July 2012: I bought a pair of Bruno Magli shoes 12 years ago in Venice, Italy. They’re the highest-quality kicks I’ve ever owned, and easily the most uncomfortable. They feel like they’re made of wood. It would be agony to wear them more than two or three hours at a stretch. But I’d rather suffer with a pair of beautiful shoes than walk around in super-comfortable shoes that look atrocious.

10.7.20: I’ve decided to get rid of some shoes that have been sitting in my closet for years but have never been worn. I’ve chosen four pairs; I’ll be dropping them off at Goodwill later today. But I couldn’t discard my 20 year-old Bruno Maglis. I just couldn’t. They hurt too much to wear more than a couple of hours, as mentioned years ago, but I cherish the fact that they’ve barely aged over the course of two Bush terms, two Barack Obamas and one Donald Trump.

I remember the moment I bought them like yesterday. Some overpriced boutique in the well-lighted San Marco district, where you’re always guaranteed to over-pay. But I was in a sucker mood. Time and again they’ve made my feet feel aching and punished, but I’ve never felt badly about owning them. Comfort is nice, but looking good is more important.

Every time I see DVD Beaver screen captures of 4K Blurays, they always look darker than corresponding Bluray and DVD captures from years past. Which always prompts the same question — “Why shell out good money to watch a darker, more shadowy version in 4K when (a) the 1080p Bluray version is more pleasing to look at plus (b) the naked eye is hard pressed to tell the difference between 4K and 1080p in the first place?”

The latest examples are screen captures of Warner Home Entertainment’s 4K Bluray of Full Metal Jacket, which came out on 9.21.

HE to DVD Beaver’s Gary Tooze: “Why is it that your 4K frame captures are ALWAYS DARKER? Who the hell wants to see a film with inkier images and diminished colors compared to the Bluray versions? Call me a peon but I don’t see the attraction. Not to mention the fact that HBO Max’s “boxy” HD version of Full Metal Jacket, which was sadly removed a few weeks ago, looked beautiful. Please share the upside in buying a cleavered (1.85:1) version with inkier images? Especially compared to the more commonly available versions via HD streaming or previous Blurays.”

Tooze to HE: “Hi, Jeffrey — without going into a long detailed answer, darker is GENERALLY more accurate to the theatrical [presentation]. Also you are probably not looking at this with an HDR monitor. The [DVD Beaver] image is only a simulation. It generally looks better on an HDR TV system. Best, GT.”

HE to DVD Beaver’s Gary Tooze: “I tend to prefer images that (I know this makes me sound like a peasant) look really good over those that are ‘closer to theatrical.’ If ‘closer to theatrical’ means the addition of muddy shadows, I’ll take a pass and stick with the good old 1080p version.”

Competing captures of 1080p Bluray vs. 4K

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For years Russian car crashes have been my favorite source of entertainment. I laugh out loud every time, and I’m speaking as an LQTMer. My second favorite is Jurgen Henn’s website devoted to crashes at Durham’s Norfolk Southern–Gregson Street Overpass. Nicknamed The Can Opener or The Gregson Street Guillotine, it’s commonly known as the 11-foot-8 Bridge, hence http://11foot8.com. Between April 2008 to October 2019, Henn recorded over 145 collisions.

Donald Trump as Evita Peron…there’s something in this. Could his deranged supervillain profile translate down the road into some kind of grandiose tragic figure in a film, play, musical drama or opera? Sure, maybe, but who would want to see it? He’s too much of a grotesque figure — too bloated, too corrupt, too much of a hatemonger, too much in the grip of demented fantasy and rancid delusion — to be portrayed in any kind of half-sympathetic terms.

There’s obviously a Nixon-like movie in Trump’s saga, and I’m guessing such a film (which Oliver Stone might not be interested in making) could be morbidly fascinating. But we’re all watching this movie unfold right now. Almost every ghastly detail is out in the open, and those that aren’t are being speculated or imagined six ways from Sunday.

Friendo: “I always feel a tiny bit of annoyance that we have to go through Kamala the presumptive candidate in 2024 instead of Pete, and that it might be forever until he has a shot at running.”

…how would you play Wednesday night’s debate with the priggish Mike Pence? Would you go right for the Covid jugular? Would you slice and dice like a sushi chef and possibly risk seeming overly aggressive to male bumblefuck voters who may be watching? Or would you hold back on the grandstanding and wait for Pence to strike first or possibly put foot in mouth?

I think Kamala should hit this stooge hard and strong over the Trump administration’s non-handling of the pandemic. Charge with a sharp lance, give no quarter.

Tim Kaine to N.Y. Times‘ Sydney Ember: “Kamala’s good. She’s a prosecutor, and she has evidence to argue. When she was in court back in the day, she would have to argue the evidence. She’s got a lot of evidence to argue.

“But the vice president is a trained communicator who can look in a camera and basically say anything, even if it’s contrary to the facts, and say it as if he believes it. He’ll be praising his boss over and over again. The challenge for him is, how can you do that without it going in a completely discordant way with Americans who are suffering?”

The veep debate will happen between 6 and 7:30 pm Pacific at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.

Philip Noyce‘s Lakewood, a tense relationship thriller starring Naomi Watts, finished shooting in northern Ontario a week or so ago. Lensing happened in and around the North Bay region, subbing for Maine. A six-week shoot.

Slogan tease: “Someone is threatening the fictional northern Maine town of Lakewood.”

The cast and crew were tested for Covid three times each week. Masks, social distancing, all the required protocols.

Greg Goldstein synopsis: “Lakewood follows a mother (Watts) who desperately races against time to save her child as authorities place her small town on lockdown.” What does that mean? A lockdown over what? Covid contagion, BLM protestors, an active shooter, an army of reptiles?

The Lakewood script was written by Chris Sparling. It’s being produced by (this is a long list) Watts a la Jam Tart Films, Zack Schiller and David Boies, Limelight’s Dylan Sellers and Chris Parker, Untapped’s Andrew Corkin and Stratagem’s Alex Lalonde. Limelight’s Alex Dong is an executive producer.

Pic is basically a one-hander, performed almost entirely by Watts in the vein of Steven Knight and Tom Hardy‘s Locke. It’ll also allow Noyce to show his knack for staging inventive suspense. When it comes to nail-biters, fewer distractions means a more gripping scenario.

Contrary to the photos, the Lakewood producers didn’t insist that each and every cast and crew person wear whitesides — it just worked out that way. Notice: As part of a new mild-mannered policy, Hollywood Elsewhere accepts that whitesides are ubiquitous and no longer has a “problem” with them. Live & let live.

Bret Stephens excerpt from “There Is Too Much Happening,” posted in The New York Times on 10.5:

Taken last night around 7:10 pm, corner of Sunset and Larrabee.

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Throughout last summer and until late August some of us were getting $600 per week by way of federal pandemic assistance (“economic stimulus”) funds. On-and-off talks between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Treasure Secretary Steven Mnuchin have been searching for a fall agreement by which to resume these payments. Alas, Orange Plague has abruptly ended negotiations while accusing Pelosi of “not negotiating in good faith” and yaddah yaddah. The Republicans were offering a $400 weekly supplement instead of $600. Honestly? $400 doesn’t sound so bad right now. I would’ve accepted that if I’d been in Pelosi’s shoes.

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If Donald Trump has truly jettisoned Covid-19 from his system, great. But based on what little I know about coronavirus coping, he could relapse any time over the next couple of weeks. Herman Cain, who’s the same age as Trump, was in and out with the disease (which he probably caught during Trump’s Tulsa rally) for three weeks before succumbing on 7.30.20.

Eddie Van Halen has passed at age 65. Due respect to a great rock guitarist and ’80s superstar. Condolences to friends, fans, family. Never saw the band live during the day. It is believed presumed that EVH’s decades-long embrace of the proverbial rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle had at least something to do with his relatively early departure.

What does Variety‘s Chris Willman have to say?

Rolling Stone‘s Andy Greene: “Eddie Van Halen, the legendary guitar innovator and virtuoso who led Van Halen through five decades and three lead singers, establishing himself as on the all-time great players in rock history, died Tuesday after a long battle with cancer. He was 65.”

Wiki: “Eddie was the main songwriter and founder — with brother and drummer Alex Van Halen, bassist Mark Stone, and singer David Lee Roth — of the American rock band Van Halen. In 2012, he was voted number one in a Guitar World magazine reader’s poll for “The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time”.

Wiki excerpts: “Valerie Bertinelli filed for divorce form EVH on 12.5.05 after four years of separation. The divorce was finalized in December 2007. Van Halen has struggled with alcoholism and drug abuse. He has stated that he began smoking and drinking at age 12, and that he eventually needed alcohol to function. Van Halen entered rehabilitation in 2007. In a 2015 interview, Van Halen stated that he had been sober since 2008. Van Halen married Janie Liszewski on 6.27.09. In August 2012, Van Halen underwent an emergency surgery for a severe bout of diverticulitis. It was revealed in 2019 that Eddie had been secretly battling throat cancer over the last five years.”