I don't feel like writing anything, but I will say YES, THAT to someone else being self-righteously and long-windedly indignant about the further wrecking of all of our nice things. I mean, I haven't seen the movie and I don't necessarily gaf, but I will safely assume that it's going to piss off FSF fans.
"Why can't they make one movie that is just pitch-perfectly what-it-was?" Challah, my sister. You're gonna have a hard time in this life, btw.
I don't understand what seems to be the typical takeaway from The Great Gatsby. Are people just looking at the cover of the book and drawing their own conclusions? Why does everyone think this is a novel about how fabulous and mysterious a rich guy is? To me, the central theme is about wanting something desperately and never getting it, and the strange manifestations that creates in behavior. Gatsby is not the ultimate coolguy, he is a wraith in a big empty house, rattling his chains to no one. F. Scott couched all of that inside of long automobiles and fountains of champagne as a device. It's not the point.
After I wrote that, I watched a video of Bill Nack reciting the last couple of paragraphs from the book, which told me two things, the first of which is that I might have a skewed-ass view of this book myself. Is it actually about hope and the beauty of sentiment? Have I completely grouched this thing up? Maybe. I'll read it again soon and decide.
The second thing is that F. Scott's prose is deeper and more perfect than I had admitted before. It's beautiful and affecting. The first time I read the book, I got so tired of noting line after winning line that I stopped reflecting on the artistry because it was preventing me from getting into the story. WE KNOW. YOU'RE GOOD. NOW STOP INTERRUPTING. Hearing the words said aloud is a whole other level, of course. Ted Hughes said it was a necessity to read poetry aloud, but in this case, maybe prose too.
Kate Beaton addresses the Fitzgerald marriage on Hark a Vagrant.
F. Scott's editor's first impression of the book: "a great deal of underlying thought of unusual quality."
Hemingway to FSF after reading Tender is the Night: "You can write twice as well now as you ever could. All you need to do is write truly and not care about what the fate of it is."
And again, FSF to his young daughter, Scottie: "I am glad you are happy — but I never believe much in happiness. I never believe in misery either. Those are things you see on the stage or the screen or the printed pages, they never really happen to you in life."
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
Saturday, May 25, 2013
Friday, April 19, 2013
Betty? This is Bette.
BD to Elizabeth Montgomery after a spat at Bette's house:
"Betty? When they do the story of my life, you should play me. And I'm not sure that's a compliment!"
Listen here. 2:20. It's all very adorable.
I suppose I should note that it could be confusing of me to refer to Bette Davis as BD for short, because her traitor daughter, Barbara Davis, was and still is known to the world as B.D. It may look lazy to my other middle aged gay Hollywood columnists, but I do like to use initials and B.D. doesn't even count, right? She wrote a shit book about her mother and ran off to join a Christian cult where she apparently remains. These seem like poor choices to me. Now she and her children have nothing to show for their famous lineage but bad attitudes and googly eyes. Bette cut B.D. entirely out of her will and ended up giving half of her estate to the personal assistant who became a friend and confidant in her last years.
It seems that B.D.'s book was universally rejected as opportunistic and discreditingly fictional slander at the time, particularly by people who had known she and her mother through the years in question. Perhaps she was seeking to ride the coattails of Christina Crawford and her seemingly more legit "Mommy Dearest," about her childhood with scaryass Joan Crawford. Even Mommy Dearest is considered to be partly fictional, but who knows what happened behind those hedges. Like I may have mentioned before, JC seems like she could have been the teacher in Sideways Stories from Wayside School, and that's not a compliment either.
"Betty? When they do the story of my life, you should play me. And I'm not sure that's a compliment!"
Listen here. 2:20. It's all very adorable.
I suppose I should note that it could be confusing of me to refer to Bette Davis as BD for short, because her traitor daughter, Barbara Davis, was and still is known to the world as B.D. It may look lazy to my other middle aged gay Hollywood columnists, but I do like to use initials and B.D. doesn't even count, right? She wrote a shit book about her mother and ran off to join a Christian cult where she apparently remains. These seem like poor choices to me. Now she and her children have nothing to show for their famous lineage but bad attitudes and googly eyes. Bette cut B.D. entirely out of her will and ended up giving half of her estate to the personal assistant who became a friend and confidant in her last years.
It seems that B.D.'s book was universally rejected as opportunistic and discreditingly fictional slander at the time, particularly by people who had known she and her mother through the years in question. Perhaps she was seeking to ride the coattails of Christina Crawford and her seemingly more legit "Mommy Dearest," about her childhood with scaryass Joan Crawford. Even Mommy Dearest is considered to be partly fictional, but who knows what happened behind those hedges. Like I may have mentioned before, JC seems like she could have been the teacher in Sideways Stories from Wayside School, and that's not a compliment either.
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Pre-Code
I've been watching one of TCM's "Forbidden Hollywood" collections, which showcases movies made in the 30s before the Hays Code really became active and movies were forced to become coy and generic for the good of the viewers. I always have to put my hand in the air when someone refers to the sweet, good old days when men were men and women were babies and no one cursed or took their clothes off, as my grandmother would say. I don't think so. Shit was raw when your grandparents were running it. You just don't know because they didn't tell you. Ask Ruth Chatterton.
These early movies were mostly free of censorship and contain all kinds of things like near-nudity, violence, portrayals of women that violated the conservative norm (running businesses! doing drugs! sex with non-husbands!), and difficult topics like rape, abortion, incest, abuse, addiction.
Unfortunately, the drawback to many of these earlier films is they are terrible. They have weird, pointless plots, bad acting, continuity issues, and, worst of all for me, stupid and convenient endings. Still, I love them best. I watch them over and over because there are so many small details and I love absorbing all of the sets, street scenes, clothes, slang. They seem like much truer reflections of life than glossier, more edited films.
Since the code was enforced from the mid 1930s to the late 1960s, I would guess most people probably haven't seen films made before it. My first exposure to pre-code movies was FEMALE (all caps for emphasis, as in, not a lady but a-), which is a story about the fall of a corporate titan who learns the same lesson that all women learn in these films: being independent will ruin your entire life. Societal constraints for women are for their own good! Examples:
The Divorcee (1930): A wife learns that her beloved husband has cheated on her with someone named Janice, for god's sake. She gets very drunk and sleeps with his best friend as payback. He divorces her and she's never happy again. Until he takes her back.
A Free Soul (1931): A girl is raised by her libertine father whose lack of conservative parenting lands her in the bed of a mobster who looks a lot like Clark Gable. Clark tries to ruin her life and Leslie Howard rescues her and brings her back to the prim world she should have occupied all along.
Three on a Match (1932): A bored and fickle housewife leaves her goodguy husband for some scumbag she meets on a cruise. She gets addicted to heroin and the boyfriend abducts her child from the ex-husband to ransom him for money to pay off his debt to the mob. A very young and vicious looking Humphrey Bogart is one of the bad guys who decides to just kill the child, which the mother prevents by jumping out of a window with a note to the police about the kid's whereabouts written on her dress.
Starting to get the idea? I think it's safer in the house, babe.
Another thing that shocked me about the pre-code films is seeing big stars playing some scandalous roles as younger women. One day I was searching for photos of Claudette Colbert in her Cleopatra outfit, as you do, when I found this clip from The Sign of the Cross, another crazy early film. I thought the Cleo dress was risque for her, but apparently not. Here she is, playing an Arab princess and bouncing around topless in a milk bath. Well, she is French.
I was also surprised to see Norma Shearer in similar roles, although they apparently couldn't get her to take her clothes off, and the extent of her sex scenes are outside shots of some drapes closing, or of her being in a man's house in the morning, which tells you all you need to know about her night.
Edit: OH MY GOD, Universal has gone through and had all the clips from The Sign of the Cross taken down! Don't they have better things to do? But I did find this, in case you didn't believe me earlier:
These early movies were mostly free of censorship and contain all kinds of things like near-nudity, violence, portrayals of women that violated the conservative norm (running businesses! doing drugs! sex with non-husbands!), and difficult topics like rape, abortion, incest, abuse, addiction.
Unfortunately, the drawback to many of these earlier films is they are terrible. They have weird, pointless plots, bad acting, continuity issues, and, worst of all for me, stupid and convenient endings. Still, I love them best. I watch them over and over because there are so many small details and I love absorbing all of the sets, street scenes, clothes, slang. They seem like much truer reflections of life than glossier, more edited films.
Since the code was enforced from the mid 1930s to the late 1960s, I would guess most people probably haven't seen films made before it. My first exposure to pre-code movies was FEMALE (all caps for emphasis, as in, not a lady but a-), which is a story about the fall of a corporate titan who learns the same lesson that all women learn in these films: being independent will ruin your entire life. Societal constraints for women are for their own good! Examples:
The Divorcee (1930): A wife learns that her beloved husband has cheated on her with someone named Janice, for god's sake. She gets very drunk and sleeps with his best friend as payback. He divorces her and she's never happy again. Until he takes her back.
A Free Soul (1931): A girl is raised by her libertine father whose lack of conservative parenting lands her in the bed of a mobster who looks a lot like Clark Gable. Clark tries to ruin her life and Leslie Howard rescues her and brings her back to the prim world she should have occupied all along.
Three on a Match (1932): A bored and fickle housewife leaves her goodguy husband for some scumbag she meets on a cruise. She gets addicted to heroin and the boyfriend abducts her child from the ex-husband to ransom him for money to pay off his debt to the mob. A very young and vicious looking Humphrey Bogart is one of the bad guys who decides to just kill the child, which the mother prevents by jumping out of a window with a note to the police about the kid's whereabouts written on her dress.
Starting to get the idea? I think it's safer in the house, babe.
Another thing that shocked me about the pre-code films is seeing big stars playing some scandalous roles as younger women. One day I was searching for photos of Claudette Colbert in her Cleopatra outfit, as you do, when I found this clip from The Sign of the Cross, another crazy early film. I thought the Cleo dress was risque for her, but apparently not. Here she is, playing an Arab princess and bouncing around topless in a milk bath. Well, she is French.
I was also surprised to see Norma Shearer in similar roles, although they apparently couldn't get her to take her clothes off, and the extent of her sex scenes are outside shots of some drapes closing, or of her being in a man's house in the morning, which tells you all you need to know about her night.
Edit: OH MY GOD, Universal has gone through and had all the clips from The Sign of the Cross taken down! Don't they have better things to do? But I did find this, in case you didn't believe me earlier:
 |
| A few years later, she'd become America's considerably more modest sweetheart in "It Happened One Night" |
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Next Stop is the Grave
Well I did it. I reached into my heart and/or soul and conducted out a 10 track playlist about flagrant gothery.
In my review, however, I realized two things: 1. This is obviously just an installment and 2. All of these artists are British except Dead Can Dance, who are Australian, and Christian Death. Of course the British make better music in this realm. They're just standing on a big pile of bones and angst over there. There are American goth outfits, of course, they're just all later and suck.
This list contains nothing but well known, well-loved hiteroos, including the excellent Bauhaus cover of Ziggy Stardust, which I actually like better than the original, although only kind of if you're going to get all heated about it. I don't repeat any artists, which was obviously a hardship for me. I also stay largely on track, genre-wise, which is actually totally impossible at all times and we start with punky goth, then move into more baroque eyelinery stuff and then into neo-folk with almost no attention paid to new romantic this time. Deal with it? Don't worry, next time there will be Marc Almond.
In my review, however, I realized two things: 1. This is obviously just an installment and 2. All of these artists are British except Dead Can Dance, who are Australian, and Christian Death. Of course the British make better music in this realm. They're just standing on a big pile of bones and angst over there. There are American goth outfits, of course, they're just all later and suck.
This list contains nothing but well known, well-loved hiteroos, including the excellent Bauhaus cover of Ziggy Stardust, which I actually like better than the original, although only kind of if you're going to get all heated about it. I don't repeat any artists, which was obviously a hardship for me. I also stay largely on track, genre-wise, which is actually totally impossible at all times and we start with punky goth, then move into more baroque eyelinery stuff and then into neo-folk with almost no attention paid to new romantic this time. Deal with it? Don't worry, next time there will be Marc Almond.
Thursday, March 21, 2013
The smell of creosote is so everywhere lately that I barely noticed that I should be smelling orange blossoms right now.
I'm always on the edge of desert now. I veered from my path today to drive through my old north central neighborhood, sure it was a space where the white blossoms would take over for the little creosote poms. It was. Dueling spring scents.
I love the musty musky smell of orange blossoms, and the creeping smell of the creosote, which makes me think of rain and delicate green grass that looks like carpet on the mountains.
I'm always on the edge of desert now. I veered from my path today to drive through my old north central neighborhood, sure it was a space where the white blossoms would take over for the little creosote poms. It was. Dueling spring scents.
I love the musty musky smell of orange blossoms, and the creeping smell of the creosote, which makes me think of rain and delicate green grass that looks like carpet on the mountains.
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
I volunteer at a tiny art gallery every once in a while. Because my schedule is insane, I only ever make it there about once a month, but I keep it on my schedule because why not. The gallery is on the first floor of City Hall, almost completely unknown to the public, which is fine by me, because I just sit and read for a couple of hours in almost completely uninterrupted silence.
I was interrupted this morning by a quiet, somewhat grizzled older guy in all black and a feathered hat who came in to ask me about prints of the pieces, all recent shots of architectural landmarks around Phoenix. He pointed to the Valley National Bank on Camelback and 44th st, saying, "That's my building." Maybe I've just had too many downtown kooks up in my face recently, because I just smiled and nodded to the guy, thinking, yeah buddy, it's my building too, we all like it.
I asked him for his contact information to follow up about the prints and watched as he printed his name in exacting block letters, then spent the next 10 seconds squinting blindly into space, my mind desperately trying to remember and fact check without the internet. As soon as he started to leave, I concluded: he designed the Valley National Bank building, the "mushroom bank," in 1968.
IT IS HIS BUILDING.
I didn't call after him to tell him that I had finally figured out who he was, because really. His demeanor was interesting, very quiet, almost awkward, although I usually find introverted, subdued people to be interesting.
Anyway, he is cool. About the building.
I was interrupted this morning by a quiet, somewhat grizzled older guy in all black and a feathered hat who came in to ask me about prints of the pieces, all recent shots of architectural landmarks around Phoenix. He pointed to the Valley National Bank on Camelback and 44th st, saying, "That's my building." Maybe I've just had too many downtown kooks up in my face recently, because I just smiled and nodded to the guy, thinking, yeah buddy, it's my building too, we all like it.
I asked him for his contact information to follow up about the prints and watched as he printed his name in exacting block letters, then spent the next 10 seconds squinting blindly into space, my mind desperately trying to remember and fact check without the internet. As soon as he started to leave, I concluded: he designed the Valley National Bank building, the "mushroom bank," in 1968.
IT IS HIS BUILDING.
I didn't call after him to tell him that I had finally figured out who he was, because really. His demeanor was interesting, very quiet, almost awkward, although I usually find introverted, subdued people to be interesting.
Anyway, he is cool. About the building.
Monday, March 18, 2013
Julius H. "G." Marx
Groucho: Say, I wanna register a complaint.
Captain: Why, what's the matter?
Groucho: Matter enough. You know who sneaked into my stateroom at 3:00 this morning?
Captain: Who did that?
Groucho: Nobody, and that's my complaint!
All of the Marx Brothers films have little spaces after each zinger, allowing time for the audience to laugh without missing the next one.
It's amusing that Groucho is always the lech in the movies, but that may be an exaggerated reflection of life. Lines like,
Waitress: What can I do for you?
Groucho: I'll tell you later.
...would probably piss me off in a modern film, but the way he alternates being completely ridiculous with making sly dog side comments just amuses me instead.
Like a lot of things that feel like a given now, the humor of these movies seems like part of a universal cultural memory. When I first started watching these films, I was surprised at how familiar the jokes and antics felt. Did I watch them as a kid and forget? Maybe. What's more likely is they were copied, referred to and lampooned in a lot of old cartoons and came to me that way.
Captain: Why, what's the matter?
Groucho: Matter enough. You know who sneaked into my stateroom at 3:00 this morning?
Captain: Who did that?
Groucho: Nobody, and that's my complaint!
All of the Marx Brothers films have little spaces after each zinger, allowing time for the audience to laugh without missing the next one.
It's amusing that Groucho is always the lech in the movies, but that may be an exaggerated reflection of life. Lines like,
Waitress: What can I do for you?
Groucho: I'll tell you later.
...would probably piss me off in a modern film, but the way he alternates being completely ridiculous with making sly dog side comments just amuses me instead.
Like a lot of things that feel like a given now, the humor of these movies seems like part of a universal cultural memory. When I first started watching these films, I was surprised at how familiar the jokes and antics felt. Did I watch them as a kid and forget? Maybe. What's more likely is they were copied, referred to and lampooned in a lot of old cartoons and came to me that way.
Friday, March 15, 2013
Oh, battleaxes.
Here's the thing - people hate salty, bitchy, eccentric old women. Even salty, bitchy, eccentric younger women hate them. Why? That's you in 25 years, dummy! Recognize!
I like tough, grouchy old women because I find them to be kind of charming, and oftentimes, that brand of no-fucks-giving eccentricity is a sign or byproduct of above average intelligence. Most people would have to agree that a quick survey of the most intelligent people they know also contains the fussiest, most self-embattled people they know.
This Bette Davis appearance on Dick Cavett inspired me to explore this topic. Look at her! Wearing a mink beret and Emma Peel boots, and looking good. She's sassy and funny but you know she could attack at any time.
I have a weird relationship with battleaxes in that I almost always get along with them while the rest of the world avoids or merely tolerates them depending on their level of importance. I don't find their gruffness to be a personal affront, and I seem to know how to talk to them in a way that quickly gets me out of their bitch zone. Did you see The Horse Whisperer? Like that. It's amazing what funny little skills we develop based on adaptations made for survival in childhood. My family is filled with "difficult personalities," and I grew up in a coven of old women and their friends. I'm in. I'm one of them.
That's not to say that all crotchety old women are secret-charmers with valuable things to share with the world. Like most old men, some old women are just bastards, perversely spreading their sourpuss misery as widely as they can. I worked in retail as a kid, and the most unfairly, unpredictably mean people by far were old men, and then women of menopausal age. Sorry - realtalk.
Since entering the museum world, I have been exposed to lots of eccentric old women, and I have cultivated positive relationships with them all while the rest of our peers can't stand them. At the same time, I have a very difficult time connecting with those bubbly, frivolous persons most loved in their little networks. I find them irritating, and they find me off-putting. I belong to another world, and we'd all prefer that I stay there.
Here's the thing - people hate salty, bitchy, eccentric old women. Even salty, bitchy, eccentric younger women hate them. Why? That's you in 25 years, dummy! Recognize!
I like tough, grouchy old women because I find them to be kind of charming, and oftentimes, that brand of no-fucks-giving eccentricity is a sign or byproduct of above average intelligence. Most people would have to agree that a quick survey of the most intelligent people they know also contains the fussiest, most self-embattled people they know.
This Bette Davis appearance on Dick Cavett inspired me to explore this topic. Look at her! Wearing a mink beret and Emma Peel boots, and looking good. She's sassy and funny but you know she could attack at any time.
I have a weird relationship with battleaxes in that I almost always get along with them while the rest of the world avoids or merely tolerates them depending on their level of importance. I don't find their gruffness to be a personal affront, and I seem to know how to talk to them in a way that quickly gets me out of their bitch zone. Did you see The Horse Whisperer? Like that. It's amazing what funny little skills we develop based on adaptations made for survival in childhood. My family is filled with "difficult personalities," and I grew up in a coven of old women and their friends. I'm in. I'm one of them.
That's not to say that all crotchety old women are secret-charmers with valuable things to share with the world. Like most old men, some old women are just bastards, perversely spreading their sourpuss misery as widely as they can. I worked in retail as a kid, and the most unfairly, unpredictably mean people by far were old men, and then women of menopausal age. Sorry - realtalk.
Since entering the museum world, I have been exposed to lots of eccentric old women, and I have cultivated positive relationships with them all while the rest of our peers can't stand them. At the same time, I have a very difficult time connecting with those bubbly, frivolous persons most loved in their little networks. I find them irritating, and they find me off-putting. I belong to another world, and we'd all prefer that I stay there.
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