Poor Shannon Doherty has passed at age 53. She’d been grappling with cancer for nine years. Breast cancer, lymph node cancer, chemotherapy, remission, etc. Then the cancer returned four years ago (i.e., February 2020), and the stage four kind…Jesus. 13 months ago she announced that she had brain cancer and that things had gone terminal. Tough luck, brutal gauntlet. Sorry.

And then she passed on the same day Donald Trump was shot. Doherty, Aldous Huxley and C.S. Lewis. Again, sorry.

R.I.P. Shannen Doherty, who has tragically died from breast cancer at 53. Yes, she was best known for 90210 and CHARMED but to me, she’ll always be Rene from MALLRATS. My heart goes out to her friends and family… pic.twitter.com/nD0jHRVU5R

— Jeff Sneider (@TheInSneider) July 14, 2024

Dear @MSNBC, @CNN, and especially the @nytimes.

Watch every second of this — and reconsider your reporting of the Trump shooting.#TrumpIsNotFitToBePresident pic.twitter.com/C1OdZgQzyW

— JΛKΣ (@USMCLiberal) July 14, 2024

I tried re-watching Spike Lee‘s BlacKkKlansman the other night…couldn’t last. What was I thinking when I reviewed it six years ago in Cannes? I’m sorry. I was taken in by the bravura Trump-trashing ending,

“You can feel the fire and rage in Lee’s veins in more than a few scenes, and especially during the last five minutes when Lee recalls the venality of 2017’s “Unite the Right” really in Charlottesville, which ended with the death of protestor Heather Meyer, and reminds that Donald Trump showed who and what he is with his non-judgmental assessment of the KKK-minded demonstrators.

“Lee paints Trump with the racist brush that he completely deserves, and it makes for a seriously pumped-up finale.

But that doesn’t change the fact that BlacKkKlansman is basically a police undercover caper film, based on Ron Stallworth’s 2014 novel (“Black Klansman: Race, Hate, and the Undercover Investigation of a Lifetime”).

Nor the fact that tonally it sometimes feels like Starsky and Hutch or even to some extent like John Badham‘s Stakeout, especially as it involves the main cop protagonist falling in love with a girl (in this case an Afro’ed black activist played by Laura Harrier) who shouldn’t know what he’s up to, but whom he eventually confesses to. In this sense John David Washington‘s Stallworth is Richard Dreyfuss in the Badham film, and Adam Driver (as partner Flip Zimmerman) is Emilio Estevez.

At times the film also reminds you of some Clarence Williams III scenes from The Mod Squad.

Set in 1972, pic isn’t literally about Stallworth joining the Ku Klux Klan but a stealthy undercover investigation of the Klan, initiated when he was the first black detective in the history of the Colorado Springs Police Department.

After initial correspondence with the Klan, Stallworth received a call in which he was asked if he wants to “join our cause.” Stallworth answered affirmatively, and in so doing launched an audacious, fraught-with-peril inquiry.

SPOILER-ISH BUT NOT REALLY: Right away you’re telling yourself, “Yes, I know this actually happened and that Lee is using the facts in Stallworth’s book, but it made no sense for Fallworth to be heavily involved in this operation.” And it just feels crazy as you’re watching one crazy incident after another.

Problem #1 is that throughout the film Stallworth talks to KKK members on the phone (including wizard David Duke, played by Topher Grace) and so Zimmerman, pretending to be the Real McCoy, has to sound like Stallworth as much as possible. Except this is a dicey game that’s unlikely to fool anyone. Early on a local KKK leader tells Stallworth that his voice sounds different, as it obviously is.

If I was Stallworth’s supervisor I would tell him he’ll make a mistake sooner or later and that he’s too much of red flag, and that the smart move is for Zimmerman to carry the ball alone.

Problem #2 comes when a KKK member spots “a black guy” (i.e., Stallworth) behind the wheel of a car that’s following as he drives with Zimmerman. Brilliant tactical maneuvering, Stallworth!

Problem #3 happens when Zimmerman is told by a suspicious klan member to submit to a lie-detector test, and so Stallworth, knowing that Zimmerman’s in a tough spot, runs up to the KKK member’s house and throws a rock through a window…it just seems nuts for Stallworth to have done that, given the likelihood that the klan might wonder why a black guy happened to be nearby.

Problem #4 occurs when the same looney-tunes KKK member looks up Stallworth’s address in the phone book and pays him a visit. Stallworth answers the door and for a couple of minutes he and the KKK member eyeball each other.

Problem #5 happens when a Colorado Springs police supervisor insanely orders Stallworth to provide security for David Duke during a visit to their city. Before you know it Stallworth is in the same room as the same KKK member who knocked on his door, his identity protected only by a pair of shades. And then he takes them off before posing for a Polaroid photo. It’s just crazy — no undercover cop would behave this way.

All this aside, BlacKkKlansman is edgy and involving as far as it goes, and occasionally quite funny from time to time. It’s a reasonably good film, and I love that Lee shoots Trump between the eyes at the end, but people calling it “great” need to calm down.

Posted on 2.4.23 — 17 months ago:

For the first time since he was branded as a sexual cannibal-animal and wham-banished from the film business, Armie Hammer has presented his side of the story.

Ignore the Variety summary by Elizabeth Wagmeister because the Air Mail piece is about a lot more than just about the usual contrition and spin (i.e., “I was bad, and now forgive me”). What Hammer contends and what he offers in terms of compelling evidence is highly persuasive.

I’m not going to summarize the main points of James Kirchick’s 2.4 Air Mail article as anyone can read it (it’s not paywalled), but there’s no question that anyone with an open mind will emerge with their previous impressions strongly challenged.

I read the article this morning, and many of the accusations against Hammer look kinda flimsy now, I can tell you that.

At the very least readers will conclude that Kirchik’s piece has downgraded Armie’s status from that of an alleged monster and ruthless rapist-carnivore to the much less odious label of admitted former asshole (an asshole in recovery, I mean) who knows where the BDSM attraction came from (i.e., sexual abuse as a powerless youth).

The article claims that Hammer’s primary sin was using his power as a rich, famous actor in his 30s (“power imbalance” being a major #MeToo felony these days) to sexually overwhelm various younger women and then (this is what really got him in trouble) ghosting them when he decided to abruptly or whimsically end the affairs like that.

Which is similar to what what Ansel Elgort was lynched for also — ghosting the of-legal-aged “Gabby” after being intimate with her a couple of times.

Message to everyone: “Ghosting” a lover really hurts and often leads to revenge moves. If you want to move on, save yourself a lot of trouble by conveying this in some kind of half-considerate way.

We all agree that ignoring a safe word is an awful thing to do, and this charge hasn’t been specifically addressed in the article (or maybe I read it too fast) but the sexual behavior of Armie and the various women who participated, so to speak, is addressed and explained. Hammer raped no one, he says — it was all a consensual game with rules and a particular script laid out in advance.

Hammer seems to be mainly guilty of behaving like a sexual obsessive. He certainly didn’t chew on anyone’s rib or cut off a woman’s toe and put it in his pocket….none of that crazy stuff.

Excerpt #1: “The Hammer case raises questions about the media. Virtually without exception, the press has treated the accusations from Hammer’s professed victims, no matter how fantastical, with utter credulity. As recently as last October, for instance, a story in New York magazine claimed that Hammer stands accused of ‘possible cannibalism.'”

Excerpt #2: “One prominent Hollywood figure has decided to speak out unreservedly in Hammer’s defense. ‘I found him to be so polite and so well mannered and so nice and so funny and so real,” says Howard Rosenman, the veteran producer of Call Me by Your Name. ‘And don’t forget, I spent time with him a lot, both in Crema and on the road, when we were on the Oscar trail. So all of [the allegations are] just pure bullshit, and yes, he deserves a second chance.’

“Rosenman, who is gay and has been involved in some of Hollywood’s most important gay-themed films (The Celluloid Closet, Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, Milk), sympathizes with Hammer as someone whose sexuality was once considered taboo. ‘It’s been puritanical,” Rosenman says of the media’s prurient coverage. ‘The kink-shaming is just awful. I, as a gay man who had sex for many, many years with many different kinds of people, understand this better than anyone.”

“In a recent podcast interview, Luca Guadagnino said that he ‘cannot wait to work with Armie as soon as I have a great role for [him].'”

Excerpt #3: “When I ask [Hammer] if he takes inspiration from his mentor Robert Downey Jr., who was arrested multiple times in the late 1990s on drug charges and spent several spells in jail, his answer turns toward the mythological: ‘What I would say is this: There’s examples of people who went through really difficult times and experienced what [the author] Joseph Campbell would call ‘the hero’s death.’ And the hero must die so the hero can be reborn again.’

And it tears my heart apart to admit this, but that image of a defiant, fist-pumping Trump with blood streaked across his face means…please, God, no…that he’s going to win the election.

Doddering, drooling, hoarse-voiced, cognitive-decline Joe vs. the Bloody Defiant Fist-Pumper…courage under fire.

That image is like Boris Yeltsin climbing on top of the tank during the Russian coup attempt of ‘91. It’s the precise opposite of Martin Sheen’s Greg Stillson cowering before a would-be assassin’s bullets.

Obviously a theatrical gesture. Trump realized it was a huge historic moment and he instinctually “performed”. Shameless but effective.

The post-shooting hubbub will all calm down by tomorrow. Before you know it, the “oh my God!” will fade away. But that fucking photo will live on.

The only chance Democrats have in being at least competitive between now and Election Day…even competitive, mind…is to jettison stumbling Biden immediately and nominate someone substantial and especially younger. Otherwise it’s over.

I strongly suspect that Trump’s favorability rating will shoot up now, just as Ronald Reagan’s favorability numbers went up after John Hinckley tried to assassinate him. Abraham Lincoln James Garfield William McKinley Teddy Roosevelt JFK Malcolm X Martin Luther King RFK Gerald Ford Ronald Reagan  Assassinations and assassination atttempts are as American as apple pie.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presidential_assassination_attempts_and_plots

The Trump shooter was a 20 year-old Zoomer — Thomas Matthew Crooks.

He looks dweeby, dorky — like the Sandy Hook guy. Ten to one he had no girlfriend.

BBC: “The FBI has named the man who shot at Donald Trump during a campaign rally as Thomas Matthew Crooks.

“Crooks is alleged to have opened fire while the former US president was addressing a crowd in Butler, Pennsylvania, leaving one audience member dead and two others badly hurt.

“The 20-year-old was shot dead at the scene by a Secret Service sniper, officials said.

“He had not been carrying ID, so investigators used DNA to identify him, the FBI said.

“He was from Bethel Park in Pennsylvania, about 43 miles from Butler, the site of the attempted assassination. He appears to have graduated in 2022 from Bethel Park High School, according to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review newspaper.

“State voter records show that Crooks was a registered Republican, according to US media. He is also reported to have donated $15 to liberal campaign group ActBlue in 2021.”

@commonlycensored BREAKING NEWS! Footage of Trump shooter. Thomas Matthew Crooks can be seen here collecting his high school award in 2022. #fyp #trump #thomascrooks ♬ original sound – Commonly Censored