Tag: Marlon Brando

Tomorrow Belongs to Me

Ah, Cabaret.

I first became aware of this movie from commercials on television, and it looked very weird to young Greg. I had no idea what the movie was about, other than it was a musical; starred Liza Minnelli; also had the gorgeous Michael York in the cast; and seemed to be set in old pre-Nazi Germany. It also came out in the same year as The Godfather, which sucked all the air out of the year when it comes to film. I had also read that book that year because of the movie…which also got me interested in Marlon Brando, which is a whole other entry. (Not to mention the sex scenes, which were really confusing in a lot of ways…especially Lucy Mancini’s over-large vagina.) But Liza was everywhere that year, too–every talk show, had her own special “Liza with a Z”, magazine covers and newspapers and periodicals like you wouldn’t believe.

I had no clue what the plot was, other than decadence and debauchery?

I remember asking a friend that year if she knew what Cabaret was about–her parents were European immigrants from after the war; her father was Czech and mother German–and she told me her parents had seen it and her mother said, “It’s all about homosexuals”, which naturally got me incredibly interested in the movie. I finally saw it several years later when it aired on television, but everything queer was sliced out of the movie and it was disjointed and didn’t make a lot of sense, so I thought well, that was shit, how did it win all those Oscars?

Because of course, all the queer stuff has been excised from the movie; the movie was basically castrated and to me, seemed like nothing more than a vehicle to move the movie along to the next musical number–many musicals are like this, so I really didn’t understand what the big deal was about this one.

A few years later, I caught the original uncut version on HBO…and have been a fan ever since.

Cabaret never should have been sold to television for airing because it had to be gutted to make it ready for prime time. I only hope no one involved with the film saw that version of it, but it really was a desecration.

By the time I saw the movie as Bob Fosse originally intended it to be seen, I had become aware of the source material: Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood, an autobiographical novel about his experiences in Weimar Berlin and witnessing the rise of the Nazis–and how their malevolence was poisoning German society and culture. It had been adapted for the stage by John Van Druten as I Am a Camera (which is the opening sentence of the second paragraph of the book), and the play was also filmed, starring Julie Harris, who may have played Sally on stage, too. I Am a Camera was adapted into the musical Cabaret, but significant changes were made from the stage version of the musical in adapting it for the screen–and the screen adaptation also wound up causing the stage version to revised, remodeled, and reinvented as well. (And to make things even more confusing, Isherwood later wrote a memoir about that time period in Berlin called Christopher and His Kind, which was also filmed.)

I had not seen the earlier film, nor had I read the book when I saw the uncut version of Cabaret.

And you really couldn’t go wrong casting Michael York in the 1970s. Stunningly handsome, and that velvety voice that just dripped syrup.

I mean, really. I think this is from Something for Everyone, which is a great, little-known queer movie also starring Angela Lansbury! (There’s a watchable version uploaded to Youtube, but the sound and picture quality isn’t great.)

I rewatch the film every now and then. I went through an Isherwood phase in the late 90’s/early aughts, when I read everything he wrote, and I enjoyed them all. And when I see some political movements today (hello, MAGAts!), Cabaret is never far from my mind.

It’s astonishing that the film was even made, given that homosexuality was still considered a mental illness in 1972, and the film didn’t judge. It simply presented these alternative sexualities as normal, and while the times themselves weren’t normal, there was also a very strong sense that the Weimar period–which is endlessly fascinating, which is one of many reasons I love Babylon Berlin so much–that filled the German political vacuum between the wars wasn’t very different from the twenties everywhere else, either; a time when the society and culture rejected the old, more conservative times that led to the first war, and everyone just wanted to have a good time because so much was misery. (I often wonder how much the American Stock Market crash of 1929 had to do with the rise of fascism in Germany; it was the economy, after all, that really caused the problems, and wasn’t the global economy heavily impacted by the collapse of Wall Street? We never realize how what happens in our country affects the rest of the world, because the United States is just as narcissistic as the convicted felon the Republicans are running.)

But the underlying message of Cabaret is one that is hard to miss: that living in your own bubble and ignoring the world outside is precisely how garbage like the Nazis rise to power…the assumption that someone else will do something to take care of it, and we’ll just keep having fun. In the late 1980s and early 1990s I thought we as a country we’re headed down that path; the unholy marriage between the right wing and evangelical christianity (I will never capitalize that C because cults don’t deserve that respect) certainly made it very clear to me that there was a very large segment of the American population that would be more than happy to put all racialized people and queer people into death camps. (I even started toying with the idea for a novel about that very thing; I still think about that idea A LOT, and even more so since 2016–which is also when I started rewatching Cabaret again on a more regular basis. Cabaret, and Bob Fosse’s vision of what it should be, was very powerful; and it changed the face of what movie musicals looked like and could be, and has influenced stage and screen musicals ever since. It’s a stunningly shot film, and now I can say that I understand why Fosse won the Oscar instead of Francis Ford Coppola for The Godfather; both films are masterpieces, but Cabaret was more “showy,” and that always wins over diligent and detailed craft.

And no, the movie isn’t “all about homosexuals”–even though there’s a minor character who is a trans woman; the main character is gay and bi-curious, and Max, Sally’s other love interest, is also bi and sleeps with them both cheerily. That was VERY avant-garde attitude to have in a 1972 Hollywood movie made for American audiences.

I wonder how seeing it on the screen in 1972 might have impacted me? But I also can’t imagine my mother and sister sitting through it, either.

Cabaret is a must-see if you’re interested in queer film–or great American cinema, for that matter. And I will judge you for not seeing it. In fact, I’m doing that right now.

The Man of Metropolis Steals Our Hearts

I have always loved Superman, ever since I accidentally pressed the wrong button on the comic book vending machine at the Jewel Osco on Pulaski Avenue in Chicago as a child and got Action Comics instead of the Betty and Veronica I wanted. I was disappointed, and asked my mom for some more change so I could get what I actually wanted, which was when my mom decided to teach me a valuable life lesson: if you hurry and don’t pay attention you won’t get what you want–and sometimes that’s the end of it. So always, always make sure you’re picking the right thing. (I still do, to this day, and whenever I “forget” and rush–it inevitably ends badly.)

I wasn’t happy about it, but made the best of it. I had a comic book, after all, and while I had never shown any interest in super-heroes and their comics before, I decided to read it when I got home.

Once I did, I was done with the Archie and the world of Riverdale for good. I started reading DC Comics–I already knew about Batman from the television show, which we watched every week with its epic cartoonish campiness–and all the other titles that involved Superman even if only in a peripheral way. Both Jimmy Olson and Lois Lane also had their own titles, there were at least three titles alone devoted to Superman, and of course, Justice League of America. There was a Superboy title, too, and of course we can’t forget Linda Danvers, Supergirl. I read them all, and finally stopped buying them when they reached the (to me then) insane price of a dollar per issue. But I never lost my sentimental attachment to DC Comics and their heroes. I was also terribly bummed when the peripheral titles, like Superboy, Jimmy Olson–Superman’s Pal, and Superman’s Girlfriend, Lois Lane–were cancelled. For the most part, Lois’ adventures that didn’t involve Superman–when she was actually doing her job as an investigative reporter–often involved her in mysteries she had to solve, which were a lot more interesting to me than her schemes to expose Clark as Superman, or to get Superman to marry her. The old television series, with George Reeves, was often shown in reruns on alternative non-network local channels, and while I of course watched, I was kind of disappointed with how bad and cheap the effects looked. Batman’s television show was campy, of course, and highly entertaining–but campy. Wonder Woman was also campy and cheesy, but had Lynda Carter, who personified both the super-hero and her alter-ego, Diana. (When I was watching Superpowered: The DC Story the other night Carter said something I thought was very perceptive and explained thoroughly her role on the show: “I didn’t play them as separate characters–I just played her as Diana, the Amazon Princess, with a strong belief in equality and that there’s a better way than fighting.”)

So, when they Superman movie was announced sometime in the mid-1970’s, I knew I’d go see it, but didn’t have a lot of high hopes. But the tagline was fantastic.

You’ll believe a man can fly.

I think I was at the theater, waiting to watch either The Deer Hunter or Animal House, when they played the preview for the upcoming December release Superman The Movie, starring Christopher Reeve and Margot Kidder (among many other major names in supporting roles–from Marlon Brando to Gene Hackman to Ned Beatty to Valerie Perrine). I knew they were making the movie, and I had allowed myself to get a little excited about it as a Superman fan. I’d always found previous Superman adaptations–mostly the television show–to be so inexpensively done that it was almost comical. But special effects had been changed forever by the one-two punch of 1977’s Star Wars and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and I also knew they were spending a LOT of money on this adaptation, so when the screen and theater went dark, and you just heard a voice saying “You’ll believe a man can fly” and then…there he was, flying. I caught my breath because it looked so real. And when Christopher Reeve turned his face to the camera, smiled, saluted and somehow got his eyes to twinkle, I also knew the movie was perfectly cast. I couldn’t wait for the movie to finally open (I think I also saw the sequel on its opening weekend), and yes, when it finally came to the Petite Twin Theater (apparently still there? No, no movie theater on Commercial Street anymore, alas) I saw it on that first weekend.

I’ve always loved Superman, and Christopher Reeve was fantastic in the part; the bar every actor who puts on the suit has to clear.

Obviously, the recent announcement that David Corenswet has been cast to play Clark/Superman in the new reboot of the film franchise, replacing Henry Cavill, has me thinking about Superman again. I was very pleased, frankly, when Cavill was originally cast; I’d first noted him playing Charles Brandon on The Tudors and thought, “that is one fine-ass man.” I thought he was the perfect choice to play the dual roles of Clark and Superman; he is drop dead gorgeous, for one, and his eyes have the ability to twinkle when he smiles and the dimples? Just take me now, Henry.

Mr. Cavill fills out the suit rather nicely, does he not?

The Henry Cavill version of Superman, which followed on the heels of a failed reboot with Brandon Routh (who returned to the televised DC Universe–the Arrowverse–in Legends of Tomorrow. I always felt bad for Routh, who I didn’t think got a fair break, either), wasn’t the best interpretation of the character but that wasn’t Cavill’s fault; that was the vision of the director and writers and the studio; and while I think I can understand the need to update Superman, the need to darken his story a la The Dark Knight 1980’s Batman reboot was a mistake. Superman is the World’s Biggest Boy Scout; he stands for hope and truth and all those things we used to believe embodied the United States; if anything, Superman was the personification of the idea of American exceptionalism.

David Corenswet certainly has the right look for the part; he’s from the Ryan Murphy stable of dark-haired blue-eyed square jawed hunks who regularly appear on his television series. I first saw Corenswet in The Politician, and then again in Hollywood. I found the following fan art through a Google search, as there are no available official images of him as the Big Blue Boy Scout. James Gunn’s vision for the DC Universe is one I am interested in seeing; while I didn’t enjoy the second and probably won’t watch the third (I’ve come to detest everything about Chris Pratt over the last few years), I did think the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie was pitch-perfect for a popcorn super-hero type movie.

But I do hope they move away from the dark broodiness of the Cavill version. I enjoyed them (and love Henry Cavill for reasons that should be obvious; look at the posted picture above again), but they didn’t feel right for Superman movies. The underlying theme and element of all the Superman stories is his positive energy and determination to protect people from harm and most importantly, lead by example. One of the core elements of the original Superman series (before the first of many DC reboots of their universe) was that Superman’s most sacred vow was that he would never take a life, no matter who or how much they deserved death. That didn’t matter to Superman, whose pursuit of justice was limited to capturing the bad guys and turning them over to the judicial system. It wasn’t his job to determine justice and punishment.

I keep hearing good things about the animated DC movies and series, but have yet to really watch any of them. I don’t know why I have this automatic resistance to animated super-hero shows/movies; I love Disney animation, and there are literally hours of DC animated entertainment available for streaming. I’d been hearing good things about a new DC animated series on MAX called My Adventures with Superman, so while I was waiting for Paul the other night (and was tired of LSU football highlight videos) I decided to give My Adventures with Superman a chance.

Constant Reader, I am so glad I did.

The show is utterly charming. It’s very well animated, for one–Clark/Superman is handsome, which is weird to say about a cartoon–and it’s refreshingly well-written with more emphasis on the characters and who they are, as well as their relationships with each other, over the adventure aspects of it, which makes it all the more likable and enduring. The premise is that Clark, Lois, and Jimmy Olson are all interns at the Daily Planet; Clark and Jimmy are just starting, and Lois is given the job of breaking them in and showing them the ropes. Lois is ambitious and determined to become a star reporter, and her impetuosity and ambition quickly leads them all into trouble–not only with the bad guys, but with Perry White back at the paper. Fortunately, Clark is, well, Superman, so all turns out for the best and Lois gets the scoop of all time: there’s a super-man amongst us! Which gets all three of them hired on staff. Clark is exactly the way he should be: kind, thoughtful, empathetic, a little bit shy–and the cold open of episode 1, which has young Clark suddenly discovering that he can, actually, fly; and his excitement and wonder at discovering this sudden new ability slowly begins to fade–imagine learning at age ten or eleven that you have super-powers–and he begins to wonder not only who he is, but what he is….then after the opening credits it flashes forward to Metropolis and Clark and Jimmy–roommates–getting ready for their first day as interns. The chemistry between the three of them–truly the Holy Trinity of the Superman stories is Clark, Lois and Jimmy (it’s so nice to see Jimmy Olson finally getting something to do and being included as something more than just a bit part, which is a nice nod to Superman history), and I am really looking forward to watching more of it.

And the art is fantastic.

Well done, DC. I hope this series lasts and is a hit–and I hope James Gunn is watching so he can see how to do the Big Blue Boy Scout properly.

I Would Have Loved You Anyway

And suddenly, it’s Friday again: WEEKEND EVE!!!!

Late September is a gift Mother Nature gives to New Orleans; one that’s kind of owed to us after the brutality of a normal New Orleans summer. I greatly enjoyed my walk Wednesday afternoon, and walking to the gym after work yesterday was equally marvelous. The gym workout felt incredible; my muscles had clearly been aching to be worked and stretched, and they feel absolutely wonderful this morning. My creativity is slowly coming back–the walk on Wednesday kind of kick-started it all; and I’ve been having a lot of thoughts about this upcoming new series book I have to write, that I am looking forward to writing. First and foremost, as with all my books set in New Orleans, it needs to be more about New Orleans than what I’ve already written on it; I think I am going to spend some time over the next few days revising and rewriting those first four or five chapters to get more of a “New Orleans” feel to them; I think that’s what is missing and why I feel so dissatisfied with them.

I definitely need to reread them, at any rate.

I also need to reread and edit the first three chapters of Chlorine; I’d like to get chapter four written this weekend as well as–if not an actual outline for the rest of the book, than at least– a working synopsis of how it all is going to come together in the end. I am very behind and i need to start getting caught up, even if that means no more lazing around in my easy chair watching documentaries from the BBC/Odyssey about ancient Egypt with a bizarre British Egyptologist/historian with raspberry colored hair as the star–but the woman clearly loves not only history but all things Egypt, so it is very difficult to not get caught up in her enthusiasm about her subject. Each documentary is about an hour, and I’ve not been watching them in order; I’ve watched the one about Amenhotep III and the Armana revolution, as well as the one about the foreign conquerers, leading eventually to the final recognized dynasty of pharaohs, the Ptolemies–who fascinate me; there’s so much more there than the story of the final and most famous Cleopatra (yes, she’s fascinating, but I’ve long been more interested in her sisters/rivals, Berenice and Arsinoë).

I also watched, for the very first time, the original film of The Postman Always Rings Twice, which, surprisingly enough, I’d never seen. I’ve never really been much of a Lana Turner fan (I’ve never had a lot of respect for her as an actress–certainly in Peyton Place and Imitation of Life she never seemed to inhabit her characters and simply followed her director’s orders) and I’ve never really thought she was all that pretty; there was always something artificial about her to me–though the body was definitely stunning. The costume designer was incredibly smart in putting her always into white ensembles, that went with the stiff white hair, and John Garfield was pretty good as the homicidal, lovesick drifter; he had the right “beaten around by life” lived-in look that was perfect for the character. Cecil Kellaway as Cora’s husband was the best performance in the film, really; he stole every scene he was in, but was the movie progressed Turner seemed less stiff and mannered, and Garfield’s performance of a man so driven mad by lust and love that he would cold-bloodedly murder Cora’s husband to be with her (Body Heat was often compared to Double Indemnity, but I think it’s more like Postman, in all honesty). I also felt the changes to the script and to the ending actually worked better than in the book (same with Double Indemnity and Mildred Pierce, even though I love Cain as a writer). I also couldn’t help thinking, as I watched, what Marlon Brando or Montgomery Clift could have done with the role of the drifter, and Marilyn Monroe could have done with Cora. (Dream casting: filmed in 1954 with Brando and Monroe; with Karl Malden as the husband–what a film that would have made!) But it’s a very good movie, very well done, and I greatly enjoyed it; it’s definitely a classic. I’ve never seen the remake with Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange, but what a terrific version could be made today, starring someone like Robert Pattinson along with Margot Robbie or Rosamund Pike.

It also got me thinking about noir again, and what fun it is to write, plot, and think about; as well as got me thinking about Laura Lippman’s marvelous Sunburn and everything by Megan Abbott.

I’ve also been, since my walk the other day, thinking about my noir story about the condos built recently on my street, “Condos for Sale or Rent” and so maybe I can squeeze in the time to work on it a bit this weekend…

Big dreams, as always, but at least I am thinking in terms of getting things written again, which is a big step in the right direction.

We also finished watching season two of The Other Two, which is fantastic and has one of the best, most honest and realistic gay characters–struggling actor Cary Dubek–that I’ve ever seen on television. The premise of the season finale–Cary takes a photo of his butthole to send to a potential Grindr hook-up, only he has his camera on LIVE rather than PHOTO, and the little LIVE feature means you can not only see his face at the beginning but you can also hear the flight announcements (he does it in the First Class bathroom on a flight from New York to LA)…and it kind of goes viral. It’s hilarious, and the fact that this is the primary STORY for the gay character in a TV show (granted, it’s HBO MAX) had me impressed for the writers’ willingness to go there, but how fucking funny it all turned out to be.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines, and a happy Friday to all.

Blow

Good morning, Sunday, how are YOU doing?

I overslept (for me) again this morning; which felt nice; I’ll take oversleeping over insomnia any day of the week, frankly, and this morning I am going to swill coffee, read some more of S. A. Cosby marvelous Razorblade Tears, and then will write for a while before going to the gym later on in the early afternoon. I still haven’t gotten phô yet–maybe next weekend I can make to the Lilly Cafe and finally get some.

Yesterday saw me relaxing and organizing and cleaning for most of the day, at an incredibly casual pace–so casual, of course, that I didn’t get everything finished that I wanted to get finished (natch); but progress was made and I will always take some progress over not making any. I finished writing Chapter 2 of Chlorine yesterday, also setting up Chapter 3 to be written for today (after some reviewing of Chapters 1 and 2 before getting started on that today). I like that I am starting to feel connected to this manuscript; it’s finally taken root in my head and all the other considerations about it no longer matter to me other than the two most important: that I finish writing it, and that i write the best book I possibly can.

The whole Chlorine thing is remarkably improbable about how it came to be in the first place. I’ve always wanted to write about 1950’s Hollywood and the gay closet/underground that existed there; it was an incredibly turbulent time, with television stealing film audiences, HUAC investigating Communists, and J. Edgar Hoover at the FBI going after gay men and lesbians. It was also during this time that the biggest closeted movie star perhaps in Hollywood history, Rock Hudson, came to success–and there were plenty of other closet cases on the headlining pictures with their names above the title: Montgomery Clift and Tab Hunter–and plenty who may have been bisexual but definitely had experiences with men, like Marlon Brando, Anthony Perkins, James Dean, and so on. I idly wrote about this notion I had for a noir set during that time, with the main character a hustler with no talent but a lot of good looks and charm, that opens with another closeted actor’s nude, dead body being found in the morning on Santa Monica beach–only the drowning victim also had chlorine in his lungs, so he clearly drowned in a swimming pool and his body was moved. I riffed on this concept here on the blog for a little bit, and then thought nothing of it.

Yet Chlorine landed with my peers in the crime writing community for some reason–I got a lot of tweets and DM’s about what a great idea it was, and that I needed to write it. Some people continued pestering me about it, enough time and enough people, for me to go ahead and slot it into my writing schedule….but even then I kept putting it off and not taking it or myself seriously; was I the right person to write such a book? Is this interest in such a book even something that could turn into sales or whatever? You know, the usual self-doubt that plagues me on a daily basis. I sat down and wrote a very rough first chapter several years ago, just to see if I could get the tone right, and the voice properly done; I was rather pleasantly surprised with how it turned out, and so I put aside any thought of imposter syndrome and figured, okay, I CAN do this.

But the syndrome came again when the calendar time to write the book rolled around; I spent the last month or so writing anything but this manuscript…and finally sat down to revise and reshape that first chapter so that it set up the second even better, and I also had an idea of how to do the second as I worked on the first. It took me a few days, but I now have a very nice 3700 word second chapter written; and today I am going to work on writing the third. I wanted to wait until August and spend that entire month writing it, but finally decided that I was being decidedly un-confident, so while I still want to have the first draft finished by the end of August, I decided to go ahead and get started on it in the meantime. I still want to work on Scotty for the rest of the year, from September on, but there’s also a lot of other things I need to get done, so I need to stop being lazy and get my ass into my chair and writing.

We watched the Olympics some yesterday–I am amazed at the sports I couldn’t care less about most of the time but will watch avidly during an Olympics–but it again seems weird that there’s no audience or crowd…and this whole weird vibe these Olympics are giving off–no you smoked weed so you’re banned; you’re a serial sexual assaulter so we’ll make accommodations for you–has kind of tarnished the whole thing for me in some ways. There has always been cheating and stupidity at the Olympics (another example of how media has brainwashed us all into the mythology of the Olympics), but for some reason this year it seems more intolerable than usual. But I love watching the US swimmers–it’s weird without Michael Phelps in the pool–and I will undoubtedly watch more, especially the gymnastics.

But…..still.

I also figured out last night how to change a story I started writing at some point during the last decade and make it actually work–“The Brady Kid”–and while the new idea I have for it may not work after all, it’s an interesting idea for a story and something I definitely want to try writing.

And on that note, Razorblade Tears is calling me, and so it’s off to the spice mines for a bit to read, swill coffee, and prepare to start writing.

Ecstasy

It’s gray again this morning in New Orleans, and I have about six boxes of books to take to the library sale today. I also have five or six boxes of condom packs that will have to go back to the office on Monday; which, I suppose, is the easiest way to say that my living room currently looks incredibly cluttered and desperately in need of organizing and cleaning and so forth. I also have a lot of errands to do–the mail, groceries, etc. and need together to the gym today as well. I would also like to get some writing done today–at least a revision of a short story or something–so tomorrow I can primarily focus on the edits of Bury Me in Shadows….and maybe do a bit on Chlorine as well.

I was ridiculously productive yesterday–as mentioned before, I really did a great job of paring down the books last night while laundering the bed linens; Paul was out having dinner with a roommate for college (who was indirectly responsible for our meeting, actually) and so while I watched Smithsonian documentaries on World War II (The Battle of Midway, The Battle of Okinawa, The Fall of Japan, Normandy: 85 Days After D-Day) Started going through the boxes of books I have cleverly concealed beneath blankets so they sort of look like tables, in way, with more books and decor on top of them (we have far too much bric-a-brac in this house, seriously), and when Paul got home we watched the second part of the Aaron Hernandez documentary. (I think perhaps the saddest thing–other than the victims, of course–was how exploited he was for his ability; he was clearly trouble at the University of Florida, so they covered for him for three years and once they’d gotten their use out of him, told him he wasn’t welcome back on the team for his senior year and to enter the draft early; as soon as he was arrested and charged the Patriots–and their fans–turned their backs on him immediately as did their fans…which tells me everything I needed to know about how his coaching staff and teammates felt about him–that was an almost lightning like 180, and considering how many other players have committed crimes and not been abandoned….and while murder is pretty extreme, of course, they clearly knew there were issues there and yet no one did anything.)

I also watched two movies yesterday while making condom packs, and both were kind of terrible. The first, The Getaway, starring Steve McQueen and Ali McGraw, was so unbelievably bad I came very close to turning it off numerous times, but figured you finished Carnal Knowledge, you can finish this. Directed by Sam Peckinpah, known for his violent and bloody films, and based on the novel by Jim Thompson (whom I’ve never read, and I need to correct that at some point), it basically is a dark story about a criminal whose wife gets him paroled by appealing to a corrupt businessman (with her body), so that they can commit a bank robbery and share the money with the businessman. Of course, there are all kinds of double crosses, and the bad guys are after them, as are the cops as well as one of their other accomplices they assumed was dead; there’s a weird subplot with him taking a veterinarian and his wife along with him on the chase for no reason (other than he’s banging the wife); interestingly enough, the vet is played by Howard fro The Andy Griffith Show and the wife/girlfriend (never clear) by Sally Struthers. It’s a mess, really; its only saving grace the chemistry between McQueen and MacGraw (who became involved) and that they are both ridiculously good looking; neither can act their way out of a paper bag (if they can. there’s no evidence of it here), and the score is also terrible and jarring. I know it was remade in the 90’s, I think; but as a noir film, or Neo-noir, it fails. I didn’t care about any of the characters and breathed a sigh of relief when the credits rolled. It’s a definite Cynical 70’s Film Festival entry; that was the time of the anti-hero and anti-establishment thinking…but I couldn’t help but think how much better the film would have been had it starred, say, Paul Newman and Ellen Burstyn, or Clint Eastwood and Natalie Wood, or even Robert Redford and Jane Fonda.

In fairness, they were done no favors by the script.

The second part of my double feature was John Huston’s Reflections in a Golden Eye, based on the Carson McCullers novel and boasting a cast including Elizabeth Taylor, Marlon Brando, Julie Harris and Brian Keith. I read the book several years ago and didn’t much care for it, to be honest–again, maybe I simply missed the point, but I didn’t care about any of the characters and that also translated into the film. There’s never any sense of why they do the things they do, and it’s kind of just a story about sexual hang-ups and frustrations, set around a military base somewhere in the South. Both Taylor and Brando sport really bad Southern accents, and Julie Harris is the only one who really pulls off her role–that of a sad woman who never got over the death of a child and has formed an unnatural attachment to her (incredibly racist and homophobic depiction of a) Filipino houseboy. She also apparently cut off her nipples with garden shears; she’s clearly not well, and yet all around her no one, especially her husband (Brian Keith), who’s sleeping with Elizabeth Taylor. Taylor is married to Brando, who chews the scenery at every opportunity (as I watched I couldn’t stop thinking considered the greatest actor of his generation, wow) who is an extremely repressed gay man who becomes obsessed with a young enlisted man who likes to ride horseback in the nude as well as lay out in the sun in the nude. The enlisted man is obsessed, in his turn, with Taylor, breaking into their house at night and watching her sleep while he paws through her underwear and nightgowns, sniffing them but never touching her. Brando becomes convinced the young man feels the same attraction to him, and at the end, sees the young man sneaking up to the house in the dark out a window. Thinking the young man is coming to him, he becomes enraged when he sees the young man–Elgee–sneak into his wife’s room, so he gets a gun and shoots him dead. The credits roll as Elizabeth Taylor screams. The movie is pretty true to the book, which kind of goes to show how not every book needs to be made into a movie. Most of the book is internal, which doesn’t translate to film very well–and I didn’t much care for the book. The movie could have been good–great cast after all–but overall, it fall flat for much the same reasons The Getaway did; I couldn’t muster up even a little bit of investment in any of the characters, other than Julie Harris, who is the only one who comes across well in the film. It did make me want to revisit the novel again, though, so that’s something. And while this is from 1968 or 1969, I do include it in the Cynical 70’s Film Festival–as there were many films in the late 1960’s that actually began what I consider the cynical period in American film, where the heroes were now who would have been the villains under the old Hays Code–neither Bonnie and Clyde nor The Graduate (both from 1967) could have been made under the code; certainly Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966) couldn’t have been.

I may have to take a break from the Cynical 70’s Film Festival for a bit. The last three films were terrible, and while I am kind of glad I saw them–always wanted to–I don’t know if I can stand watching another dated bad movie.

Maybe it’s time to go back to the Halloween Horror Film Festival.

And since I finished The Man with the Candy, now it’s time to pick something new to read. I came across a copy of Dan Jenkins’ Semi-Tough, of all things, while pruning the books. I read it when I was a teenager, along with Peter Gent’s North Dallas Forty, which are two completely different books about the same subject: pro football. Semi-Tough is comic; North Dallas Forty (which I preferred) is dark and almost noirish; the two books came up in conversation on Twitter recently; someone tweeted asking for people’s favorite sports film. I responded with Brian’s Song, and Laura Lippman professed her love for North Dallas Forty. I would really like to revisit the Gent novel and was also thinking I should reread the Jenkins; so having it turn up while pruning the books seemed to me like a sign. I’ll probably hate it–just looking at the first page there are some racial slurs already, and there’s nothing I hate more than the contract sumbitch, which was prevalent in the 1970’s; in theory, it’s how Southern people say “son of a bitch” with their accent. It annoyed me because everyone in my family, excepting my sister (and her children and grandchildren) and I, has a very thick accent…and not one of them ever says sumbitch. It became extremely popular in the 1970’s because Jackie Gleason, playing a corrupt Southern sheriff, says it all the time in Smoky and the Bandit…and I’ve always hated it, and never minded that it went gently into that dark night and no one bothers with it anymore. Being reminded of it sets my teeth on edge, frankly.

I may not, in fact, be able to get through the book. I know it’s meant to be funny and satirical, but….I just opened it at random and the narrator was talking about how it’s very important that we understand that he’s white because most running backs aren’t and….

Yeah.

I can only imagine the misogyny. Sigh.

All right, I need to get this mess under control so I can get everything done. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader.

Me!

Hey there, Saturday! It’s gray and raining here in New Orleans, which explains why I slept so deeply and well last night–there’s really nothing like the sound of rain to put me to sleep. (I wish it would rain every night, quite frankly.)

I didn’t write at all yesterday. After I finished work I went to the gym and did my workout, then came home and was quite tired, both physically and mentally. I repaired to the easy chair with a bottle of Sunkist (I’m trying to reduce my caffeine by not drinking as much Coke, but I also like sugary fizzy drinks, so non-caffeinated Sunkist works just fine as a substitute; I am also considering 7-Up) and switched on the television, going into a loop of Ted Lasso reviews, clips, etc. Everyone is already starting to prepare their Best of the Year lists, and I wish that I could do the same, but trying to remember 2020 isn’t particularly easy. I know I didn’t read as much as I usually do, and most of what I did read I’ve forgotten already–even forgotten that I read them, to be completely honest. I also really can’t remember much of what I watched on television or what films I watched or what short stories or documentaries or movies. But Ted Lasso continues to stand out for any number of reasons–it also helps that I regularly recommend it to people who then wind up loving it as much as Paul and I did. I know a book I read early in the year–Elizabeth Little’s Pretty as a Picture–is making a lot of Best of lists; I read that before the pandemic shut down when the world changed, and literally, it seems like it was a million years ago when I read it.

Then again, I also don’t limit myself to things that came out during the calendar year when I make a best-of list; my list is the best things I read or watched during the calendar year, regardless of when they were actually released. My list, my rules. So, at some point I guess I will go through my blog entries and find the things I enjoyed enough to talk about on here, and will thus pull together a list of what I enjoyed most in 2020. (I know that television is going to be a three way tie between The Mandalorian, Schitt’s Creek, and Ted Lasso–and I am also going to have to come up with a foreign-language television so I can mention Dark and Elite and Toy Boy.)

Today I plan to write all day–or most of it–around doing household chores and so forth. There’s literally no need to turn on the television and watch football–although as a diehard LSU fan I’ll have to tune in to the horror that will be the Florida game tonight–and so I might as well take as much advantage of a free-from-football day to write and get caught up on the book. Two chapters a day this weekend will take me to Chapter 21, with only five left in this draft, which will–again, as I have reiterated over and over–give me some down time to let it rest before going over it one last time before turning it in. I am also very excited about the prospect of getting back to work on the Kansas book one last time before turning it in and calling it a day on it as well.

I also want to spend some time reading The Spy Who Came In From the Cold. John LeCarre is widely considered one of the greats when it came to spy novels–or whatever the genre is called–and while it has been quite some time since I read Ian Fleming, Helen MacInnes, Robert Ludlum, and Alistair MacLean, I am very interested in reading LeCarre. The first few chapters of this book haven’t exactly grabbed me, but I do appreciate the writing. One of the things I love the most about the mystery genre is there are so many fascinating and interesting subgenres–the broad spectrum of what is routinely considered mystery fiction is quite vast; everything from traditional mysteries to romantic suspense to police procedurals to international intrigue. (I also want to finish it so I can move on to the new Alison Gaylin, and I also have the new Lisa Unger–and I think I have the new Ivy Pochoda as well) Spending the rainy morning reading really sounds like a lovely way to spend the morning, does it not?

Yesterday I watched The Ruling Class while I was making condom packs for the Cynical 70’s Film Festival. The film hangs entirely on yet another award-worthy performance by Peter O’Toole as the fourteenth Earl of Gurney, who is completely insane–and yet because of the terms of his father’s will (his father was into auto-asphyxiation, which finally went terribly wrong and he hung himself while wearing a military jacket and a tutu) the entire estate is his–and any attempt to break the will means everything will go to a charity. So his vile family cooks up a scheme to get him married and produce an heir, after which they will promptly have him committed. It’s a satire, and occasionally the cast will suddenly break into song-and-dance; which was disconcerting the first time it happened, but after that I went with it. Coral Browne–most famous for playing Vera Charles to perfection in Auntie Mame–is also a standout here as his grasping aunt-in-law; she really should have had a bigger career. When we first meet the new earl he thinks he’s God and insists on being called “J.C.”–and as the family continues to try to either cure him or have him committed, O’Toole could easily have started chewing the scenery and gone over the top; yet he is remarkably restrained and completely believable in the part. He was nominated for an Oscar (losing to Marlon Brando in The Godfather), and deservedly so; his great misfortune as an Oscar contender was to always be nominated against performances that became legendary. The film is quite a send up of the British class system and how it rotted and how it really didn’t make sense from the very beginning–noblesse oblige, indeed, and yes, cynical. It would be interesting to see how a remake/reboot could work, with one of our fine British actors of the present day in the role–but I also can’t see how anyone could ever outdo O’Toole.

And now, I am going to repair to my easy chair with John LeCarre, get under my blankets and hope that Scooter joins me for some kitty cuddling–if he hasn’t gone back upstairs to bed with Paul. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader!