Well, dear readers, I awoke this morning at eight-fifteen. And yet, when I turned on my handy-dandy computer two minutes later it was nine-seventeen. Time had moved forward by one hour. One hour had simply disappeared, gone into a void, a black hole. There I was, standing in my house, in one room it was eight-fifteen in the next nine-seventeen. I was beginning to feel like I was in a David Lynch movie. I kept walking back and forth between rooms – in the bedroom it was an hour earlier, in the kitchen it was an hour later. I felt discombobulated, disconcerted and several other dis words. And then it hit me! Why did “it” hit me? What did I do to “it” that “it” should hit me? Where was I? Oh, yes, the shifting sands of time. Finally I realized what had happened. Daylight Savings Time had happened and time had moved forward during the night. At two o’clock a.m. it was suddenly three o’clock a.m. Time had sprung forward and do you know why? Because it is Spring. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, it is Spring. Spring is Here. You can’t even say It Might as Well Be Spring because it is Spring. And in Spring, time Springs forward and there is nothing you can do about it – you simply lose an hour, period, the end. It is inexorable, like birds flying south for the Winter. Is that when birds fly south? I would hate to pass on false information. I’m flying south right now because I have lost an hour and feel discombobulated, disconcerted and several other dis words. I feel like I’m in a David Lynch movie.
Perhaps the reason I feel like I’m in a David Lynch movie is because last night I watched a David Lynch movie, Mulholland Drive. But before that I’d watched a John Dahl movie called Joy Ride. Why did I watch a movie called Joy Ride? Well, I’ll tell you why – because every month I buy this stupid little rag called The DVD Newsletter, which is loaded with reviews of DVDs. And this guy spends the entire first page of the rag raving about Joy Ride, especially raving about the extras, because appararently after a test screening of this film, they went back and reshot the entire last third of the movie. The DVD includes not only the original twenty-nine minute ending, but several other versions of what is now the ending. He says the way they isolated the problems and fixed them is genius. So, I had to watch the film. The fact that this “reviewer” is a total nincompoop and that I have never agreed with him didn’t stop me, nosireebob and nosireemelvin. No, I watched the fershluganah movie. Genius? I think not. It was okay, I suppose, but it’s just a retread of things that have been done better elsewhere, most especially in Mr. Spielberg’s Duel. The critics’ love affair with John Dahl escapes me, frankly. I thought Red Rock West was okay, and I thought The Last Seduction was tolerable, but neither were the works of a major new auteur, they were just okay B-Movies, neither here nor there and, if anything, stylistically overwrought in that modern filmmaking way. I thought Joy Ride was pretty standard fare, and script-wise rather inane. I do like that Leelee Sobieski though. I looked up the reviews on this and they were raves – critics were falling all over themselves, because they love John Dahl. The audience, apparently, doesn’t love John Dahl, however, because the film stiffed at the box-office. So, all that test audience crap, all that reshooting was for naught, because they didn’t come anyway. Is the new ending better than the first ending? Sure. The first ending was almost laughable at times. Anyway, from now on if this guy raves about a movie I will not go anywhere near it. Fool me once, fool me twice, fool me one hundred and forty times, but that’s it.
Then I watched the David Lynch movie entitled Mulholland Drive. But let’s all click on that Unseemly Button below because this section is way too long and we run the risk of being bitch-slapped by Mr. Mark Bakalor and we simply can’t have that, now can we?
Has anyone noticed that it’s an hour later than it used to be? That’s why these notes are going up late today. Blame it on Daylight Savings Time, blame it on the bossa nova, just don’t blame me.
Anyway, last night I watched Mr. David Lynch’s film, Mulholland Drive. May we just say that Mr. Lynch is very peculiar. I sometimes think that I occasionally am fairly outre, but this guy owns the word outre. The entire two hourse and twenty six minutes of Mulholland Drive are like a dream. You don’t ever quite know what’s going on, who is really who, why things are happening or, heaven forbid, what the plot is, or even if there’s a plot. A woman is involved in an accident, gets amnesia, sneaks into someone’s house and goes to sleep. The niece of the woman who owns the apartment comes to LA for her big break – an audition at Paramount Studios. She finds the amnesia woman and together they have many dreamlike adventures. In the amnesia woman’s purse they find lots of money and a key. Two thirds of the way through the film, they find a small blue box – the amnesia woman unlocks the box, and the camera seems to whoosh down inside the box, and then suddenly everything in the film is different. People that we’ve met are now different people. It’s all very strange and weird but oddly compelling, like most dreams. The fact that the first shot of the film is of someone sleeping might tell us something. The film is also filled with Mr. Lynch’s wacky humor, which does make me laugh out loud sometimes. There’s a bit with espresso that is especially amusing. The actors are all very good, especially Miss Naomi Watts, who is called on to do many things – play two-thirds of the film as one character, and play the last third of the film quite differently, plus partake in two very vivid Lesbian scenes. I’ll probably watch it again, just to see how things puzzle together. Interestingly, Mulholland Drive started life as an ABC Pilot back in 1999. ABC, after taking a look at it, refused to air it – so Mr. Lynch got additional funding and fleshed it out as a film.
What am I, Ebert and Roeper all of a sudden? So far we haven’t had many guesses to the trivia contest – so, do your research, think your thoughts and guess your guesses. I will say that the sci-fi film I mention in the question is a true classic and is from the Golden Age of Sci-fi films, i.e. the 50s. Donald has a fun new radio show going up today, so be sure to give it a listen.
It’s so late I simply must get these notes up. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite Randy Newman songs? I’ll start: I discovered Mr. Newman way back in 1971 and I’ve always been a big fan. His first albums are terrific and filled with great songs – I Think It’s Going To Rain Today, Sail Away, Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear, Mama Told Me Not To Come, Lonely at the Top. I also love Marie, Real Emotional Girl, You’ve Got A Friend in Me, When She Loved Me, Political Science, Short People, I Love L.A. and scads of others. Your turn.