Well, dear readers, thank goodness yesterday is done and maybe now we can see the pretty countryside – oh, a Stephen Sondheim reference. Yesterday was, to put it mildly, a stinky day, a horrible day, from start to almost finish. I cannot convey to you how stinky the day was. The day was clearly possessed by the devil and needed an exorcist. And so, it is only fitting that right now I am sitting here like so much fish listening to Brahms’ A German Requiem, sung in English by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, with Mr. Ormandy conducting in luscious stereo sound. Yesterday needs a damn requiem. Shall we just begin listing the irritants. I got up around 11:45 after a bit more than eight hours of sleep. All good. I drag myself to the computer and check the e-mails. Problem one: I have a PayPal invoice for some subscription from someone I don’t know to the tune of $399. Say what? Add to that, I was already going to call PayPal to complain about them having not closed a dispute when the provided tracking number clearly shows the package as delivered. So, I go to the site and notice a charge from Spectrum for $29.99. Spectrum is an auto pay and they do that on the first, so I thought that was weird. I called and got a nice lady on the phone. She confirmed that the invoice was fake and was happy to hear I hadn’t clicked to pay it or anything or called the bogus phone number on it. So, that was good. Then I complained about the still open dispute and she told me that for overseas shipments they need a copy of the label as USPS doesn’t show the address, just that it was delivered to Japan. Now, this fellow got his CD on March 25. Wouldn’t you think since he’d opened the dispute four days after he’d ordered it that he would have closed the dispute? Noooooo, that would be too hard. I told the nice gal that the label was, of course, ON THE PACKAGE, but thankfully the helper was able to send me a copy of it and I put that in as proof – they still haven’t closed it, but I can assure you I said in no uncertain terms that they needed to do so and do so quickly. If it’s not resolved by tomorrow, they will hear from me again, oh, yes, they will hear from me again. I got off the phone and called Spectrum to see what the charge was for. Well, they made no charge for that amount, not yesterday, not ever. I knew then the writing was on the wall so I called PayPal back, had them stop the credit card and I’ll have a new one in seven to ten days and then I get to have the fun of having to figure out all the places online that I use it so I can add the new card for all the autopays especially. We filed a dispute for the 29.99 but that’s gonna take up to thirty days to come back to me. Meanwhile, I transferred every cent in the PayPal account to my bank account.
That took almost ninety minutes and I just wish I knew where the card breach happened so I could go there and cause a damn ruckus. I wish only horrendous things to those who cause people this kind of trouble. Thankfully, I caught it so quickly because we all know that the 29.99 was only the tip of the iceberg. I’m sure that was a test, just as I’m sure the invoice was. By that time, I was so irritated and hungry that I ordered a smash burger from a place where I’d had one that was pretty good. Big mistake. The minute I unwrapped the package the smell was weird. The meat didn’t look rancid or anything, so I ate it, but boy was something off and I felt really nauseous for hours. I did have a nice telephonic conversation with David Wechter and then I had to sit on my couch like so much fish and watch a motion picture.
Given how the day was going, I think you can imagine that the movie I chose was just as stinky as the day. I mean, a complete stinkaroo save for the film’s final shot. This film was entitled Exorcist: Believer and is part of what complete idiots call the Exorcist Universe, as if the original movie was some kind of Marvel comic. You’d think the filmmakers would at least attempt to understand why the original movie worked so well and why it was such a huge hit and even phenomenon, much as Psycho had been when it came out. A no-star cast can do nothing with the horrid script, the whole thing is simply incoherent, you don’t believe a second of it, you don’t care about anyone or anything, and the last twenty-five minutes, the big exorcism sequence is unintentionally amusing rather than shocking or scary, and it’s followed by saccharine preachiness about kindness and goodness that made me even sicker to my stomach. Why Ellen Burstyn would agree to come back for this one when she’s avoided all the others is anyone’s guess. Perhaps at 90 years of age, the paycheck was too attractive. But for her ten minutes onscreen, they make her suffer a huge indignity when one of the TWO possessed young girls stabs her in the eye with a cross. So, she spends her other five minutes of the movie in a hospital with her eyes covered and bandaged.
The exorcism itself is so horribly filmed and all the CGI crap they thrust at you isn’t anywhere near as effective as the original film, which, as you know, had no CGI at all.
It’s not hard to figure out why the first film landed with audiences and worked like gangbusters. It was really well directed, it was shocking because – wait for it – you really like Regan and therefore what happens to her makes the audience horrified because what adorable little girl deserves what she goes through. It wasn’t just the effects and the brilliance of Mercedes McCambridge as the voice of the devil, it was the script and the excellent dialogue and its religious themes and the gravitas of Max von Sydow and Jason Miller and Lee J. Cobb – the film was ABOUT something, and you cared for its characters. Then again, William Peter Blatty was a terrific writer and the writers of the new film stink. The only scene in the entire film that has any emotion at all is the film’s final shot, Ms. Burstyn in the hospital who is paid a visit by someone who she hasn’t seen in years – her daughter, Regan – and seeing her and Linda Blair hug packs a little punch. That said, it’s not enough to have to endure the awfulness and crassness of the rest. They should stop. And the lies about the film’s grosses are pathetic. It didn’t do well in the US and we all know they can just say it did well overseas and no one can check. Highly NOT recommended by the likes of me.
After the movie, I was still feeling a bit icky and could still taste the burger, so since I’d gotten a complete refund from DoorDash, I ordered egg rolls and pork baos from Shanghai Rose, the only jernt still open. That arrived twenty minutes later. Thankfully, the egg rolls were very good. The baos are kind of ridiculous – the bun has about two tiny pieces of pork and almost no sauce so you’re basically eating an empty bun, or in this case, three empty buns – small, thankfully. After that, I listened to more Ormandy and right now the Brahms German Requiem is on its final track. After that, I’ll take a brief Ormandy break because I found two movie scores by Philippe Rombi that I knew nothing about, both thankfully on the Tube of You – I grabbed both and will listen to one of them before bed.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I’ll do whatever needs doing, I’ll hope for a nicer day, I’m thinking maybe a cube steak and an artichoke for food – that’s nice and calorie friendly, or if the ribs look good, I may do that. I’ll have some telephonic conversations, and then I’ll watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow, I’m being taken to dinner by Partridge Family friends, so that will be fun, then I’ll take it easy on the weekend, I suppose.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up when I’m up, do whatever needs doing, hope for a nicer day, do a Gelson’s run for food, have some telephonic conversations and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: What movies had a really big effect on you in terms of being shocking and upsetting, like The Exorcist? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy that the devil of a day is done.