renaissance man
I had a spell of being fascinated with a certain brand of gay porn, from the early ‘70s. Kansas City Trucking, in particular, which I came to – if you’ll pardon the expression – via its very funky intro music.
And thanks to this period of exploration I grew to know and love Jack Wrangler. I’d like to read his autobiography. But I doubt I will, as the only copies I’ve ever seen online are very expensive.
I’m typing this in bed, just having watched Bruce Almighty, round at Hannah’s. The film wasn’t the highlight of our visit, by a long shot. But it was fun, and I might as well review it here and now.
I have to admit that I do love Jim Carrey, and he’s pretty much the perfect actor for this role. Morgan Freeman, meanwhile, is surprisingly credible as God. And, whilst I’m not a big Jenifer Aniston fan, per se, as schmaltzy as her role here is, she does it well.
The titular Bruce (Carrey) is a self-obsessed narcissist, with a persecution complex, who presents the lighter side of the news for a TV station in Buffalo. It takes a brush with God (a Christian God, of sorts) to set him straight.
If, like me, you’re a devout rationalist and sceptic, a ‘humanist and free-thinker’, then the religious or ‘spiritual’ angles of this movie might grate somewhat. But that said, it’s still damnably funny, in places, and has, at its somewhat saccharine heart, a very positive and pleasant message.
If you take the whole religious perspective part with a big bag of salt, as I do, then what remains is still funny, engaging, thought provoking, and well made. Ironically, perhaps, some of the best moments are also some of the least devout, as when Bruce ‘possesses’ first Evan Baxter’s teleprompter, and then Evan’s body.
What I take away from this fun and sometimes very funny movie is not anything remotely theological. I won’t bother taking it apart in relation to that thread. What remains for me, after all the laughing and the tugging of heartstrings, is a reminder to be humble, grateful, thoughtful and generous, and to take personal responsibility for one’s own life, as opposed to wishing for what you don’t have, and taking for granted or not enjoying what you do have.
Anyway, prior to this, Teresa and I enjoyed a lovely smorgasbord type dinner with Hannah, Ali and Sofi. We shared a few tipples, and there was even ‘red velvet’ birthday cake, and a bit of singing, in honour of Teresa’s birthday (the day before).
The food was lovely. And Sofi put some lovely French sounding music on, which set the perfect mood: jazzy accordion, guitar and bass, mostly, in a mellow and sophisticated Parisian café vibe vein.
We watched a fair few Simpsons episodes as well. What terrific fun they are! They almost always touch on themes that can be enjoyed by both big and little kids, such as peer group anxieties in childhood, or ageing in relation to being cool, and how music can be a big part of that. Very relatable.
The Treehouse of Horror ones are particularly funny in a slightly macabre or twisted way. And in a similar (severed) vein, The Itchy & Scratchy Show segments are delightfully and disgustingly hilarious.
It’s very nice to be able to get away from home, and spend some simple humble quality time with family. And it’s gratifying to know that we get along so well and appreciate each others company. If only more of life could be like that!
We hadn’t planned or expected to stay the night. We probably should have. Anyroad, we are doing. And it’s lovely. Thanks Hannah, Ali, Sofi and Teresa what lovely ladies y’all are!
‘Here’s a little number I tossed off recently at the Academy…’ Brilliant! Such a funny little ditty.
This song, and esp’ the way it ends, also reminds me of a pithy little saying attributed to Robin Williams: *
‘See, the problem is that God gives men a brain and a penis, and only enough blood to run one at a time.’
* I’ve tried to find out where and when he allegedly said this (I’d previously thought it was either Woody Allen, or maybe even Jasper Carrott!), and – until I found the above video – the best I’d come up with is that he might’ve said it on stage: Live On Broadway (2002).
Pic
I haven’t been playing guitar at all, for ages. And my Yamaha CG-100A has been gathering dust, with a missing D-string, for way too long.
I canvassed opinion on FB, re the best choice for new strings, and D’Addario Pro Arte were clear favourites. Turns out these were what I used last time!
One thing that occurs to me is, given it’s usually the same string that snaps – namely the D – I ought to just get a few of those, individually.
This popped up on Goodreads when I checked in with that app today. A sound bit of advice that resonates down the ages.
A spot of borderline insomnia lead me to watch two horror films last night; Wes Craven’s The Last House On The Left (1972), and the much more recent X (2022), by Ti West.
I have to confess, I enjoyed them both. Craven’s much older film is pretty grim, and follows on ‘nicely’ from Death Wish, in a way, inasmuch as there’s a ‘revenge porn’ aspect.
I won’t synopsise either in any detail here, as there’s plenty of other places where one can read recapitulations of their plots. What they have in common are interlaced themes of sex and violence.
In Last House, which Craven purportedly based on Ingmar Bergman’s brilliantly dark Virgin Spring, we see youthful beauty and innocence destroyed, leading all-American parents to an orgy of violent retribution.
X, by contrast, follows a small film crew and their ‘talent’, set on making a porno flick, who wind up in hillbilly hell, a la Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Actress Mia Goth is both the lone surviving aspiring porn queen, and elderly psychotic murderess, Pearl.
Last House was considered an appalling shocker at the time. And, seen as an exemplar of the ‘video nasty’ phenomenon, was banned in the UK for decades. It all seems pretty tame now. Nasty at times. But massively eclipsed by far more graphic depravity in later years.
It is brutal, undoubtedly, as is X. But both also have some degree of a lighter, even humorous side, as well (esp’ the dumb-ass cop duo in Last House). And so it is that now we have indeed become rather inured to such violence and gore. Indeed, it’s assumed, and correctly so, that many viewers will revel in these once decried aspects.
Both of these films are, I would say, well shot and directed. X is the slicker of the two. And is actually quite beautiful visually at times. And both also manage to be cleverer than they might appear, at first glance.
The one theme that might elevate X above run of the mill horror is that of ageing, in relation to sex, beauty, etc. Sinister old wrinkly evil types aren’t anything new:
But depicting them as libidinous and sexually frustrated/active is a tad more unusual. And the pathos of a once beautiful Southern Belle turned murderous ol’ hag, does have aspects of poignancy, in addition to the more usual ‘yuck’ factor.
Anyway, whatever gets you through the night, as Lennon (and others) have sung… And last night that was, rather unexpectedly, horror movies!
Judged purely on quantity Woody Allen is very clearly my favourite film director. I currently have something in the region of 45 DVDs of his movies, films he appears in, or that are about him.
This blog entry is a place for me to keep track of the stuff by or with/about him, that I don’t yet have. That includes:
I have seen some of the above. And might even have one or two as digital downloads. But I don’t have them as part of my otherwise quite comprehensive Woody DVD collection. Sadly at present finances preclude expanding the collection!
The situation for me, is a bit like it is with Tom Waits; my favourite Waits stuff is everything up to about Rain Dogs/Frank’s Wild Years, maybe even Big Time? Thereafter Tom remains a great artist, but my passionate attachment to or love for his work fades somewhat.
With Woody he really gets going around the early ‘70s, and has a long wide purple patch running way into the 1980s, possibly even the ‘90s. But from the ‘noughties’ on, things have been more hit and miss.
There are occasional gems, like The Curse Of The Jade Scorpion, and Midnight In Paris. But after 1994’s terrific Bullets Over Broadway, I’m no longer compelled by his output, as I am in the years prior to that.
Based on a 1972 novel of the same name, Michael Winner’s 1974 movie met with a pretty high degree of disapproval on release.
I’ve long wanted to see it, very largely due to Herbie Hancock providing the musical soundtrack. But I’ve never gotten around to it. Until now.
And the funny thing is, by the time I got around to watching Death Wish, I’d actually forgotten Herbie did the music. So I’m watching it, and immediately I’m thinking ‘God damn it, this music’s unusually good!’
Rather unbelievably, to my mind, I have to ‘google it’… Oh, yeah, it’s the Herbmeister!
Personally I think it’s actually a pretty well made movie. Obviously made much better by the incredibly groovy music.
The basic idea, plot wise, is as old as the hills. After he is wronged, a man takes the law into his own hands. From Westerns galore, through to Clint and Sly Stallone, even more arthouse stuff, like Ingmar Bergman’s Virgin Spring, it’s a long established plot driver.
It’s possible to think that, without Herbie’s music, this might just be a rather workmanlike entry in that long established tradition. But I’m going to make a case for it being better than that.
Okay, so it is very ‘70s. But in good ways, I’d argue; gritty, urban, grim, yes. But there’s even an element of humour, with Bronson’s Paul Kersey character referencing the Western tradition, which this movie is very definitely a somewhat twisted modern heir to.
This is most obvious when Kersey challenges an assailant to ‘draw’, and again, when he asks Inspector Frank Ochoa (the stand in for the sheriff, played by Vincent Gardenia) if he needs to be out of town ‘by sundown’.
Charles Bronson is great as Kersey, the taciturn former CO (conscientious objector, as opposed to commanding officer) and Korean War medic, who snaps and turns vigilante, when his wife (played by Hope Lange) is murdered, and his daughter sexually assaulted, and left so traumatised she can’t function, in a home invasion mugging turned violent.
The film takes its time, building to the protagonists’ crossing the line. And Bronson’s Kersey is physically sick after his first rather impulsive slaying. Ochoa, ill and overweight, is nonetheless a resolute legal beagle. So the Western tradition and it’s heirs are somewhat subverted, in this grimmer modern urban ‘Wild East‘.
Personally I think this film is much more nuanced than its detractors, at the time of release, realised. Despite his brawny physique Bronson/Kersey isn’t typical leading man material, facially speaking. There’s even a depth to him that makes his role here quite beguiling.
And, as well as the self-deprecating awareness of the clichés it draws upon, there’s an interesting relationship with ideas that have become ever stronger with time, such as the media’s role in such things, and the vigilante as modern urban hero. I like how this idea is somewhat undermined when Kersey passes out, during his final ‘mission’ to clean up the streets of NY, near the end of the film.
Somehow – maybe it’s just chutzpah? – Death Wish walks a tightrope between being grossly clichéd and grittily realistic, in its depiction of contemporary urban grimness. The plot, acting, direction, and music all contribute to making a rather familiar idea quite refreshingly compelling and entertaining.
Perhaps the most strikingly dated things (for some another might be the music; but I love it!) are the hippy-bum-ne’erdowells. These are not ‘60s love and peaceniks, but the amoral dregs of a more Last Exit To Brooklyn type lineage.
The home invasion scene, which sets up the rest of the movie, really is nasty. The villains are repulsively trashy and amoral. Jeff Goldblum’s character in particular is an appalling avatar for the idea of modern urban youth as poisoned and toxic beyond redemption.
The book was, I’ve read, unequivocally anti-vigilante. The movie is, according to its detractors at the time, not just ambivalent, but unabashedly pro vigilantism. This scenario caused the author of the book to write a sequel, Death Sentence, clarifying or reinforcing the anti-violence message.
The movies meanwhile, would spawn a further series of films – six in all (so far!) – all of which are more blatantly exploitative of the longstanding tradition of retributive violence, as meted out by the lone man pushed too far.
The first three of these are all by Winner, and Bronson reprises his role as Kersey in all but the last, in which Bruce Willis stars (and Eli Roth directs). All of these remakes are, according to most critics, blatant ‘revenge porn‘.
I guess such folk do have a case that even this original film version certainly leans that way. But as critic John DeFore noted, the later iterations make the original ‘look philosophical by comparison’.
All told, a very watchable and – I found – enjoyable movie. The cherry on top? Herbie’s fabulous soundtrack.
Having invested in a load of fancy ring binders and wallets, for some of our DVD collection, which has grown way too space consuming, it’s taken me many years to finally get round to cataloguing what’s in these folders, and trying to impose some kind of order on the inchoate mass.
There are currently 18 of these folders. Eleven are general movies of all sorts, with Hitchcock and Woody Allen both very well represented. Teresa collecting the former, me the latter. Then there are the remaining folders, some of which house a good chunk of my war movie collection, with other covering music, comedy, documentary, etc.
Cataloguing all this stuff is proving very labour intensive and time consuming! I think that as well as having web pages like this, I’ll also do PDF catalogues, for both print and digital storage. Don’t want to lose all this work!
Other movie folders include several dedicated to war films, and some dedicated to comedy, documentaries and music, as separate categories. Folders 1-11 (probably twelve soonish?) are just general movies.
Boxed sets and individual/loose DVDs will also be getting catalogued. As soon as time allows!
Sorting the 11 folders I just did took a lot longer than anticipated. I started around 2-3pm, yesterday, and I’m just finishing now, at midday Sunday. And I’ve been working on it solid between those two times. I’d estimate it’s taken about 14-16 hours!!!