Charles Laughton’s Sir Wilfrid Robarts on yesterday’s bible photo-op in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church: “My Lord, I would also remind my learned friend that President Trump has lived such an arrogant and deplorable life, told so many lies and violated so many solemn oaths that I am surprised the Testament did not leap from his hands when he posed with it before the cameras.”

Last night I was browsing through some HBO Max films, and was startled to discover that the boxy (1.37:1) version of Stanley Kubrick‘s Full Metal Jacket (’87) is being HD streamed. Which is certainly cause for celebration.

One, I hadn’t watched this version of FMJ since the early aughts, or soon after the release of the 2001 “Kubrick Collection” DVD version, which was mastered in 1.37:1. Two, until last night I’d never seen the boxy version in 1080p HD, as the ’01 DVD was naturally presented in 480p. And three, Kubrick preferred the boxy version to the cleavered 1.85, which is how 99.5% of the home viewing public has seen this Vietnam War classic.

Full Metal Jacket as it currently appears on HBO Max, with a 1.37:1 aspect ratio.

Same scene within the standard 1.85 a.r., which is how almost everyone has seen Stanley Kubrick’s 1987 Vietnam War classic over the last 15 or 20 years, give or take.

HE is advising all HBO Max subscribers to stream the boxy FMJ as soon as possible before it disappears. Because the sworn enemies of “boxy is beautiful” will be doing everything they can to erase this version, despite the fact that Kubrick personally preferred it.

Seriously, hurry. If I know Bob Furmanek and the 1.85 fascist cabal they’ll soon be hounding HBO Max to swap out the boxy with the 1.85. These guys are fanatics. They hate boxy and will stop at nothing.

Perhaps someone on the HB0 Max tech team made a “mistake” in uploading the boxy version, but it’s a good mistake, trust me.

Consider the following 2008 DVD Talk interview with longtime Kubrick employee and collaborator Leon Vitali, in which he explains Kubrick’s visual aesthetic:

DVD Talk: “One of the areas of greatest debate in the DVD community is about aspect ratios. The two films that people talk about the most in terms of aspect ratio are Full Metal Jacket and Eyes Wide Shut, maybe because those are the ones that have been seen theatrical by the DVD buying audience. But people will go through [these films] frame by frame and say ‘in the trailer of Eyes Wide Shut, you can see a sign on the street that you can’t see on the full frame video. You can see an extra character.’ So how do you address the differences between the theatrical releases of Eyes Wide Shut and of Full Metal Jacket in the DVD releases?”

Vitali: The original video release of Full Metal Jacket was in the supervised hands and owned by Stanley. The thing about Stanley, he was a photographer. That’s how he started. He had a still photographer’s eye. So when he composed a picture through the camera, he was setting up for what he saw through the camera — the full picture. That was very important to him. It really was. It was an instinct that never ever left him.

The chaos, looting and anarchy that I saw first-hand on Melrose Ave. an hour ago (including a small fire just east of Fairfax that was being put out) had nothing, repeat, nothing to do with the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis last Monday. It was a “get all you can” free-for-all.

Mostly I saw Average Joes with vaguely alarmed expressions standing around and eyeballing the destruction, but here and there I saw teenaged and 20something POCs in masks and hoodies grabbing all they could. Madhouse looting, small stores.

Way to go, guys! — raise high the flag of freedom. Donald Trump says “thanks!”

If poor George Floyd is watching from above, it’s a safe bet he’s feeling a mixture of shame and disgust. (Thanks to the fearless Tatiana Antropova for taking most of these stills and videos.)

Last night I got suckered into sampling HBO Max on a trial basis (no billing until June 5). The fairly immense library melted me down. Five minutes after signing up I decided to watch David Lean‘s Summertime (’55), which I’d never seen in HD before.

A concise story of a 40ish unmarried woman from Ohio (Katharine Hepburn) enjoying her first visit to Venice, Italy, and then falling in love with a covertly married native (Rossano Brazzi), Summertime is a swoony, Technicolor dreamboat dive into the charms (architectural, aromatic, spiritual) of this fabled city.

The cinematography by Jack Hildyard (The Bridge on the River Kwai) is perfectly framed and lighted, and the fleet cutting by Peter Taylor ensures that each shot is perfectly matched or blended with the next.

A cleavered 1.85 image of Summertime vs. the 1.37 version.

But I was especially pleased by the 1.37:1 aspect ratio and all the extra glorious headroom that comes with that. It goes without saying that I was also delighted by the fact that a few years ago 1.85 fascist Bob Furmanek had expressed profound irritation with Summertime‘s boxiness. I’ve read that Lean preferred the 1.37 version over the cleavered 1.85 version, which is what Furmanek and his fascist allies reflexively wanted to see.

Furious, fuming Furmanek = ecstatic HE.

Seven years ago David Brayton explained the whys and wherefores on alternateending.com:

“David Lean professed a preference for the 1.37:1 open matte version, giving it the fairly inarguable aura of authorial intent. Looking at the film, I think it’s pretty obvious why he felt this way. Simply put, the 1.85:1 version of the movie is about people while the 1.37:1 version is about Venice. As a direct result of shooting this movie, Lean fell in love with Venice for the rest of his life. [It seems apparent that] he preferred the version that showed off the city to greater effect for that reason.”

I just hope that all of the building fires and shattered windows and tear gas pellets that rocked so many cities on Friday night don’t wind up scaring the weak of heart and seekers of order into voting for The Beast a few months hence.

For her You Must Remember This podcast, Karina Longworth has created a ten-episode tribute to legendary producer, production designer and Pretty Baby screenwriter Polly Platt. It’s called “Polly Platt, The Invisible Woman.” I haven’t had a chance yet. I’m thinking of catching the first two episodes on the drive back to Los Angeles later today.

“Dearest Polly Platt,” an HE tribute posted on 7.27.11:

The tide has turned against Wokester McCarthy-ites, or at least those who are paying attention. Jig’s up, time to trim sails, hand overplayed, etc.

Please consider a day-old, profoundly comforting, nearly perfectly phrased Bulwark article by fiction writer Greg Hurwitz.

Excerpt: “All women are not to be believed any more than all men are. To suggest that females are magical truth-telling creatures isn’t just insulting; it’s objectifying.

“And of course the leaders of #MeToo knew that.

“But the biosphere of social and mainstream media no longer responds to — or has any interest in — nuanced positions. So ‘Women will no longer be silenced just because they lack relative power in certain circumstances, an injustice that now demands we give equal weight to those who’ve been victimized’ became ‘Believe all women.’

“Which then, by its very lack of nuance, set off a firestorm of cancel culture, circumventing due process and harming people of both genders. And when members of the left said nothing or responded with glee to the one-size-fits-all mob sentencing guidelines, they ended up condoning the same sort of overzealous nonsense that the right does when pretending that cancel culture rules the day.”

Acknowledgment: I dearly wish that The Bulwark could be a centrist, common-sense website as opposed to an American conservative news and opinion website founded by conservative commentators Charlie Sykes and Bill Kristol. I regard myself as a sensible leftie, but I completely agree with Hurwitz except for the “believe all women” slogan, which some #MeToo-ers have claimed was a rightwing mis-labelling of a view that more correctly could have been understood as “take accusations by women seriously.”

In mid January ’42, go-getter reporter Gene Sherman, 26, covered the Carole Lombard plane-crash tragedy for the Los Angeles Times.

Sherman reported that formidable MGM fixer Eddie (i.e., “Edgar J.”) Mannix had identified Lombard’s “charred and burned” body, relying on his familiarity with her blonde hair “as well as the general contours of her face.” Mannix was memorably portrayed by Josh Brolin in Joel and Ethan Coen‘s Hail Ceasar!.

Like any driven big-city reporter, Sherman knew most of the angles and could write a mean paragraph. In 1960 the 45 year-old Sherman won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. In a bid to strengthen the L.A. Times‘ influence on the world stage, Sherman opened the paper’s London bureau in ’64. The “hard-working, fast-living” Sherman died in 1969, at age 54.

L.A. Times reporter Gene Sherman

Somewhere in the middle of Die Hard (’88) John McLane (Bruce Willis) says he’s “kinda partial” to Roy Rogers as a walkie-talkie handle. That’s because McLane was a boomer who’d watched The Roy Rogers Show (’51 to ’57) as a toddler. No GenXer, Millennial or Zoomer would have a clue who Rogers was if it wasn’t for that one line in Die Hard. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

This morning I found a Rogers-related sentiment on Facebook, probably written by some crusty codger: “We [boomers] were born at the right time. We were able to grow up with these great people even if we never met them. In their own way they taught us about patriotism and honor. We learned that lying and cheating were bad, and that sex wasn’t as important as love. We learned how to suffer through disappointment and failure and work through it. Our lives were drug-free. So it’s good-bye to Roy and Dale, Gene and Hoppy (Hopalong Cassidy), the Lone Ranger and Tonto.

“Farewell to Sky King (and Penny) and Superman and Sgt. Joe Friday. Thanks to Capt. Kangaroo, Mr. Rogers and Capt. Noah and all those people whose lives touched ours, and made them better. Happy Trails. It was a great ride through childhood.”

The words “drug-free” brought me up short. What kind of boomer who lived any kind of life went through his or her teens and 20s without at least a touch of pot or hashish or, if they were truly adventurous of spirit, without dabbling in psychedelia?

HE reply: Boomer kids who marinated in the lore of the above-named TV heroes were also raised under the suffocating influence…I’m sure you guys remember this…of a tidy, suburban, rule-dominated culture that Robert Redford, an unhappy teenager in the mid ‘50s, once described as “the bland leading the bland.” (Not an original quote but we’ll let that go.)

This is why “the ‘60s” happened…right? The steam pressure had gathered and gathered, and it finally just blew the doors open, starting sometime in ‘64 (or perhaps more precisely on 11.22.63) and certainly by ‘65 and especially with the release of “Rubber Soul.”

In ‘71 a Don McLean song tried to spell it all out. Billy Joel took a more mundane stab at the same dynamic in “We Didn’t Start The Fire.”

Captain Kangaroo, the Lone Ranger, Ward Cleaver, Sgt. Joe Friday and other totemic figures of that era were about decency and kindliness and a certain kind of conservative, modestly measured approach to life — I get that. And what about the influence of Elvis, James Dean, Little Richard, Marlon Brando and Jerry Lee Lewis?

The plain hard truth (sorry to be the bearer) is that Sky King, Superman, Ozzie Nelson and others in that hallowed realm (and I’m trying to put this gently) were basically kind-hearted prison guards. And here you are saying “ohh, those kindly and morally upstanding prison guards…they raised us with the right kind of values!”

And I guess they did to some extent, but boomers (who became the “We generation” only to turn into the “Me generation” and then Reagan-era yuppies and then the most destructively selfish generation ever in terms of totally ruining the economy for Millennials and Zoomers) were never about “sex isn’t as important as love.” If I recall correctly, the anthem of the late ’60s, ’70s and early ’80s was “sex is just as important as love, and above all women need to learn to own their own orgasms.”

I’m sorry but as soon as I read the above I felt I needed to open the French windows and air the place out…no offense and have a happy Memorial Day.

For the first time in 17 or 18 years, I got rip-roaring stoned last night. By way of a single cannabis gummy bear, manufactured by CAMINO. It was a steady. bump-free high, but my God, the strength of it! It was like I was suddenly atop a galloping racehorse, but the horse knew the realm and was fairly cool about it. And it was like I’d been shot…shot with a diamond bullet, right through my forehead. (Kidding.) On the other hand I was scared that it might be too much for my psyche to handle (I’m basically a candy-ass in this realm), and this was why I decided to drop a Tapentadol to mellow things down.

All I know is that my senses and my free-associating mind and especially my imagination became more and more alive and attuned, and yet I was concurrently sensing how frail and delicate everyone is, myself included. I was doing everything I could to speak as softly and gently as possible. Music, colors, aromas, our Siamese cat…everything suddenly had an extra quality. If you’ve ever galloped on a horse, you know that it’s all about becoming one with the charging steed and not fretting about falling off…you have to be fearless and go with it. Last night I was half-fearless and half “uh-oh”, at least until the Tapentadol kicked in.

I’m basically saying that the THC in my system felt, from my vantage point at least, very, VERY strong for a while. I was half amazed that I’d allowed myself to get this ripped (which was actually Tatyana’s fault — she popped one of the candies into my mouth and I meekly went along with it), and half intrigued that this kind of cannabis high was a lot smoother and stronger than the pot I used to suck down in the ‘70s. It was quite the ride — lemme tell ya.

From “Don’t Monkey Around,” posted on 11.29.15: I stopped getting high as a rule in the mid ’70s, partly because I’d begun to hate the sense of weird isolation I was feeling when fully ripped. Pot is not a social drug — it’s about having giggly fits about tickly notions that are mostly in your head alone. And then it’s about spiralling down through the looking glass and becoming a flying monkey. And then about succumbing to the munchies.

I stopped getting high decades ago because pot opened the door to “the fear” — that mounting panic anxiety state that led to wild inconsolate hell and nerve-jangled insanity from which there could be no return. During a visit to Cinevegas in ’02 or ’03 I stupidly ate a super-potent pot brownie and got so ripped I had to down an entire fifth of Jack Daniels to keep the anxiety at bay.

But I really loved my early experiences of getting seriously baked, and particularly that odd time-loss thing that would happen every so often. I would be riding in the backseat of a friend’s car and just leave the planet for places unknown, and then I would suddenly awake and be somewhere new…how did I get here? I could have been space-tripping for five minutes or five seconds — I couldn’t tell but I had left the realm. I’ll never forget that “whoa, what just happened?” feeling.

Michael Winterbottom‘s The Trip to Greece is the fourth luxuriously quirky travel doc costarring Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon…exotic climes, duelling impressions, expensive gourmet dishes, cryptic insult humor.

I loved the first installment (2010’s The Trip, mainly because of their great duelling Michael Caine impressions), enjoyed the second (The Trip To Italy) and didn’t see the third (The Trip to Spain). But I adore Greece, which I saw last night. The island scenery, to-die-for food, biting guy humor, diseased laughter, pine needles and a slight sense of gnawing reality.

Maybe the pandemic helped, but cruising through sunny, colorful Greece (which I’ve never visited) did wonders for my spirit, especially in glorious HD.

God, I miss roaming around Europe so badly. Sometimes it hurts to think about it, and other times not. But generally my heart aches.

One, Greece made me laugh out loud four or five times, and that’s highly unusual for an LQTM type.

Two, their impressions of Dustin Hoffman and Laurence Olivier doing the “is it safe?” scene from Marathon Man melted me down like cheese, particularly Brydon’s imitation of a dentist drill.

Three, I’m not sure what to trust or distrust but interesting stuff happens in this one — Coogan gets laid, Brydon feels a touch of trepidation about his wife, Coogan’s dad dies, Brydon’s wife joins him at the end, etc.

And four, Brydon (who stands all of 5’7″) has gotten his gaping bald spot repaired (did he visit my Prague micro-plug guy?). I can’t tell you how gratifying it was not to contemplate that empty patch.

The trip follows the route of Homer’s Odyssey. It starts in Troy (which is in Turkey) and moves on to Kavala, Lesbos, Pelion, Athens, Hydra, Mani and Ithica.

Brydon mentions at the end of one meal that the tab is 300 euros. Tatyana, having been to Greece and Cyprus, says you can eat magnificent meals in that region for much, much less.

Quibble: Coogan, 54, is now silver-haired for the most part. Brydon, I have to say, uses a little too much kindness when he says that Coogan is aging well. He’s aging okay, but his hair is way too short — he needs to grow it out, Byron-style. (Or did when they were shooting last year.)

The Trip to Greece is such an upper I’m planning to watch it again tonight. How’s that for an endorsement? I’m also thinking of re-watching The Trip to Italy.

Brydon: “What would you say is the thing you’re the most proud of?” Coogan: “My seven BAFTAs.” Brydon: “For me, it would be my children.” Coogan: “Yeah, well, that’s ’cause you haven’t got any BAFTAs.” Brydon: “Though you have got children, which is interesting.”

I’d like to be able to watch the whole Trip to Greece series, which used to be purchasable on DVD. The series ran 168 minutes; last night’s feature stopped at 103.

I’m sorry to report that Gregor Jordan‘s Dirt Music (Samuel Goldwyn, sometime in July) got roughed up last September by Toronto Film Festival critics. And yet Tim Winton’s 2002 source novel, an Australian road romance between a free-spirited woman named Georgie Jutland and a poacher named Luther Fox, is widely respected and won a slew of literary prizes.

Garrett Hedlund and Kelly Macdonald play Luther and Georgie. At the very least Sam Chiplin‘s cinematography seems appealing. We all understand that some books simply don’t translate to the screen, and sometimes they’re not adapted in quite the right way.

Either way you can’t help but wonder what might have happened if the original Dirt Music team — director Philip Noyce, costars Heath Ledger and Rachel Weisz, and screenwriters Justin Monjo and John Collee — had made their version a decade or so ago.

Phillip Noyce (l.) discussing Dirt Music with Tim Winton (center) and Justin Monjo. Sydney, June 2004. 

Noyce had been working on a Dirt Music flick even before Winton’s novel became an Australian best-seller in ’02. He had the option to make a film version for roughly 11 years, from before publication until sometime in 2012. Noyce had wanted Rachel Weisz to play Georgie — she wound up being attached to the project for several years. In February ’07, with the project very much alive and ready to roll, Noyce ran into his leading man.

“One morning, walking with my coffee in Sydney, a Range Rover pulled up at a pedestrian crossing,” Noyce recalls. “Down came the window, and there was Heath Ledger. We agreed on the spot to shoot the film in Western Australia eight months later with Rachel.”

But the usual delays occured, and then Ledger died of an accidental overdose on 1.22.08. He was 28 years old.

“And I could never find the same spark for making the film with anyone else,” Noyce laments. “Not with Colin Farrell nor with Russell Crowe. No one could be the Luther Fox that Health showed me that morning in Sydney.”

In November 2011 Noyce asked Chris Hemsworth to play Luther for a shoot that would have begun in March 2013. That didn’t pan out either. Noyce’s option expired.

Along came Gregor Jordan. Jack Thorne (The Eddy) was engaged to write a new script. In August 2018 Hedlund and Macdonald were announced as the costars. Filming eventually happened in Kimberley, Western Australia, as well as Perth and Esperance.