Well, dear readers, here we are in the final week of March. I’ve said it before and I’ll undoubtedly say it again – where in tarnation do these months go? Time is flying by like a gazelle dressed in leather riding on a Harley-Davidson. Not only that, but given the accelerated pace of the year thus far, my allergies have kicked in. Just what in did to my allergies to deserve said kicking is anyone’s guess. So, I sit here sniffling, eyes red and moist, overtired, trying to write with panache and verve, not necessarily in that order. Speaking of order, yesterday was a day that was a little busier than I’d expected. For example, I got up and had to leave immediately, as she of the Evil Eye arrived bright and early and cast her gaze on me. I shipped a couple of packages, then drove to West LA, where I killed some time. Yes, I perpetrated a homicide on some time. I came back home around twelve-thirty and did a few things around the home environment, and then I wrote five pages more quickly than I would have thought possible. I, in fact, finished the chapter I was on. However, after some thought, I decided that the chapter was about five pages longer than any other chapter in the book, and as soon as I realized that, I realized the solution was to end the chapter with what occurred just prior to the new five pages. It was an excellent ending to a chapter, and thus I was already five pages into the new chapter. The conundrum is that at the end of the five pages I wrote the end of a chapter (originally the previous chapter). I don’t want a chapter as short as that, so I’ve found a place to add at least two pages, and I’ll do that tomorrow – it will still be a relatively short chapter, but that seems to be the style of this book, and I like it. This coming week’s pages should propel me into the last section of the book, which will run approximately sixty to seventy pages. After writing, I went to eat, and then took a nice, long drive and found a good used CD store, where I spent an hour perusing their stock. After that, I came home and immediately sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I managed to watch a motion picture on DVD entitled Naked City. It’s quite a good motion picture and one of the few Jules Dassin films I hadn’t seen. I was happy to see that the film ended with the famous line that was used in every episode of the TV series made from the film – “There are eight million stories in the naked city – you’ve just seen one of them.” The narration spoken by Mr. Mark Hellinger, got a little much at times, but the gritty, on location filming was superb, with wonderful camerawork by the great William Daniels, a good score credited to Miklos Rozsa and Frank Skinner, a melodramatic but interesting script by Albert Maltz and Malvin Wald, and excellent direction by Mr. Dassin. But the best part was the supporting cast – none of them credited, and most with less than a line to speak or even no lines. The leads were very good – Barry Fitzgerald, Don Taylor, Howard Duff and others, but here’s who I saw pass by during the film – I actually couldn’t believe my eyes and it became great fun picking out the actors I knew. The uncredited supporting cast includes first film appearances for many of them, and the ones I definitely recognized were Arthur O’Connell, Kathleen Freeman, David Opatashu, Robert H. Harris, Bern Hoffman (who would go on to play Earthquake McGoon in Li’l Abner), Molly Picon, James Gregory, Paul Ford, and John Randolph. I’m sure there were others. Some of these folks were literally on the screen for five seconds, some a bit longer. The transfer was very nice with excellent contrast. Image Entertainment had done a few of these Mark Hellinger films on DVD and the quality was awful – these are huge improvements and much recommended by the likes of me.
What am I, Ebert and Roeper all of a sudden? Why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because there are eight million stories in the naked city and they all take place in the next section.
Today, I shall spend the morning hours finding some music charts for my gals. I shall then have a nice, leisurely luncheon, and then I’ll be going to the DGA to see a motion picture entitled Shooter, starring Mark Wahlberg and directed by the guy who made the awful film Training Day. So, why am I going to inflict this on myself? Well, I’ll tell you why – because Shooter is based on one of my favorite books of the 90s, Stephen Hunter’s Point Of Impact, at terrific thriller with a great lead character called Bob the Nailer. I actually wanted to buy the rights back when I read it, because I knew it would make a great film – but, I didn’t. Now they’ve made it, and the casting of Mr. Wahlberg is so not what the character is, that I hold almost no hope for the film to resemble the book at all. Bob the Nailer needs to be played by a star – a real movie star, like Clint in his prime, or someone like that. It doesn’t need to be played by one of these actors who whispers and mumbles everything so that the dialogue is completely incomprehensible. I will, of course, have a full report.
I’m not sure I’ll get any writing done today, unless I do it in the evening when I get back from the film. If I don’t, I’ll make up for it tomorrow. I don’t think I have much planned for the day, other than writing, but I do have a very big meeting to attend – it’s at my house, so I don’t have very far to go.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, find music charts, lunch, see a film, and perhaps write a page or three. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s free-for-all day, the day in which you dear readers get to make with the topics and we all get to post about them. So, let’s have loads of lovely topics and loads of lovely postings and remember, there are eight million stories in the naked city – you’ve just seen one of them and it was called BK’s Notes.