all the Popes have come from the aristocracy and the middle class, the groups with traditionally the most access to higher education. Now that higher education is more widely available there are Popes like JXXIII, the son of a farmer, and John Paul I, the son of a bricklayer. To be sure, the upper classes still dominate the government of the Church: take the examples of Paul VI--son of a politician and of an aristocrat--, John Paul II--son of a career military officer--, Benedict XVI--son of a policeman--, and Francis--son of an accountant. But is that so strange? Abraham Lincoln did not get elected POTUS because he was born in a log cabin, but because of the extraordinary qualities he possessed; JXXIII was not elected Pope because he was of peasant stock, but because he proved that he was no ordinary peasant. What idiotic statements from reel and from real life do you people recall, please?

GF lived in its own alternate universe, in which Grand Ducchess Gloriana thought that Coolidge was still the President of the USA.

THE MOUSE THAT ROARED Its setup is that, because Grand Fenwick was founded by an English knight, the language of that country is an English identical to that of GB and the Commonwealth. That is clearly an impossibility, since GF is separated from GB by France, and is half surrounded by Switzerland. A more likely scenario is that the medieval English of its founder would be transformed by the influence of the countries surrounding it into a language totally unique to GF, not unlike the brand of German that is spoken in Switzerland, which the Germans themselves find hard to understand. When Haiti won its independence in 1804, it was a largely French speaking country; one century later, Haitians spoke a language that was clearly no longer French, even though contact with France was never interrupted. GF was cut off from GB a lot longer than just one century.

SPECIAL is indeed a term that is used way promiscuously.

Which quote do you have in mind, please?

In THE INCREDIBLES, Dash Parr complains to his mother of having to hide his super power. DASH: Our powers make us special. HELEN: Everybody is special. D; Which is another way of saying that nobody is. I am of the opinion that Helen Parr is confusing UNIQUE with SPECIAL. Everybody is an unique individual with no duplicate in the rest of the universe; special, on the other hand, means that one has a quality or talent that sets him apart from the rest. Europe was full of talented painters and sculptors in the time of Michelangelo; M's talents, however, were so outstanding that he impacted the 16th century into BEFORE MICHELANGELO=AFTER MICHELANGELO eras. Those show biz people who have been dying in 2017 were more than unique: they were very much SPECIAL.

I'm glad that the holiday was celebrated with movies related to Mexico--quite unlike that time in 2016 when TCM featured a whole bunch of movies about Scotland in a day that had absolutely no relevance to Scottish history. 5 May 1862 is the day of the Battle of Puebla, a Mexican victory over the French.