February 19, 2017

I've had the DVD of Django Unchained for several years now. Finally watched it last night. Christoph Waltz is amazing. Lots of cameos: Don Johnson  as Big Daddy,  Tom Wopat as U.S. Marshall Gill Tatum, Russ Tamblyn as Son of a Gunfighter, Bruce Dern as Old Man Carrucan, Jonah Hill as Bag Head #2, and Quentin Tarantino as The LeQuint Dickey Mining Co. Employee /Robert (Bag Head.)




Watched the last hour of North by Northwest. Loved this line:

Roger Thornhill: Now you listen to me, I'm an advertising man, not a red herring. I've got a job, a secretary, a mother, two ex-wives and several bartenders that depend upon me, and I don't intend to disappoint them all by getting myself "slightly" killed. 



The real Mt. Rushmore sequences were limited and most scenes were done away from South Dakota: "Alfred Hitchcock's Expedient Exaggerations and the Filming of North by Northwest at Mount Rushmore."



“We’re talking about putting a manifestly irresponsible man on national television.”

Network still packs a punch. Wonder what Paddy Chayefsky would think of today.

Wesley Addy in the house.

Howard Beale:

This is not a psychotic episode. This is a cleansing moment of clarity. I’m imbued, Max.I’m imbued with some special spirit.It’s not a religious feeling. It’s a shocking eruption of great electrical energy.I feel vivid and flashing,as if suddenly I’d been plugged into some great electromagnetic field.I feel connected to all living things.To flowers,birds,all the animals of the worid. And even to some great,unseen, living force.What I think the Hindus call prana.

Prana: In Hindu philosophy including yoga, Indian medicine, and martial arts, prana (प्राण, prāṇa; the Sanskrit word for "life force" or "vital principle") is all cosmic energy, permeating the Universe on all levels. Prana is often referred to as the "life force" or "life energy".

February 19, 2011

Last night was Paddy Chayefsky night on Turner Classic Movies. They are having their usual Oscar Festival. The Hospital wears well, it is still a great movie.

Sidney Aaron Chayefsky received his more familiar nickname of Paddy while in the army during World War II. One Friday night, pork was being served in the mess hall. Rather than eat food forbidden him as an orthodox Jew, he said, in a put-on Irish brogue, that he was forbidden from eating meat on a Friday. His fellow soldiers, amused by this, started calling him Paddy, and the nickname stuck.

Paddy Chayefsky wrote such wonderful dialogue. I didn't stay up for Network but ordered the DVD from Barnes and Noble- $7.97, a steal.

Edmund Drummond: So at 9:15 this morning I rang for my nurse...
Bock: Rang for your nurse?
Edmund Drummond: To ensure one full hour of uninterrupted privacy.
Bock: Good.



Nelson Chaney: All I know is that this violates every canon of respectable broadcasting.
Frank Hackett: We're not a respectable network. We're a whorehouse network, and we have to take whatever we can get.
Nelson Chaney: Well, I don't want any part of it. I don't fancy myself the president of a whorehouse.
Frank Hackett: That's very commendable of you, Nelson. Now sit down. Your indignation is duly noted; you can always resign tomorrow.

And, Bill Holden, doing what Chayefsky does best, looking back on decisions and consequences in a complex world.

Max Schumacher: I feel lousy about the pain that I've caused my wife and kids. I feel guilty and conscience-stricken, and all of those things you think sentimental, but which my generation calls simple human decency. And I miss my home, because I'm beginning to get scared shitless, because all of a sudden it's closer to the end than the beginning, and death is suddenly a perceptible thing to me, with definable features.

Beatrice Straight's Oscar-winning role in Network (1976) lasted a mere 5 minutes and 40 seconds on screen, making her performance the briefest ever to win an acting Oscar:

Louise Schumacher: Get out, go anywhere you want, go to a hotel, go live with her, and don't come back. Because, after 25 years of building a home and raising a family and all the senseless pain that we have inflicted on each other, I'm damned if I'm going to stand here and have you tell me you're in love with somebody else. Because this isn't a convention weekend with your secretary, is it? Or - or some broad that you picked up after three belts of booze. This is your great winter romance, isn't it? Your last roar of passion before you settle into your emeritus years. Is that what's left for me? Is that my share? She gets the winter passion, and I get the dotage? What am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to sit at home knitting and purling while you slink back like some penitent drunk? I'm your wife, damn it. And, if you can't work up a winter passion for me, the least I require is respect and allegiance. I hurt. Don't you understand that? I hurt badly.



My tax refund came in today, it was delayed for acceptance and only went in this Tuesday. Party Time ! Mimosas to start the day, with leftover truffles from Valentine's Day. Most of the cash infusion will be saved, but a little "Mad Money" must be spent, our National Economy needs it and I will do my share.



Outback time. A chain, but you can do well if you order correctly. A little Surf and Turf is in order. As are Margaritas.



Also ordered Simone Dinnerstein's Bach: A Strange Beauty and J.S. Bach: Goldberg Variations.



Had a Borders Gift Card with remaining money on it and went there today after reading about their upcoming Bankruptcy. Picked this one up and had a 33% discount coupon to boot. Atul Gawande's The Checklist Manifesto looked too good to pass up.



Beers for the long weekend are Barrier Brewery's Barrier Rembrandt Coffee Porter and On Cask: Barrier Smoked Scottish Ale.