Topic: UNWIELDY (Read 18907 times)

JMK · « **Reply #120 on:** January 30, 2005, 04:25:59 PM »

Snow: well my parents' house outside of SLC was well over 4000 feet above sea level, so we knew from snow. It was not unusual to get several feet overnight. In fact, we had a little tractor with a snowplow to clear the driveway that I got to use when I was a kid (didn't seem like a chore--even taught me to use a stick shift when I was 8 or 9!).

Words: I know not why the talk of "wield" and "unwield" reminded me of this, but there is an infamous anecdote in our family about a little essay I wrote about my father when I was in the first grade. It went something like this:

My dad was in the big war. He was in the war for three years. One day he got hurt in the war and got to come home. My mom said she never wanted him in another war again.

Now, what is so infamous about that, you may ask? Well, I'll tell you--I was taught to read and spell phonetically, and to my little 6 year old mind (I was a year ahead, but that's another story), war was spelled whore!

bk · « **Reply #121 on:** January 30, 2005, 04:30:17 PM »

I didn't totally overdo the potato salad, AS YET. But there are more hours in the day and evening.

Now, I see quite a few people on this board - so, what's that haps people on this board?

bk · « **Reply #122 on:** January 30, 2005, 04:32:28 PM »

My haps is that I'm watching Mr. Robert Altman's film, California Split. It's got some good stuff at a poker casino I used to frequent (The Normandie Club, south of downtown LA), but I'm just no fan of Mr. Altman's overlayered dialogue and improvisation that goes nowhere. However, there are several interesting things about the film which I'll go into when I talk about it in the notes.

elmore3003 · « **Reply #123 on:** January 30, 2005, 04:41:20 PM »

Quote from: Charles Pogue on January 30, 2005, 02:53:50 PM

elmore, I just wish the Lester Musketeers movies had been spliced together into one long movie. As they stand now, I find them a bit unbalanced...with the second suddenly getting all the heavy stuff in them...also continuity is bad, you'll see Michael York walk into a house in one costume and then be in the house in another costume from like the first movie...scenes were obviously being re-arranged.

Still they're fantastic movies and the best of the musketeers movies I've ever seen. And the fencing...well...magnificent! I just got both on DVD recently.
.

DRPogue, I was reading the THE THREE MUSKETEERS the summer of 1973 while I was working at The Jacobs Pillow Dance Festival, and I still remember how I excited I was by an article in the NY Times about the Lester film. At that point it was to be one long film, and the producers cut it into two, forcing the cast to demand payment for two film instead of one. I think the films, which are amazingly faithful to the book's long plot, are a hoot, but a lot more tongue in cheek than Dumas' romantic adventure intended. Still, I love the casting, the design, and the sweep. I have this strange memory that each film has a different composer. Like the films, the book gets darker once Milady starts manipulating the plot with Buckingham's assassination and Constance's death, but that's also part of Dumas' development of D'Artagnan's character from country squire to sophisticated protector of Queen Anne against Richilieu.

About two years ago, I read the unabridged COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO, which is the first novel I can think of with two lesbian characters, omitted from every screen version! It was an excellent new Penguin translation and took me several months to get through it. I enjoyed it much more than the unabridged LES MISERABLES, which I thought I would never get through; it was a jury duty read around 1992 or so. I think knowing the book got me through the plot lapses of the musical, but it also soured me on reading NOTRE DAME DE PARIS. I'm so pulp fiction, preferring Dumas to Hugo!

Kerry · « **Reply #124 on:** January 30, 2005, 04:48:57 PM »

DR Laura,

I saw snow once.

Kerry · « **Reply #125 on:** January 30, 2005, 04:49:48 PM »

Run, Eliza, Run!

bk · « **Reply #126 on:** January 30, 2005, 04:54:12 PM »

I never has seen snow.

Ann · « **Reply #127 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:04:20 PM »

bk - you've seriously never seen snow??

I did it, I went to the gym and used the treadmill! It wore me out pretty quickly, but I managed it.

I have found The Gay Divorcee on TCM. I haven't seen it in a few years, and I'm excited to watch it again. It was one of my childhood favorites.

elmore3003 · « **Reply #128 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:04:28 PM »

I remember snow.

bk · « **Reply #129 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:09:38 PM »

I've seen snow. I was quoting a song. I've seen lots of snow on my many winter visitations to New York, New York.

bk · « **Reply #130 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:10:27 PM »

The sun is setting in the west. The west is setting in the sun. There is no sun.

Ginny · « **Reply #131 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:20:49 PM »

Growing up in Michigan, I saw plenty of snow, but only remember one time when Detroit schools (which I attended K-12) were closed. My sophomore year in high school we had a 26" snowfall. There was a fire station at the end of our street and the hook and ladder got stuck in front of out house.

Winters are much milder here in southern Ohio, but in 1978 we had a blizzard with about 20+ inches and blowing and drifting.

Joey · « **Reply #132 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:24:59 PM »

I am in a White Christmas mood now with all this talk of snow. I may have to have an out of season viewing of the movie. :-) I watched Meet Me in St. Louis the other evening also. Two movies with Christmas in it that can be watched year round. :-)

Joey · « **Reply #133 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:26:57 PM »

After chipping out the front walk so students on their way to class won't have to slip and fall, I have to say I am not a fan of ice unless it is in a rink though.

Joey · « **Reply #134 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:28:18 PM »

Was it here on HHW or somewhere else that I heard they are planning on opening several productions of White Christmas in different cities next season?

Ron Pulliam · « **Reply #135 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:47:56 PM »

Quote from: Matt H. on January 30, 2005, 12:54:02 PM

Spent a nice time in Africa today with KING SOLOMON'S MINES. Some of the obvious jungle photography where the actors weren't present looks a bit washed out, but all of the scenes with the stars look in beautiful shape with only a speck or two here and there to betray its age. Nice to see it looking so good. Other than a trailer, however, no extras at all.

I'm betting the washed out sequences were from the studio footage shot back in the late 30s for "Trader Horn". MGM sent a cinematographer to Africa back then to get footage for "Trader Horn" and he, apparently, came back with quite a bit of usable stuff. I recall reading that "King Solomon's Mines" took advantage of the stock footage from that trip.

Ron Pulliam · « **Reply #136 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:51:34 PM »

Quote from: Joey on January 30, 2005, 05:28:18 PM

Was it here on HHW or somewhere else that I heard they are planning on opening several productions of White Christmas in different cities next season?

A production was mounted this past November at San Francisco's Curran Theater. It was based on the film story and used Berlin's music.

It was so popular, according to something I read in the San Francisco Chronicle, that it is being considered for a Broadway production.

Don't know if that's linked to other productions you've heard off....it may be they've taken the production that played here through the end of last year and are planning on testing it in other cities.

Charles Pogue · « **Reply #137 on:** January 30, 2005, 05:58:49 PM »

elmore I, too,love the 3 Musketeers casting in Lester's film. Olivier Reed as Athos is my fav (of course, I also love Van Heflin as Athos too in the '48 version...Athos is my favourite musketeer, because of all the darkness in his story). In college, I remember seeing a televised version of a wonderful stage production of the Musketeers done by Stratford, in Ontario Canada. Wish someone would put that out on DVD.

Speaking of Reed and swashbuckling scores, anyone else here like the Maurice Jarre score to Crossed Swords (aka Prince and Pauper) from the 70's which starred Reed and was produced by the Salkinds who did 3 Musketeers and directed by Richard Fleischer (of Vikings fame)? It had a great whistling main theme.

JMK · « **Reply #138 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:04:38 PM »

Van Heflin's daughter Vana (O'Brien) lives here and is one of the grandes dames of the Portland theater scene. She played a psychotherapist in the tv movie Pillars of Portland that I helped to score.

Jane · « **Reply #139 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:13:34 PM »

JMK-ROTFLOL

Ann I’m glad you only used the treadmill at the gym.

Jane · « **Reply #140 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:23:10 PM »

I also loved the cast in Lester’s cast THREE MUSKETTERS

There are Lesbians in THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO? LOL-Guess I was too young when I read the book. Maybe I should read it again and discover what else I’m missing.

Elmore the first time I read LES MISERABLES I was in 9th grade and barely put it down until I was finished reading it-read all night. I did not care for the musical.

Jennifer · « **Reply #141 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:33:51 PM »

Well I've never seen snow.

Oops, just kidding.

Wow, DR Ann, that is impressive that you were using the treadmill. Just be careful.

Good night all.

Jrand73 · « **Reply #142 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:37:49 PM »

LOL JMK...it must have been the Second World Whore.

Jrand73 · « **Reply #143 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:43:36 PM »

DR RON - wasn't TRADER HORN in Black and White. There was a 1937 British version, but I think some of the footage was used in some of the early Tarzan films.

Extra footage from KING SOLOMON'S MINES in 1950 was used in the 1959 film WATUSI.

Charles Pogue · « **Reply #144 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:49:08 PM »

There was a '37 British version of King Solomon's Mines. Gaumont, I think. Cecil Hardwicke, John Loder, and Paul Robeson. Trader Horn was in black and white and copious amounts of its footage got used in the Tarzan film and it seems like every other black and white jungle picture ad nauseum.

elmore3003 · « **Reply #145 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:58:06 PM »

Quote from: Jane on January 30, 2005, 06:23:10 PM

There are Lesbians in THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO? LOL-Guess I was too young when I read the book. Maybe I should read it again and discover what else I’m missing.

Elmore the first time I read LES MISERABLES I was in 9th grade and barely put it down until I was finished reading it-read all night. I did not care for the musical.

DRJane, yes, dear, there are lesbians, the daughter of one of the men who betrayed Dantes and her music teacher. When all the revenge plots take over, the two women have run away together and are caught in bed at an inn and publicly disgraced. The older translations of the novel puritanically cleaned all this up, but it's very clear in the new Penguin translation! There are also lesbian characters in Zola's backstage novel NANA, based on Offenbach's musical comedy star Hortense Schneider.

I'm glad you liked LES MISERABLES, which I found a fascinating but too long novel. The last film version with Liam Neeson was pretty good up until the barricades; then I felt like they ran out of money and had to wrap the damned thing up quickly. Uma Thurman(?) was a lovely Fantine, and I don't remember much else about it now, the book or the film. I am not a fan of the musical either but I do like "I Dreamed a Dream."

DRPogue, I've read the Stratford Musketeers script by Raby, I think. Dramatists Play Service handles it, and I would love to see that Canadian broadcast. The photos I've seen look fantastic.

elmore3003 · « **Reply #146 on:** January 30, 2005, 06:58:52 PM »

Quote from: JRand54 on January 30, 2005, 06:37:49 PM

LOL JMK...it must have been the Second World Whore.

I know the Third avenue Whore. Oh, what a lovely!

bk · « **Reply #147 on:** January 30, 2005, 07:18:32 PM »

I used to enjoy watching the whores who were in the neighborhood of the St. Moritz in NY. My friend Nick Redman and I used to chat them up.

bk · « **Reply #148 on:** January 30, 2005, 07:18:59 PM »

Is that right? The St. Moritz? On 59th and sixth or something?

bk · « **Reply #149 on:** January 30, 2005, 07:20:16 PM »

This is the slowest day we've had since the 2nd of January. Come now, we must send off the month with flying colors.

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Author Topic: UNWIELDY (Read 18907 times)