DR Elmore:
Yes, I very much anticipated my watching of NASHVILLE last night, and as the main title sequence went by, I was stunned at how good it was. Everything about that first five or ten minutes is what Altman so excelled at, and I couldn't believe I had ignored it all these years. Another five or ten minutes in, and I was mentally adding it to my list of landmark/favorite 1970s movies from the other day. AND ranking it right up there with my favorite Altmans.
And then -- silly me, I took a break about an hour into the film, and on my return I ended up getting drowsy and finally nodding off. So today I'm making an exception to my rule (or just my preference) of not watching a good film at home in the daytime, and I'll finish the second half. Then I'll check into a few of the extras on the Criterion disc. Fortunately, I can darken the Music Room enough to make the viewing pleasurable and comfortable.
As I type this, it occurs to me that I only ever do any serious watching in the daytime in cases where I'm completing something and just can't wait till later. I never go in there during the day and think "I'll put in something to watch". More often than not, it's a TV series I'm bingeing on. I've done this with the likes of THE WIRE, TWIN PEAKS, MAD MEN, and I think the last such thing for me was FOSSE/VERDON. Somehow, an Altman epic seems just as appropriate.
