Earlier in the year I was using the remote, desperate to find something interesting to watch, when I stumbled onto Reel Faith on the National Evangelical Television network. The show reviews films from a Christian viewpoint in a style similar to what Siskel and Ebert did on Sneak Previews. This particular episode focused on the best films of 2011. One showed up on each of the reviewers’ list, The Mill and the Cross, directed by Lech Majewski, a Pole. With my Netflix list growing short, I reluctantly added it, wary of being preached to. It is only remotely about religion. It is a challenging film completely out of the mainstream, almost too intelligent for its own good. It brings viewers into a painting by Breugel, The Way to Calvary, and shows how his ideas may have come about. The cinematography by Majewski and Adam Sikora is stunning. Dialogue is sparse. Most is assigned to Michael York, who plays a banker, the benefactor of the artist, played by Rutger Hauer. Without those words, the film may have been even a greater mystery than it is. I watched a 44-minute short in the special features to understand it better. The year is 1564 and the Flemish population of Flanders is under Spanish rule, and the conquerors are persecuting those they dub heretics. One of the themes is how the routines of life trump even monumental events. In the painting the crucifixion is almost lost amid 500 inhabitants, adults going about their business, children...
Last night I watched another of the music videotapes I made long ago, this one circa 1994. It began with the unusual protest song Zombie, by the Cranberries, done on SNL. Despite its chintzy main guitar riff and bizarre vocalizations ("Eh, eh. Oh, Oh."), it somehow works. It is a stirring plea for people to wake up and demand an end to the "troubles" in Northern Ireland, which have since ended. Hopefully, the collapse of the European economy won't spark a return of them.
The tape had the usual variety I enjoy. The only mistake was having six Eric Clapton songs back to back. They were from his From the Cradle period, broadcast on PBS, when he honored the blues men who influenced him. Of course, the performances are all first-rate, although I'm not as enthusiastic about them as I was on initial viewing. Van Halen made a rare network appearance on Jon Stewart's failed talk show. Eddie's guitar playing was spectacular. Unfortunately, the songs (Amsterdam was one) left a lot to be desired. They were from the Sammy Hagar period. I've never been able to warm up to him as a front man.
There was a sad moment in the mix - the appearance of the late Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys, tearing it up with his buddies, performing Sureshot. It was a reminder of how fickle life can be even for the successful. There were two superior highlights on the tape. Bjork and PJ Harvey teamed on a...
There is interesting news on the financial side of pro sports. According to sources, the Stanley Cup finalists, the New Jersey Devils and Los Angeles Kings, are both up for sale, although ownership and the league deny that is the case with the latter. On his PBS talk show, Charlie Rose once remarked that the most common regret of successful businessmen was ownership of a sports franchise, which seems to require persons more interested in publicity than profit. The Devils have been on the brink of ruin for a while now. Their deep run in the playoffs will wipe out losses for this season, but future financial prospects remain bleak. Lou Lamoriello is one of the greatest General Managers in the history of sports, keeping the team competitive despite a limited fan base and paltry revenue. The Devils are vying for their fourth Stanley Cup, astonishing given the circumstances. Way to go, goombah.
Red Sox pitching hero Curt Schilling, he of the famed bloody sock, stands to lose the 50 million he earned playing baseball. A venture on which he gambled, 38 Studios, has been a bust. I feel bad for him, but any help should come only from the private sector. He took the risk, he must suffer the consequences. Same for all who invested in Facebook, including me. No one twisted anyone's arm to buy. The whiners are pathetic. Worse are those gloating about the fall of the stock. It reminds me of how wonderful a Yankees losing streak...
Yesterday Antenna TV's schedule consisted of war films. There was an unusual pairing from eight to midnight: Sahara (1943) and Castle Keep (1969). The former was made during WWII and is rife with propaganda. Humphrey Bogart is the leader of a band of heroes stranded in the desert, desperate for water. There are several notable elements beyond its exciting action. Lloyd Bridges does a turn as a British soldier. Younger viewers might remember his memorable portrayal of the aged exercise guru on Seinfeld ("Mandelbaum! Mandelbaum!"). J. Carroll Naish received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. He plays an Italian prisoner who gives the film's main anti-Nazi speech. Dan Duryea, for once, plays a heroic figure, so unlike the sniveling weasels he did to perfection throughout his career. The highlight, though, is the tackling of the issue of race, seen through an African career soldier whom a German prisoner berates and Bogie defends. I'm not sure this was handled as frankly in previous Hollywood fare. To my chagrin, I was unable to figure out the actor's name among the credits at IMDB. I actually think it was left out. Sahara was directed by Zoltan Korda, whose most famous work is Jungle Book (1942).
Somehow I had never gotten around to viewing Castle Keep. Now I know why. It is too surreal for prime time TV. It is par for the era, when the iconoclastic was hip. It seemed gobbledygook to me, an opinion that would rile its supposedly avid cult following....
Abraham Lincoln was not only a great president - he was a great writer. Here is the Gettysburg address:
"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these...
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