Simon St. Laurent - Squibber -

Saturday, August 18, 2018

Repeat My VHS Purge: A Night to Remember

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

A Night to Remember (1958) This "Titanic" nut considers the British film classic to be the finest of all the feature length dramatic films made about the famous disaster at sea. I first read Walter Lord's outstanding and absorbing book of the same name when I was 11 or 12 years of age. Seeing the motion picture adaptation a year or two later on television was a visceral experience for me, effectively cementing my interest in the R.M.S. Titanic.

The real story is not so much about a machine, but humanity. A culture of arrogance and vanity (along with bad luck) contributed greatly to the ship's sinking, resulting in the loss of many of its passengers and crew. A Night to Remember is almost documentary-like in its depiction of this tragic event.

Friday, August 17, 2018

As I Described Andrew Scheer Today

Andrew Scheer, current leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, and Leader of the Official Opposition, has had a difficult time connecting with many Canadians. A lot will rest on his shoulders come the next federal election. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau continues to rate relatively well in most popularity polls.

As I described Andrew Scheer to someone today:

The problem is Admiral Scheer's flotilla is made up of leaky ships. And he cannot command or unify.

Nothing will change, otherwise.

Trudeau will almost certainly win again. Our Prime Minister is far from perfect (who is?) but he has much going for him.

With Scheer on the bridge, the Conservatives are dead in the water.

Repeat My VHS Purge: The Brain That Wouldn't Die

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

The Brain That Wouldn't Die (1962) Most films one thought of as brilliant in his or her childhood don't stand up when viewed from an adult perspective, but, The Brain That Wouldn't Die is not one of them. In my twenties I saw the cut home video version, with the film's infamously gruesome moment completely missing. I felt robbed of a special childhood moment. (I should note that I first saw Brain when it carried the slight re-title of The Head That Wouldn't Die.)

What happens in cases like this is Public Domain (PD) prints end up saving the day for childhood memories.

Positively drenched in atmosphere, The Brain that Wouldn't Die holds many creepy scenes; and ingredients. I suppose one could argue that, in its own way, Brain/Head is every bit as good as Citizen Kane....

Repeat My VHS Purge: Taxi Driver

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Taxi Driver (1976) Stunning filmmaking; all departments, including: Direction (Martin Scorsese), Script (Paul Schrader), Cinematography (Michael Chapman), Music (Bernard Herrmann), Editing (Tom Rolf, Melvin Shapiro), Acting (Robert De Niro, Jodie Foster, Harvey Keitel, and more), etc.

I remember seeing Taxi Driver for the first time on late night television. Few film viewings have had such a grip on me.

Final Note: Check out the VHS tape's box front above. "Jodie Foster is delightful." She certainly is terrific. The 'critic' -- Liz Smith from Cosmopolitan magazine -- was not incorrect, but for such a quote to end up as the box front's representative critical notice tells me that someone at Columbia Pictures Home Video was not doing his or her job.

I can imagine: "Hey, honey, you like romantic comedies. This looks like it might be fun, and something the kids could watch." (Until they turn the box over to read the back....)

Repeat My VHS Purge: Strategic Air Command

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Strategic Air Command (1955) Shot in VistaVision, and starring Jimmy Stewart, it is very much a film of its time. But, although born during McCarthyism, this picture avoids glorifying "Strategic Air Command" outright. The men and women have a job to do. No serviceman comes across as blood-thirsty or rings in any way of "I wanna get those Russkies". There is a conscience within the film, a quality all but absent in most films of this type produced today.

Mention must be made of Jimmy Stewart's service on bombers during WWII. His piloting of the Convair B-36 and, later in the film, a Boeing B-47 feels right.

Strategic Air Command is not a great film, I don't think, but it entertains in an almost sombre manner. And the sugar bowl-sweetness between Stewart and onscreen wife June Allyson is not to be missed. The highlights, for aviation fans certainly, are anything involving SAC bombers flying high above the clouds. In particular the B-36 is lovingly photographed as it soars. Victor Young's beautiful score elevates these sequences, making them almost poetic. Now that is something you do not get anymore. (What's a tune?)

I liked Strategic Air Command when I first watched it on late night television in late 1976 and I still like it.

Thursday, August 16, 2018

10 Quotable Lines from Cats

"Humans? What about them?"

"Sounds like a complete waste of time."

"That's a big mouse!"

"Sleep replenishes the soul."

"Those curtains had to go."

"No! Don't clean up the garage. Bad idea!"

"Can openers? That's putting it politely."

"Even I don't like all cats."

"Why mice and rats? Human infants are too easy to catch."

"Ah, piss on it."

Roger Corman's Political Leanings

I'm currently in the process of re-reading Beverly Gray's insightful book Roger Corman - An Unauthorized Biography of the Godfather of Indie Filmmaking (2000). It was a pleasure reading it the first time around. Last night I came across this little passage discussing Corman's politics:

... Roger once informed his young children (in the presence of then assistant Anna Roth) that Democrats are naturally superior in terms of both "IQ and compassion."

I've long admired Roger Corman.

Roger Corman on the Monsters Up Front

Don't show the monster too much at the beginning.

He's absolutely right, but in reality the advice is often not taken.

Roger Corman on Why Filmmaking

What turned me on was film, not only as an art form but as an exciting way to make money.

Film can be an art form, and it can be an exciting way to make money.

Wednesday, August 15, 2018

Repeat My VHS Purge: Doctor Who "The Curse of Peladon"

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Doctor Who: The Curse of Peladon (1972) For me this is the representative story of Doctor Who. It has: Freaky aliens, atmospheric settings, memorable characters ("Hepesh!"), effective jeopardy, a murder mystery, terrific lines of dialogue ("I'm the Earth ambassador!"), and just the right number of episodes to tell the tale.

"The Curse of Peladon" is perfect Who -- the 'balance of things' is just right. And as a Brit might say, "It's a cracking good story!".

Proof of purchase: I bought the VHS of "Peladon" after doing a little pricing power play. It was January of 1996; I saw the tape in HMV -- on lower Yonge Street here in Toronto -- and then made the natural progression to the great Sam the Record Man store a few doors down and noticed "Peladon" was there too, but at one dollar more in price. (It should be stated that "Sam's" almost always had better pricing.) I went up to the sales guy behind the counter and told him what HMV was charging for the same tape. The quiet man, without saying a word, pulled out his label machine and popped out a price to match the competitor's. Sold. (My wording makes it look as though I had to have that videotape of "The Curse of Peladon".)

Repeat My VHS Purge: Doctor Who "The Tomb of the Cybermen"

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Doctor Who: The Tomb of the Cybermen (1967) Long thought to be a "lost" Doctor Who, all four episodes were eventually discovered in 1991 residing in Hong Kong. (The copy was a 16mm kinescope used for foreign distribution; the original recording tapes had been erased by the BBC years before.) Considered a glorious find by "Whovians", this one works, I think, because it drips with atmosphere. The actual storyline is almost secondary; at times it seems to exist just to bump and creep along in order to fill four parts/episodes. The Cybermen are great villains, however.

My introduction in any real way, other than having read a fair bit about "Tomb" over the years, was through a British friend who told me it scared him when he saw it as a child. He may have used the word "frightened". Doctor Who certainly scared me when I was a child.

Acquiring the VHS tape allowed me to see "The Tomb of the Cybermen" and I was impressed.

Repeat My VHS Purge: Superliners: Twilight of an Era

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

The Superliners: Twilight of an Era (1980) What a morsel of sweet goodness this is to an ocean liner fanatic. Narrated by Alexander Scourby, the best of the National Geographic voices, Superliners tells the tale of the great liners that plied the North Atlantic between the Old and New worlds. The Queen Elizabeth 2 is filmed during a voyage between Southampton and New York City in 1979. This footage functions as a framing, and contrasting, device as it's intercut with archival film, photographs, and interviews with experts and seafarers of all sorts.

Lyn Murray's musical score sets a tone of nostalgia and longing. "Longing" in that the business of moving people across thousands of miles of water was all but superseded years ago by jetliners.

I watched The Superliners: Twilight of an Era when it first aired on PBS in 1980. Years later, seeing the VHS tape for sale made for a quick sail.

Repeat My VHS Purge: Search for Battleship Bismarck

Soon I hope to get back to "My VHS Purge". It's been a while. [This page was accidently corrupted when I went to repost on Feb 15, 2020. The intro was best-guessed, but the rest below is unchanged.]

From February 12, 2017:

My VHS Purge: Search for Battleship Bismarck

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Search for Battleship Bismarck (1989) Dr Robert Ballard searches for the lost World War II German warship. The pursuit and sinking of the Bismarck is a grand tale of a sea battle between two great naval forces: Britain's Royal Navy and Germany's Kriegsmarine. Search for Battleship Bismarck plays the straight documentary form: Archival footage from the war and battle; interviews with historians, and with men who fought on both sides. The stories are at times moving. One in particular is recounted by former Royal Navy seaman and author Ludovic Kennedy as he reads from his book Pursuit: The Chase and Sinking of the Bismarck: The HMS Dorsetshire's rescuing of German sailors from oil slicked water is abandoned after a lookout spots what appears to be a U-Boat's periscope. Perhaps the most sobering story told in the film is that of a German sailor whose arms had been blown off in the final battle. He tries desperately to stay afloat and to clench a lifeline with his teeth.

Motion picture film shot from the deck of a Royal Navy warship showing the Bismarck in its death throes may be the most potent and 'truthful' footage of the documentary.

Many documentaries have been made about the sinking of the Bismarck, but Search for Battleship Bismarck carries the National Geographic mark of quality.

Tuesday, August 14, 2018

The Great Power Outage of 2003

"It was fifteen years ago today." (August 14, 2003.)

I was at my place of work in downtown Toronto. My co-worker and I stood in front of the bank of VTR (Video Tape Recorder) equipment and chatted some technical business. Suddenly, a harmony of clicks and clacks. And lights going out: overhead fluorescent tubes and the video decks' myriad of little indicator lamps. The shutdown was dramatic. And it meant that every video feed and recording we had going at the moment was rendered useless.

At first my partner and I both thought it was that bloody little local transformer station that too often failed in the middle of a work day. No doubt it'll pop back on in seconds or minutes.

Minutes passed.

Our manager popped out of his office and exclaimed: "There's a blackout on the entire eastern part of North America!" That was drama. Then it set in. We would have no need to finish our shift. Time to go home.

Wait a moment. That means there's no subway. Then, as now, I lived in Toronto's Annex neighbourhood.

Fine. I'll walk home.

As I propelled west along King Street I bumped into a friend and former co-worker who was making his way home. The fifty-minute walk was a great chance to catch up.

That evening I went for a stroll: Shadow People!

Repeat My VHS Purge: Carmina Burana

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Carmina Burana (1990) No, it's not the music from the film The Omen (1976), as the overture to Carmina Burana, "O Fortuna", is so often mistakenly attributed, including by cinema scholar VIncent LoBrutto in his biography on director Stanley Kubrick, for it's the head-banger intro and extro bit to one of the greatest musical masterpieces of the 20th Century.

Written in 1935 and 1936 by German composer Carl Orff, Carmina Burana is a cantata asking for interpretation by dance company or musical group of all mixes.

This VHS tape is of a traditional performance by symphony orchestra and choir: The great conductor Seiji Ozawa leads the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Shin-Yu Kai Chorus, and Boys Choir of the Staats- Und Domchor, Berlin in a definitive performance of Orff's masterwork. It also doesn't hurt having soprano Kathleen Battle.

Whenever I played this tape my VCR's capstans would rattle.

Repeat My VHS Purge: Chuck's Choice Cuts

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Chuck's Choice Cuts (1982) As good as this tape is, it's not The All Night Show, the source. Tomorrow, Monday, February 20th, I will be posting an article on "Chuck the Security Guard" and his short-lived late-late night series, so I won't go into any great detail here. The VHS has Chuck, actually Toronto-based actor Chas Lawther, doing the kind of thing he did on TANS: Having some fun in front of the camera and showing an assortment of film shorts such as the Superman and Betty Boob cartoons, music shorts, and old movie trailers. The difference is this production was shot in a tape-house machine room and not in a small television's station control room. Also, the original show was live-to-air, which is quite impossible to do on a pre-recorded videotape. I suppose the best way to mimic The All Night Show experience would be to play this tape starting at 1 o'clock in the morning.

I grabbed Chuck's Choice Cuts in the early 'nineties from After Dark Video on Bathurst Street here in Toronto. The store itself had a fine collection of off-beat videos and a decor to match. (After Dark closed its doors years ago.)

Repeat My VHS Purge: Annie Hall

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Annie Hall (1977) My favourite new film release that year and my favourite film of 1977. Woody Allen had not entirely left his slapstick behind him when he made Annie Hall, but somehow those loopy little moments work in this story for the people. I remember that opening night; out came a manager: "Folks, the theatre is almost full. There are individual seats, however." Friend Chris and I looked at one another for approval. "Why not, let's go." We found a freakish arrangement of two side-by-side seats. I sat in the corner-most front left seat while he sat immediately to my right.

That, for those who do not remember, or had yet to arrive on this planet, is how anticipated and popular Annie Hall was in 1977. And soon after the film's opening, the character herself, Annie Hall, became a bit of an item. She spawned a clothing line, of sorts: "The Annie Hall Look."

Part of the reason I picked up the VHS was the low price. Such a small price to pay for a great movie.

Repeat My VHS Purge: Dazed and Confused

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tape collection. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

Dazed and Confused (1993) The Bloor Cinema, Toronto, January 1993: The house was packed and the audience reaction was one of "I'm having so much fun watching this", which threw me back to 1973 and American Graffiti. A communal screening feeling was Dazed and Confused.

I would have been the age of the film's 'kids'; part of the "freshmen" pack, even if we don't use those decidedly U.S. terms here in Canada (as far as I know). In addition, initiation rites, certainly at the high school level, and most certainly in the mid 1970s, are not a Canadian thing (as far as I've been led to believe).

Richard Linklater is one of those film directors who understands people, what makes them tick, and cultural inter-dynamics flexed by time and place. Dazed and Confused is a retro time capsule, but in an enjoyable motion picture.

Monday, August 13, 2018

Repeat My VHS Purge: The Blue Max

Soon I hope to return to "My VHS Purge". The series' most recent filing was done on March 5th of last year. Over the next few days I will be revisiting the original "Purge" postings....

From March 4, 2017:

My VHS Purge: The Blue Max

As part of a downsizing project eight years ago I purged most of my pre-recorded VHS tapes. I've never been a big collector of movies -- my DVD library is fairly small -- but the fact is I had accumulated around 70 tapes:

The Blue Max (1966) An underrated epic. Three or four years ago I rewatched it after a prompt from a friend who had himself reappraised the film. He was right. The screenplay is superior, not typical of a 'roadshow' picture, I find. There is the brand of spectacle usually found in the form -- in this case fabulous flying and combat scenes -- but also present is a lot of human-based machinations, the kind that might have impressed the Bard. These finely wrought narrative streams roll to a satisfying climax.

Star George Peppard, while much too old at the time to be playing a fighter pilot (those guys were in their early to mid twenties), is believable as a man who will stop at nothing to get the big prize: The Blue Max, the "Pour le Mérite". Ursula Andress, James Mason, Jeremy Kemp, and Karl Michael Vogler give fine support. As for tech credits, cinematographer Douglas Slocombe and composer Jerry Goldsmith fly high. (What is typical of a blockbuster film is the staffing of top people, in front of and behind the camera. More often than not this loading of talent does not translate into a great movie, or an okay one, even if the individual contributions can be spotlighted and raved about.)

Some of the film's highlights: The balloon-busting sequence; a game of "chicken", with contributions from a bridge; Peppard and Andress; the clash of Allied and German soldiers, complete with visceral hand-to-hand combat (which film critics had somehow not known about when they raved about Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan); and James Mason's 'big stamp' (it packs a punch).

The Blue Max deserves a spin on DVD or Blu-ray....

A Scene Today from Mainz, Germany

Courtesy of my Germany correspondent. (I wish I was in Mainz right now.)