In the Heat of the Night (1967)

An unpopular, rich man is found murdered in a small Southern town.  At the beginning of the investigation,  Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier), who is waiting for the train, is suspected as the murderer by the Police Chief Bill Gillespie (Rod Steiger).

I wasn’t sure if this movie would live up to its excellent reputation.  Many topical movies seem heavy-handed and irrelevant as times change. It made me sad that I recognized several episodes and characters in the movie.

The acting is excellent, the pacing is great, and the story is involving.  I don’t exactly remember all the details of the solution to the crime but I remember every bit of the changing attitudes of the two men.

I’d seen the “They call me Mr. Tibbs!” line by Sidney Poitier in clips for years.  Still, in context, the line and the scene gave me chills.

Recommended.

book 34: Those Who Hunt the Night

Those Who Hunt the Night by Barbara Hambly

I’m finally back to my 5 book challenge. I had to drop John Saul because his books weren’t exactly my thing. I replaced his books with Joyce Graham’s Tooth Fairy. But in the meantime, I read Hambly’s book.

It reminds me of Laurie R. King’s Monstrous Regiment of Women. Both are well written and set in the early 1900s. King uses Sherlock Holmes as a main character and Hambly refers to Bram Stoker and Dracula. Neither Bram Stoker nor Dracula appear in this book. At the heart of Hambly’s book is a moral question, much like the moral quandries in King’s books.

The plot: an ex-spy James Asher is forced to help vampires solve a murder mystery. The chief focus of the story is the development of an edgy friendship between the hero and the elegant vampire, Don Ysidro, who has hired him.

Hambly’s vampires are not as glamorous and sexy as they are in other stories. In fact, they are deadly and disgusting. Still, Ysidro manages to hide all signs of his grotesque appetite, except for an occasional warmness in his fingers.

The story is set in England, with a brief and eerie foray into Paris. The human stories and the vampire stories are interwoven and the resolution of the mystery was satisfying to me. The moral element was satisfying as well – for the character and for the situation.

Spies (1928)

Spies was directed by Fritz Lang, a director that I’m appreciating more and more with each movie of his I see.  (Dr. Mabuse, Siegfried, Metropolis).

Spies is about super-spy No. 326 who falls for Sonja, a spy working for the villain Haghi.  These spies and others double-cross each other and then double-cross each other again, just to make sure.

First of all, I want (Gerda Maurus) Sonia’s evening dress (scroll down a bit).  It’s the one she wears at the beginning of the movie.  I would hang it up like Kaylee at the end of “Shindig” and look at it.  So pretty.

The main character No. 326 (Willy Fritsch) looked scruffy and more contemporary at the beginning of the movie when he was doing his undercover work.  It was a little unnerving to when he transmogrified into the 1920s leading man but I adjusted to it.

The villain of the movie Haghi (Rudolf Klein-Rogge) was surely the precursor to the Bond villain – all he needed was a cat.

The movie was a lot of fun and while I didn’t think it got started for awhile, once it did the tension never let up till the last frame.  Thanks for for your suggestion, Andy.

Bunny Lake is Missing (1965)

Ann (Carole Lynly) moves to a new apartment with her young daughter Bunny. She takes her to the preschool early in the morning and despite a rather uninterested reception leaves her there.  Her landlord (Noel Coward) pays her a creepy visit and unnerves her.  

That afternoon, She goes to the school and waits to pick up Bunny.  Bunny isn’t there.  In fact, everyone claims not to have seen her and they are highly uncooperative. 

Her brother shows up to support her and he cows the teachers.  However the inspector (Laurence Olivier) begins to doubt that Bunny exists outside of Ann’s imagination.

Olivier is very understated and gives the movie an welcome air of realism.  He is so different in manner that at first I didn’t recognize him as Rebecca’s Maxim de Winter or Hamlet.  Lynly does a good job as a hysterical mother (surely the most thankless of roles).

The movie’s strongest point is its creepiness.  It comes at unexpected moments and very effective.  I like seeing scary that doesn’t involve buckets of blood or loud noises to make you jump.  It’s beautifully shot and makes you realize how lovely black and white film can be.

I liked it quite a bit, despite the old, old plot.

FilmFanatic.org review.

book 33: One! Hundred! Demons!

One! Hundred! Demons! by Lynda Barry

I was a bit nervous of this one because the artwork seemed busy – too bright, too many things to look at. So I didn’t try to read it for a long time. I’m sorry I waited because it’s wonderful. She’s very, very honest and I almost expected the characters to walk out of the pages because they were so real.

I read this a little while ago and my memory is fuzzy. I think the title is from a spiritual practice of drawing things from your past that hurt. Some of the stories are the lost past, some hurts she’s overcome, and some hurts just linger.

I loved the bit about how people’s houses smell different – fun.

The one story that stood out was the one about hate. My brother and I had had a conversation similar to this story a few days before I read it. I think the whole story is at salon.com.

The saddest story was of a friendship that she abandoned and now wishes she hadn’t.

Barry’s really good. Don’t mind the bright colors, most of the stories are dark enough.

comic strips – geeks and breasts

I was searching Oh No Robot - it searches for terms in online comic strips – way cool.

I found this strip about a woman in a boys’ club comic book store.  I take a little issue with the strip but I WANT that T-shirt.  Of course, no one but role playing gamers  in d20 systems would even get the reference.  It amuses me though.

Rereading the strip, I don’t know if the artist even meant the T-shirt as a joke.  Maybe only I think it’s smutty.  To be honest, that amuses me even more.

recommended daily dose of surrealism

This is a link to Michael Paulus’ drawings of the skeletons of cartoon characters  

such as Charlie Brown and Hello Kitty. 

Gotta say the Power Puff Girl skeleton is creepy.

1960s movies – top 25

This list is taken from Digital Dream Door’s list of 100 best movies from the 1960s. These are only the first 25. I really didn’t do so well this time.

Here are my other top 25 lists:

Silent :: 1930s :: 1940s :: 1950s :: 1960s :: 1970s :: 1980s :: 1990s :: 2000s

Underlined means I’ve seen it. Blue text means I haven’t. A ♣ means I want to see it.

1. Lawrence of Arabia (1962, David Lean)
2. Psycho (1960, Alfred Hitchcock)
3. Dr. Strangelove… (1964, Stanley Kubrick)
4. 8 1/2 (1963, Federico Fellini)
5. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968, Stanley Kubrick)
6. Once Upon a Time in the West (1968, Sergio Leone)
7. To Kill a Mockingbird (1962, Robert Mulligan)
8. Midnight Cowboy (1969, John Schlesinger)
9. Bonnie and Clyde (1967, Arthur Penn)
10. La Dolce Vita (1960, Federico Fellini)♣
11. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966, Sergio Leone)
12. The Graduate (1967, Mike Nichols)
13. Breathless (1960, Jean-Luc Godard)
14. Yojimbo (1961, Akira Kurosawa)♣
15. Wild Bunch (1969, Sam Peckinpah)
16. Persona (1966, Ingmar Bergman)♣
17. The Leopard (1963, Luchino Visconti)
18. L’Avventura (1960, Michelangelo Antonioni)♣
19. The Apartment (1960, Billy Wilder)♣
20. The Manchurian Candidate – (1962, John Frankenheimer)
21. Easy Rider (1969, Dennis Hopper)
22. Last Year at Marienbad (1961, Alain Resnais)
23. West Side Story (1961, Jerome Robbins, Robert Wise)
24. Cool Hand Luke (1967, Stuart Rosenberg)
25. The Battle of Algiers (1966, Gillo Pontecorvo)

Shania Twain vs. Papa Roach

see my land of gnod post for the set up

My Brother:  So what have you been listening to?

Me, in a futile bid for cool points: I’ve been enjoying Panic! at the Disco.

My Brother: *sound of meh*

Me: I think their titles are clever, like Lying is the Most Fun A Girl Can Have Without Taking her Clothes Off or The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide is Press Coverage.

My Brother: What else?

Me:  I’ve been listening to *cough* Christina Aguilera, Frou Frou, and Savage Garden.

My Brother:  Christina Aguilera is the slutty one?

Me: Well, she has a good voice.

My Brother:  Frou Frou sounds like one of those ugly-girl bands.

Me:  Imogen Heap is actually quite pretty, although there was some controversy about her armpit hair.

My Brother, drops phone: *sound of distant laughter*

note: I believe I was thinking of Paula Cole’s armpit hair not Imogen Heap’s.  My apologies to both ladies and their fans. 

My Brother:  But Doom Garden sounds a little more hard-edged.

note: If I had had my wits about me, I would have said this:

Yes, they’re so hard-edged, their advisory label is in orange, and it’s for TOXIC LYRICS.  And that one song, Truly, Madly, Deeply, is so rough that they still won’t play it on the radio.

Sadly, my wits have long been lost under the sofa cushions.

Me, what I actually said:  I’ve mostly been listening to their ballads like “I would fly to the moon and back/ if you’ll beeeeeeeeeeeeeeee/If you’ll beeeeeeeeeeeeee mai baaaybeeeeeee.”

My Brother: I get it, I get it.

Me: ’Kay.  And for the first time, I’ve been enjoying some country music.

My Brother: !!!What!!! have they done to you!!!?????

Me: It’s mostly the pseudo-country like LeAnn Rime’s Right Kind of Wrong or Shania Twain’s Party for Two.

My Brother:  We need to ween you off that.

Me:  What should I listen to?

My Brother:  Smashing Pumpkins, Papa Roach, and Green Day, but not their latest album.

Me, taking notes: …not their latest album.

My Brother:  No more LeAnn Rimes.

Me: …no more LeAnn Rimes.

My Brother: And no more Shania Twain, ever.

Me:  …and no more Shania Twain, just a little bit of Sugarland.

My Brother, suspiciously:  Sugarland’s not country like Shania Twain, is it?

Me:  Nope, not country like Shania Twain.

cf. wits in sofa.  This was a bold-faced lie in itself, plus I had no intention of stopping my new Shania Twain infatuation.

The next morning, I left a message on my brother’s answering machine asking permission to blog our conversation.

I got this on my voice mail:  “You may use my mouth-words.”

I love my brother.

Gnod: music recommender

Gnod.net  is a recommendation site that I really like.  They have three sections: movies, books and music.  You can try the interactive maps – you know those trembling spider-webs of concept connections.    Those are fun but sometimes I question the connections.

Or you can list 3 authors, musicians or movies and get suggestions.  Obviously, it improves your results if you list three mystery authors or 3 action movies or three boy bands.

For me, the movie and book suggestions are decent enough but I like the music suggestions best.  Anyway, try it and see what you come up with.  Some of the spelling is hard to decipher but you can report typos.

_____________________________________________________

Further: since I’ve starting buying music online, I’ve been using Gnod extensively.  I called my brother to tell him that I had new music for us to listen while I beat him at Tetris.  (This is our joke, he can beat me at it blindfolded and has before.) The conversation we had was too long to add here, so I’ll post it tomorrow.

So far, our only band in common is the Red Hot Chili Peppers but we’d like to have a variety. For the conversation to make sense, you have to understand that I have been woefully underexposed to pop music, or any music really.