TMZ is reporting that Full House‘s Bob Saget has died. He was only 65, and in the middle of a multi-city tour and, to go by recent tweets, having a great time. “Multiple sources” have told TMZ that Saget passed late this afternoon (Sunday) at Orlando’s Ritz-Carlton. Quite unexpectedly. Very sorry.

Loving beyond words being on tour —And doing an all new show of standup and music. Hope to see you out there. More dates being added continually as we go further into 2022… For tickets, go to: https://t.co/nqJyTi0Dbk pic.twitter.com/ECSOpGt1K0

— bob saget (@bobsaget) December 9, 2021

Lewis Allen and Richard Sale‘s Suddenly (’54) has been in the public domain for decades. I’ve seen different versions maybe five or six times. They’ve ranged from mildly tolerable to better-than-decent to good to first-rate. Plus I own what I believe is probably the best-quality Bluray version. But I honestly believe that the GoldenAgeClassics 4K UHD version, which was posted on 1.6.22, is the best I’ve ever seen.

The detail is exquisite, and the monochrome tones and shadings are as rich and natural and un-pushed as anything I’ve ever seen via streaming. I’ve mirrored this version on my 65-inch and it looks great. Plus the corners of the 35mm image are rounded, which indicates that every square inch in every shot has been rendered — no cropping whatsoever. Acres of head room. Hats off to the Golden Age guys…excellent work as far as it goes.

…and perhaps even breathtaking happened in my head when I accidentally mis-titled Jane Campion’s 1920s Montana western. All I knew was that the attitude suggested by The Power of the Doug felt curiously liberating. If the first name of Benedict Cumberbatch’s smelly, snarly, well-educated, self-loathing gay guy had been “Doug” instead of “Phil”, the whole package would have radiated a different mood or tone. Just don’t ask me to explain.

…about being blissfully and contentedly ignorant about movies. To hear it from Alia Shawkat, there are definite generational differences between Zoomers and Millenials (including sexual histories).

Dwayne Hickman, forever and indelibly identified as the star of The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis (September ’59 to June ’63), passed this morning at age 87. Hugs and condolences to friends, fans, family, former colleagues.

And by “former colleagues,” I’m partly referring to Dobie Gillis costar Warren Beatty, whose path and potential in life led to historic accomplishments, Oscar nominations and wins, and the altering of cinematic culture. During his heyday Beatty was an extraordinary, legendary, real-life hound while Hickman only played one, and the kind of hound, by the way, who never really experienced an erection (even an erection of the mind) or coped with primal lust and longing and hot blood.

For Dobie Gillis‘ romantic passion was more in the realm of Percy Bysshe Shelley than Lord Byron — he sought love and assurance and the perfect mating with a sister of the spirit — a soul priest in search of the perfect nun. It’s not that Dobie tried and failed to get laid during the four-year run of the series — he never even seemed cognizant of the idea. Wokester prudes can point fingers at Beatty’s off-set behavior in the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s, but at least he was alive and pulsing on the planet earth.

But Hickman’s Dobie was kind and considerate and thoughtful — he believed in middle-class values (the show was one of Hollywood’s final expressions of the sleepy and hermetic 1950s, ending only a few months before the murder of JFK and the onset of ’60s social turbulence) and he identified, remember, with Pierre Auguste Rodin‘s “The Thinker”.

Born in 1934, Hickman costarred with the recently departed Dean Stockwell in Joseph Losey‘s The Boy With The Green Hair (’48) and was, at the time, considerably taller than Stockwell.

Hickman’s first big score was a recurring role on The Bob Cummings Show (’55 to ’59). He also played a Marlon Brando-like rebel in Rally ‘Round the Flag, Boys! (’58). Hickman began playing the teenaged Gillis at age 25, and with blonde hair yet. (His hair reverted to brown in subsequent seasons.) His biggest post-Gillis score was the role of “Jed” in Elliot Silverstein‘s Cat Ballou (’65), along with costars Jane Fonda, Lee Marvin and Michael Callan.

Incidentally: Hollywood Elsewhere has always identified with Bob Denver‘s Maynard G. Krebs, the difference being that while Maynard was known for freaking out whenever he heard the word “work”, HE freaks whenever anyone mentions the word “woke.”

I always carry around three combs because sooner or later I’ll lose one of them and then I’ll be down to two.

The best kind of comb isn’t too large + has a rubbery, bendable quality. This black comb [below] was perfect — my #1 default. The other two were semi-acceptable but not really — too large, too brittle, one is blue.

Anyway a couple of weeks ago the black comb disappeared. I looked and looked and looked and couldn’t find it — heartbroken. I have five backup combs (right size & bendability) that I keep in a trinket box, but I didn’t want to deplete my reserve. I exhaled and imperceptibly slumped and grumpily resigned myself to the loss of the blackie.

Then this morning I washed and aired out a dark blue couch comforter, and lo and behold blackie re-appeared. It made my day, but this is my life. I lose stuff all the time — combs, chargers, connecting cords. It’s always something. Stressful, anxious, unceasing.

Pretty much the entire cast (significant-name-wise) of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Paradine Case (‘47), which is partly a courtroom drama but mainly a saga of sexual obsession and unrequited desire that ends in total humiliation. Extremely minor Hitchcock + the Kino Bluray allegedly blows from a perspective of HD quality. Speaking as a Hitchcock completist I’d like to see the Bluray, but something psychological is preventing me. I would rent it in a second, but you can’t.

What needs to be done at this stage in our social-political evolution is an investigation into the possibly racist decisions made by Peter Jackson in the making of his Lord of the Rings trilogy. Why didn’t Jackson anticipate presentism? And why was he so oblivious to the notion of casting actors of color? I don’t want to sound overly scolding or militant, but it might be necessary to haul Jackson before a committee and rake him over the coals.

And why, by the way, couldn’t Denethor (John Noble), Grima Wormtongue (Brad Dourif) and Saruman (Christopher Lee) be gay?

With her wins from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association and (today) the National Society of Film Critics, Parallel Mothers‘ Penelope Cruz has now won two major-league Best Actress awards. Plus 13 out of 27 Gold Derby go-along whores have included her among their top-five spitball picks.

HE has never harbored the slightest doubt about the award-worthiness of Cruz’s performance. And yet Cruz isn’t among the six nominees for the Critics Choice Awards Best Actress award. They didn’t even nominate her! And yet it’s been claimed that the CCAs are predictive of the Oscars — sure!

HE also applauds the NSFC’s first-runner-up support of The Worst Person in the World‘s Renate Reinsve (42 votes); ditto handing its Best Supporting Actor trophy to Reinsve’s costar Anders Danielsen Lie (who’s also quite good in Bergman Island).

Otherwise the NSFC went hog-wild for Drive My Car — Best Picture, Best Director (Ryusuke Hamaguchi), Best Actor (Hidetoshi Nishijima) and Best Screenplay (Ryusuke Hamaguchi and Takamasa Oe).

Drive My Car is a morose, slow-paced film about coping with grief and long-festering guilt (i.e., the trials and tribulations of grief monkeys). It’s strictly an art-house sauna movie for elite, ivory-tower critics — a respectable effort by any measure, but a movie that resides in its own cave and doesn’t begin to even try to capture or engage with or reflect anything about mainstream life in the years 2020 or ’21. It could have been made in 1957 or ’63 or ’86 or ’92.

NextBestPicture‘s Matt Neglia recently had the temerity to suggest that Drive My Car, having won Best Picture trophies from NSFC, LAFCA and the NYFCC, is cut from the same cloth as Goodfellas, Schindler’s List, L.A. Confidential, The Hurt Locker, The Social Network and Spotlight. Neglia is one of those film nerd types who lives on his own planet, or, if you will, inside his own rectum. There’s no reasoning with guys like this.