The Big C

A completely annoying show that will begin airing on Showtime this Monday. I actually found it painful to watch at times. My review is up on Slant Magazine.

The Farmer's Wife (1928)

Another oddity from the silent years of Hitchcock. This is both a very broad comedy about a farmer seeking a second wife out of the available women in his vicinity, and a sort of pastoral ode. Except for The Trouble With Harry, no film of Hitchcock really celebrates the beauty of a rural existence like this one. Like most silent films, there are several versions, all of different lengths, and the one I watched clocked in at 129 minutes, which is a lot of time to spend on essentially a one-joke comedy. The fact that it was well-made, or the fact that it starred the gorgeous tragic silent film actress Lilian Hall-Davis, or the fact that I was spending time in my air-conditioned office during the tenth heatwave of this summer, didn't really justify the hours spent.

A Man of Affairs (1965)

Having just read a slightly sub-par MacDonald effort it was great to read this perfectly realized "business thriller." I don't really know what else to call it. No one commits a crime in the book, at least not legally. The basic plot is a 72-hour party in the Bahamas that is organized to grease the wheels on a corporate merger. Sam Glidden, the hero of the story, has to decide whether to sign a proxy saying he agrees to hand over control of the company he manages to unscrupulous raiders. In between the corporate wrangling (there isn't even that much, in fact MacDonald never specifically says what the company does) there are love affairs and drinking and fishing. It's perfectly done, and the moral line that is drawn is not too clear; there are pretty good arguments for Sam Glidden to sell out and live the American dream. Also of note: last chapter is one of the best and most romantic MacDonald has written.

Also of note: I was pretty pleased with the beautiful Dell 1st edition I was reading (see above) till I got a look at the very cool cover of the Fawcett Gold (see below). No reason I shouldn't own both of them, right?

Poetry Monday

Veruca Salt

by Roald Dahl

'Veruca Salt, the little brute,
Has just gone down the garbage chute,
(And as we very rightly thought
That in a case like this we ought
To see the thing completely through,
We've polished off her parents, too.)
Down goes Veruca! Down the drain!
And here, perhaps, we should explain
That she will meet, as she descends,
A rather different set of friends
To those that she has left behind–
These won't be nearly so refined.
A fish head, for example, cut
This morning from a halibut.
'Hello! Good morning! How d'you do?
How nice to meet you! How are you?'
And then a little further down
A mass of others gather round:
A bacon rind, some rancid lard,
A loaf of bread gone stale and hard,
A steak that nobody could chew,
An oyster from an oyster stew,
Some liverwurst so old and gray
One smelled it from a mile away,
A rotten nut, a reeky pear,
A thing the cat left on the stair,
And lots of other things as well,
Each with a rather horrid smell.
These are Veruca's new found friends
That she will meet as she descends,
And this is the price she has to pay
For going so very far astray.
But now, my dears, we think you might
Be wondering–is it really right
That every single bit of blame
And all the scolding and the shame
Should fall upon Veruca Salt?
Is she the only one at fault?
For though she's spoiled, and dreadfully so,
A girl can't spoil herself, you know.
Who spoiled her, then? Ah, who indeed?
Who pandered to her every need?
Who turned her into such a brat?
Who are the culprits? Who did that?
Alas! You needen't look so far
To find out who these sinners are.
They are (and this is very sad)
Her loving parents, MUM and DAD.
And that is why we're glad they fell
Into the garbage chute as well.'

from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Patricia Neal, 1926 - 2010

The Other Guys (2010)

I should probably stop going to see Will Ferrell movies in the theater. They almost always tire me out and I end up feeling ambivalent about the movie, then later, when the film shows up on HBO I start watching scenes and it grows on me. Just so long as I can watch in short bursts. This happened with Anchorman, with Blades of Glory, with Step Brothers. This will probably happen with The Other Guys. I liked it okay. Parts were funny, and many parts were more clever than funny. Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg had good chemistry as an overly cautious police accountant and a hot-blooded cop. I loved Michael Keaton as Gene, the good-natured Captain of the police station (plus a manager at Bed, Bath, and Beyond). None of it was great and for right now I think of it as the movie that got me into air conditioning for a Saturday afternoon.

Deadly Welcome (1958)

A little more contrived than most of John D.'s standalone thrillers. This one has a special agent who is sent back to Ramona Beach, the town he grew up in, to extract a scientist. But there is also a murder, a sexually damaged young lady (natch), and an old man who buried a fortune on an island. These all feel like ingredients tossed hodge-podge into the pot instead of elements that come naturally out of a situation. Still, it's not a bad short read but definitely not one of MacDonald's best.