Saturday, May 12, 2012
Backdraft (1991)
Two Chicago firefighter brothers who don't get along have to work together while a dangerous arsonist is on the loose.
Over-average drama due to great cast and competent directing.
Friday, May 11, 2012
First Lines: Janet Frame - Towards Another Summer
When she came to this country her body had stopped growing, her bones had accepted enough Antipeodian deposit to last until her death, her hair that once flamed ginger in the southern sun was fading and dust-coloured in the new hemisphere, and she was thirty, unmarried except for a few adulterous months with an American writer (self-styled) who woke in the morning, said
- I write best on an empty stomach,
pulled a small piece of paper from his tweed coat hanging on the end of the double bed, and wrote one line.
Thursday, May 10, 2012
New Stuff: My Bloody Valentine
I had these remastered versions pre-ordered for 3 years, now they have finally been released!
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
First Lines: Allen Ginsberg - Howl
(ph: Essie Snell)
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
The King (2005)
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A troubled man, recently discharged from the Navy, goes to Corpus Christi, Texas, in search of the father he's never met.
Subtly staged familial drama cleverly escalating it to semi-mythological dimensions.
Night Passage (1957)
The workers on the railroad haven't been paid in months, because a gang has been robbing their wages...
Although barely a standard Western, the story wins alone by James Stewart's participation.
Backlash (1956)
A man seeks a survivor of the Apache ambush his father died in.
Standard and solid Western, but otherwise not quite remarkable.
New Stuff: Making Noise
The ultimate book on noise, 900 pages, and 379 pages of endnotes, only available online...
Monday, May 7, 2012
Into the Abyss (2011)
Conversations with death row inmate Michael Perry and those affected by his crime serve as an examination of why people - and the state - kill.
Gripping and in-depth study that manages to analyze this difficult issue without bias.
New Stuff: The Ten-Cent Plague
Finally a book about this era in the history of comics which I always wanted to know more about.
Herr Ober! (1992)
Together with his posh, suppressive wife a man is managing a hotel, but is more interested in writing poetry.
This vehicle for (and by) the popular Bavarian humorist Gerhard Polt is entertaining, but far less ingenious and funny than his more famous short sketches.
