The Writer's Life 7/8 - Bravo

In a profile at IMDb, David Cronenberg is described as "The King of Venereal Horror" and "The Baron of Blood." I first learned of him in the early '80's, intrigued by the exploding heads in Scanners (1981). In Videodrome (1983), Deborah Harry did something creepy with a lit cigarette. That same year he did The Dead Zone, which remains my favorite adaptation of Stephen King. Crash came out in 1996. It featured something I'd never heard of and not sure even exists - characters deriving a sexual thrill from involvement in auto accidents. I don't think it was satire on how far society was willing to take sexuality, as the tone was deadly serious. A lot of my friends loved A History of Violence (2005). Although I found it satisfying viscerally, the protagonist was too much like a super-hero for the film to be taken seriously. Eastern Promises (2007), which focused on gangsters from former Soviet satellites, had an authenticity that gave me the willies. In one scene, the protagonist is vetted by made men, taking off his shirt to reveal elaborate tattoos of his dirty deeds. Last night I watched A Dangerous Method (2011), courtesy of Netflix. It is the story of two pioneers of psychology, Carl Jung and his mentor Sigmund Freud, who are connected by a female patient on the verge of madness, victim of abuse by her father. She eventually becomes a psychologist herself. It is a bold film in that it requires the viewer to listen carefully to the dialogue of the two famous men, who approach discussion with quiet intellectualism. They eventually have a falling out. Jung believes there is more to analysis than the sexual element that Freud found. The further I get from my peak sexuality, the more I agree with this. I also believe that dreams have broader meaning than the wish fulfillment that Freud diagnosed. Whenever I have a puzzling one, I try to find the wish behind it. It does not always work, so I suspect there is more to it. Science is always evolving. Michael Fassbender, Viggo Mortensen and Keira Knightley played the leads. Knightley injected needed vigor into the narrative. Without her, it would probably have been too dry to sit through. Still, it does not quite take off. On a scale of five, three.

I thank the four people who purchased books today at Bay Parkway & 85th, where Steve, a photographer for the Brooklyn weekly newspapers, showed and took pictures of the silly venture I call the floating book shop. His boss told me the article should be in the coming issue. I doubt it will increase sales any, but it is fun. You never know.

RIP Ernest Borgnine, 95. The son of Italian immigrants, he accumulated 203 acting credits according to IMDb, beginning in 1951. He continued to work to this day, appearing in at least one film or TV show per year since the start of the millennium. His last appearance will be in the forthcoming The Man Who Shook the Hand of Vicente Fernandez. Of course, his most famous role is as the PT boat Lt. Commander in the WWII spoof, McHale's Navy, which ran 138 episodes form '62-'66 on ABC. Few people know that he won the Oscar as Best Actor in 1955 in Marty, written by Paddy Chayefsky (Network), directed by Delbert Mann. It featured a couple of lines that were repeated around Brooklyn for years:

Angie: What do you wanna do tonight?
Marty Pilletti: I dunno, Angie. What do you wanna do?

Bravo, paisano.

Visit Vic’s sites:

Vic’s Third Novel (Print or Kindle): http://tinyurl.com/7e9jty3

Vic’s Website: http://members.tripod.com/vic_fortezza/Literature/

Vic’s Short Story Collection (Print or Kindle): http://www.tiny.cc/Oycgb

Vic’s 2nd Novel: http://tinyurl.com/6b86st6

Vic’s 1st Novel: http://tiny.cc/94t5h

Vic’s Screenplay on Kindle: http://tinyurl.com/cyckn3f