FredCDobbs

Warm summer sun, shine kindly here; Warm southern wind, blow softly here; Green sod above, lie light, lie light? Good night, dear heart, good night. Good night. ~ Mark Twain epitaph for his daughter

I?ve seen debates about the Nazis and the Commies, about both being ?socialists?. I would say that one of the main differences between them was that Communism was supposed to be an ?internationalist? movement, while Nazism was a ?nationalistic? movement. Of course the Russian, Chinese, North Korean, and Cuban Communists were ?nationalistic?, but they had to pretend they were part of a big world-wide commune-ism internationalist movement, designed to make the whole world one big ?commune? with one big one-world government. The Nazis wanted only a nationalist movement with Germany at the center of it, ruling the world. The Nationalist Fascists became known as ?Right Wingers? and the Internationalist Communists became known as ?Leftists?. The early Italian fascists wanted the same thing, with Italy at the center, as in the old Roman Empire. The Japs wanted the same thing with Japan at the center. The Germans and Japs played along with each other during WW II, in order to defeat the US and since they were so far apart, but had both sides won the war, they would have probably attacked each other and tried to become the center of their own one-world fascist government, with ?nationalism? still important to them. Of course Russia was always ?nationalistic? and tried to gain control of the world in the ?40s and ?50s, but Communist China didn?t want to be ruled by the Russians, so, actually, Communism began to split into several nationalistic groups, such as the Russian, Chinese, North Korean, and Cuban, and that might have eventually led to the downfall of the Russian domination of Communism. The word ?Fascism? comes from the ancient Roman symbol called the ?fasces?. This is a bundle of sticks, bound by ropes, with an ax-head embedded at one end. If all the sticks hold together, then the ax-head is firmly in place. The ?sticks? represent the various institutions of a nation: government, industry, agriculture, business, the media, the education system, etc., etc. All must work together in a unified way to make a Fascist government succeed. Ironically, the US government has used the ?fasces? symbol itself, mainly long ago, such as on the back of the Liberty Dime (before the Roosevelt Dime), and on each side of the podium in the US House of Representatives. Originally, early in the 20th Century in Italy, ?Fascism? basically meant ?a unified and strong country.? But after the Nazis began to use the term, it began to mean ?a bad right-wing government?.

Hey! My satellite receiver is working again! I've found a good old pirate movie on TCM.

?Speaking of Nazis, one version that was based on the Petrified Forest (loosely, very loosely) used escaped Nazi war criminals instead of gangsters in the plot. It was a hoot. I can't remember the name though.? Interesting. I don?t think I?ve seen it. I agree with you about The Petrified Forest. It was perfect as it was, and it can?t be out-done.

?I think TCM should run the "There is nothing wrong with your television set......" disclaimer before showing some of these "treats".? LOL! That?s a great idea!

One voice that grated on my nerves was that of Elizabeth Taylor in ?Cleopatra?. Throughout the entire movie she sounded to me like Maggie the cat in ?Cat on a Hot Tin Roof?. I kept expecting Big Daddy to come into the room and say something like, ?What the heck are all these danged Italians doing in ma house!?

I can?t seem to find TCM on my satellite receiver right now. All I can find are a bunch of ?70s and ?80s films. Anyway, I?m watching a DVD of ?Flying Down to Rio?. Great music!

I suggest: "Gone With the Wind" "Citizen Kane" and "The Third Man"

I don?t know about the difference between the theatrical and DVD versions. I was commenting bout the ?white guy? remark. A white Anglo gentile guy in the ?50s would not have called Columbus a ?white guy?.

You are correct.

Also, an early term in pre-codes for ?doing it? was ?something happened?. You?ll hear this in an early Cagney movie regarding his brother and his grilfriend. Also in ?Rain?. Joan Crawford says it. Also in ?It Happened one Night.? That?s exactly what the title of that film means, and it did ?happen? on the last night shown in the film. This term seems to have gone out of style in films by the end of the ?30s.

What I think would help all film noir fans is if someone would study ?The Big Sleep? and write out an outline of all the characters and their relationships with each other. I think that would make this film less confusing. There are characters mentioned several times in this film who we never ever see, and I keep getting them mixed up with other characters. I?m so confused now, I?m not sure if I should be the one to make out the outline.

I saw a movie on TCM recently titled ?The Black Book?. This is the British title for ?Reign of Terror?, 1949, with Robert Cummings and Arlene Dahl. She had the most beautiful smile in this film. In one scene, both the cameraman and the editor held this one close-up of her smiling for an unusually long time. I used to be a documentary cameraman and editor, and occasionally I would hold a scene for an unusually long time, especially if I caught an unusually beautiful smile on a woman or a guy or a little kid. It is scenes like this that people in the audience remember forever, even though the ?unusually long time? might only be 8 seconds. But this is 8 seconds that will go into the mind?s memory banks and stay there forever. In style, the movie was a ?film noir? type of film, but set during the French Revolution. The sleazy dives and back alleys were in Paris circa late 17-hundreds.

I like the scene in ?The Lady from Shanghai? where the taxi driver almost hits Welles driving the carriage and he yells something at Welles like, ?Hey Mack! Get that nag outta here!? I also like to see Rita Hayworth driving that 1948 Lincoln Continental convertible.

I loved Lucy and Desi in ?The Long Long Trailer?. It is so true to life, regarding husbands and wives trying to drive any unusual or large vehicle under adverse conditions. I also remember my mother and father trying to dive on the narrow two-lane highways in the high Rocky Mountains in Montana in the late 1940s. LOL. And me trying to push my car while my wife was in the driver?s seat trying to start it. LOL. Of course, we are divorced now.

I think Mitchum played a small role in "Thirty Seconds over Tokyo".

There have been reports here about this from other people who have cable. I have Direct TV satellite and I have not had these problems. Are you in snow country? Your local cable company might have trouble receiving some satellites during rain or snow. When it snows on my own little satellite dish, I get break-up and then nothing. That's how I know it is snowing late at night. I have to go out in the cold in my pajamas and wipe the snow off my dish.

Ok, I found my January movie list. I think the film was ?Air Force?, 1943, with John Garfield.

I can?t remember the name of the film. It was about a bomber crew that had to head toward the Philippines right after Pearl Harbor. I think that?s the film with a little dog in it and the crew of the bomber got stuck on some island trying to repair their airplane and take off before the Japs overran the island. They finally made it. The fighter pilot was flying with them. Maybe someone else will remember the name of the movie.

?PSYCHO is one of my favorite films, but is there anyone online that saw this film when it came out in 1960? What were you thinking when the supposed protagonist was murdered half-way through the film?? I haven?t been able to take a shower since without locking my bathroom door.

I hope I?m not lynched for saying this, but I can?t stand Katharine Hepburn?s voice, or her. The only other worse voices and ?actresses? are Mercedes McCambridge and an older Joan Crawford.

To all, One of the problems with showing modern movies on TCM is that everyone will disagree about which modern movies they like the most, and what will ultimately result is the showing of more and more modern movies, in an attempt to please everyone and to get a maximum audience, and in the meantime all our classic old films will be shoved back on the shelf, never to be seen again, and then TCM will be exactly like TBS, TNT, AMC, and all the other modern-movie channels on TV. Once it degrades that far, THEN they will start inserting commercials in the movies, and there will be no more old classic movie channel on TV. My suggestion is that if modern movies we might like are available on the other channels, and are available for sale and available at the tape rental stores, we who like old classic movies need to lobby TCM to keep these easily-available films OFF of TCM. Why should I lobby TCM to show these modern films that I like: ?Wag the Dog,? ?Romy and Michele's High School Reunion?, and ?Selena?, if most other old-movie fans might not like those movies and when I can see them on other channels and I can rent them at Blockbuster or buy them at Wal-Mart for $5? It would be different if all the rare old classics were available on tape and DVD for rent or were shown on a lot of other channels, but they aren?t. Classic noir films like ?Stranger on the Third Floor? might be shown on TCM only once every 5 years, and if modern films are shown more, that means the old classics might never be shown again or maybe shown only once every ten years. There are a few modern films I watch on the other channels, but I would NOT like to see them shown on TCM because they have no historical value, they are NOT classic films in any way, and they most likely will not be liked by most old-movie fans. If some people like the modern ?Titanic? film (I do), they can get it from many sources other than TCM. But some people might like many old classics that are ONLY available from TCM. So I say let?s keep the modern films off of TCM since they are available elsewhere, and let TCM stick to showing older classics.

Hey, last night I watched a tape of ?Somewhere in the Night?. This is a pretty good noir film from 1946. I recommend it, although it is not shown on TCM very much. It?s about a guy (John Hodiak) who wakes up in a military hospital at the end of WW II, and he doesn?t know who he is. People call him George Taylor, but he?s never heard that name before. He spends the next hour and 40 minutes trying to find out who he is, and he gets robbed, beaten up, chased, and threatened by a bunch of crooked characters, and he doesn?t know why. Some beautiful dame (Nancy Guild) runs into him and decides to befriend him and fall in love with him. (Gee, why can?t that ever happen to me whenever I can?t remember who I am and when hoodlums beat me up and leave me dumped in a sewer by the docks?)

This DVD stuff is a little complicated today. There are several different DVD formats. I did a little research and I bought a recorder that uses several formats: DVD ?R, DVD R, DVD ? and RW, and DVD RAM. After reading the 84 page instruction booklet, I started out using DVD +R disks. They require a ?finalizing? process before they can be played on any other DVD player. I just go to the main menu and click on ?finalize? after I finish recording the disks, and that takes about 3 minutes. My ?finalized? disks will play on all DVD machines, including computer DVD drives. You might read the instructions of your recorder and your player and see if the disks you use are compatible. If I record onto a DVD +R disk but do not ?finalize? the disk, it won?t play on other machines. I?ve never used the other formats, so I don?t know how they would react to being played on other machines. I can record movies off of TCM either directly onto DVD or onto tape. I can copy the tape directly to my DVD machine. You might want to try playing your disks on some friend?s machine to see what happens.

Hey, I just remembered. There is at least one Japanese noir movie, titled ?Drunken Angel? by Akira Kurosawa, 1948, with Toshiro Mifune and Takashi Shimura. Mifune plays a local gangster who hassles people for money. He wears a white zoot suit. There are some nightclub scenes with Japanese dames singing American type jazz and jive music. Very good film.