Vautrin

Sorry to hear about your dad. My remark about running out of wars was partly facetious. Long drawn out engagements as in Afghanistan and Iraq seem to lack the drama of ones like WWII and Vietnam. I suppose I've seen most of the usual suspects of WWII movies and, to a lesser degree, Vietnam. Like other genres, some are good. some are bad, and most are of average quality. As for Afghanistan, even the Russians knew it was time to leave after ten years.

Problem is we're running out of new wars to make movies about. WWII, Korea, Vietnam. Been there, done that. Afghanistan, Iraq. Boring. Got to come up with something big that can extend the cinematic war franchise beyond 24 hours.

Rather standard fare. At around 77 minutes I don't feel I lost a whole lot of time. The cruise ship setting during the last part of the flick was slightly reminiscent of Dangerous Crossing. Couldn't recall if Jean Peters was in that one, but it was Jeanne Crain. Can't go wrong either way.

A three way with Cody and Rocco. There ain't enough booze in the ocean.

And Ma wonders why my back is always out of whack.

You should have seen the look on Ma Jarrett's face when I showed her Johnny's Rocco. Thought she was going to faint dead away.

Yeah, bring the old bag in. I'm gonna show her something she hasn't seen in forty years.

Yes, I doubt no one knew in 1958 all the reams of paper to be spent on discussions of all the possible meanings of Vertigo, including Hitchcock himself.

Waiting for Cody to show up and hoping to knock him off was certainly one of Big Ed's options, which didn't exactly work out as planned as Verna was a situational ethicist. I would have gone with Plan B: since Cody seems to hang out on the west coast, head for the northern woods of Maine. Pacino was a more sympathetic character in Donnie Brasco than Cody. Someone you could truly feel sorry for. That scene near the end where he slowly takes off and carefully puts away his jewelry knowing that he won't be returning is so sad. He is so much in the life that he just goes to his fate without a second thought. If Cody got a gander at Johnny Rocco in the bathtub even he might make a hasty retreat. I know he wouldn't want Ma to see that.

I recall indulging just before watching The Wizard of Oz in a college movie theater. A little weird, but since I had seen it numerous times on TV I really didn't mind missing the details of the film. If I only had a joint.

It does give people the ability to minutely analyse things that were perhaps never meant to be so closely analysed, but sure that's fun too. There is a site for The Andy Griffith Show fans which I visit sometimes and they really get down into the weeds on all sorts of trivial topics, which is a result of endless reruns of that show. I also thought that Big Ed was kind of stupid. He seems to be just waiting around for crazy Cody to show up instead of getting the hell out of there and going underground.

As many folks have pointed out, audiences in those days likely only saw the film one time and didn't have our ability to watch movies over and over again and notice things that probably flew right by the people who only saw it once. I just take it as that old Hollywood magic. Sure a guy can take a radio and convert it into a oscillator or an oscillator can just sort of show up on its own. Just like there happened to be a lamp over the mirror in the men's room that Fallon could hang his jacket on and cover up his message when the other criminal came in to tell him to hurry it up. And the audience has time to muse about Cody's relationship with Fallon, while ITRW a guy like Fallon would have been concerned with staying alive and getting his job done.

I had forgotten. I guess Bogie felt he might as well keep the check in the family.

I guess if I could find someone to give me money to globe trot around the world talking about my beloved object, I'd take the deal too. I watched the whole thing, though I was tempted a few times to switch over to Perry Mason. Cousins had some interesting ideas about Little Orson Annie, though I don't know if there were enough to fill up 110 minutes. But he is obviously head over heels about Welles. There's no doubt that both Welles and Cousins have their pretentious sides, so go for it. His Irish brogue didn't bother me that much, sometimes it was amusing trying to decipher some words, like per for poor.

Not to get all practical when it comes to the world of movies, but even though I don't know much about electronics, I find it difficult t believe that Fallon could turn a radio into a oscillator or whatever it was supposed to be. And lord knows, Verna needed something to keep her busy. I presumed that Fallon's alias was Pardo, like Don Pardo. Pardou sounds like he was a French mime. Roy Earle knew that to be sympathetic it helps to have a dog. If Cody had a dog he probably would have killed it and eaten it when he ran out of fried chicken. Made it ma, top of the woof.

Yes there are the usual suspects and then other suspects on different sections of the continuum. As for Fallon. He was a professional who specialized in undercover ops in prison, so he was probably indifferent to his target and used to dealing with bad dudes without caring very much about their individual characters and Cody was an especially bad dude. Fallon never did fix Verna's radio either. Oh well.

I just wouldn't want to be the guy who has to tell Cody that dear old mom is dead. Hit the deck.

There is definitely a subjective element, though there seems to be a consensus that the usual suspects--Out of the Past, Laura, The Killers, et al--are noir. To each their own.

If I cared all that much about it, I would mount a defense that White Heat isn't really a noir, but I don't really care that much, so I'll only say it's just a gangster picture where the head man is a loony. Very entertaining as such, no doubt. I got a kick out of ma telling Verna she'll wear out the mattress, though maybe not in the way ma meant. And once again, poor old mother gets all the blame. Shame on you, Siggy.

True, she wouldn't need a medical degree to be a psychologist. But there are so many scammers in the movie, what's one more. And they probably weren't as vigilant back then as they are now when it comes to professional credentials.

Poor posture? That's more a matter of taste. Maybe I misheard it, but I think that in the movie someone mentioned that Lilith was not actually a licensed psychologist. She sure had the lingo and the office furniture down pat.

That's the problem with these PC types. They actually think the confederates were racists. C'mon, man.

Some sources say he got out of Ireland because the Brits were after him. Don't know if that's true or not. Georgie spent a number of his adolescent years in the U.S., so maybe that weakened his Irish brogue. On first hearing he was involved with the IRA I was surprised as his screen persona was often on the bland side.

Oh oh. There go the daily production numbers.