I RODE WITH HIM, AND I GOT NO COMPLAINTS

The great if unheralded cinematographer Bruce Surtees has died at the age of 74.

His dad was the Golden Age cameraman Robert Surtees, who toiled at MGM at the close of its Dream Factory days, but the son's work would be the polar opposite of the father's easily read Classical Hollywood style.  His most frequent collaborator, Clint Eastwood, dubbed him the Prince Of Darkness for a reason.

After serving as an apprentice to his father and others, Surtees' first film as director of photography was Don Siegel's The Beguiled, the first of several outstanding collaborations, including Dirty Harry, The Shootist and Escape From Alcatraz.  He provided tabloid squalor for Bob Fosse's Lenny, low-key naturalism for Arthur Penn's great Night Moves and a touch of glamour for Stanley Donen's wonderful Movie, Movie.  Why he didn't become one of the superstar cinematographers of the seventies, joining the ranks of Laszlo Kovacs or Vilmos Zsigmond or Gordon Willis, is frankly beyond me.  He could shoot in any style, and it always looked good.

But his preferred style was the underlit naturalism of his work with Eastwood, one of the great director/cameramen collaborations in movie history.  In particular, their work on three great Westerns--High Plains Drifter, The Outlaw Josey Wales and Pale Rider--feature some absolutely stunning imagery.

High Plains Drifter has a strange, stylized appearance, its colors just slightly oversaturated.  Pale Rider, by contrast, is almost monochromatic, its overcast skies and drab clothing giving it a feeling of black-and-white in color.  And The Outlaw Josey Wales--well, look, I pretty much consider it as close to perfection as any movie ever made, and Surtees' visuals are surely one of the major reasons for that.  I can't think of any film that so subtly conveys the passing of seasons, the feeling of moving from place to place.  Every frame is gorgeous and gritty in roughly equal measure.

Sadly, Pale Rider would be his last film for Eastwood.  He'd work with other good directors in the eighties, like Sam Fuller and Paul Brickman, but his A-list days were behind him.  He wound down his career toiling away on TV movies obviously unworthy of his talent.  But at least he kept working, a pro to the end.

UM...OKAY?

According to E! Entertainment News--the only information source that matters, if you're really, really stupid--Josh Duhamel is "not sure" he'll be back for the latest Transformers movie.

I think I speak for all Americans when I say, "Who's Josh Duhamel?"

Since I have cable TV, I've seen huge chunks of the Transformers movies, and all I remember are giant but weightless CGI robots, plenty of offensive caricatures and Shia The Beef running around screaming, "OPTIMUS!"  Whoever Josh Duhamel is, he clearly made no impression on the films whatsoever.

Then again, I'm pretty sure he's made no impact on anybody whatsoever.  I'd be willing to bet that if you asked ten random strangers who Josh Duhamel is, none of them would know.  Some of them might say, "Yeah, wasn't he the guy in Pearl Harbor who was even less interesting than Ben Affleck?" and while that was my first thought, too, it turns out that particular nonentity was Josh Hartnett, who has himself gone from being hyped as The Next Big Thing to toplining direct-to-video horror movies, a career arc that should surely give pause to Duhamel. 

What I'm saying is, Josh Duhamel should be fighting like hell to continue doing whatever minimal, uninteresting work he can get in a new Transformers movie because hey, a paycheck is a paycheck, and I'm guessing a check from a shitty Michael Bay movie has more zeroes in it than a check from some celebrity autograph fest.  Sure it may be humiliating to find yourself billed below the guy who does the voice of Optimus Prime, but it beats sitting between Billy Mumy and Jonathan Frid at a table in some suburban convention center, with a placard in front of you identifying you as a "former Transformers star" and gritting your teeth the whole time because Mumy's got a huge line in front of him and you're just sitting there.

And he deserves it, dammit, because Billy Mumy recorded Fish Heads and you...well, you're just Josh Duhamel.

NOW WE ARE SIX

Mom didn't care much for Peter Jackson's King Kong.: "Why did it take so long to get to the island?  Why was it three hours long?  And that dinosaur stampede!  What were they thinking?  And that scene on the ice--cute, cute, cute.  No, I didn't like it."

This was late December of '05.  Earlier that month, she'd been given six months to live.  As it turns out, she had considerably less.  To many of us, the reality of impending death might cause us to give in to fear, or despair, or introspection, or something.  Mom...just became more like she always was.

On the movie version of Rent: "Oh, it's terrible.  He dies of AIDS, and we're going to try to make you cry by reminding you about it over and over, 'Oh, it's so sad,' like we've forgotten what happened ten minutes ago.  Was it this bad on stage?"

On Lost, then in its first season: "Maybe there's a monster, maybe there's not a monster.  But if there's not, they need to stop pretending that there is and get on with the plot.  And if there is a monster...that would be kind of stupid, wouldn't it?"

On Brigadoon, which she's stumbled across on cable and called me immediately after just to gripe about: "It doesn't work that way.  You can't say, 'These are the rules, this is what happens,' and then do something else and say, 'It's a miracle.'  Why did you make the rules in the first place?  And I don't think Cyd Charisse was Scottish..."

Six years since her death, I admit I don't think about Mom as much as I used to.  I don't miss her anymore, not really, not like I thought I would.  But sometimes, when I'm in the middle of a rant, when I'm asking a sales clerk to stop talking to his friends and actually give me some service, when I see through the lies of a politician...These are the times when I am thankful Mom was there to teach me how to question, to stand up for myself, to see what is really there.

Mom liked everyone, and everyone liked her.  She had a sentimental streak a mile wide, any rendition of Bein' Green would automatically reduce her to tears, she had a goofy sense of humor and laughed easily.  But beneath her easygoing manner was a fierce determination to say what needed to be said.  In the wake of my divorce, I was unloading my feelings about my ex, but she seemed to be taking Sue Ellen's side.  Why, I asked, are you sticking up for her?

"Because she messed up, but she wasn't stupid.  You were stupid."

I remember that, and I've used that to guide me since, in relationships and everything else.  Because she was right, of course.  She was always right. 

Well, except for her weird obsession with Murder, She Wrote...

MEMORIES CAN HANG YOU UP AND HAUNT YOU

There are two tragedies in what will now be known as the short life of Whitney Houston.  There is the obvious one, the numbingly familiar tale of a huge star with the world at her command, who somehow finds fame isn't enough, who falls into a downward spiral of drugs and erratic behavior, who tries for the Big Comeback that never quite happens, who is found dead in a hotel room, in this case at the depressingly young age of 48. 

As sad as that story might be, there's another one that to me is even sadder: The story of a possibly major artist with an absolutely incredible talent, who let herself be led by industry professionals down a path that would strip her of any individuality, to a career of absolute inconsequence. 

I first became aware of Houston as so many people did, with her debut album, cannily assembled by blanderizing industry pro Clive Davis.  The first single, Saving All My Love For You, showed promise, especially in this performance on David Letterman's old show, assisted in no small part by the arrangement by band leader Paul Shaffer, much superior to the schlocky, overproduced version on the album.



She's incredible here, in full command of her multi-octave voice, and the vocal pyrotechnics are deployed well.  Later, of course, she'd start melisma-ing all over the place, a profound and bad influence on so many singers who would follow her.  The most obvious Whitney Wannabe, of course, was Mariah Carey, but ironically, Carey's recorded legacy is stronger than Houston's.  Saving All My Love isn't a great song, but it's at least servicable as a showcase for Houston's vocals, and it stands out on an album full of pop piffle like How Will I Know? and overwrought ballads like The Greatest Love Of All.

Unfortunately, all of her albums followed the same carefully-engineered template, machine-tooled by Davis and his minions to maximize profits.  Album, tour, album, tour, with numerous awards show appearances thrown in along the way--that became Houston's life as a musician.  Artistic concerns never entered into the picture.

But what about the path not taken?  Prior to superstardom, Houston was a working musician, which is what led her to work with the NYC collective Material, which produced this stunningly beautiful track, which showcases Houston, not even twenty, as the jazzy chanteuse she might have been, the artist she was.

THREE TIMES THAT NIGHT

First Staley--of course.  Every night when I go to bed, Staley leaps up beside me, purring loudly, head-butting me into I skritch her her, moving around constantly, making sure I pet her just as much as she wants.  Then--wump! wump! wump!--she scrambles to the foot of the bed, leaps down and runs off.

Later, Cookie appears, climbing over Janie and draping herself on my side.  I pat the bed beside me and she crawls down, snuggling beside me, tucked under the blanket.  Her entire body vibates from the force of her purring, and she's close enough to me that my body feels it, too, it's comforting, it's reassuring.  But ultimately, like Staley, Cookie is only there for herself.  Once I stop actually petting her, she's gone.

But when I wake, there he is--Delmar.  He doesn't care if I'm petting him, if I'm paying attention to him at all.  In fact, he seems happier when I'm not noticing him.  Those are the times when he can sneak in and remind me of his existence, can prove his intense, unending devotion to me. 

Sometimes that devotion is just strange, not like a pet's love for his owner but more stalkerish, like I'm Jodie Foster to his John Hinckley.  But the little feller's so sweet, and he means so well, and when I wake with his front legs wrapped around my arm, I know he's been holding me, claiming me as his own, offering his heart.  And as cats go, well, Del's pretty much the greatest thing ever.

Staley and Cookie are prettier, though.

IN THIS MOMENT FOREVER

Janie's in bed by the time I get home.  Of course she is.  I work later now.  Since I'm gone all evening and sleep later in the morning, it sometimes seems like we hardly see each other anymore.

So I walk the dog, choke down a late dinner, spend some time on the interweb.  There used to be an entire evening to decompress after work, but I've only been home a little more than an hour, and it's already 1 AM.  The bed is calling.

The radio's on, the "lite FM" station Janie favors when I'm not around.  Fine.  I leave it on.

She stirs slightly as I get into bed, a relexive action to the new presence beside her, but she doesn't actually wake up.  I claim my side, put my arm around her...and become aware of the song that's playing.

Look, I don't like Aerosmith, okay?  And especially this--I Don't Want To Miss A Thing.  A generic Diane Warren song, recorded for Michael Bay's typically awful Armageddon?  Can it get any worse, less inspired, more corporate?

No.  I hate this song.  I've always hated this song.  But at this moment...damn.



Right now, it can't be denied: These words sum up my feelings perfectly. Staley leaps over Janie and looks at me, letting out a tentative meow, and the three of us snuggle together. Maybe, I think, even the crappiest music has its place, and I drift off happily to sleep.

JUST SITTING HERE DOING TIME

Walking down the corridors of a hospital at night, the thing that immediately stands out is the blue TV light shining from patient rooms, and the sounds of different channels wafting into the halls.

The mix is always pretty mainstream.  Sports.  Religious broadcasts.  Sitcoms, both old and new.  Shitty Ben Stiller movies that would have been comfortably forgotten had they not been repurposed into basic cable staples.  Nothing really demanding of anyone's time or attention.

That's the point, of course.  People in a hospital, whether patients or visitors, are a captive audience, but they tune into these shows for the same reason people at home do: Because they're there, and there's nothing else to do.

This sort of TV is often described as the audio-visual equivalent of comfort food, but that's not quite true.  A meatloaf and mashed potato dinner may be full of calories and starches, but it will still provide some form of nourishment.  This sort of TV doesn't do that--quite the opposite.  It deadens the mind and senses.

Sometimes that's needed.  There are times in our lives when there is literally nothing else to do, and all that's left is to kill some time.  That's the job of most TV, and it does it well.

THE NAMES HAVE ALL CHANGED SINCE YOU HUNG AROUND

Since this will only be my fourth post for the month, it doesn't seem possible that I could become less prolific around here, but enormous changes in my work schedule are likely to have some sort of trickle-down effect on my writing time. 

What this means, I can't really say.  It's going to take some time to readjust all the other patterns of my life, and quite honestly, writing isn't as much of a priority as it used to be.  I'll presumably pop back here from time to time, but it may take some time before that happens. 

For now, let me just note the passing of Robert Hegyes, Juan Epstein from Welcome Back, Kotter, my favorite sitcom when I was eleven.  It's funny how the clips of Brooklyn street life in the opening credits look vaguely hellish today, but when I was a kid, I longed desperately to go there, to be anywhere away from the isolation of the country.  Now, of course, I'd give anything to go back to the life I once had, the life I once hated, the life that is gone forever. 

Sorry, did I say "funny"?  That may not have been the word I meant...

IS THIS SAD? YES. YES, IT IS...

The thing is, I get up absurdly early every day in order to give myself time to write.  And great googly moogly, it's not as though there's nothing to write about. 

The baffling persistence of Newt Gingrich, for instance, and the stunning hypocrisy of the Republican party.  The post-death treatment of Joe Paterno by the press, which may make a few concessions to his "tarnished legacy" but still insists that the greatness of being a winning football coach somehow trumps looking the other way as his assistant fucked little boys.  Or even the Oscar nominations, which...seriously?  Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close?  Did anybody like that?

But, as always, I find something--anything--to do with my time to avoid writing.  Playmate Of The Apes was on cable, and who can resist the lure of fake tits and bad puns?  That was followed by The Pope Of Greenwich Village, the movie that by itself derailed the career momentum of Eric Roberts and Mickey Rourke.  Neither of these movies are remotely worth watching, despite either abundant nudity or a fine cast that includes Geraldine Page, Kenneth McMillan and M. Emmet Walsh, and yet I sat through them anyway.

Then sat down and knocked this thing out in a couple of minutes, just to reassure myself that, yes, I'm still writing.  Sort of.

OH LOOK, CHILDREN, IT SEEMS TO BE ONE OF THOSE RANDOM THOUGHTS POSTS WE'VE HEARD TELL OF

1) I really don't want to turn this space into a series of musings over songs heard on my cable company's "Seventies Gold" music service, but once again I had it on in the background this morning while I was doing other things (by "other things" I mean reading the Wikipedia entry on Mamie Van Doren), and this came on in the background.



And the thing is, it took me awhile to realize what it was.  It sounded like just another sensitive singer/songwriter from an era loaded with 'em, and as such, it didn't really seem, you know, bad.  Then at some point I realized, "Oh my God, it's David Soul," and I remembered I was supposed to treat this song with the sneering condescension I regularly bring to clips of Lynda Carter variety specials and whatnot, but honestly, it really isn't bad.

Also, honestly?  David Soul's a pretty good actor.

2) So I'm wandering around a department store today and I keep running into the same little kid, who is being chased everywhere by his mom, who keeps calling him by name: "Xander!  Come back here!"  "Xander!  Put that down!"  "Xander!  This isn't a playground!"

Though I realize there are any number of reasons why she might have named her kid Xander, I prefer to conclude that she's a big fan of Buffy The Vampire Slayer.  Because it makes me happy.

3) Janie's dozing in the other room, the TV tuned to back-to-back showings of Young Guns and Young Guns 2.  Periodically I feel the need to try watching these things, to see if time has been kind to them, as programmer Westerns from the fifties starring the pretty boy likes of Rock Hudson and Robert Wagner have aged better than might have seemed possible at the time.

Of course, those fifties movies had the advantage of the occasional Douglas Sirk or Nick Ray directing, whereas the Young Guns movies were helmed by the auteurs of Gone Fishin' and Freejack.  And even though Emilio Estevez's stock has risen in recent years by simply not being as awful as Martin Sheen's other kid, he's still absolutely terrible in this movie, as are his fellow "guns"--Kiefer Sutherland, Lou Diamond Phillips, Christian Slater.  Also, dropping in better actors (Alan Ruck, Jenny Wright) or authentic cinematic icons (Terence Stamp, Jack Palance) does its stars no favors.

And seriously, Young Guns 2--you really want to throw a cameo from James Coburn into your crappy Billy The Kid movie?  Because anything that makes a viewer think how they could be watching Sam Peckinpah's magnificent Pat Garret & Billy The Kid instead of this piece of shit would seem to be a thing to avoid.  But what do I know?  It's not like I directed Freejack.

4) To be fair, it's not that basic cable perennial Freejack is a bad movie (though it is) so much as the single laziest, most unnecessary thing ever projected on a screen.  Literally every single aspect of this thing had been done before, and better.  As bad as movies are now, I sometimes forget just how bad things were in the late eighties and early nineties.  (Newsies--enough said.)  Next time I'm sitting through the trailer for the latest Resident Evil sequel, I'll try to remember there was once a time when Hollywood thought we all wanted more Emilio Estevez or singin' and dancin' Christian Bale, and be, for lack of a better word, grateful.

5) Cats and dog.  Are they adorable?  Of course!

EVERYTHING WE ARE WILL NEVER DIE

Janie's sleeping in the other room, cats gathered all around her.  The dog is at my feet, and music plays softly in the background.

Specifically, Music Choice, courtesy of my local cable channel.  The choices are broken down according to genres and moods or, in this case, eras--I've got Seventies Gold playing, for no better reason than the hope some song will unexpectedly pop up that sparks a frisson of recognition, conjures a memory so vivid that it can't be shaken.

Because I haven't been having any of those lately.  Last Saturday, for instance, was the seventeenth anniversary of my wedding day.  The fact that the marriage has been dead for years is beside the point--it was still a milestone in my life, and you'd think, given my nature, I'd spend time ruminating over loss, impermanence, regret, what have you--that's what I do here, after all, to the extent I do anything at all.

Instead, it flashed through my mind once as I sat down to watch New Year's Rockin' Eve and that was that.  A good thing, I suppose, moving on and all that, but again, it just doesn't seem like me.  I obsess over things that were that will never be again.  A passing shrug?  Is that all I've got?  Really?

I'm eating Fudge Rounds and drinking Sprite for breakfast (because what's the point of living to adulthood if you can't do everything you wanted when you were six?) and when I finish, I take my empty glass to the kitchen.  Suddenly the mellow horn intro to the Bee Gees' Too Much Heaven wafts from the TV, and it happens.  I have a vivid memory of this song drifting from the radio as my brother John and I drove down 141 heading from the farm to Des Moines on yet another record-buying spree.  I'd just seen Brian DePalma's Obsession on TV, with its great, brooding Bernard Herrmann score, and I knew Music Den in Merle Hay Mall had the soundtrack, because I knew everything they had in regular stock, and where everything was, the details assembling in my head with remarkable clarity...

...Until CLANG!  Isabella has used her front paw to flip her water dish upside down, and it hits the linoleum with a reverie-shattering sound.  She looks at me, head tilted, tail wagging, big brown eyes in full-out soulful mode.  "You're in the kitchen," she seems to say.  "That means snacks, right?  I love snacks.  Also, I seem to have spilled my water.  Can you do something about that?"

As I get out a biscuit, refill the water and give the dog a big hug, the Bee Gees fade to background noise, and I realize any vivid memories of thirteen-year-old me are...well, only memories.  They matter, sure, but they don't--can't--define me.  Isabella scampers off, perfectly satisfied, briefly chasing Delmar and Staley, who'd come to the kitchen to see what all the noise was about.  I move quietly back to the bedroom and rest my head next to Janie, glad that I've learned to live in the here and now.

COUNTDOWN TO ECSTASY

My brother and sister had vague plans.  They had sodas and snacks, and they planned to stay up until midnight.  Why, I asked Mom, were they doing this?

"They want to celebrate the new year."

Why?

"Because that's what people do."

I was six, my brother and sister thirteen and eleven--enough older than me that I figured this must be some vaguely grown-up thing.  I never stayed up until midnight, but I saw the footage on TV every year of people who did, people crowded together in cold weather, wearing fancy clothes and silly hats, raising glasses in honor of...something.

To me, the new year only represented the end of Christmas vacation.  In a couple days I'd be back in school, my brief, glorious period of freedom ended.  It wasn't a new beginning, it was an ending.  The good times were winding down.

Guess I've always been that way.  I've never put much stock into the promise of a bright and shiny new year.  Arbitrary markings of time aside, it's just another day.  Sure, as I got older, my brother and I took to ironically watching New Year's Rockin' Eve, an act of condescension that eventually became a full-blown ritual, so maybe the joke was on us all along.

Also, of course, I got married on New Year's Eve, and we joked that we picked that date so we could remember our anniversary, but five years later, we'd have no more anniversaries to mark.  And for some time after that, I'd try to pretend the evening had no significance, just another night, not a reminder of failure and regret.

But hey, don't let my sourness ruin your mood.  I'm doing okay as this year draws to a close.  I have to work, so no midnight celebrations here, but let's face it, I probably wouldn't stay up anyway.  Still, let me offer wishes to anyone who happens to read this:

Happy New Year.

SUBSTITUTE "BEAGLE" FOR "GUN", AND "BOUNCE AROUND ADORABLY" FOR "FIRE IT"--IT'S JUST LIKE THAT CHEKHOV QUOTE!

Ordinarily I wouldn't go see a family-friendly crowd-pleaser like We Bought A Zoo, but hey, it was Christmas, Janie and I wanted to go out and, frankly, if you're looking for a relaxing good time at the movies, there aren't many choices.

And really, it's not bad at all.  You can sense writer-director Cameron Crowe trying to put a more personal spin on the original script, by Aline Brosh McKenna, author of such by-the-numbers claptrap as Morning Glory and (ugh) 27 Dresses.  There are formulaic elements, but Crowe does his best to ignore them, aided immeasurably by Matt Damon's fine performance as a grieving widower trying to do right by his kids while still trying to sort out his own emotions.

So things happen--you might be surprised to learn that Damon buys a zoo--and the whole thing glides along nicely thanks to likeable actors and Rodrigo Prieto's shimmering cinematography.  There is, however, one serious flaw that makes the whole movie unwatchable, in my opinion.

The family owns a beagle.  There's an early, pre-zoo-buying scene in which Damon's adorable daughter is fixing a sandwich at the kitchen table while the dog just sleeps pleasantly in the other room.  I'm not saying that's impossible, but in my experience, any self-respecting beagle is going to be right there at the kid's feet, just in case any food drops onto the floor.

But where the movie just turns into some sort of alternate-universe science fiction crap is when they get to the zoo.  And the dog, again, just kind of sits on the porch, or otherwise completely ignores his surroundings.

I'm sorry, but this just isn't possible.  This is a scenting dog!  In a zoo!  He's going to be going nuts, chasing down all the assorted animal smells.  For crying out loud, there are foxes at this zoo, and he's a hunting dog.  That's a plot point just waiting to happen, and the movie inexplicably ignores it in favor of a wandering bear, a dying tiger and some manufactured fake suspense over whether or not the zoo can be brought up to code.

I realize the vast majority of people could care less about this sort of thing--when I ranted about this to my brother, he said, "I didn't realize beagle owners were even more self-righteous than Mac users"--but I think it should be a good rule of thumb for all filmmakers: If you're going to bring a beagle onscreen, you'd better find something for it to do.

Or at least give it a few more close-ups.

AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?

I take Isabella out for her morning walk, my mind racing through the list of things I have to do before I even go to work: Finish the laundry, wash dishes, plan the week's breakfasts and lunches.  Then there are things for later, like deciding which bills to pay first.

It's the day after Christmas, and life goes on.

Whether we mean to or not, we all invest too much in this particular holiday.  We carry some ideal of what it should be, or memories of a perfect past that can never be recaptured, and on some level, there is always disappointment.  But that feeling of melancholy--is that the right word?--never fully kicks in until the day after.

That's when we shuffle back to work, or return the disappointing gifts, or otherwise realize that our dreams once again didn't quite come true.  Nice things happen, good things, yes, but that elusive magic we recall from childhood just never quite reappears.  And it will be a whole year before we can reach for it again.

Ah, but we become more aware of our own mortality with each passing year, and more aware, too, that the perfection we seek will never happen.  Things are put in better perspective, a hard-won wisdom that tells us that our dreams and disappointments are both equally fleeting.  Things don't mean what they once did because they simply can't, there's no time to dwell on what might have been or what once was.  Life goes on regardless.

Isabella picks up a scent and pulls on the leash.  For her, there is only here and now.  That should be enough for anyone.

I HAVEN'T LONG TO STAY

Back in the day--as recently as the mid-seventies--this thing used to pop up on local stations whenever their programming would run a couple minutes short.  And...well, yeah, okay, even as a kid I was prone to depression.  But honestly, is there any mood to be conjured by this other than overwhelming despair?



Is it the unaccompanied voices of the Norman Luboff Choir, apparently recorded in a public restroom?  Is it the cheap design and animation, which tries to conjure visions of an enchanted wonderland while suggesting nothing so much as a Christmas pageant performed by the residents of an underfunded mental hospital?

Or is it the song itself?  Specifically, Suzy's reminder that she hasn't long to stay?  "I'll be your best friend," she says, "but don't get too accustomed to me, don't let messy emotions get involved, don't love me, dear God, no, because soon I'll be gone, like a dream before the breaking dawn."

Why was this even produced?  Surely it was conceived with one purpose in mind: to introduce kids to the concept of mortality, as a plodding reminder that our time is brief, that all the wonders of creation are ultimately impermanent.

That's what they were going for, right?

NO ADULTS ADMITTED WITHOUT CHILDREN

Sure, this is depressing on so many levels.



Made in 1964, this thing was still being played in theaters at least until the late seventies, these ads playing during every commercial break on local afternoon kids' shows. (I remember my brother and I trying to work the word "funtastic" into everyday conversation.) And even when I was a kid, I thought this thing looked like crap, and some part of me resented how the huckster creators of this thing used the goodwill of the holiday season as an excuse to peddle their shoddy goods, to take money from audiences while giving them absolutely nothing in return.

That was then, this is now.



And though this, too, seeks to exploit the good feelings of this time of year for a quick buck, it maybe seems at first to be a little less vile in intent. The audience being fleeced by this movie is at least made up of adults.

Except...the economy is still in the toilet. The vast majority of the country must think twice before spending their money. Sure, it's fun to go out to the movies, but if you're going to pony up the dough for not only the price of tickets, but also snacks, dinner before or after, parking, a baby sitter...well, you're talking a substantial investment. Which is fine, if the movie's any good. But come on...there's no way anybody involved in this thing thought they were making a good movie. They simply wanted to separate you from your money, money that could have been spent buying presents for loved ones or giving to charity. This movie is the work of millionaires who feel they aren't rich enough.

MARVELOUS, MAGICAL...AAUUGGHH!!!

Haven't been around here much.  Life goes on, and sometimes gets in the way.  I gave some thought to posting a recollection of a particularly vivid dream I had the other night--it involved a right-wing cabal reanimating Bill Cullen's corpse to spearhead an incredibly misconceived bid for world dominance--but whenever I'd sit down to actually write, some distraction would raise its head.  (Those Wikipedia entries on Patrick Hernandez and Jeff Altman won't read themselves, y'know.)

So, um, yeah...I've got nothing.  Thus, lacking any real entertainment here, let me present an ad for what has to be the worst imaginable Christmas present.  Enjoy, I guess.

WARMTH

Mom's here, so I know it's a dream.  Still, I follow her as we go wherever it is we're going.  She moves quickly and without a walker through masses of people standing around or sitting at cheap tables--Is this Ryan's Steakhouse?--until we find a place in a corner.  "Finally," she says, sitting down.  "We have a few minutes to talk."

My eyes snap open.  Again.

I don't believe in messages from the other side or crap like that, but it's become a disturbing pattern that Mom will appear to me in dreams, announcing she has something to tell me, and I wake up before she gets a chance to talk.  It's the same every damn time, and the return to the waking world always comes with a tightness in my chest, a sense of loss so overpowering it seems nothing could heal it.

Right on cue, Staley appears. 

When she first came into my life, Staley seemed odd and a bit reserved, the exact opposite of a pet me-pet me cat.  She'd hide a lot, only occasionally appearing in corners of rooms, then venturing up onto the foot of the bed, or maybe sitting in chairs for a few minutes, only to disappear to whatever secret hiding place she'd chosen.

Lately, though, she seems to sense my moods, and is always there when I need her.  As I wake from this dream with a sense of emptiness, she burrows in close to my chest, purring loudly.  "You're not alone," she seems to be saying.  "I'm always here."  She stretches a front leg, the white toes on her otherwise gray paw gently stroke my open hand.

Most nights, I go to bed before Janie does, and Staley bounces in with me.  She's always wherever I go.  Cats aren't allowed up on my desk, but Staley is.  She follows me to the door when I leave for work, and Janie says she frequently yowls for a few minutes after I leave.

The tightness in my chest is gone.  I'm relaxed and feel myself drifting back to sleep, comforted to know that I have a fuzzy gray protector, that Staley's soul is here to give comfort to mine.

I HOPE THAT SOMETHING BETTER COMES ALONG

I really, really wanted to love The Muppets, the new big-screen attempt to bring Jim Henson's beloved characters some current pop culture cachet, and...well, I just couldn't.

Not that I hated it, mind you.  This isn't a shameful misunderstanding of everything that makes the characters great, the Space Jam of the Muppet world.  If anything, it's too reverent, tries too hard to evoke warm and fuzzy memories, attempting to coast on a sentiment it simply hasn't earned.  It's made by fans, obviously--the primary fan, in this case, being co-writer and star Jason Segel, who has publicly stated over and over how much the Muppets meant to him--but as a result, it feels like glorified fan fiction.  The real Muppet crew would never have made this.

That crew is scattered to the winds, of course.  Jim Henson, Richard Hunt and writer Jerry Juhl are dead, Jerry Nelson has largely retired and Frank Oz...honestly, it's kind of hard to know what's up with Oz these days.  Of the old guard, only Dave Goelz and Steve Whitmire are involved, and too many of the characters lack their old spark.  Henson, Nelson and especially Oz were renowned for their ability to give their characters distinctive physical mannerisms, odd bits of business that brought them to life, but all too often, the characters now just seem to move from Point A to Point B without any real sense of life.

Then again, there's not much life to the script by Segel and Nicholas Stoller.  It cleverly riffs on many beloved Muppet tropes and gags, and has some genuinely funny moments--the sight of Wayne and Wanda making out gave me great delight--but it just tries too hard.  Most disastrously, the catalyst for the story is a new Muppet named Walter, who is blessed with not a single interesting feature.  Favorites like Gonzo and Rowlf are given nothing to do so this character can go through a Screenwriting 101 Character Arc, and why?  It's like making a new Peanuts movie and sidelining Charlie Brown and Lucy in favor of Shermy.

The most exasperating thing about Walter is that he's not remotely funny, but you know who else doesn't have a single decent laugh line in this movie?  Kermit The Frog.  Sure, he's the starry-eyed dreamer and all that, but Kermit's always gotten some of the best gags.  But he spends the entire running time of The Muppets (that is, when he's not reminding the audience what an awesome new character Walter is) being mopey.  And when he finally breaks into The Rainbow Connection...

Look, if you've spent any time at this site at all, you've seen countless vintage Muppet clips posted, you've read all sorts of stories about how my Mom cried for days on end when Jim Henson died, how Bein' Green was the one song she stipulated had to be played at her funeral, and, for crying out loud, I went through a period there where most of the titles of my posts were taken from Muppet Movie lyrics.  All I have to do is hear the banjo-plucking intro to The Rainbow Connection and I immediately tear up.

And yet, its performance here did nothing for me.  Instead of an Applause sign, it felt like the filmmakers were using a Sentimental Tears sign.  The honest emotions that Jim Henson and company could evoke effortlessly just isn't there anymore.  I wouldn't presume to say that the time of The Muppets passed with Henson, but it's been twenty-one years since the man's death, and the characters still seem trapped, unsure where to go.  Despite the brilliant efforts of his fellow puppeteers, designers, scriptwriters and songwriters, maybe the only person who truly understood what made The Muppets work was Henson.  We know it was probably magic.

The Muppets is an honest attempt to bring back that magic, but a failed attempt just the same.  Still, if nothing else, it proves that audiences still have great love for these characters, and maybe next time they'll get where they're going.  Or, as Gonzo so eloquently put it, they're going to go back there someday.

IT'S JUST A SHOW

Thanksgiving, right?  I should list all the things I'm thankful for (my health, my home, my friends, the cats, beloved beagle and, of course, Janie), I could reminisce about holidays past, I could do any number of things.

Or I could tell a story I've told before.

Because this is November 24th, the day when, twenty-three years ago, a scrappy UHF station in Minneapolis first broadcast a crudely-produced program entitled Mystery Science Theater 3000, a vehicle for local comedian made good Joel Hodgson.  The premise was simple: Hodgson played a guy trapped in space, forced by his evil overlords to watch terrible movies.  He did, with the help of his two robot pals, and the three of them would crack wise all through the movie.



Simple, and potentially awful.  But somehow, MST3K (which got a lot better than that original intro would suggest)transcended its simple premise, ultimately running for ten seasons on two different cable channels, and bearing a profound influence on the world of comedy.  It has provided its fans with an alternate way of looking at the world, has encouraged, in its small way, its viewers to never accept what is given to them, to talk back, to question.  And it has provided comfort.

As on that Wednesday night, when I stumbled home dead tired from working late.  When I got to my apartment, I found numerous messages on my answering machine from my sister Ann, informing me that Mom was in the hospital.  Finally, a message from Mom herself, assuring me that she was okay, I could call her or stop by to see her, but she understood if I was busy.

I went up to see her.  She'd fallen, and had...never mind.  You don't need to know the details.  The point is, she looked so small, so fragile, so...mortal.  But she was still Mom, and we talked, though her voice was weak.  "Have you eaten yet?" she asked, always more concerned about others than herself.  No, I said, I'd probably just go home and have a pizza.  "Oh, yes, it's Wednesday, isn't it?  Are you going to watch an MST?"  (She was, obviously, aware of my weekly ritual.)  Yeah, maybe, I said, but I can stay here.  "No," she said.  "I have to watch Lost."

So I went home, fired up the pizza and the VCR and chose an episode of MST to watch.  I hadn't seen the episode where they mock Roger Corman's Gunslinger in awhile, so that's what I picked, completely at random.  Halfway through the show, there's this sketch:



I thought nothing of it, or any of the other odd reminders of mortality in this particular episode.  Why would I?  It's not like Mom was dying or anything.  I enjoyed the episode, laughed myself silly, and went to bed.

The next morning, Ann called early.  Someone from the hospital had let her know it would be a good idea to get up there and see Mom.  Wait, what?  She just fell.  How could that lead to...to...Dear God, no.

If you've spent any time at this site, you know what happened, since this space was originally conceived as a way of working through my grief.  The days after her death were spent dealing with the usual things, but it was funny.  She died on a Thursday, the funeral was the following Monday...but by Tuesday, I felt cried out.  I didn't want to be sad anymore.

So I turned again to MST3K, and it did the trick.  I laughed, and it was as though my whole world hadn't changed, as if things would be okay again.  It reminded me that there was still joy in the world, and that life, not unlike Celine Dion's heart, would go on. 

When I think of my favorite TV shows of all time, I think of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, or Columbo, or Wiseguy or Batman: The Animated Series or The Simpsons or so many more.  But I never think to include Mystery Science Theater 3000 on that list, because, no matter what the theme song says, it's never been just a show.  It's part of my life.