TCM: The Greatest Movie Channel

[Crisopera]

Oh, Rinaldo - the farewell trio is one of the most sublime pieces of music ever written.  I was lucky enough to sing Dorabella in Cosi many (MANY) years ago, and it was almost difficult to sing, it was so beautiful and moving.

[Rinaldo]

Lucky you, @Crisopera. The version used in the film was specially recorded for it by Pilar Lorengar, Yvonne Minton, and Barry McDaniel, and it's beautiful. But my very favorite rendition is the one by Leontyne Price, Tatiana Troyanos, and Ezio Flagello on their RCA recording. Hearing it for the first time made me fall permanently in love with the whole opera.

Edited August 16, 2018 by Rinaldo

[Rinaldo]

Aw, I recorded Sunday, Bloody Sunday despite owning the Blu-Ray because I'm always interested in what the host will say before and after. But they showed it late enough that they didn't bother with that. Oh well, at least they showed it.

Tomorrow is Barbra Streisand. Among the oft-aired (both justifiably and not) items, they're also showing two early nonmusicals that seem to have dropped out of pop culture completely: Up the Sandbox and The Owl and the Pussycat. The former is an interesting but not really successful attempt to capture some of the confusions (about marriage, feminism, etc.) that were in the air in the early 70s; I had mixed feelings then (though a few scenes linger in memory as really funny), and I'll be interested to see what I think now at this remove in time. But the latter I recall as a sweet low-key romantic comedy, that at the time (my friends and I made a point of seeing its opening weekend) answered the question of whether Streisand was still a star when she didn't sing (answer emphatically yes; she even dropped an f-bomb, which in 1970 was still a bit of a novelty from movie stars). She and George Segal make a nice pairing, and though it embraces the clichés of its time and subgenre -- the drab writer throws away his typewriter, so enraptured is he with this free-spirited woman, and the only way that writers can conceive of a lively independent woman is to make her a prostitute -- I recall it as a pleasant little picture that doesn't deserve to have been so totally forgotten. Let's see if I still think so.

[chitowngirl]

Oooo! What’s Up Doc? is on at 8:15 tomorrow morning!!! [scurries off to set recorder!]

[voiceover]

One of the many things What's Up, Doc? gets absolutely, hilariously right, is that it *is* possible to write clever exposition.

Here is some -- sadly, not all -- of Ryan O'Neal's courtroom explanation of the A-plot of the film.  Liam Dunn is the long-suffering judge trying to make sense of it all ("Is that clear?" "No, but it's consistent!").

[Vixenstud]

I was watching one of my fave BS movies this morning, The Main Event....truly a classic.

And yay!  Tonight we get Yentl and The Prince of Tides, two other faves.

[voiceover]

I liked the title track from The Main Event, but that's about all.  That is one hideous, soul-destroying, warped, chick-flick idea of a happy ending...for one thing.  

Star is Born has moments where I can see why somebody thought Kristofferson & Streisand would work.  Specifically, while he's riffing the lyrics to her piano sonata.  *That* was charming.  Sometimes you sense that they were having fun together.  

But the sound and the lighting/ cinematography are such disasters, the performances can't save it.  The soundtrack album, I love; especially Kris goofing & Barbra giggling at the end of their duo of "Evergreen".

[Rinaldo]

@voiceover, your whole post could pretty much have been written by me. I remember my whole college audience booing the ending of The Main Event when we saw it on its opening weekend. And yes, Kris and Barbra do have some charming spontaneous-looking moments together, but not enough to save a misconceived movie.

Well, now I have my answer to why nobody talks about The Owl and the Pussycat any more. Boy does it not hold up. It's simultaneously ugly about women (and gay men, just as endless incidental insults; I'm reasonably thick-skinned about older flicks in this respect but this just got tiresome), naive about hookers, sentimental and false about the value of being "real," and devoid of actual comedy. I'm baffled why my friends and I thought it was so wonderful when it was new, but it was another time, so were we then, and it can just stay there. 

(Oddly, Streisand's curse that I referred to several posts back was snipped out -- she walked up to the rowdy boys in their car, said nothing [SNIP], and they were so outraged that they jumped out and chased her. TCM has generally had a standard of presenting movies as-is, so I choose to believe that this was not their doing, but the print that they happened to be sent, edited by that one word from an R to a GP rating. Yes, the name of the rating was GP from 1970 to 1972. I wonder if thats the only form of it that now exists. That would be pretty funny as the Mad magazine parody was all about her being Miss Foul-Mouth.)

[prican58]

Only got to see The Way We Were and boy I do love that movie! It grabs me every time and Barbra is perfect in this. And I always cry at the end. They still loved each other after all the years and they both knew they could never socialize or see one another again. They both settled but were ok with it. Redford was never more beautiful to me and i can't comprehend him being 82 years old!

So glad the weekends seem to be dedicated to the big stars...Cooper, Gable today and Judy on Sun. I don't think I could have endured Jeanette MacDonald for a Sat or Sun. I don't mean to take away from her stardom as I know she has many fans and maybe they don't care for my faves. She bores me to tears except when I can be distracted by a Chevalier, Gable or Tracy.

Watching Adventure now and Gable is impressing the hell out of me.  I've always liked him but have grown to love him more over the years.  

[fairffaxx]

19 hours ago, prican58 said:

... Watching Adventure now and Gable is impressing the hell out of me.  I've always liked him but have grown to love him more over the years.  

I find Clark Gable to be worth watching in anything, but even he can't save this movie.  I also love Joan Blondell & Thomas Mitchell, so it must be Greer Garson's fault (as usual, for me).

[prican58]

Yes fairfaxx, I agree about this film even though it does have its moments. Joanie is my golden girl and I love her. I appreciate an actors need to stretch and not be typecast but I love Gable as this kind of character like in It Happened One Night (still my favorite film and performance of his) and Comrade X.  The King.

[Milburn Stone]

On 8/16/2018 at 8:40 PM, Rinaldo said:

Tomorrow is Barbra Streisand. Among the oft-aired (both justifiably and not) items, they're also showing two early nonmusicals that seem to have dropped out of pop culture completely: Up the Sandbox and The Owl and the Pussycat. The former is an interesting but not really successful attempt to capture some of the confusions (about marriage, feminism, etc.) that were in the air in the early 70s...

I started watching this via DVR and could not take it after ten minutes of literally nothing happening. I then FF'ed to the final scene to see what looked like Barbra abandoning her children and husband in search of self-actualization, while giving lip service to "loving" them. Does that about sum it up?

Edited August 20, 2018 by Milburn Stone

[Inquisitionist]

3 hours ago, Milburn Stone said:

I started watching this via DVR and could not take it after ten minutes of literally nothing happening. I then FF'ed to the final scene to see what looked like Barbra abandoning her children and husband in search of self-actualization, while giving lip service to "loving" them. Does that about sum it up?

I've never seen Up the Sandbox, but there are a lot of positive user reviews at IMDb.

[Rinaldo]

6 hours ago, Milburn Stone said:

I started watching this via DVR and could not take it after ten minutes of literally nothing happening. I then FF'ed to the final scene to see what looked like Barbra abandoning her children and husband in search of self-actualization, while giving lip service to "loving" them. Does that about sum it up?

Not at all, actually. She wasn't abandoning her husband and children; in a previous scene she had asked (after her husband offered "anything you want") for "the day off." So she dropped by the park to tell him she was pregnant (which she found out near the beginning of the movie), and then got in a cab to enjoy the rest of her Sunday off. She'll be back in the evening as usual.

That said, I can't recommend going back to see the whole movie. Like The Owl and the Pussycat, it's an artifact of its time that doesn't travel well (and wasn't liked by the public at the time, either; it was one of her commercial failures). I had remembered it as "interesting" at least, in its flailing around with her fantasy sequences (she sleeps with Fidel Castro, she literally wrestles with her controlling mother during a family gathering, she engages in research in Africa, etc.) about the issues of the early 1970s. But no, it's a mess, sometimes an ugly one, and interesting only to a historian of pop culture. It's best forgotten.

[voiceover]

But she looks absolutely gorgeous, all the way through.  The best she's ever looked in any of her films.  Prince of Tides and Funny Girl are a close second.

[Inquisitionist]

Did anyone catch The Miracle recently?  I vaguely remember watching this with my mom when I was very young and into movies about nuns.  Now... I can't believe the Comcast description gave this 3 stars out of a possible 4.  It's pretty much a howler.  But Roger Moore was pretty.

[Rinaldo]

I'm sure everything you say is true, @Inquisitionist. But the source material (of which this as the third film) is some of the most interesting in theater history. It was a pantomimed drama with a full musical score, in seven scenes, directed by the legendary Max Reinhardt, in Germany in 1911, in London (in the Olympia arena) in 1912 on Broadway (actually in a now-demolished theater on Central Park West). For the latter, designer Norman Bel Geddes transformed the whole interior of the theater into a Gothic cathedral, with each scene emphasizing a different visual art (ceramics, stained glass, etc.).

The orchestral-choral score is the most substantial one Engelbert Humperdinck wrote apart from Hansel and Gretel. And probably nothing on this scale has ever been staged since.

Isn't it odd that someone in Hollywood in the 1950s decided that the time was right for another version of the story? I know it was the era of Biblical spectaculars, but this was a near-forgotten bit of old-school grandiosity.

Edited August 26, 2018 by Rinaldo

[ratgirlagogo]

Neil Simon has died. 

https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/26/entertainment/neil-simon-playwright-dies/index.html

[voiceover]

His was neither the intellectual humor of Woody Allen, nor the knee-slapping outrage of Mel Brooks.  His characters were...accessibly funny!  Neil made us believe they were funny like *we'd* be funny: Oscar & Felix; Corie & Paul; Willy & Al; Charity Hope Valentine...and my all-time favorites, Elliot & Paula.

Thanks for the laughs, Mr Simon.  And thanks for one of the greatest of all comebacks to "I love you!": 

"Never mind that! You're rusting my guitar!"

[Inquisitionist]

On ‎8‎/‎26‎/‎2018 at 1:08 PM, Rinaldo said:

I'm sure everything you say is true, @Inquisitionist. But the source material (of which this as the third film) is some of the most interesting in theater history. It was a pantomimed drama with a full musical score, in seven scenes, directed by the legendary Max Reinhardt, in Germany in 1911, in London (in the Olympia arena) in 1912 on Broadway (actually in a now-demolished theater on Central Park West). ...

Yes, some of the reviews I was able to track down from the time of The Miracle's release mention this backstory.  Wikipedia summarizes the original play's plot as:

Quote

The Miracle re-told an old legend about a nun in the Middle Ages who runs away from her convent with a knight, and subsequently has several mystical adventures, eventually leading to her being accused of witchcraft. During her absence, the statue of the Virgin Mary in the convent's chapel comes to life and takes the nun's place in the convent, until her safe return.

The play has its origins in a 12th-century legend which Spanish writer José Zorrilla y Moral turned into a dramatic poem entitled Margarita La Tornera (Margarita the Gatekeeper). The poem differs from The Miracle in resetting the story in 19th-century Spain, as the 1959 film would do, and in not letting the reader know that the statue has taken the nun's place in the convent until nearly the very end.

The movie does indeed update the setting to the early 1800s, but it's apparent to viewers that the statue has "taken the place" of the missing postulant.  I don't know if this was part of the original production, but the movie also has the local populace suffering terribly during from drought and other calamities because the statue is no longer available to "intercede" on their behalf.  Oy vey. 

[Milburn Stone]

Caught up via DVR with Ann Sheridan in a just-OK late-forties "woman's picture" called The Unfaithful, with Zachary Scott and Lew Ayres (and Eve Arden in a supporting role). The reason I kept watching, besides the admirably workmanlike direction by Vincent Sherman, was how much a relic of its place and time it was. I've seen post-war movies that talked about how the women at home suffered during the war. This was the first one I've seen that was audacious enough to equate their suffering with that of the men on the front. There was some dialogue that spoke of the two years Scott spent in the South Pacific, and how Sheridan had just as hard a time living alone in Beverly Hills, which is what drove her to have an affair. I've seen adultery in this situation played with some empathy, but never this much empathy. I wondered how the returning veterans, who'd accompanied their wives and sweethearts to the movie theaters of the time where The Unfaithful was playing, felt about that one.

[Charlie Baker]

I don't disagree with Milburn about The Unfaithful--but there are a couple instances at least where I think both Scott's and Ayres's characters take brief issue with any effort at equating Scott's and Sheridan's situations. Leonard Maltin called this a post-war rehash of The Letter, and I would add a much softened one. But it's watchable. (Plus it's got Eve Arden spinning her lines for all they're worth.)

It was fun to see Lew Ayres take on a gangster role in Doorway to Hell, though he didn't quite pull it off.  Particularly when his second in command was played by James Cagney, in something like his second movie role.  The day also showed Ayres to good advantage in the first two Dr. Kildare movies and the delightful The Golden Fleecing, where he's a charming doofus turned hero and Lloyd Nolan is his gangster antagonist. Not to mention that the day included All Quiet on the Western Front.  And if they had included Holiday I would have watched it again.

In brief, from other days, Agnes Moorehead Day included The Magnificent Ambersons, in which she excels, and as a movie, despite the imposed, abrupt, jarringly "up" ending, is still pretty great.  Requiem for a Heavyweight is compact, stylish, and powerful, and the four principals (Day's honoree Anthony Quinn, Julie Harris, Mickey Rooney, and Jackie Gleason) are all excellent. 

Nice to have a Marcello Mastroianni day--watched 8 1/2 last night as it aired.  And I recorded A Special Day, which I haven't seen since its original release, and as I recall, is worth watching just to watch him and Sophia Loren work together, 

Edited August 31, 2018 by Charlie Baker
Because Eve Arden.

[Milburn Stone]

4 hours ago, Charlie Baker said:

(Plus it's got Eve Arden spinning her lines for all they're worth.)

 

You can't not keep your eyes glued on her whenever she's on screen, waiting for the next spin. I agree this was a big reason to plow through the movie. And it was Eve Arden as I've never seen her before--an unlikable Eve Arden (though somewhat redeemed in her last scene). The unlikability factor is probably why some of her zingers were not as amusing as they otherwise might have been, or else the writing just wasn't there. But she's giving it all she's got. And--to her credit as an actress--somehow she's doing this while at the same time never striving to make her unlikable character any more likable than she ought to be. It's the full Eve Arden treatment, put in the service of a story in which she's thoroughly unpleasant. 

Edited August 31, 2018 by Milburn Stone

[Wiendish Fitch]

Am I the only one baffled as to why Eve Arden was typecast as homely, unappealing, man-starved spinsters? I thought she was gorgeous! Same goes for poor, adorable Betty Garrett. Hollyweird, amirite?

[Rinaldo]

5 hours ago, Charlie Baker said:

In brief, from other days, Agnes Moorehead Day included The Magnificent Ambersons, in which she excels, and as a movie, despite the imposed, abrupt, jarringly "up" ending, is still pretty great.  Requiem for a Heavyweight is compact, stylish, and powerful, and the four principals (Day's honoree Anthony Quinn, Julie Harris, Mickey Rooney, and Jackie Gleason) are all excellent. 

After hearing about The Magnificent Ambersons for decades, I finally saw it thanks to TCM. And I was surprised (though I shouldn't have been, after Citizen Kane) by its effortlessly light, stylized tone at the beginning, perfectly brought off. As always, Welles just has so much fun with the film medium. And Moorehead's performance is just astonishing, again different from what I'd expected knowing its legendary reputation.

Having for so long thought of Julie Harris as a "devoted solely to the stage" sort of actress, I'm belatedly discovering what a substantial Hollywood resumé she built up in the 1950s -- thanks again, TCM. (Now, show I Am a Camera someday, please? Her Sally Bowles must be different from any other I've seen.)

[voiceover]

13 hours ago, Charlie Baker said:

Nice to have a Marcello Mastroianni day--watched 8 1/2 last night as it aired.  And I recorded A Special Day, which I haven't seen since its original release, and as I recall, is worth watching just to watch him and Sophia Loren work together

Careworn and middle-aged: I think they never looked sexier.  And that longtime collaboration serves them so well in this film, as two strangers who have an immediate affinity.  This is my favorite of all their movies together.

[chitowngirl]

If anyone missed What’s Up Doc? a few weeks ago, it’s on again tonight!

[Milburn Stone]

17 hours ago, chitowngirl said:

If anyone missed What’s Up Doc? a few weeks ago, it’s on again tonight!

I remember a great feeling of hope when I saw this back in the day. "In addition to the wonderful new wave of experimentation in American movies, the classic well-made film is back!" Well, with some exceptions, things didn't turn out exactly that way, but the movie is still a bright spot.

Edited September 3, 2018 by Milburn Stone

[prican58]

Want to see if Doc is as fun as I remember it.

[chitowngirl]

I thought it was! Except for 70s fashion, I didn’t find it dated at all. And it’s a story, that if made today, could be done without the plot being resolved with cell phones and computers. There are many movies whose plot falls apart with the knowledge that if it were set today, a cell call would solve the plot.

[Milburn Stone]

1 hour ago, chitowngirl said:

I thought it was!

I agree. The movie could have come off (even at the time) as a museum-piece re-creation of screwball comedy. (John Hillerman in the Franklin Pangborn part, etc. etc., on up the food chain.) But it felt and feels absolutely fresh. It's like Bogdanovich saying, "No, you don't get it, there's nothing dated about screwball comedy! Set the well-oiled machine in the modern world, with modern characters who have modern attitudes, and there's nothing about it that won't work!"

Edited September 3, 2018 by Milburn Stone

[chitowngirl]

My husband was half watching this with me (as he usually does). He looks up and notices that all have the same suitcase! That’s the point, you goof!!

[AuntiePam]

Rainy weekend, so managed to finish a few -- Sudden Fear, noir, Joan Crawford and Jack Palance (and Gloria Grahame)-- perfect casting.  Joan's character is a playwright, Jack's character is an actor.  In early scenes, Joan removes Jack from a play, saying he's a good actor but not believable in a romantic role.  Truer words . . . the man has a high level of what they used to call "animal magnetism" but romantic?  Nuh uh.  Jack woos and wins Joan and of course he's not on the level.  We're never sure how much of what happens later was an early plan*, or maybe I missed something.  *Because how can you plan for someone to fall in love with you?

Then it was a repeat viewing of The Locket, also noir, with Robert Mitchum not quite believable as an artist, and Laraine Day quite believable as a psychotic woman with a fixation for jewelry.  I like the flashbacks within flashbacks. 

Finally, The Prince and the Showgirl, another repeat.  I've also seen My Week With Marilyn, which is sort of about the filming of the movie.  I can understand why Olivier was so upset and angry.  She steals every scene, despite all her issues.  He comes off as wooden, uncomfortable, really quite silly, almost.  Yeah, she delayed production, but dammit, she's Marilyn.  I think she was wonderful in this, maybe her most natural, with almost no posing.

[voiceover]

13 hours ago, Milburn Stone said:

John Hillerman in the Franklin Pangborn part

Yeah, I don't get this.  Hillerman was the hotel's manager ("I have a message from the hotel staff.[...] 'Goodbye'."), not Fritz the desk clerk, which seems more the "Pangborn part".   "Snakes, as you know, have a deathly fear of...tile" is a line he would have owned.

[Milburn Stone]

9 hours ago, voiceover said:

Yeah, I don't get this.  Hillerman was the hotel's manager ("I have a message from the hotel staff.[...] 'Goodbye'."), not Fritz the desk clerk, which seems more the "Pangborn part".   "Snakes, as you know, have a deathly fear of...tile" is a line he would have owned.

Let me help you out. In addition to his several roles as "Hotel Desk Clerk," Pangborn played the following roles in movies in the sound era, according to the IMDB, in chronological order: Hotel Manager, Hotel Manager, Hotel Manager, Hotel Manager, Assistant Hotel Manager, Apartment Manager, Hotel Manager, Club Manager, Manager, and Sourpuss Manager.

[voiceover]

Yeah.  I'm familiar with his IMDb profile.

But if I had to choose the Pangborn part, it would still be Fritz.

Benchley in the Hillerman role.

[mariah23]

Another TCM Remembers:  Burt Reynolds died.

[Charlie Baker]

I was not a huge Reynolds fan, but there was no question he had star presence and personality.

And some range as an actor: Deliverance to Starting Over to Boogie Nights.

[Rinaldo]

Being around for most of Burt Reynolds's career allowed me to see how many times his "image" changed -- from "just another TV actor" to "TV star" to "new movie leading man" to "Cosmopolitan centerfold" to "self-mocking cigarillo-chomping talk-show personality" to "genuine movie star with a distinctive persona" to "older character man with a distinctive edge." All of the "image" stuff often masked the fact that he was, in fact, a good actor with (as @Charlie Baker rightly said) more range than he's often given credit for. In with all the fast-car action stuff, he could be an appealing romantic-comedy leading man and more. Even in At Long Last Love, rightly considered an all-around disaster, I'm not calling his performance good by absolute standards, but it's far from the worst in the film, including some with more musical expertise than he had.

[Milburn Stone]

1 hour ago, Rinaldo said:

All of the "image" stuff often masked the fact that he was, in fact, a good actor with (as @Charlie Baker rightly said) more range than he's often given credit for. 

It is good to be reminded of this. The really terrible thing about the image stuff was that the image he cultivated was that of an actor who didn't give a sh*t about acting, or making movies that didn't suck. Ironically, he was a good enough actor that he made that lazy-ass nothing-matters shtick convincing.

Edited September 6, 2018 by Milburn Stone

[Rinaldo]

Fortunately time will sort that out (probably already has). Nobody has seen those in-person appearances with all their schtick for decades now, and all we're left with is the movies, some of which are pretty good, or classics of their type (however one feels about the Smokey and the Bandit series, they've achieved a kind of classic-pop status), or contain a good performance from him. If he rates an "In Memoriam" day, it'll be interesting to see what TCM programs.

[Bastet]

1 hour ago, Rinaldo said:

If he rates an "In Memoriam" day, it'll be interesting to see what TCM programs.

I don't think he will, but if I'm wrong, I hope they show The End, an underrated black comedy in which he not only stars but also directed.  And Myrna Loy and Pat O'Brien play his parents, so that's right up the TCM audience's alley.  (As I noted in the Celebrity Deaths thread, he - a big fan of old movies - sought them out for the roles, threw a huge party for them on the soundstage the day they filmed their one scene, and remained friends with Loy for the rest of her life.)

[voiceover]

As ever, I so enjoy peeling away a moment from a much-loved movie, holding it up to the light of my years & experience, and finding something new there.

Tonight it's the scene where Gregory Peck's Atticus is commanded to pick up a rifle and shoot down a rabid dog.  After stammering that he hasn't fired a gun in years, he throws down that emblem of mortality (his spectacles), takes aim, and dispatches the creature with one shot.

In the silence that follows, I can't decide which facial expression I like more: Atticus's slightly-smug "Pretty fly for an old guy!", or Jem's gobsmacked stare of utter disbelief.

[Sharpie66]

Ah, To Kill a Mockingbird. So very good! 

I love that scene, voiceover. I just listened to a podcast about this film yesterday, so I had it on my mind, too. One scene that I always return to for its heartbreaking simplicity is the one that was added to the script and not in the book, when the kids are in their beds and talking through the open windows about Jem’s memories of their mother, and the camera pans over to Atticus sitting on the porch, listening with this expression on his face that gets me every time.

Mary Badham’s performance is really remarkable for as inexperienced as she is. Some of it isn’t quite successful, but I love her discussions with Atticus, the scenes with all three of the kids playing, and the iconic delivery of “Hey, Boo.” Oh, and when they all meet Atticus after his work day and they get stuck having to talk with the old lady on her porch. “Good afternoon, Miss Dubose. My, you look a picture today!” “He don’t say a picture of what.” ::Whack::

[Charlie Baker]

I would think of the Saturday Evening Post as wholesome, All American stuff--not a source for film noir.  So it was news to me that last night's triple Saturday Evening Post feature was so very noir.  The Big Heat (Lee Marvin--yikes!) and Dark Passage (Bogie and Bacall and an all stops out Agnes Moorehead) have some geat jaw dropping moments. I hadn't seen Too Late for Tears (with Lizabeth Scott and Dan Duryea a match made in noir heaven), which Ben M noted was saved and restored by Eddie Muller's Film Noir Foundation.  Not the slickest or smoothest, but this one delivers. 

Might be my advancing age, but too much noir in quick succession can make me feel hungover. :-) 

[Charlie Baker]

I don't know how much in advance TCM would schedule such things, and it was there to plug the probably-long-in-the-schedule upcoming showing of Captains Courageous--but they played Burt Reynolds' remembrance of Spencer Tracy, whom he met when they were working on the same lot. It was touching, to say the least.

[Rinaldo]

28 minutes ago, Charlie Baker said:

Burt Reynolds' remembrance of Spencer Tracy, whom he met when they were working on the same lot.

Yes, this is one that seems to turn up whenever they have a Tracy movie coming up and they have some time that needs to be filled. I encountered it about a week ago.

[Milburn Stone]

Reading Wikipedia's entry on Burt Reynolds, I was struck by how many risks he took and unconventional choices he made not just in his career but in his life. Leaving a successful TV series at the start of his career because he was bored, investing in dinner theaters and restaurants that went broke, posing nude for Cosmopolitan, taking up with a star 20 years his senior, etc. I don't know how I feel about all that. (Not that it's "my place" to feel anything at all about it, but nevertheless I do. I just can't settle on a feeling.) It seems to bespeak a restlessness and impulsiveness that make my heart go out to him; did he ever find contentment? On the other hand, it also, if you slice it differently, seems to bespeak an inner-directedness, a following-his-own-star, that causes me to admire him. It's complicated.

[Rinaldo]

As we're continuing to talk about Reynolds, I'll share a conversation about him from Sheila O'Malley's blog; the occasion was not his death, but his last birthday. I had hesitated to bring it up before, because there's a lot I don't agree with in it -- both parties to the conversation love the self-deprecating-acting's-a-joke-media-image Reynolds of the 70s, which I don't. But they do recognize the complications @Milburn Stone just acknowledged. Part of the restlessness, I have little doubt, was connected with an actor's need to extend his viability in a business that throws people away when they're no longer news, or have committed the crime of aging. Reynolds managed the challenge better than many, keeping going through the 70s and much of the 80s, and finally turning back to TV with a slightly more matured image in Evening Shade. But after that, his resumé becomes sparser, and even the shot-in-the-arm of Boogie Nights didn't prove a permanent solution. (That was also the period when he declared bankruptcy, after his theater ventures.)

Acting's a tough and insecure life.

[voiceover]

That penultimate moment in The Man Who Would Be King -- Danny's begging forgiveness of Peachy, and Peachy shrugging his fate off with a grin -- put me in mind of other times, other films.  Like the ending of Breaker Morant: Edward Woodward and Bryan Brown, refusing the blindfolds, and Woodward admonishing his own firing squad with a "Shoot straight, y'bastards!"  Val Kilmer's "I'm your huckleberry!" before he guns down Michael Biehn in Tombstone.

That's some ball-clanging, testosterone-y bravado in the face of mortality.  I always want to smoke a cigarette after, whilst dreaming of Errol Flynn in any of those roles.