esrosedotblog

ROCKS OFF

You want to be ready for the beginning of today's NYTimes Best 1176 Film.

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953)

Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe appear on screen immediately—no titles—doing "Just Two Little Girls From Little Rock". And the screen does just that; ROCK.

There is a smile a minute in this lightweight musical adapted from the Broadway original and directed by Howard Hawks.

The two women make the picture. There is no way to convey the magnitude of their talent. This was an early Monroe film and she is dancing her ass off and certainly more than holding her own with the more star-encrusted Russell. Not that they compete. They are a great team as well.

It is hard to explain Monroe to anyone today. She was immensely talented in all departments including playing a dumb blonde. Which she was not.

She was a superb actress and comedienne.

Here she makes you forget the Carol Channing signature performance. Channing, looking like bad drag queen, drug the show and the songs behind her for decades. They are saved in this picture. Only the special numbers written for the film fail to ignite.

Oh. To those who might be so inclined, the Russell number done with the US Olympic team in training (tight flesh colored shorts only) is so deliciously balanced between camp and solid homo-erotics that you will cheer out loud.

The film also stars Charles Coburn as the old diamond miner 'Piggy'. I always loved watching him do his thing in the old films. We will see him in The More the Merrier when we get to the 'm's.

We liked it a lot and will give it a 4 out of Netflix5 because the script is so corny at times that it is hard to wait for the girls to take the screen over again. And we didn't need the extra tunes.

ROTATION

You know I believe in order.

I guess I haven't covered one way that order can be preserved in a hectic environment.

The answer? Rotation.

Take breakfast foods for example. I eat a range of cereals in the week for nutritional balance and also variety. Boredom is not favored here.

But, left to my own devices, I am unreliable. I will go for the Corn Chex every time; or maybe the Shredded Wheat (bite size).

Either.

I could get blocked. Stuck.

Not with my system.

I have the thing set in order. Left to right, always, always, always.

Corn Chex, Shredded Wheat, Rice Chex, Cheerios, Wheat Chex. Then go back again. No exceptions.

Why this order? Nutritional balance. Look at the grains. No adjacent analogs.

Admittedly, I wince a bit on the Cheerios day. I don't know why. When I hit the bowl, I like them; but not before. See? The rotation system rules. It is a winner. My impulses, positive or negative, are unreliable.

Early protein is easy. One day yogurt and fruit, the next boiled eggs.

Fruit with breakfast (apple sauce on the egg day; raspberries, strawberries, banana, peaches on the yogurt days).

Yes. I eat a lot of breakfast. My biggest meal. I didn't even mention peanuts; my fat supplement. No rotation there. Half a cup every day.

I use rotation in other meals. Sandwich filler for lunch (turkey, no fat bologna, ham, no fat cheese, tuna salad, egg salad or fried egg. Fruit with lunch (melon mix, pears).

Dinner? I have 25-30 menus. All on rotation of course. Just like in jail. If it is the tenth Tuesday we are having Chili.

You could do this too if you want to.

I can see you getting eager to try it.

Where else?

I rotate clothes too. Biking shorts. Boxers (no briefs). Outer shorts. Pajama pants. All of it. This stuff is not left to right. It is bottom serve.

I even have a system for the outer shorts which don't go to the laundry every day like the others. I have three shelves and load the shorts down to the next shelve when they have their day.

T-shirts? Polos? Same thing. Left to right. I take what I get. I have to admit to a little loading. When I get clean shirts and put them on the right side, I don't put black, then black. I do mix the blend. No two days are the same.

What about color coordination? No problem. These are all Gap clothes. They all match. No fucking way does anything fight with anything else. This is the Gap way. Although I hear they are changing it.

Truth? There are a few Lands End things in there but they pass. They are a bit brighter and size larger than the Gap but we all keep it mum and they get away with it.

Don't ask; don't tell.

Rotation.

A way of life.

Left to right at all times. Bottom to top.

The other thing is, no thinking. You don't have to stand there and gaze at your shit and choose anything.

Another thing. Equal wear. My Gap crew sox all wear out at the same time. It is amazing. The other stuff never wears out.

Oh. I didn't mention sox. They are all white. But they get the bottom to top treatment too. Wear. Like I said.

The only thing not in the rotation is my shoes and the band on my pony tail. Usually they match the rest of the rotationally random ensemble.

Are you with me here? Do you need a map?

I could come and arrange your closet to work the same way if you want.

Anyway, that it the system. I just got tired of people saying 'you look good' or 'I like your shirt' and then I have to say it is all the system; what came off today. But I don't. No one wants to hear it.

Now they all know. It is out there.

MORE TRUTH TO POWER

Now it is in the British press too. A new cliché like 'at the end of the day'.

"Sir Richard believes in speaking truth unto power with a directness all too rare in the upper ranks of Whitehall these days."

I like the Brit-twang on it.

For the full article go to

Forthright civil servant to be PM's security adviser

If you want to know how forthright he is, go to the seventh para.

Thanks to Kevin Drum the Political Animal.

WIND MILL

We have had a couple days of Santa Ana Winds.

This is not a problem for us so far. For some, out in the Simi Valley, it is a driver for any brush fire. The winds whip it up and keep it going.

They are coming in from the Great Basin which includes Death Valley so they are hot and dry.

We are under #4 in the diagram; lower right.

As far as we are concerned, they just keep the temps up a bit particularly at night as the winds pick up a bit then. We are getting heated from the big desert.

There is not quite enough breeze to bench me on the morning bike ride but I am still going into the wind in all directions; an extra work out.

I have mentioned before that, when it blows here, the canyons and coves create major wind eddies so, on a bike or running, the wind is against you in most directions for most of the time.

I got one period this morning when I had the wind to my back for maybe 5 minutes in a 50 minute ride.

It is OK. I just cut out the last hill.

INDICTED

I told you the worm was turning.

They indicted Delay. And that is just the first part. There will be more.

The Abramoff stuff hasn't even begun to churn.

We have heard about this for quite a while and then yesterday the blogs broke out.

This guy Earle is not a partisan freak. He is a zealot with a very good record. He has done Demos and Goopers equally.

Besides, it isn't the prosecutor who did the deed, it is the grand jury.

Delay Calls Indictment Baseless.

Sure it is.

I read that his lawyers were girding for this and quite worried.

Delay steps down since they didn't go through with the 'rule' that would let indicted members stand in their House positions. That was too much for even the most political of the GoOPers to swallow.

Now watch for more worm turning. There is the Plamegate thing starring Karl Rove and/or Scooter Libby and as I type we are watching Frist squirm in the spotlight. Experts say that his seeing eye trust move was worth 2-6 million bucks.

So much for comparison with the chump change Martha.

INTO THE FIRE

I have read only 30 of the 100 Most Challenged Books of 1990-2000.

I don't know what happened! I consider myself more of a radical than that. Well, an out of the mainstream guy.

I better get busy and read the other 79 books on the list. I am obviously missing the best stuff.

Of course, the good thing is that most of these books are in the mainstream and that is why they are noticed by the booboisie. They are highly regarded works in the 20th Century.

Take a look. What is your rebel quotient?

Oddly, Farenheit 451 is not on here. Some of the other brave new world type of books are.

It is just amazing. No wonder we need an ACLU.

RESUSCITATION

I have mentioned that a lot of annuals turn to perennials here. I am working on a new one.

I had some great geraniums last winter and spring. They grew bushy and strong with a lot of blooms all the time.

Then summer came and the sun knocked them down. They all browned and lost their foliage. No flowers for sure.

I kept watering them.

Low and behold, come the 'autumn' sun, there are small new leaves on the old brown growth. They are going to come back.

I have talked around and know now that I should have pruned the upper branches off to encourage low growth. So I did it now anyway. They look good.

We will see.

Perennial geraniums. Imagine.

100 YEARS OLD

DOES THE INERTIA OF A BODY DEPEND
UPON ITS ENERGY-CONTENT? By A. Einstein

ROBBING HOOD

We saw John Boorman's

The General (1998)

today. You gotta see this film.

Brendan Gleason plays the true story of Martin Cahill an infamously clever criminal in Ireland.

He is so convincing in his portrayal that you cannot help come to like the guy even while he is doing very criminal things. He has it on the law at all times.

The law is Jon Voight in a great role and a great Irish accent.

Eventually, it is not the law that gets Cahill. It is the politics. The IRA and the Loyalists. They do not play by any rules but their own.

The direction and structure of the film are really clever. We know the outcome from the outset and set out to see the story unfold to that end.

The 'talk' in this film is really great. A lot of asides. A lot of ingenious bits. We play the subtitles for films like this and get a lot more out of it. The early sequences are very hard for this American ear to get.

You can see the film in black and white, as it was presented on-screen or in 'desaturated color'. We chose the latter and it is quite effective. This is Ireland, after all.

From what I can tell, desaturated color is a type of film or 'video card' and gives a, well, desaturated look. Muted colors. Perhaps a reader knows about this. Email me upper right.

I think that Ebert may be wrong about the film having been shot in black and white as you cannot go from b&w film to any kind of color. Boorman clearly filmed desaturated and then decided to show in black and white.

No matter how it was filmed, I will give this film a 5 out of Netflix5.

SECOND THOUGHTS

The more I thought about the Gimme Shelter debacle shown in the Maysle brothers' film, the more I realized how incredibly naive the Stones themselves were about all of it.

They were even unaware of their own physical danger. The mob was only an arm's reach away.

Or maybe it was not naiveté but rather hubris and a liberal dose of alcohol and drugs.

The Jim Beam or whatever is never very far out of sight in any scene and while we do not see them loading up you can be sure that was going on. After all, quality of performance was not at issue. They were doing numbers (sloppily) that they had done since they were pups.

Ahhhh. The innocent days of love, peace, and anarchy. How they got out with their own skins intact is the miracle. You see them scramble into the escape helicopter at the end of the picture. It is the clown car in reverse; so many people getting in and on each other's laps you think it will not take off.

I guess this means that yesterday's movie got to me more than I thought. I hardly ever write a second note.

That may give the Maysles a 5 out of Netflix5. Indelibility.

'BYE DON

Don Adams 1923-2005

So he was not so 'dumb' after all.

SAVINGS OP

Bushie is turning up the wheedling, whiny thing that will soon be making him a wimp like Carter and Ford.

We are all going to drive less: President Calls for Less Driving to Conserve Gas.

What is next? Wool sweaters? Carter got his nuts in the vise over his energy crisis and the lecturing he did to the country. How do you spell 'malaise'.

In addition to the Carter-ish whine, I am reminded of the Gerry Ford WIN button; whip inflation now. Another PR fiasco.

The worm is turnin' folks.

I have an idea! Why not cut down on flying that fucking plane all over the country looking for photo ops?

Losers.

Mr. Bush's comments, while similar to remarks he made shortly after the disruption from Hurricane Katrina pushed gasoline prices sharply higher, were particularly notable because the administration has long emphasized new production over conservation. It has also opted not to impose higher mileage standards on automakers.

In 2001, Vice President Dick Cheney said, "Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue, but it cannot be the basis of a sound energy policy." Also that year, Ari Fleischer, then Mr. Bush's press secretary, responded to a question about reducing American energy consumption by saying "that's a big no."

"The president believes that it's an American way of life," Mr. Fleischer said.

SEVEN UP

Paul explains the 7 game Red Sox Yankee confusion.

I saw on the blog you were confused about the Red Sox and Yankees. In fact the playoffs have not started yet. Before Monday night both teams had 7 games left (they were tied at that point). The Red Sox have a 4 game series against Toronto and the last 3 games against the Yankees in Fenway. The Yankees play Baltimore 4 games before they come here. I know there are mixed emotions on the playoff format, but it does make it more exciting in a way. The ironic part is that either the Sox or the Yankees may not make the playoffs. One will win the division one may go home (the wild card possibly coming from the Central division this year). Hopefully the 3 games in Fenway will be meaningful and may the better team win. Go Sox!!

I also read The Daily Fix in the WSJournal OnLine which is a compendium of stories from other papers, linked.

I skip a lot.

Now that it is mostly football, I will soon be skipping almost all of it.

Did I mention that I cannot stand to watch football or anything about it? Loathing would be a mild description.

Anyway, I got my hat out and ready to wear. GO SOX!

POWER PLAY

One of those clichés that run through the media barefoot from time to time: "Telling truth to power".

It pisses me off to see it used so much. Repetition leads to annoyance.

The other thing is that it is a power play. Whose truth? Oh, yours? Hmmmm.

So if you have the truth on your side then you must be powerful too.

It is everywhere. One of those academic women at Harvard hurled it at Lawrence Summers. Now it is Cindy Sheehan or the people who write about her.

I think it undermines one's case to use such self-aggrandizing statements.

It is also an awkward phrase. It rings of insincerity with a tinge of illiteracy. Even if you are a female academic.

But, I asked myself. Where did this come from? It must have started somewhere.

Ahhhhh. Answers.com comes through.

The usual suspects and the originator or populizer, Anita Hill in her book about the Clarence Thomas episode of her life.

Can anyone find an earlier reference?

SEX, DRUGS, AND.....

I have never been much of a fan of the 'world's greatest rock and roll band" aka The Rolling Stones.

I didn't like their anarchy and violence thing.

Today's NYTimes Best 1176 Film was the Maysle Brothers'

Gimme Shelter (1970).

The Maysles had the good (or bad) luck to film the 1969 tour of the Stones in which the Altamont free concert disaster occurred. They center their documentary around the event; handed to them on a silver platter.

No horses are spared. No commentary is needed to see the atmosphere building.

Ahhhh. Those were the days.

The Angels violence is catching. Who ever thought of using them as a police force? It is a disaster.

Of course, the mix brews and builds with 300,000 people (?) and all that booze and dope. The Angels are the final mix and 'match' that sets off the explosion.

Viewed as a documentary, it is a pretty good record of the events but, somehow, one sided. The Stones lose.

I will give this a 4 out of Netflix5.

The end of the summer of love.

Here is a history of the film by Stanley Goldstein for anyone who wasn't there. He was. I guess he is telling the truth.

PLAYED OUT

I don't understand this baseball playoff stuff at all.

It is all so complicated and too much trouble to learn.

I just want to know one thing.

The Red Sox are playing the Yankees for 7 games (only 3 at Fenway). Does that mean that they will be the AL champs if they win 4?

And when should I get my Sox pennant out and wave it?

They have ruined baseball with all this wild card and playoff stuff.

EPIC EPOCH

I was 11 years old when Gandhi was assassinated (1948).

I remember it pretty clearly. I was already a news junkie.

There was all kind of shit going on at the time. You think we live in a stirred up world now!

WWII was just over but the repercussions continued for a very long time. Palestine and Israel were happening. The "iron curtain". China split. All that.

History was on the move.

As successful as Ghandi was in achieving independence for India, it was a mixed blessing. He could not achieve unity between the Muslim and Hindu populations. The nation was split and huge migrations occurred from one land to the other. The Kashmir problems were set in stone. The trouble continues today at the atomic weapon level.

I remember we had to write a paper on Kashmir when we were in the 8th grade or something. It nearly killed me but I did it. Most of the class rebelled. Really.

It is hard, now, to see the film Gandhi as other than a tract or history lesson.

But, somehow, the story of the human being comes through this huge epic film that spans the man's whole adult life.

It is a fiver, for sure, on the Netflix5 scale.

Awesome in scale and intimate in human detail. Very hard to pull off.

Richard Attenborough does just that with a lot of help from Ben Kingsley who has had to claw his way out of being so identified with the role for life. You feel that he is the man he is portraying.

HACKARAMA

It is just outrageous to see the parade of hacks and cronies that have invaded, polluted, then abandoned some of the best of the government agencies.

This is GOoPer governance.

Leader of the F.D.A. Steps Down After a Short, Turbulent Tenure.

PUBESCENT

The French cinema has always had dibs on the coming of age flick. The one where the 13 year old boy is seduced by a beautiful older woman and is treated kindly and gently.

Today's Best NYTimes 1176 Film has a whole new flip on this idea.

In Bernard Blier's

Préparez vos mouchoirs / Get Out Your Handkerchieves (1978)

we get a new twist on this theme. A husband seeks to find a way to excite his wife (sexually as well as generally) who is depressed and has 'attacks'. He recruits a stranger to help him get her going. The (now) friend is no more successful than the husband.

They become buddies and join to solve this problem. They decide she needs a child and so they find a 13 year old boy (genius) who, as it turns out, can also sexually satisfy her.

Sorry you asked?

It is a little hard to write the plot in a short burst.

I can't say that this film is funny although it is very amusing. Also, as you now know, very French.

Even I got uncomfortable when the lady removes her nightie for the boy.

It is hard to get going with it, yet once you get engaged it is pretty good.

We see the young Gérard Depardieu here. A hunk. You can see, though, that he is already running to bulk. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

As for the general idea, it all seems very heterosexual angsty. It is not quite a pedophilic twist. The boy is a genius after all. And seems to seduce her but she actually seems to be taking the lead in the dance.

That these two guys can't 'awaken' the maiden seems to be kinda hard to figure. They are boyish. Maybe that is it. A puzzle.

I will give them the benefit of the doubt.

I will give this one a 4 out of Netflix5. Maybe just a 3.

So French.

ASSHOLE II

This choice film strip presentation from last year has been updated.

Not for the weak of for loud play in the office.

THE HAPPY WARRIOR

Daily Kos (link upper right) has been running a straw poll of potential Democratic candidates.

Of course, this did not include Howard Dean, since he has said he will not run as DNC chief.

Nevertheless, some of us would like to see how he would do against all the others.

Take a look and vote at

Fantasy Straw Poll with Dean.

Guess who is out in front?. I will give you a clue. I am very happy with the results.

In the Dean-less version of the poll I voted for Richardson who didn't fare well. Every one liked Clark. This is a mystery to me. Complete. Maybe I missed all those CNN military expert/talking head appearances. Something.

I should say, in all honesty, that when Kos did the same thing with Al Gore, Gore did better than Dean. There was no head to head on Gore vs. Dean.

How political junkies amuse themselves in off cycle years.

RUSTLES AND FLOURISHES

I am off aspirin for the first time in several weeks.

First was the sinusitis; then my foot hurt. So I maxed the dosage of the extra-strength.

I don't do well with the alternatives to aspirin. This time I tried Aleve and it sucked. No control. An eight to twelve hour dose.

It is a little like drinking too much coffee. Once the dose is down there you are pretty much stuck with it. It works or it doesn't. I had the old in and out effect of some time release products; pain/no pain/pain.

Anyway, now I am clean and clear and it is a bit strange to have all my body feelings back; my percussion section.

You know, the creaks and whistles and jerks and flashes of little pains here and there. Actually they are not pains. They are feelings. They are old friends. Mine. They tell me who I am and how I am responding to my physical and emotional world.

Bing, crack, bobble, whiz.

Hello old friends. I have missed you.

Now there is something to feel going around my body during meditation. Or, when I hit the sack at night and pay attention to feelings in my frame, there is something to feel.

No pain, no gain. Of course it is the middle of the road, huh? We don't want too much or too little.

THE LONG AND SHORT OF IT

John is attending the annual

Palm Springs International Short Film Festival.

I am not going. I used to.

I quit because I am slightly agora-phobic. I don't like to be held to someone elses' schedule. I didn't like the involuntary schmoozing; someone leaning across the seat to ask you what your favorite film is. All that.

So I quit going. Most of the films were half-baked anyhow. Half were good.

I could only take three movies a day and that didn't make economic sense on the pass.

So I passed myself out. John enjoys it. All of it, apparently. I stay home and Franklin and I keep bachelor hall. No cooking. A small vacation.

While we are at it, I have to admit that I don't go to the regular movie theater any more either.

I like to think I am in the avant garde. Moving to DVD and all.

And, I am one of those holdouts who went to the theater for all my movies (except the old ones) because I liked the experience of sitting with an audience. Laughs, sobs, all of it, are more intense in the group experience.

But the movies that are coming out suck. They are not worth the admission for the most part. My last theater film was with the Hobbits.

But this has been a long time coming. First, came the multi-plex and the teeny theaters. When that didn't work out, they built the arena theater. I only really like sitting in the middle of that. Too loud.

Then came ads. Then came cell phones and people talking on the fucking things. Then came people talking to each other without the phones; then me loudly SHUSSSHHHing them.

Now, little kids running rampant. People talking back to the screen. We are verging into the land of the crazies with that one.

Well, actually not. In Boston, if we went to a 'black' picture with a heavily afro audience there was a lot of talking at the screen. Different. A cultural event and appropriate. Even funny. Also good at the Rocky Horror midnights.

No fun for most films. Not at all. No, no, no, no, no.

This guy has a lot to say about the future here. I am already in it except I havn't downloaded anything yet.

Newspapers and Movies Fading Fast.

SEEING WHAT YOU WANT TO SEE

I have not seen that Penguin movie.

I quit that kind of thing with the Disney nature series. I did like their bird migration film though; the Penguin folks. I was more interested in how they did it than in what they did.

But, Andrew Sullivan has gone to the latest film and has this report which is a rollicking riposte to the wing-nuts and christers that see a god-message in it all.

He also has a thing or two to say to those of us who are of the gay persuasion; the ones who are all into the idea that some penguins are as queer as we are.

The Politics of Penguins: A March to Nowhere

CUT!!!

I just want to be honest about it.

I cut Scorcese's Goodfellas from the Best Film program.

I am so tired of St. Martin and his obsession with violence.

And to watch that nasty little Joe Pesci. Once was enough. In some other densely bloody piece of crap. Despicable little runt.

No way.

There.

A review without once having to watch the fucking picture.

And I rate it in the negative but since I didn't rent it there will be no question to answer.

And don't tell me about above it all DeNiro either. For the most part, I think he is a thug too.

But, I will not blacklist him.

TRACT

Moss Hart adapted and Elia Kazan directed this version of Laura Z. Hobson's

Gentleman's Agreement (1947)

This is one of those NYTimes Best Films that is on one list and not another.

A split decision.

Same reaction here. Some of this film is brilliantly done and insightful. It tries to touch on the more subtle nature of anti-semitism. Any 'minority' group could be substituted really. It is that twist on the 'some of my best friends are......' attitude that many minorities run into.

It is about the small instances we let slide whether we are IN the group or out of the group being defamed. No stand taken.

It is pretty good.

I think that there is still some pretty virulent anti-semitism but not where this film shows it. The Jews have done a good job of fighting back.

When I went to MIT, there were Jewish dormitory sections. I think not because of assignment but because the Jewish kids clubbed together and formed small ghettos. This was ten years later than the film.

I ended up in one of these enclaves and experienced reverse discrimination of a sort. I was still a good boy christian at the time and didn't mind showing it. I got some flack.

I am actually grateful to these boys for shaking me out of my non-thinking Babbit-y ways. So it was a different thing entirely. No parallel with the real anti-semitism that existed.

All of these guys, though feisty about it, had felt the scorn and ridicule and apartness. I learned a lot by being with it all.

And MIT was a bastion of human rights (still is) at the time. The campus was crawling with all sorts of minorities. Hillel Society was a big deal.

Anyway, it is hard to take myself back to the time that this film came out. There was one Jewish kid in my whole 12 graded consolidated country school. He took some shit.

Gregory Peck is the journalist who decides to 'live as a Jew' for 8 weeks. Somehow, this rankled me. He could and did get out of it. Dorothy Malone is a limousine liberal that he falls in love with. All of their romantic troubles center around his being 'too serious' about it all. She is a foil. John Garfield, always welcome, is the only card carrying Jew in the film. He provides gritty reality when needed. And, in her role as the good buddy, also-ran romantic interest, Celeste Holm once again demonstrates that she owns that territory all to herself; witty, wry, and warm as always.

I will give this a 3 out of Netflix5 because some of it is implausible and it doesn't cut very deep. The acting is mixed. And at times it sounded like a human rights training film.

FIREWORKS

As I type, another thunder storm is passing.

This is the second storm tonight.

Both times, we have had the kind of super powered fireworks that are rare in these parts but which will last in memory.

The first time we lived in our own house, for three weeks of May in 1997, we had one of these come by. We were stunned!

The noise; the power as the storm rolled down the sides of the mountain behind us and crackled its way out across the desert. The snap, crackle and pop are given extra impetus by the low humidity and the extreme difference between the cool air up there and the hot air down here.

It is a spectacular show.

I awoke with the first one to see Franklin bolting for the hallway; actually a good place to hide out. I got up and went to hold him and soothe with pats and 'It's OK'. He believes us when we tell him it is OK and that did the trick. He calmed down and then we could go look out at the show. He was not sure he liked it but he stood and took it in.

This storm the same deal; only a little less noisy. Now he is a veteran and has taken to pacing up and down and grousing about it in his near human voice of grrr-whoop--rattle; his imitation of the way we sound; I think.

And I tell him it is OK. And pet him a bit. And we stand and watch the show another time.

He is still not too sure about it but that is OK. It is a nice time together and he gets that he is safe to do his complaining and that I won't leave his side.

FORM AND FUNCTION

I came up (or maybe down) with a sore, really sore, foot last week; the outer insole sort of; the outer arch.

I had to curtail my walks with the Airedale for a few days. It hurt.

I couldn't figure it out. Was it a bruise? A broken bone?

No. I didn't go to the doctor. Not yet. I was not done self-diagnosing.

I just couldn't remember doing anything to it. No stones walked on. No 'hits' to my foot.

But today, I figured it out. I think.

Every personal trainer I have ever worked with emphasized form. Do it the right way and you will not hurt yourself. Good form is the prophylaxis of good mechanical health.

Aha!

You know, I have been pumping up hills. The only change in my routine on the bike.

Today, I was pumpin' it and suddenly realized that I had let my foot slip on the pedal so that the arch was doing the pushing.

Voila!

I had been taught a long time ago to pedal from the toes. Didn't know why. Now I got it.

I fixed that one quickly enough.

The foot had gotten better. I had not done the heavy pushing for a few days. Uh-huh.

OK.

We will keep the foot OK.

Form.

COOL ENOUGH

I am not sure that you will understand this but it has finally gotten cool enough to use the pool on a regular basis.

In the desert's hot hot months the pool is a plunge and out for cooling. The water is warm and what makes you cool is the very dry air.

The other thing is that it is so hot that you don't want to linger. Feet burn on the tile surround. Long raft rides, floating in the sun, getting a tan are just not done. You gotta keep turning over and over to stay cool.

So now, with the temperatures in the 90s and the water in the 80s and the air still very dry in the 10% RH range, we have the conditions for rafting and sunning and some swimming back and forth and back and forth.

I am one of the few people who had a dermatologist who ordered regular sun for my skin. Not only are all the preparations bad for the skin itself, some think the lesser of two 'evils', but I tend to chronic excema or dermatitis. The rays kill it.

Don't let me get started on people's fear of the sun; the use of chemical glops directly on the skin.

There is no universal rule about it. I suppose that most people need to be careful and some more than others. If you want to go outside you glop up. But there is still the chemical risk. They don't avoid testing that shit on animals for nothing.

Like everything else, moderation rules.

I do use sun-block on my upper outer right arm; the butterfly tattoo which still sports its four colors after all these years. Well, fifteen maybe.

ACTIVE SHADOWS

If we had a parliamentary form of government, the Clintonistas would be the 'shadow government'.

This weekend, Bill had his world conference and got a lot more than shadows out of it.

Here is a rundown from the LA Times:

Privatized Global Problem Solving, Care of Clinton Alumni.

And if you want to read more from the horses mouth instead of the other end here is

First Annual Clinton Global Initiative Closes with $1.25 Billion in Commitments.

I really like the attitude here. Non-whiny. Low on the partisan plane (Rice and Wolfowitz, among other bushenistas, were there). Emphasis on results.

In a word, Bill, playing the field as well as he can.

You gotta know he loves this.

BILL SPEAKS

Here is where I look for leadership:

Clinton Levels Sharp Criticism at the President's Relief Effort.

There is none in Washington and scant opposition from the head demos in charge.

SAVED Revised 091905--Kennedy added

Today's Best 1176 NYTimes Best Film was

Elmer Gantry (1960).

This film is a major overhaul of the Sinclair Lewis novel, yet maintains the force of the original. Some punches are pulled nevertheless. We can never quite get to say what we feel about the bogus in religion. Someone always gets nervous.

The force in this picture is personified by Burt Lancaster at the peak of his power as an actor. He inhabits Elmer with a performance of great humanity. He is a sinner and a con-man for sure but he is also, at bottom, a good man. This is one of the pulled punches but somehow Lancaster makes it work.

Jean Simmons is a revelation as the evangelist who Lancaster hooks up with; in more ways than just the professional. She is legit and to maintain the balance while she has a fling with Lancaster requires grace and dignity which Simmons summons most effectively.

I had forgotten about Arthur Kennedy. In this, he is a reporter in the H. L. Mencken mode. He serves as a sort of greek chorus and attitude adjuster; helping us hear and see the rich text in a particular light. It is a clever device that helps move this story forward through the brambles of controversy. Remember, this was just barely, hardly, out of the fifties.

Arthur Kennedy was a great actor; always on the edges of stardom and often in this type of role. His dad was Edgar Kennedy, a comic actor who had anger management problems. He was a Saturday matinee short staple.

Shirley Jones is the whore who drives them apart and spoils the game. She is mid career between musical comedy and the Partridge family. (That is her isn't it?) and just makes it through the door.

We liked it a lot. It is long at 147 minutes but the time flies. There are great vignettes with wonderful character actors of the time throughout.

I will give it a 4 out of Netflix5.

I have to say that I got weepy at the beginning about missing Burt Lancaster. We have seen him in so many films and he has been in many of these Bests and will be in more. He was a 'good friend' over the years. He always gave us more than our money's worth.

This film has him in a lot of closeups. You notice that he leads with his teeth a lot. Out and shouting. In and closing down. He was a real technician.

His hair is a force of nature; a mind of its own. He must have had to have a comb on him at all times. We could see it unravel in a scene. Just great.

They did not use his beef in this picture at all. No shirts off. All serious mid-west wool suits and the like. He is a tough cookie but he doesn't show it until it is called for.

I digress. Like I said. I loved to watch Burt Lancaster. And will continue to do so.

BOOK REPORT

I just finished a novel called American Gods by Neil Gaiman.

I heard about the author in an article about book shows and, it was said, Gaiman commanded one of the longest lines of autograph hounds at the show, mostly young male adults.

Part of this celebrity is due to the graphic novels (what we used to call comics) that Gaiman has done; yet there is a lot of straight fiction as well.

This one is about, well, American Gods who have been abandoned by the people who brought them here. You would know some of them. Odin plays a key role. Their is Loki. Some Indian goddesses. Like that.

They sort of exist in a half life because they are no longer worshipped. Many are on the way out.

On the other hand there are new Gods; media, television, the net, and so on. These have humanoid forms as well.

I probably shouldn't be telling any of this because the novel starts out as a regular story of a prisoner about to be sprung after a three year term in the slammer and covers his travels into this strange veiled world.

I still don't know exactly why he is chosen for this or what his role is or what the fuck the whole thing means.

It is one of the strangest books that I have read in a long time.

But, I stayed with it and never wanted to quit nor was I even tempted to throw it across the room.

You might like it too. Your tolerance for ambiguity must be rather high. A lot of it is similar to fantasy fiction but totally without the surety of a genré to guide you through the rough spots.

I am stalled at whether to get another Gaiman book. I have a backlog so maybe later.

CRUMBLE

Well, you knew that it would not last.

I have seen it coming. The blogs have been full of it. Passive resistance.

The cruel and inhumane treatment of prisoners in Guantanamo and their continued illegal incarceration will not succeed.

The human spirit is too strong to be crushed. The people running the deal are not on solid spiritual ground; it will not hold. And democratic process, even where it has been denied, will out.

This obscene manifestation of the bush war on 'terror' is destined to become another sad chapter in our national history right next to the Japanese internment during WWII.

Read all about the latest hunger strike and how it has driven fear into the hearts of the military bosses. The success of non-violent resistance over the centuries has been demonstrated. Even the sadists among us cannot be clever enough to foil it.

In the NY Times this morning:

Widespread Hunger Strike at Guantánamo.

You can say what you want about lawyers but the people who are volunteering to work with the prisoners are real, bona-fide, patriots and heroes(ines). Some come from the most prestigious firms. They are the eyewitnesses to history. Without them, god only knows what these bastards would be up to.

And don't give me any of that enemy combatant bullshit either. Due process exists for one and all, period.

And another crack opens up in this LA Times story:

Detainee Challenges 'Combatant' Status

And more about the internment camps in this LA Times article:

Manzanar Icon Now More Than a Memory.

TIME IN

Did I mention that I like to time shit; that I am a timer guy?

Yes. A bona-fide stop-watch freak.

I think it started a very long time ago; maybe with running. I had to know my times. So I got me a Casio four function digital and away I went.

Soon, I found that I could use the timer to know where I was in my management training work. I got expert at running the schedule the same way each time; a rarity among trainers, believe it or not.

Then I found other stuff. I started to run the fixed time timer for my meditation. It isn't a Tibetan gong or anything but the chirp I get is the 'come on out' signal. Also, if I have gone 'to somnolence' it snaps me out of that semi-sleep state. Not good to go there but the purpose of meditation is that there is no purpose, so?

I use the timer for the morning bike rides now. No more running.

I use it for cooking.

I run it when Franklin and I take our walk so I know that we are getting in his (and my) hour.

In the spa, I know when enough is enough.

I like to time stuff that happens too. How long it takes John to come home after he calls to say he is getting in the car at wherever.

It is a lot of timer watching.

An indispensable tool.

Not too compulsive, you think?

PUMPED

Crisis today with the bicycle tire pump. Phlaghhhggghhhhhgssshhhh. When I pushed. Air out the bottom of the pump housing. Heat. Summer, Fucked.

And you know, it only lasted two years because I got it when Franklin was just a pup. He had to stay in the car while I went into the store. It did not help that I parked in front and he could see me. Made it worse. Since then, he goes with a sitter or doesn't go if there is in-store time.

Back to the pump. I wasn't happy with the gadget that set on the valve. It seemed better but wasn't.

Before that I had a Trek and it had a lever set. The one that just broke has a turn-screw kind of thing.

So, what did I get?

A Serfas FP-200.

Mine is red. Look, it has the window set at the top of the pump. Great for a geezer's eyes.

Look, it has the lever arm to seal the connection with the tire valve.

Look, it has a thing for soccer ball inflation and another thing to inflate rafts.

I got a great sales pitch from the young man in the store. The

Palm Springs Cyclery

Where we got our Schwinn one speed coaster-brake bikes. All four of them. I also notice that Lance is wearing my crash helmet on their site! Giro. Holes.

Anyway, for me, a new tool is a big thing.

I get all pumped about it.

SEMI-COLONIC

You may have noticed that I use a lot of semi-colons.

Some have raised eyebrows at this. Others have kept mum as one would when a fart sounds in church.

Still others wallow in the ebb and flow of the semi-colonic bath. They give into it. Swim and enjoy.

Since that awful book with the panda on the front was printed, people seem to be all hyper about proper punctuation. It is as though we have all been eating happy meals together for years and now someone pulls out an etiquette book. We go all self conscious and somehow end up clumsier when we were going natural. Silver clatters to the floor and napkins go all berserk.

Natural works. That is my approach to punctuation. I do not remember one goddam thing from English class nor do I want to.

I have been edited by experts and show up pretty well. In fact, if you need that kind of thing, that is what experts are for. You hire them to fix your stuff.

But, if you just want to get on with it, you do the best you can and go by feel. It is like playing music by ear. Pauses. Stops. Waves of mental sound.

But, if you want the whole rundown on the semi-colon, this is for you.

Pause celebre

Wake me when it is over.

Did you notice that I have not used a ; in this entire item?

Oh, and thanks to Andrew Sullivan for this. He mentions that Mike Kinsley used to have a key on his computer that would change all semi-colons to a period and a next capital letter with one stroke.

I believe the zealotry if not the fact of the key.

TB

We watched the second Garbo film today and it was much 'better' or easier to watch.

Camille (1936).

Garbo again with the handsome and studly Robert Taylor directed by the ace homo-in-chief George Cukor. We have seen and will see a lot of his films in this series.

Garbo glows. The accent is lighter. It is 5 years after Anna Christy. John says this is a much more apt part for her. Dunno. She sure stands out. Even the dying is great to watch.

The story is a classic so it is hard to put a spin on it that moves the viewer but I was moved. We know how it is going to turn out but somehow that doesn't make any difference 'when the time comes'.

I think that they were still doing this in the 30's, so it has/had modern significance. I am not sure we use the word 'tramp' today. I am out of touch with the current societal limits living, as I do, in the land of the sybarites.

I will give this a 4 out of Netflix5.

GARBO TALKS

It is almost always difficult for me to plow through 'old movies'.

I know that there are people who are fascinated by them and collect and sift and do all the obsessive things that you can do with a film. I am not that even with new ones. But, the old are tough to handle.

There is the 'style' of it all and the dated dialogue. There are the stars who do not even look like contemporary theater people let alone Hollywood types. Hell, they don't even look like the people down the street.

It is a time machine with not every trip a happy one.

Anna Christie (1930)

is one of those less happy trips.

The contemporary review, at the link, is almost all about Ms. Garbo's voice; 'although the sound was too loud'. Not a lot has changed at the movies. Loud sound.

We are on a Garbo kick because they have just released her films all together on DVD; nice Criterion restorations. We saw Grand Hotel and tomorrow there will be Camille. There is no underestimating her screen power at the time. It is not surprising that her 'talking' debut was a matter of breathless anticipation.

The thing that I noticed is that when we first see her coming in the 'ladies entrance' of the waterfront bar, we learn all we need to know about her. She has not uttered a word. She is an astonishing actress and no more need be said about it. That she had a thick accent was a problem in other films but not in this play since she is playing a Swede; her home base. Nevermind that her character was born in the US and has lived in Minnesota. Well, they do have some accent in MN.

Anna is one of Eugene Oneill's early plays. Some consider it the first feminist play. I would not go that far. The theme of the double standard, as it applies to sexual mores, is not really resolved. The people just go on with their lives of separation. The film also boils the thing down to 90 minutes from 4 acts. There is a lot left on the cutting room floor.

An odditie. After filming this, they turned around and did the whole thing again on the same sets in German. Garbo with different actors.

Here in the English, Marie Dressler does her thing as a seaside drunk and Charles Bickford who became a formidable 'serious' actor is sailor Anna's suitor.

I will give this exercise in cinematic archeology a 3 out of Netflix5. Hard going for some good nuggets.

RECOVERY BUDGET

Well, we know that there will be a lot of money spread around; buying bush' image back. But it also has the happy result of adding to the spoils system so well perfected by the GOoPers.

This has it almost perfectly laid out; making my point exactly.

Halliburton Gets Contract To Pry Gold Fillings From New Orleans Corpses' Teeth

HOUSTON—On Tuesday, Halliburton received a $110 million no-bid government contract to pry the gold fillings from the mouths of deceased disaster victims in the New Orleans-Gulf Coast area. "We are proud to serve the government in this time of crisis by recovering valuable resources from the wreckage of this deadly storm," said David J. Lesar, Halliburton's president. "The gold we recover from the human rubble of Katrina can be used to make fighter-jet electronics, supercomputer chips, inflation-proof A-grade investments, and luxury yachting watches."

September 14, 2005 | Issue 41•37 of The Onion.

THE BILL SHOW

Forget the U.N.: Clinton Has a League of His Own.

The article is just a little tongue in cheek, which is OK.

You can't see the present President doing anything like this.

It must frost their asses.

Condi and Wolfie were there too! Jeez.

ENDING

We know how it ends.

But this take on the military fiasco at

Gallipoli (1981)

works its way into the heart and makes the shear insanity of war all the more vivid.

Using the friendship of two runners, Mel Gibson (young and dewy here) and Mark Lee, the stark facts of the battle gain human dimension.

Of course, one may quibble about the trench warfare aspect of this battle. It is not the same as modern warfare which we know is much more surgical and less prone to senseless mass killing. Yeh. Right. So huh?

Kids in Iraq. Car bombs. Going into places we shouldn't be. Leadership that has it all in their nuts to go over the top. All that.

The film is beautiful to watch and the relationship between the two men unfolds slowly and in considerable depth. It is also a good buddy picture.

There are some socko moments: the naked soldiers swimming and taking their first fire; the realization on arrival (at the pyramids) that this is an ancient tale as well as a modern one; the use of lighting to suggest a lot of the action, strobic.

Peter Wier is the director and we will be seeing more of his films in this Best NYTimes 1176 Film series.

I will give it a 4 out of Netflix5.

THE DEAN'S LIST

Tomorrow, in many papers, Howard Dean will have an op-ed on the Roberts' nomination.

He lists the reasons Roberts should be opposed.

Read it at:

Dean: The Verdict on John Roberts

Good enough for me. I love Howard Dean. He has the flame.

CHILD PORN?

This is Lolita's 50th birthday.

She was published in Paris in 1955 just as I was starting college. She was finally published in the United States as I ended my MIT tenure in 1958.

I did a side in the 'humanities' (as it was called at Tech). The department was abuzz with news and opinion 24/7 about this outrageous novel.

Here is a pretty good rundown by Stacy Schiff in the NYTimes of what and how it happened:

Forever Young.

It is hard to describe the stir this caused. It was at a time when all the 'dirty' classics were being published. The walls were crashing.

To an impressionable country boy, this was all very heady stuff. Furthermore, for a closeted gay boy, it gave considerable permission.

While I was never really able to read Lolita with any comfort (I think this is one of Nabakov's intentions), her very presence was transgressive enough to allow other outrages to be accepted or, at least, more tolerated.

UN

Another example of bush pissing on the UN (Reuters)

I think also an indication that some of his insulation has worn off in the MSM (main stream media). Did anyone mention lame duck?

MIKE

While we are on columnists and the LATimes; there are big doings on the editorial page of our daily national paper.

They fired Mike Kinsley as Editor of the editorial section.

He did not go quietly:

Kinsley Leaves The Times.

I like Mike but I did not like what he did to the weekday editorial page or the Sunday commentary section.

I cannot be specific but I do know that I read the op-eds a lot more before he got there than I do now. They are mostly limp.

He made a lot of cosmetic changes and they had to do with type and borders and, as usual with these things, it was just different and not an improvement.

The one thing he could have done was to fire the execrable cartoonist Michael Ramirez; a flaming asshole with an ultra right wing twist.

So, we readers wish Mike well and hope to see him in a more lovable capacity.

Q:A

Q: How could I be 'more' upset about the animals stranded in the flood than the people? (see below).

A: The question bears an opinion. I am not more upset. I am upset in a different and more emotional way.

Try this. People have options. They have (way too late and more than a pound short) dry land and food and some comfort.

The dogs that were left have no options. They don't get it. They do not have food. They are, for all intents and purposes, helpless.

After food, dogs need attention more than anything else. They are pack animals.

I said that I couldn't look at the pictures of animals who were stranded. I could watch the people because they were in a process of being saved and doing for themselves.

Blah blah blah.

If you are not an animal person, well, OK. Go give some more money to the Red Cross.

But no more questions bearing quantitative assumptions and pointy fingers, please.

This is an interesting question though. It has come up out here in regard to a columnist, Steve Lopez, in the LATimes. Steve, who we like, was in NOLA and wrote about a dog coming to their boat and their not saving him.

He got letters the other way! How could he abandon the dog and so on. He wrote a whole column today defending himself and making amends at the same time. Two separate paths, but he did it pretty gracefully.

One thing is sure. The whole Katrina thing has unleashed a lot of emotion about a lot of things and that is a good thing. We have all been holding our breath for way too long.

GONE APE

I saw an extraordinary film today.

Greystoke: the Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes 1984

It was on the first of the two Best NYTimes Best lists (why we have 1176 not 1000, remember?) but not the second. Someone had second thoughts.

While the Tarzan (his name is not uttered in the entire film) is just fine, the performance gems in this picture are Sir Ralph Richardson and the every reliable Ian Holm. Richardson is the Greystoke patriarch and Holm the discoverer of the 'Lord' himself.

Incidentally, while I have parenthesized the no Tarzan comment, it solves a problem that I have always had. If the Lord of the Apes grows up with the apes then who gave him his name? So huh?

Here is what I like. The totally different take on the legend after all these years of takes; a combination of comedy, adventure, and hard drama.

We have never ever seen the boy actually grow up with realistic apes. Just chimps and comic ones at that. Disney solved this through cartooning the process and came close but in this film the apes are for-sure apes and excellent fake ones and the drama of the child-rearing is a force of nature. Natch.

The director Hugh Hudson is the Chariots of Fire guy and he uses a lot of the b-cast from that film.

This one is going to get a 5 out of Netflix5.

PETS

Here it is; real fast. The item lost in the Blogger jam.

I realized, along the line, that while I could look at a lot of photos and read about people being displaced and lost I had a hard time when it came to pictures of dogs on rafts and stories about dogs isolated and starving. I don't even want to write about it.

That somehow, the horror distilled into a small, tight, gnarly bit when I considered the animals who had been displaced, lost, abandoned, and injured by the storm.

I would turn the page or scroll the screen so that I did not have to look or read about it.

I caught on to this when I read about another person who had the same reaction. Then another, and another.

So, I did what I learned to do. Pop into action. I sent some money to the PETsMART Charities.

Incidentally, according to the Charity Navigator, this is one of the most efficient charities that exists and for pets for sure. A lot of the traditional organizations are way top heavy with administrative load.

So, while you are sending off to the other people oriented charities, remember the animals!

Time is of the essence. These little guys are in deep trouble and need help fast.

POSTAL

I didn't post yesterday.

I wanted to, but there was no inspiration.

I had an item up about animals in the flood but Blogger put themselves on down time just as I was going to post it and it was lost.

That was enough to do me in.

This is amusing in light of 'the old days' when we would lose stuff on the computer, then the 'net, all the time.

The worst was when I was writing the Third Edition of our magnum opus and a worm started to crawl through the text.

I don't know where it came from but it was almost my undoing. The thing would literally 'crawl' line by line turning my well-turned prose into gibberish.

I don't know what we did about it. As I recall, I used one of my back up copies and started over. I think that somehow the text I was working on got corrupted or infected and off we went.

In the old days (what? fifteen years?) you didn't need a hacker to come in and screw with your machine. It was possible to somehow get shit started on your own and once it was going it was very hard to stop. If you traded copy around with other machines (discs) for people to edit, as we did, then it spread. I think that is where the virus analogy started. You do remember floppies don't you?

Anyway, that is all history. I digress.

True to form, if I get stalled in writing the blog, it is hard to get started up again.

A glitch in the system or a small amount of depression will always aid and abet the procrastination and lack of the inspiration necessary to get going.

Depression? Who me?

It couldn't be.

Bombarded daily with the news from NOLA wouldn't anyone be downed? That and feeling a little under the weather.

But I would never admit to such a thing personally. I am an up guy.

Mostly.

Have I started up again?

Looks like it.

AFTERMATH

It has been two weeks and more since Katrina. I suppose that all of us have been affected in some way from the experience; direct or indirect.

It is hard not to get all self referential about it. I have heard people who are perfectly dry and in well established homes go on about how upset they are and how New Orleans was one of their favorite places. OK.

Some of this is warranted. We all have memories. I did some of that on here the other day.

But it is pretty hard for me to get going on any of my own angst about it when I read, day after day, the personal stories of the people affected directly.

Right now, I am aware of an article I saw the other day. It claimed that this is the largest diaspora in this country since the dust bowl.

Unlike the dust bowl, though, the people who are being spread are not just the poor. There are many middle class (and up) folks who have no place to return to.

Many have already chosen not to return at all. For some, it is the nightmare of returning to the same place that one lost everything. For others, it is the charge of adrenalin of starting out anew. The past has been erased involuntarily but the future presents a different and exciting challenge.

So much depends upon our attitude.

Yes, I know that no one will be immune from the psychological shock and the loss of of self that such tragedy brings. But I can hope that these results are temporary.

It will be an interesting time to see how these folks adjust to their new situation.

It was certainly a shock for a few planeloads of NOLA people to touch down in Utah. It will be interesting to see how the people of Utah react to them.

But, beyond interesting, can't we hope that some good will come out of this for some people who had reached a dead end where they were? Or, for others, who had a pretty good life, a chance to redesign and reshape to make the inner and outer self fit more closely?

We are always saying (well some of us) that the good life requires change and challenge and stressful experience. Can we not also hope for these people that this could be a good new start?

I would hope so.

I know that I am coming terribly close to the sentiment expressed by the bitchess barbara bush the other day. That, after all, many of these people are better off as they were 'underprivileged' (a revealing term in and of itself). In so many words, "you never had it so good".

No. I am taking a different fork in the road. I am not skipping the tragic result; the empathy and sadness for what has been lost.

I am just exercising a bit of my optimist outlook; hoping that some of these people will be able to do the same and be able to get on with it soon. That the human spirit will rise.

DOGMATIC

Today's film was one of the first 'dogma/ dagme' films from Lars Von Trier.

Breaking the Waves (1996).

The style of the film, dogma, is not crucial to the result of the film but it does seem as though the technique is largely responsible for its impact. Does that sound contradictory?

I guess I mean that when you read about it, the dogma view of pure film seems to intrude on the idea of making a film. But, in viewing this, I was rarely conscious of a 'technique'. In retrospect, though, I can see that there is a lot about the naturalness of the work that enhances the great work of the players.

The film is about faith and explores its power both to liberate and oppress.

Emily Watson plays the main character Bess. She is 'touched'; a veteran of the mental ward. On the other hand, she is a brilliant force of life. Watson is incredible.

I really enjoyed this picture although, at times, it was hard to watch some of the tough parts. It is violent and unsparing in its view of the world. When things are hard, it does not gloss. That is where the technique may come in.

The ending is really something. Talk about resolution!

I am dithering.

It is a great film and I will give it a 5 out of 5.

You should really see this.

More about dogma? Go back to the link in the first line and go to the 'official site'. Run around in the site but be sure to go to the Manifesto and within that, the Vow of Chastity! You will learn all you need to know about the dogmatics.

This interview with Von Trier is also helpful in understanding that the dogma perfection is not really achievable. Like spiritual perfection, it is, nevertheless worth striving for. And, in the tension between the perfect and the imperfect, a tension arises that feeds creativity.

And so on.

Like a lot of things, this is probably horse shit but good horse shit.

TWO-TIMER