This Tonight Show taping happened around ’75. Ann-Margret had broken through in Bye-Bye Birdie (’63) and Viva Las Vegas(’64), and she was now 34 — four years after Carnal Knowledge, three years after her Lake Tahoe stage accident.
It went without saying that her gymnastic dance moves were secondary to the main attractions.
Morrow’s segment (Called “Time Out”) is about a racist who gets an imaginary taste of his own medicine.
The accident happened on 7.23.82 at an Indian Dunes location in what is now Santa Clarita, during a late-night filming of a Vietnam nightmare sequence. A helicopter lost its tail rotor due to a stronger-than-expected VFX detonation and it suddenly crashed, killing Morrow and the kids.
The rap against Landis, the segment’s director, was that he was incautious, but there’s always been a fine line between reckless disregard and capturing that extra element of super-charged realism. It was an accident, yes, but attitudes about safety certainly weren’t paramount.
I’ve always wanted to read Stephen Farber and Marc Green‘s “Outrageous Conduct: Art, Ego, and the Twilight Zone Case” (1.1.88). The hardback and paperback versions are out of print and the surviving copies are outrageously priced. Why isn’t it purchasable on Kindle?
I was under the impression that intense hot pink and the LGBTQ associations that tend to accompany same was on some kind of cultural upswing, mainly due to the approach of Greta Gerwig's Barbie, which is totally pink-flooded and (to judge by promotional materials) buoyantly and energetically gay in certain ways.
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It’s not very hip of me to say this, but I thought Steven Soderbergh‘s re-scored, dialogue-free, black-and-white version of Raiders of the Lost Ark (initially posted on 9.22.14) looked too shadowed and inky. I blew it off after a half-hour.
Yes, the combination of Steven Spielberg‘s scene-by-scene blocking and Douglas Slocombe‘s camera placements are wonderful, but we’re still left with a cavalcade of overly dark monochrome images that make you feel as if your eyesight is going.
It’s generally difficult for me to rewatch Raiders anyway because of Karen Allen, whose performance as Marion Ravenwood I literally can’t stand. If I never hear her shrieking rendition of “Indiieee!” ever again, it’ll be too soon. And there’s no way this slender, midsize woman (5’7″) could drink any brawny guy under the table.
Raiders is a great film of its type, but I honestly feel that Allen ruins it.
My favorite chapter is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, otherwise known as the Sean Connery one. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is my second favorite. It took me two viewings to realize that I hated Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I’m pretty much okay with Dial of Destiny.
Never mentioned this before: Sometime in April of ’81 I caught a not-fully-finished version of Raiders at the NYC Paramount building (Columbus Circle). It contained footage of Harrison Ford‘s Indiana Jones hanging on to the outside of a German submarine on the way to the island where the big finale takes place. It made no sense, of course, that Jones could hitch a ride on a sub that would naturally be travelling underwater, but that’s what I saw. Unless I’m misremembering, this footage was cut from the final release version.
…to any President (JFK), Presidential candidate (RFK, Jr.) or First lady (Michelle Obama) who advocates for physical fitness. Or, you know, is swole or posts Twittervid swolefies.
JFK couldn’t do shirtless pushups because of his back issues, but now we’ve got a declared Presidential candidate with a bod like Mark Wahlberg‘s. Perhaps this is unimportant in the greater scheme, but it’s definitely poking at our boredom.
Yes, the shirtless swole brand reminds everyone of Vladimir Putin on horseback, but at least this opens the door to a possible RFK-Putin UFC cage match in ’25 (presuming Putin will still be in power two years hence), which goes hand in hand with the forthcoming Elon Musk-Mark Zuckerberg barefoot battle of the titans.
Some say that in the wake of Occasionally Wobbly Joe (who, to be fair, has kept himself trim with regular workouts) it’ll be amazing to have a swole President. RFK, Jr. would set a great example as average Americans have never been flabbier or more overweight**…dear, God, please forgive me for using the “o” word!
Susie (@SoCalSuister) on Twitter: “My eleven year old son just asked me why I was watching a video of a guy doing push-ups…’do you like him or something?’”
“Not happening…way too laid back…zero narrative urgency,” I was muttering from the get-go. Basically the sixth episode of White Lotus Thai SERIOUSLY disappoints. Puttering around, way too slow. Things inch along but it’s all “woozy guilty lying aftermath to the big party night” stuff. Glacial pace…waiting, waiting. I was told...
I finally saw Walter Salles' I'm Still Here two days ago in Ojai. It's obviously an absorbing, very well-crafted, fact-based poltical drama, and yes, Fernanda Torres carries the whole thing on her shoulders. Superb actress. Fully deserving of her Best Actress nomination. But as good as it basically is...
After three-plus-years of delay and fiddling around, Bernard McMahon's Becoming Led Zeppelin, an obsequious 2021 doc about the early glory days of arguably the greatest metal-rock band of all time, is opening in IMAX today in roughly 200 theaters. Sony Pictures Classics is distributing. All I can say is, it...
To my great surprise and delight, Christy Hall's Daddio, which I was remiss in not seeing during last year's Telluride Film Festival, is a truly first-rate two-hander -- a pure-dialogue, character-revealing, heart-to-heart talkfest that knows what it's doing and ends sublimely. Yes, it all happens inside a Yellow Cab on...
7:45 pm: Okay, the initial light-hearted section (repartee, wedding, hospital, afterlife Joey Pants, healthy diet) was enjoyable, but Jesus, when and how did Martin Lawrence become Oliver Hardy? He’s funny in that bug-eyed, space-cadet way… 7:55 pm: And now it’s all cartel bad guys, ice-cold vibes, hard bullets, bad business,...
