Why is "gunite" pronounced gun-ite, whereas "granite" is pronounced gran-it?
If, in 1950, Harry Truman had said "four score and seven years ago," he would have been referring to 1863, the year in which Abraham Lincoln uttered that famous phrase.
In the computer industry, "email" is preferred to "e-mail." But it seems to me that "e-mail" better represents the phrase "electronic mail." The meaning of "e-mail" is immediately obvious to me; "email," at first glance, looks like a typo.
If the dismal northern weather of early April and late October -- which delayed the start of the 2008 baseball season in some cities and then disrupted the World Series -- doesn't convince Major League Baseball to lop two weeks from each end of the regular season, nothing will.
One of the funniest movies I've seen is Harold Lloyd's Dr. Jack (1922). It starts slowly, but builds to a hilariously frantic finish. Lloyd's Safety Last! is better known -- and deservedly considered a comedy classic -- but it isn't half as funny as Dr. Jack.
Between novels, I have been slogging my way through Thomas K. McCraw's Prophet of Innovation: Joseph Schumpeter and Creative Destruction. There's too much armchair psychology in it, but it whets my appetite for Schumpeter's classic Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy, which (I hate to admit) I haven't read. Schumpter's famous term for capitalism, "creative destruction," often is applied with an emphasis on "destruction"; the emphasis should be on "creative."
I must observe, relatedly, that my grandmother's lifetime (1880-1977) spanned the invention and adoption of far more new technology than is likely to emerge in my lifetime, even if I live as long as my grandmother did.
Showing newest posts with label Movies. Show older posts
Showing newest posts with label Movies. Show older posts
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Sunday, October 12, 2008
One-Line Movie Reviews
Movies I have seen this year:
Once - Buskers' holiday.
The Savages, Married Life - Good actors wasting their time and mine.
No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Straight Time, 3:10 to Yuma, Gone Baby Gone, American Gangster - Good actors wasting their time and mine with gratuitous violence.
Interview, Sunshine, The Nines, Unconscious, Death at a Funeral, I'm Not There, Cassandra's Dream, The American Friend - Weird and mysterious doings, sometimes funny, mostly just weird and mysterious.
The Bourne Ultimatum - Action for action's sake.
The Man on the Flying Trapeze - W.C. Fields wings it.
Cave of the Yellow Dog, Into the Wild, The Tunnel, The Kite Runner, The Counterfeiters - Gripping reality.
A Little Princess, The Jane Austen Book Club - Enjoyable froth.
Michael Clayton - New Deal propaganda in the 21st century.
Becoming Jane, La Vie en Rose, The Whole Wide World, My Boy Jack - Well done biopics and period pieces.
Lust, Caution - Spicy Chinese fare.
Shadow of a Doubt - Overrated Hitchcock.
Safety Last, Girl Shy - Hilarious silent stuff.
The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Tomorrow - Southern soul.
Atonement, This Is England, The Search for John Gissing, Son of Rambow - Excellent Britflicks.
Resurrecting the Champ, The Bucket List, The Great Debaters - Feel-good American films -- barely bearable.
Ballet Shoes, Before the Rains, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day -- Better-than-bearable Britflicks (two feel-gooders, one soaper with scenery); those accents do make a difference.
Lars and the Real Girl, Charlie Bartlett - Middle-age/teen-age angst.
The Bank Job - The best caper movie since Snatch; Topkapi in London, and more realistic.
Charlie Wilson's War - Mr. Smith goes to Kabul, with laughs.
Once - Buskers' holiday.
The Savages, Married Life - Good actors wasting their time and mine.
No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Straight Time, 3:10 to Yuma, Gone Baby Gone, American Gangster - Good actors wasting their time and mine with gratuitous violence.
Interview, Sunshine, The Nines, Unconscious, Death at a Funeral, I'm Not There, Cassandra's Dream, The American Friend - Weird and mysterious doings, sometimes funny, mostly just weird and mysterious.
The Bourne Ultimatum - Action for action's sake.
The Man on the Flying Trapeze - W.C. Fields wings it.
Cave of the Yellow Dog, Into the Wild, The Tunnel, The Kite Runner, The Counterfeiters - Gripping reality.
A Little Princess, The Jane Austen Book Club - Enjoyable froth.
Michael Clayton - New Deal propaganda in the 21st century.
Becoming Jane, La Vie en Rose, The Whole Wide World, My Boy Jack - Well done biopics and period pieces.
Lust, Caution - Spicy Chinese fare.
Shadow of a Doubt - Overrated Hitchcock.
Safety Last, Girl Shy - Hilarious silent stuff.
The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Tomorrow - Southern soul.
Atonement, This Is England, The Search for John Gissing, Son of Rambow - Excellent Britflicks.
Resurrecting the Champ, The Bucket List, The Great Debaters - Feel-good American films -- barely bearable.
Ballet Shoes, Before the Rains, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day -- Better-than-bearable Britflicks (two feel-gooders, one soaper with scenery); those accents do make a difference.
Lars and the Real Girl, Charlie Bartlett - Middle-age/teen-age angst.
The Bank Job - The best caper movie since Snatch; Topkapi in London, and more realistic.
Charlie Wilson's War - Mr. Smith goes to Kabul, with laughs.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Sidekicks, with a Twist
A sidekick, according to Wikipedia,
is a stock character, a close companion who assists a partner in a superior position. Sancho Panza in Don Quixote, Doctor Watson in Sherlock Holmes and Batman's companion Robin are some well-known sidekicks....
Sidekicks not only provide comic relief but can occasionally be brave or resourceful at times and rescue the hero from some dire fate: such as ... Festus Haggen of Gunsmoke's Matt Dillon....Sidekicks also frequently serve as an emotional connection, especially when the hero is depicted as detached and distant, traits which would normally generate difficulty in making the hero likable. The sidekick is often the confidant who knows the main character better than anyone else and gives a convincing reason to like the hero. Although Sherlock Holmes was admittedly a difficult man to know, the friendship of Dr. Watson convinces the reader that Holmes is a good person....
While it is usually the reverse, it is not unheard of for a sidekick to be physically more conventionally attractive, charismatic, or physically capable than the character who is intended to be the hero. This is most typically encountered when the hero's appeal is supposed to be intellect instead of sex appeal or physical prowess. Such characters are often middle aged or older and tend towards eccentricity; fictional sleuths and scientists for example. Such sidekicks are rarely encountered in fiction because the hero runs the risk of being upstaged by them. However, examples of successful such pairings include Inspector Morse and his sidekick DS Robbie Lewis, Nero Wolfe and his sidekick Archie Goodwin....
Other famous sidekicks -- whose roles vis-a-vis their partners range from comic foil to friendly nemesis to voice of reason to stalwart ally -- include (in no particular order):
- Huntz Hall, a.k.a, Horace Debussy "Satch" Jones (Leo Gorcey, a.k.a. Slip Mahoney)
I'm sure I've omitted other notable pairings. I'll add them as they come to mind.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Two Tenors
Compare the legendary John McCormack (1884-1945), an Irish tenor whose career spanned five decades, and Brooklyn-born Franklyn Baur (1904-1950), whose career lasted less than ten years.
Both singers recorded many popular songs of the 1920s (McCormack samples here and here; Baur samples here). McCormack's influence on Baur (among others) is unmistakable, most notably in Irving Berlin's "You Forgot to Remember." Baur masked his native accent more successfully than did McCormack. But that is no criticism of McCormack, whose distinctive, lilting voice was supported by exemplary vocalism.
Baur, the original first tenor of The Revelers, was the engine of that group's originality and success. (Aural evidence of Baur's influence can be heard on Breezin' Along with The Revelers, where the group's innovative, jazzy sound turns more traditional -- even "barbershoppy" -- following Baur's departure.) Had it not been for the influence of The Revelers, as they were in Baur's time, the Comedian Harmonists -- an even better ensemble -- might not have been formed. (If you've never heard of the Comedian Harmonists, you must see Comedian Harmonists, a 1997 dramatization of the group's history that is both toe-tapping and touching.) And without McCormack, the world might not have come to embrace Irish tenors.
We are fortunate that so many examples of McCormack's and Baur's art survive them.
Both singers recorded many popular songs of the 1920s (McCormack samples here and here; Baur samples here). McCormack's influence on Baur (among others) is unmistakable, most notably in Irving Berlin's "You Forgot to Remember." Baur masked his native accent more successfully than did McCormack. But that is no criticism of McCormack, whose distinctive, lilting voice was supported by exemplary vocalism.
Baur, the original first tenor of The Revelers, was the engine of that group's originality and success. (Aural evidence of Baur's influence can be heard on Breezin' Along with The Revelers, where the group's innovative, jazzy sound turns more traditional -- even "barbershoppy" -- following Baur's departure.) Had it not been for the influence of The Revelers, as they were in Baur's time, the Comedian Harmonists -- an even better ensemble -- might not have been formed. (If you've never heard of the Comedian Harmonists, you must see Comedian Harmonists, a 1997 dramatization of the group's history that is both toe-tapping and touching.) And without McCormack, the world might not have come to embrace Irish tenors.
We are fortunate that so many examples of McCormack's and Baur's art survive them.
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