Seven things you (probably) don't know about me

I’ve been tagged by billythekid.

The Rules?

* Link to your original tagger(s) and list these rules in your post.
* Share seven facts about yourself in the post.
* Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
* Let them know they’ve been tagged.

1. I have a younger brother who makes chain mail for a hobby.
2. I am a devout fan of the Mapp & Lucia
novels by E.F. Benson. So much so that when my friend went to Rye, he actually brought me back a Mapp and Lucia tea towel.
3. I do not drink Canadian whiskey thanks to a collegiate incident that involved me ending up with Lucille Ball red hair for a couple of months.
4. It was my miserable job doing health insurance billing that prompted me to go to library school.
5. I have kept a plant alive for over 10 years.
6. I went to see Braveheart because Patrick McGoohan was in it.
7. I once organized my non-fiction according to Library of Congress Classification.

You've been tagged:
Vintage Reader
Eat at Joe's
Rebecca's Adventures in New York
Peach's Projects
morsie reads
The Ramblings of Sugar Socks
Bonnei Rulez

Cutting the cable

I called Time Warner today and scaled down to Basic Cable. I'm still getting quite a few channels (my beloved TCM among them), but not nearly the number I had before and no more HBO. The latter is going to hurt quite a bit--not for the movies, but because some of the best series in the past few years have come from HBO. Lost aside, I'm not seeing anything significant from the regular networks.

My reason for this decision was mainly financial, but to be honest, I reached it after having several successive nights flicking through the insane amount of channels I had access to, as well as on demand options, and realizing that the only thing worth watching was "Cesar Milan, Dog Whisperer." Reader, I knew that was a sign from above.

Ready, Ok?

As a major Lost fan, I've become fascinated by Michael Emerson. So I started looking into his credits and found that he had a part in a film done by his wife's film company, actress Carrie Preston. Actually he has made a couple of movies for her film company, but the one I ended up seeing was Ready? Ok.

Ready? OK!
is about a little boy who wants very much to be a cheerleader. His mom, played by Carrie Preston, is raising him by herself and wants very much for him to be a little boy who conforms with mainstream society. Emerson plays her gay neighbor who is sympathetic to her son's struggles. The film is worth seeing just to watch Michael Emerson do a cheer, but I found it quite poignant and really well done.

Some very nice performances from John G. Preston, Tara Karsian, and Lurie Poston.

Netflix amnesia

I adore Netflix. I really do, but my queue is a million miles long. I'll be bored one night and I start looking at my friends' queues or whatever and I add a bunch of stuff. Sometimes I remember why. Many times I don't. This is a bad bad thing and it's called Netflix Amnesia. Here is my cautionary tale.

Reap the Wild Wind came in the mail this weekend.

I don't remember adding this to my queue, but it's there and in my hands and I really want to veg out in front of the TV. The blurb on the dvd sleeve is not promising. It's a Cecil B. DeMille picture with John Wayne, Paulette Goddard, Susan Hayward, and Ray Milland . John Wayne is hit or miss for me. I really don't care for Paulette Goddard, and while I like Susan Hayward and Ray Milland, I can't see myself adding this film for them either. I should mention that I really have an intense dislike for the films of the late Mr. DeMille.

The credits are rolling and I feel a little bit better. Raymond Massey is in it and also Charles Bickford. Okay. This is why it's there. I love Charles Bickford, absolutely love him. This makes some sense. I have yet to see a bad performance of his. He was started out as a leading man, but had some injuries and ended up doing character and supporting work. He was superb in Days of Wine and Roses as Lee Remick's father.

After about five minutes, I'm really doubtful about this movie. Seriously 5 minutes. I hit pause and go check it out on IMDB. User reviews are all pretty much positive. I decide to give it some more time. In retrospect it occurs to me that the reviewers were all clearly high when they posted those.

Okay, so here's the plot. It's the 1840s in the Florida keys and ships keep getting cracked up on the reefs. There are a bunch of salvage operations. Paulette Goddard's family owns one. Miss Goddard evidently saw this as her chance to play Scarlett O'Hara (and omg, are we lucky she missed out on that part). So we have a poor man's Scarlett O'Hara in Florida. Raymond Massey and his brother Robert Preston also run a salvage operation, but they are bad, bad men. Evidently what they do is actually wreck the ships rather than wait for it to happen accidentally. Susan Hayward is Paulette's girly cousin who's sneaking out on the sly to make out with Preston. Enter John Wayne as a sea captain. Paulette and he hook up and she's all about him. Wayne wants to be the captain of a steam operated ship more than anything. So Paulette goes off to Charleston to stay with her Aunt Hedda Hopper (yes, she acted too). She starts making time with the foppish Ray Milland who works at the same shipping company; he also has some pull with which captain gets assigned to which ship. Milland's character has a lap dog and he does really bad ventrioloquism act with it.

Yes, you read that right.

The guy who owns the shipping company is understandably annoyed that none of his ships are making it to port. He sends Milland and the lap dog off to the Keys to put a stop to Raymond Massey and his crew. There's also some stuff about the triangle between Goddard, Milland, and Wayne.

It gets worse from there and way more plot intensive. John Wayne strays down the primrose path to hell. Susan Hayward picks the wrong ship to go see Robert Preston on. Paulette Goddard overacts wildly. By this point, I'm invested in seeing if it can get any worse. Charles Bickford does show up and is very good for his 7 minutes of screen time.

And then it happens. There is a giant squid. Yes, that's right a giant squid. Ray Milland and John Wayne must dive down to the wreck to see if they can find Susan Hayward's body so that Raymond Massey can pay for his crimes. Paulette Goddard's heart (and body) are kind of on the line too. So they go down there and there it is. A giant squid.

A giant squid. Stunned disbelief takes over at this point. I can't look away. I mean, how can you? Will John Wayne let Ray Milland be eaten by the giant squid so he can get Paulette Goddard to himself? Will he redeem his damaged character by saving Ray Milland? And it's a giant squid.

John Wayne battles giant squid. Bad bad thing.

Netflix amnesia should be avoided. Don't let this happen to you.

Be seeing you

Patrick McGoohan passed away today. I've been a fan for a long time. In fact, I'm probably the only person in America who went to see Braveheart because I found out he was in it.

He left some really good work behind in assorted films and television appearances (his work on Columbo was really good and he got two Emmys for it), but I think my favorite McGoohan shows were Secret Agent and The Prisoner. Especially the Prisoner. He didn't just star in it. He wrote and directed episodes (some under pseudonyms). The show was very much his baby. Nobody made anything like it before its debut in 1967 and I would argue that it's never been equalled or approached since.

He will be missed.

They don't make movies like this anymore

So my friend RJ had The Last of Sheila in her queue on Netflix and on impulse I put it in mine. Wow. What a clever, literate, well-done film. Stephen Sondheim (yes, that Sondheim and no, this is not a musical) and Anthony Perkins (yes, the actor) wrote the script. Cast: the incomparable James Mason, Dyan Cannon, James Coburn, Ian McShane, Joan Hackett, Richard Benjamin, and Raquel Welch. The weak link in the actors is Welch, but she doesn't have the biggest part, and her costars more than make up for her.

It's a mystery movie that requires you to pay attention. There are visual and spoken clues all over the place, and if you pay attention, you can solve the puzzle yourself.

Sheila Greene is dead. Her husband, Clinton (Coburn) has invited his friends--all of whom were present at the party where she died (accidentally? or not?)--for a week on his yacht in the South of France. He's devised a game that they're all going to play. The game takes an unexpected turn and suddenly the guests are playing it for real.

I can't say more without spoiling the movie. DVD only has a couple of extras. The commentary track is worth listening to--again Welch is the lightweight, but the stuff from Cannon and Benjamin is really fascinating stuff.

Go rent this film.

Bits of my childhood

So my mom is sorting through stuff and asked me if I wanted some of my old toys and memorabilia. I've been gradually going through the boxes. It's been very weird and often unexpectedly moving.

This is not my homage to Dare Wright, just two of the toys that I remember most vividly. The doll bed was a present from my parents. My dad made the bed and my mom made the hangings and the linens. I can't recall what I'd named the doll (also wearing clothes my mom sewed, but the teddy bear was Gwendolyn.

Then we have this lovely scene. Mandy (the name she came with) was also in the box along with assorted outfits for her and the baby doll, and Corduroy the Bear (elementary school project).

I spent this weekend washing and mending the doll clothes. No logical explanation.It just seemed important to me. The baby doll's outfit is one I remember well. Mom made me a top for me out of the same striped fabric. I think that Mandy's flannel dress is fabric that was a nightgown.

The question is...well, what do I do with this stuff? I don't want to give it away. These were objects that had a special place in my life. I don't have children of my own. I'm not about to display these things.

Some of the other toys I am going to give to my friends for their children. I kept the Lincoln Logs (real wood, thank you very much) and some of the Fisher Price things for when my friend's son comes over.

But these are special. I guess I'll just pack them up as carefully as I can and maybe someday I'll take the box off the shelf and look at it once more.