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| bartist |
 Posted: Wed Jul 31, 2013 10:48 am |
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Joined: 27 Apr 2010
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Location: Black Hills
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You could check with the Department of Redundancy Dept.
Paul Ehrlich - any relation to the "population bomb" guy in the 60s? |
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He was wise beyond his years, but only by a few days. |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Wed Jul 31, 2013 1:38 pm |
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bartist wrote: You could check with the Department of Redundancy Dept.
Paul Ehrlich - any relation to the "population bomb" guy in the 60s?
The later Ehrlich isn't a descendant, anyway. The elder Paul and Hedi only had two daughters. I don't know if either is a relation of the former Surgeon General S. Paul Ehrlich, (Nixon and Ford administrations.)
Dr. Ehrlich could have won a Nobel Prize for any of the four discoveries I mentioned, although I can understand Behring getting the 1901 Prize by himself, though Ehrlich could easily have shared it. Behring also collaborated in the discovery of tetanus antitoxin. He and Behring had a falling out because Behring maneuvered Ehrlich out of profits on diphtheria antitoxin, though they did differ on the scientific issues in the movie. The movie's actually accurate on almost every thing else.
Acquired immunity to snake venom was first discovered by an American, though Ehrlich may also have discovered it independently. |
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I had a love and my love was true but I lost my love to the yabba dabba doo, --The Flintstone Lament |
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| knox |
| Posted: Wed Jul 31, 2013 6:58 pm |
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Joined: 18 Mar 2010
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Location: St. Louis
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Quote: Acquired immunity to snake venom was first discovered by an American...
Now there would someone who could legitimately call himself Carlos Danger. |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Thu Aug 01, 2013 1:11 am |
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Joined: 31 Aug 2004
Posts: 9010
Location: Shanghai
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Watched approx the first half hour of The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceausescu. It's a 3 hour documentary of state films chronicling Ceausescu's career, his rise and dictatorship of Romania. I'd heard good things about it, but man was it a slog watching empty speeches in front of a rubber-stamp parliament or socialist conference. Another unanimous vote in support of some commie initiative -- way to go NC!
Maybe it gets better, but I found myself mostly listening for Latin-based cognates with English. Romanian is apparently the closest extant language to Latin. I've vaguely meant to go to Romania the past two Summers, but there isn't much of a glimpse of the land or landmarks except for military and party parades down a few boulevards.
It did begin with a few minutes of court proceedings against the Ceausescus, where Nicolae refuses to acknowledge the court's authority, imperiously says he will only speak before the National Assembly (one would suppose still stocked with his cronies -- if it is still functioning). Unfortunately, that more recent archive material is very grainy and poor quality, and lasts only a few minutes.
I'm guessing the film builds up an indictment from The State's/Ceausescu's own films -- but half an hour of old party speeches left me kind of numb, and the film is 3 hours long. We shall see ... |
Last edited by gromit on Thu Aug 01, 2013 11:01 am; edited 1 time in total
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| bartist |
| Posted: Thu Aug 01, 2013 7:53 am |
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Quote: Watched approx the first half hour of The Autobiography of Nicolae Ceausescu. It's a 3 hour documentary of state films chronicling Ceausescu's career, his rise and dictatorship ....
Gromit, taking one for the team. Meanwhile, Bart is idling away a summer's eve with Christopher Walken, in "Around the Bend," (2004) which is a nice showcase for Walken (who in the last decade has done way too many walkons and cameo roles, and not stuck around long enough to fully remind us what a wondrous actor he is...), but on the whole feels like the director/author has worked too hard on scripting Foibles, Eccentricities, and Behavior, plus an annoyingly cutesy use of KFC restaurants (which are required venues in the execution of a paterfamilias' (Michael Caine) will). You can tell the writer loves his own weird ideas, but the tough work of forging real and credible characters suffers. Again, the exception is Walken, and it's worth watching to see him elevate the film to something more than self-indulgent Indie flatulence. And there's some evocative Southwestern photography that is well done - what camera doesn't love New Mexico? |
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| knox |
| Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 9:36 am |
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Joined: 18 Mar 2010
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Location: St. Louis
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| Around the Bend - the stupid scenes with Caine's ashes made me want to pop in Lebowski, the Donnie's Ashes scene, and see something truly irreverent and funny. But youre right, Walken is so good. |
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| bartist |
| Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 10:55 am |
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Location: Black Hills
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Quote: And so, Theodore Donald Karabotsos, in accordance with what we think your dying wishes might well have been.... |
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| gromit |
| Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 4:59 pm |
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Location: Shanghai
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Finished NO.
Thought it was filmed in a terribly ugly style.
All close-up and shaky handheld cam and glaring lights.
Apparently they intentionally filmed it in the style of an amateur home movie. Maybe so it would blend with the archival footage, but it didn't need to look thta ugly.
The film itself relates to an interesting transitional moment in Chile's history, but over-determines the role of the Tv ad campaign. It becomes a fairly standard type low-key thriller and the characters are secondary at best.
The film barely held my interest. The campaign jingle was rather catchy. And the actual campaign commercials on each side were quite interesting. i think I would have preferred a documentary on the vote to this ugly, bland film. |
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Killing your enemies, if it's done badly, increases their number. |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 9:48 pm |
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Joined: 21 May 2004
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Murder My Sweet: This featured prominently in the Film Noir forum about ten years ago, contrasting it unfavorably with "The Big Sleep" (my next film) and sometimes unfavorably with the remake, "Farewell, My Lovely." This one was also "Farewell, My Lovely," but allegedly the title was changed so people wouldn't think it was another Dick Powell musical.
Everyone was so busy comparing it to other things that it tended to get overlooked that this was the first Chandler adaptation and is a fine film that gave the other Chandler adaptations something to shoot for. Powell's not my idea of Philip Marlowe, but he creates an interesting character anyway, and, with his tendency to get conked on the head, drugged, and generally bewildered, is a lot of fun. I like, for example, when the femme fatale is about to kill him and finally asks his first name, he answers perkily "Philip" as though he's not in danger at all.
There are lots of nice directoral touches like the first appearence of Moose, his face appearing and disappearing because of a flashing neon light (I love Mike Mazurki in this film), the drugged dream sequence, the sudden vanishing and appearances of people which gives a spooky feel.
I first came in contact with Dick Powell through The Bad and the Beautiful and his TV show, which had a film noirish feel, and I was surprised when I discovered him as a light musical comedy star. When I watched this, I was so used to seeing him in musicals that I was shocked at how good he was at film noir, because I'd forgotten. One of those actors (Joan Bennett's another one) who had a rich and varied career that I knew nothing about. |
Last edited by Syd on Fri Aug 02, 2013 10:00 pm; edited 1 time in total
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I had a love and my love was true but I lost my love to the yabba dabba doo, --The Flintstone Lament |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 9:53 pm |
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| As near as I can tell, as much as I'm glad Marlowe solved the mystery, Marlowe had next to nothing to do with the resolution of the plot, being out of action during much of the final shootout. The big thing he did was bring Moose to the final confrontation, and Moose probably would have found his way regardless. |
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I had a love and my love was true but I lost my love to the yabba dabba doo, --The Flintstone Lament |
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| Syd |
| Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 9:59 pm |
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| duplicate post. I don't need to quote myself. |
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I had a love and my love was true but I lost my love to the yabba dabba doo, --The Flintstone Lament |
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| marantzo |
| Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 11:09 pm |
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| Syd, I agree with the movies you mentioned. They were both top notch and Powell was very good in his role. I didn't know that Powell was a musical actor until long after I'd seen him in his dramatic/mystery pieces. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Fri Aug 02, 2013 11:51 pm |
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Joined: 20 May 2004
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| Dick Powell was in many ways the very best screen Marlowe, and Murder, My Sweet is probably the best Marlowe adaptation. My one caveat is that Claire Trevor is somewhat miscast IMO. SPOILER (She is so obviously trampy and evil that the ending comes as no surprise.) |
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| Marc |
| Posted: Sat Aug 03, 2013 2:39 am |
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| My favorite Marlowe was Mitchum in FAREWELL MY LOVELY. |
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| billyweeds |
| Posted: Sat Aug 03, 2013 7:03 am |
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Marc wrote: My favorite Marlowe was Mitchum in FAREWELL MY LOVELY.
I love Mitchum--love him--but his Marlowe was completely lacking in a sense of humor IMO, and that made his performance less effective than Powell's--or Elliott (The Long Goodbye) Gould's, for that matter. |
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