Category Archives: Movies

WordPress Planetarium Software and 21 Grams

In case you hadn’t noticed it, WordPress has evidently installed a planetarium software over-ride here with the stars speeded up and going across the blog north-to-south instead of horizontally.  I’ve no idea why.

After they filmed the scene from the movie 21 grams at the motel next door to where I lived in Grants, New Mexico, I got the job of helping to clean up the site afterward.  While I watched them finish things up I saw wossname, Sean Penn smoking the cigar above and leave it in this ashtray.

Those folks left a hell of a mess.

But being the sort of guy I am, I emptied those butts into a baggie and stored them away for whatever future use I could put them to.  That’s bound to be an expensive cigar and I always figured on smoking it on down, but I could never build up the certainty I’d advanced to that level of risk level yet.  Whatever’s on that cigar always seemed to me potentially more lethal than whatever I’ve already got and don’t know about.

But I’ve digressed.  What I wanted to say is, “DAMN those movie people are a messy bunch.”

That, and, “Why don’t WordPress stars move horizontally across the screen like normal stars?”

Old Jules

Brewster McCloud – A Strange and Memorable Movie

I watched this movie repeatedly in theaters when it came out in 1970, always remembered it, but never came across it again.  Four decades later I still have vivid recollections of certain scenes and a general impression it’s one of the best movies I’ve ever seen.

  

 

I’ve no idea whether I’d still like it today, no idea whether seeing it again would inspire me to think of all of it as still as somehow haunting and valid to the human experience as I once did.

 

Watching the trailer brought back some reminders of scenes, but it somehow failed to capture whatever it was that captured me.

In some subtle ways my mind connects Brewster McCloud with Balzac’s Droll Stories.  A multi-layered plotting capable of being enjoyed for the surface stream hilarity, but containing something fundamental, profound and pervasive about the human condition.

If you’ve watched this movie recently enough to recall it better than I do, or if you should see it after reading this, I’d be interested in learning how it sits with you.

Old Jules

Best Quick and Dirty Movie Scenes Ever – Baggage Check

There’s a strange logic here:

Life’s full of choices of this sort but we rarely recognize them.

 

There are several of these, difficult to pick one over another:

We’ve probably all experienced this thing with a pesky fly.

 

This one’s in a class all its own

 

I still have a vivid recollection of seeing this for the first time 60 years ago and wanting to get under my seat at the theater.

 

These two scenes almost belong in the same movie.  Chilling.

 Cabaret – Tomorrow Belongs to Me – “Do you think you can control them?”

http://youtu.be/3EE_BoCw9zk

 Panzerlied (Battle of the Bulge with english intro)  “Too young!  They’re too young!”

http://youtu.be/8JDkdc246QQ

Zulu – The final attack – A brief history of the European conquest of everywhere else.  “They don’t have any tenors among them.  That’s for sure.”

It all sort of runs together:  “Tell your sweetheart not to pine, to be glad her boy’s in line.”

Yankee Doodle Dandy http://youtu.be/2R1jiVcIGcg

Patton – “At least you’ll be able to tell them you didn’t spend it shovelling shit in Louisiana.”

 

Followed by this:

Network – Mad as Hell Scene  – “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore!”

 

Cool Hand Luke – “I don’t care if it rains or freezes.”

 

Treasure of Sierra Madre – “Badges?  We don’t nee no stinkin badges

http://wwyoutubehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGcVhoHdRFow.youtube.com/embed/MsVi2RqE7ek

North by Northwest – Climbing the American ladder of success

 

The Alamo – “When I was a boy any girl would turn up a bunch of trees like that, cut a bunch down and one for a ridge pole and build herself a cabin alongside the other.  Seems like all anyone would ever need.”

 

The Outlaw Josie Wales parleys with 10 Bears - “Dying ain’t so hard for people like you and me.  It’s living that’s hard.  Governments don’t live here.  It’s people who live here.  I’m saying people can live here together without butchering one another.”

 

Amazing Synopsis

Have you ever considered how much time, energy, money and lousy grades could be avoided if world history could be summarized for the kiddos into videos lasting a few minutes?  For instance, consider the European conquests of Africa, the American continents, and India.  The chillerns spend all kinds of time having to memorize the nigglingest details and names the teachers can’t even pronounce.  Pizzzzarrro.  Montezooooma.  Courtessss.   Geroneeemo.  Krazyhorse.  Not to mention the even worse ones in Africa and India.

But the hilarious fact is that all that isn’t needed.  All those books didn’t need to be printed.  All those names and dates didn’t need to be memorized to understand the basics of the European conquests of more-primitive geography.

Here it is.  The incredible 4 minute 56 second summary of the European conquest of Africa, the Americas and India:

If the video doesn’t play the link below should work:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1csr0dxalpI

Those kids can now go back to playing on the computers with a total understanding of the history of their ancestors.

I’m going to search around to try finding some more good summaries of other hard-to-remember history.

Old Jules