In Memoriam

November 11, 1922 - April 11, 2007

This is truly a sad day. I found out a couple of hours ago that Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. has died. To say that it took the wind out of my sails this evening would be an understatement.

So it goes.

I felt like someone had punched me in the gut.

Perhaps it's selfish or wrong of me, but I feel like I've lost an old friend.

I think Vonnegut has influenced me as both a writer and a person more than any single artist in my life. Even more than George Lucas. I've read all of his books (with one exception) at least 4 times. Each time I read a Vonnegut book, I feel like I'm visiting with an old friend and now that friend is gone, although I'll still have his books.

I wrote Kurt Vonnegut three letters. I never sent any of them. And when I was busy not sending them, I knew that eventually his time would come and I would regret not sending them.

Truly, I regret not sending them.

In the letters I told him that he didn't need to fear so much about the generations of kids after him. That people like me still do care about things like Abraham Lincoln and Sacco and Vanzetti and Eugene Debs. Kids like myself (although I suppose I'm not much of a kid anymore) really did learn and care to learn from people as wise as he.

More importantly, he taught me how important it is to care about my fellow man better than all my years studying dogma inside an organized religion and that I didn't have to believe in God to do it. He taught me the value of Christianity and the teachings of Christ without having to fall into the trap of all of the spiritual mumbo-jumbo that went with it. He taught me the optimism to see the essential decency in pretty much any human being.

He inspired me to write what I believe to be some of my best short stories (if you're familiar with Vonnegut's work, you might be interested to read them. Here, here, here, here, and here. But this isn't about me, this is about the profound influence this man has had on my life.)

There's so much more I want to say about him and maybe in a couple of days I'll be more composed to say more about it.

But at this point, I'd be remiss if I didn't sign off by saying that Kurt's probably in Heaven now.

I'm probably not the first to say it and I will certainly not be the last, but it's something that has to be said.

Vonnegut on Free Enterprise

Free Enterprise is much too hard on the old and the sick and the shy and poor and the stupid, and on people nobody likes. They just can't cut the mustard under Free Enterprise. They lack that certain something that Nelson Rockefeller, for instance, so abundantly has.

So let's divide up the wealth more fairly than we have divided it up so far. Let's make sure that everybody has enough to eat, and a decent place to live, and medical help when he needs it. Let's stop spending money on weapons, which don't work anyway, thank God, and spend money on each other. It isn't moonbeams to talk of modest plenty for all. Dwight David Eisenhower once pointed out that Sweeden, with it's many Utopian programs, had a high rate of alcoholism and suicide and youthful unrest. Even so, I would like to see America try socialism. If we start drinking heavily and killing ourselves, and if our children start acting craazy, we can go back to good old Free Enterprise again.

-Kurt Vonnegut at his address to the graduating class at Bennington College, 1970

I think that this is noble thinking. I know not everyone agrees and I'm sure people are sick of me forcing Kurt Vonnegut and Democratic Socialism and Healthcare for all down everyone's throats, but I think the world is too harsh. We need to do more to soften the vicious nature of the Free Enterprise system.

I'll start bringing some Greg Palast quotes in here as soon as I find my copy of "The Best Democracy Money can buy." That's good stuff.

It's not a bad thing to take some extra money out of your pocket and give it to someone who needs a sandwich or a hot coffee or a bottle of booze or an appendectomy. In fact I've done all of the above. And I think when the problem is right in your face in the form of an actual hand out, pan handling for it, you put what change you can spare in their hand. We need to stop thinking out of sight out of mind with these problems and just take better care of each other.

Vonnegut once proposed an ammendment to the Constitution that said basically all Americans must be treated as though they felt they would be sorely missed whenever they left a room. I'm behind him on that one. If everyone could make everyone else feel wanted... That would be a great thing. An impossible ideal, but one to strive for, nonetheless.

10 Movies That Need DVD Releases

Not much on Earth annoys me more than finding out about a movie and not being able to get my hands on it. I wanted to put together a list of films that deserve a DVD release (a lot of them deserve Criterion releases, some of them not so much). This is, by no means, an exhaustive list. As soon as you see it, you'll say, "Jeez, how could he have forgotten X?!"

Let us know in the comments. So, without further ado and in no particular order:


1. Our Man in Havana is Carol Reed and Graham Greene's third and final collaboration. The first two, The Fallen Idol and The Third Man are widely regarded as classics and rightly so. I would assume that this film is no different, but I can't get my bloody hands on it. Alec Guinness heads up the cast which includes Burl Ives, Maureen O'Hara and Ernie Kovacs. It was also filmed in Havana during that narrow window prior to the complete closure of the country. Guinness plays Wormold, an expatriate vacuum salesman living in Havana with his young daughter. As his daughter gets older she's gotten more expensive, so when the offer comes from the British secret service comes in for him to become a spy he jumps at the chance. He begins to file fanciful and false reports but things get hairy for Wormold when his preposterous reports (vacuum blueprints) turn out to be true (military blueprints) and other foreign agents and local military descend on poor Wormold.

The book was fantastic and you'd be hard pressed to find a better cast for the film. The writer/director team produced to classics, I can't imagine how this film could be a misfire and I can't find any reason whatsoever why it isn't available on DVD. Criterion should get on top of this one ASAP.

2. Freud - John Huston directed this bio-pic that covers five years in the life of Sigmund Freud played wonderfully, I imagine, by Montgomery Clift. It was nominated for two Academy Awards in 1962 (score and screenplay) and has been largely unavailable on DVD or VHS. The film compresses most of Freuds major breakthroughs into one patient and is hailed as the best film about Freud. Turner Classic Movies plays it from time to time, but there doesn't seem to be any plans for a DVD release that I can find. I can't imagine a more compelling reason to release it than the pairing of Montgomery Clift and John Huston. (For brilliant examples of their other work, check out I Confess and The Man Who Would be King, respectively.)


3. Brighton Rock (AKA Young Scarface) is yet another Graham Greene adaptation that wallows without a release in the United States, but our friends in the UK have one. Again, the book is a nail-biter that you can't put down about a seventeen-year old kid named Pinkie who's taken over a gang in Brighton and murders a man and has to murder more and more people to cover it up. He even marries a young waitress who could blow his lid so that she can't give evidence against him. This film is notable because of the actor who plays the furious Pinkie: it's a twenty-something Sir Richard Attenborough. It's been called one of the great British thrillers but I'd never know because no one has put out a DVD in the US.


4. Drunken Angel. I'm a giant Kurosawa nerd. Not one of those pretentious film-school Kurosawa snobs, but a genuine nerd, in love with Kurosawa on every level. I was able to catch a 16mm print of Drunken Angel a few years back and I swear, aside from Seven Samurai, it's easily my favorite Kurosawa film. The story is about Takashi Shimura, a drunken doctor in a clinic in post-war Japan. He's a drunk but he's still a doctor interested in helping people. (In fact, now that I think about it, it sounds a lot like a Graham Greene novel minus a love affair.) The two patients that he deals with in the film are a small girl with tuberculosis and Toshiro Mifune, a youthful, drunken gangster with tuberculosis and a death wish. The film is equally bitter and sweet and is truly one of the greatest films ever made. Mifune, Shimura and Kurosawa are as essential and influential a team in film as Scorsese, Pesci and DeNiro or Leone and Eastwood or Ford and Wayne. I would even argue that Mifune and Shimura belong in the hallowed halls of all the acting greats like Brando and Newman.

But why isn't this film on DVD? Criterion has put out most of Kurosawa's other films (sometimes twice). I know because I've bought them all, but why not this one? Is it a rights issue or something? Wake up Criterion, get this done and in my hands. I haven't even been able to land my hands on a quality bootleg of this one.

UPDATE: (It turns out, Criterion has a release date of 11/27/2007 for this one, but Criterion has repeatedly pulled DVDs on the date of their release, most notably Kurosawa's Dodesukaden.)


5. Erik the Viking was written and directed by Monty Python alum Terry Jones. It stars Tim Robbins, among others and is a truly hilarious film. When I was a kid, I would rent this film at least twice a month and it would never cease to entertain me. It was also my gateway drug into other Monty Python films. Tim Robbins plays Erik, a Viking who has a conscious. He's just downright sick of all the raping and pillaging. In one of the funniest scenes of the film, he tries to rape a girl but can't bring himself to do it because no love is involved, then his Viking buddies come in and try to do likewise to the poor girl, but he ends up rescuing her and she becomes the love interest in the rest of the film. I don't know about any of you, but a Viking questioning the inherent moral value of rape is hilarious.

This film got an extra special sweet DVD release in the UK and there is no sign of a release in the US. Well, there was a release set. And a date. But it got pulled. Why? I've no idea. All I know is that I want a copy of this film to show my kids. Also, I want to buy it as presents for a couple of people...

UPDATE: It seems as though there's a new US release date of this for next month, but it's had three other US release dates at least, so I'll believe it when I see it.


6. Happy Birthday, Wanda June was written by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. and was filmed in 1971 starring Rod Steiger. I've had mostly bad experiences with Vonnegut adaptations (I recently wangled a copy of Slapstick on DVD and was pretty much ready to kill myself) but this seems fairly hard to screw up. The story is about a man who embodies everything about guys like Steinbeck and Hemingway that Vonnegut hated, the big-game hunting, macho, womanizing ass-hole side of them. This is Harold Ryan (played by Rod Steiger) and he's been lost in the woods for eight years and his wife and child have made an attempt to move on, his wife is dating other, more sensitive men. This is about when he comes back into their lives. The play, as written, is funny and poignant and if they filmed exactly what was on the page I can't imagine how they could deviate so far from Vonnegut to ruin it.


7. Dr. Fischer of Geneva was the first Graham Greene novel I ever read and it hit me right between the eyes. It's about greed and love and desperation and horrible families and it's all quite tragic, as Greene is apt to write. Alec Guinness tried for a few years to get the film done with himself in the title role, but it fell through for whatever reason. A short while later, it was made for television with James Mason in the Dr. Fischer role. This film is notable enough for a DVD release if for no better reason than this was James Mason's last film. Graham Greene's Dr. Fischer was the last part he ever played. Dr. Fischer is an old rich man whose hobby it is to expose human greed. He has a number of "friends" who he humiliates as far as they can take and then gives them money and gifts. Soon, his son-in-law gets involved and the prize is more money than anyone can imagine, but the final humiliation is death for one of the participants. The novel is tight and hard to put down, I can't imagine the film being any less so.


8. High School (1968). Frederick Wiseman's documentary film inside of life for teachers, administrators and students inside a Philadelphia high school is so important a film that it was selected in 1991 for inclusion in the National Film registry. So why can't I get a copy on DVD? This film looks to be the high school equivalent to the Maysles' stunning film Salesman. I'd pay money to see a verite film about life and interaction inside of a high school in 1968. This seems like a shoo in for a Criterion disc, so what's the hold up?


9. Beyond the Limit (AKA The Honorary Consul). I read Roger Ebert's review of this film and, to be honest, he said it wasn't that good. But he wrote his review when the film came out and there was a backlash of dislike for Richard Gere. I'm terribly interested to see the film now. This is another adaptation of a Graham Greene novel (big surprise, right?) that stars Michael Caine, Richard Gere and Bob Hoskins. The novel centers around a young, drunk doctor (see, Drunken Angel, but with a love affair) played by Richard Gere who is having an affair with the wife of the Honorary British Consul played by Michael Caine. She also happens to be a former prostitute. But the Consul is abducted by mistake and the only one who cares enough to try to deal with the well-meaning terrorists is the good Doctor.

The novel was intriguing and surprising and Michael Caine and Bob Hoskins could surely move enough units of this film with their names alone to warrant a release. So, if any one is paying attention, put out this film.


10. Remember the Night seems like the best Christmas-film that no one has ever heard of or seen. This film, written by Preston Sturges, pairs Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck (who melted the screen in the perfect Double Indemnity) during Christmas time. What sounds so great and interesting about that you ask? Well, Barbara Stanwyck plays a beautiful, young ne'er-do-well caught for shoplifting just before Christmas. Fred MacMurray plays the prosecutor assigned to her case and gets the trial postponed until after Christmas because it's impossible to get a good conviction during the holiday season. She'll have to spend her Christmas in jail so he feels sorry for her and arranges her bail. Well, he ends up taking her home for the holidays to meet his mother and slowly they fall in love. Now, all of a sudden that looming trial seems like a much larger problem now that he has to prosecute a loved one. This film sounds like it could be every bit as holiday classic as Capra's It's a Wonderful Life but I've only heard of it playing on TV once, last year for the first time in decades.

Granted, Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck have a much smaller amount of name recognition than Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed, but that's no reason to leave this one in the vaults.

So, there you have it. Give me your complaints in the comments and I'll be sure to do a part II with all of your suggestions. And I hope that I've done you as much as a disservice as I've done myself insofar as I've made you want to watch all of these presumably wonderful films that you can't see as much as I want to see them.

Vonnegut Remembered

At the BYU Alternative commencement, Pete Ashdown stated that he missed Kurt Vonnegut.

He then wondered aloud if anyone else missed him, too.

I do.

(Click here to read everything I've written about him on this blog here.)

But I wanted to share a few of these video interviews that I found with you guys.

My Vonnegut Rememberance on Huffington Post

After I wrote the below memoriam, I wrote a more public one for The Huffington Post. They ran it on the front page (right in between Alec Baldwin on the Imus scandal and Sheryl Crow on tour for the Global Warming thing.)

You can read it here.

Even after a nights sleep to help me process this, I still feel bad about it.

One surprising thing about the Huffington Post article was that a couple of people jumped down my throat about the title, but a few people who were actually Vonnegut fans caught on and set them straight. It's all in the comments over there, check it out.

God Bless You, Mr. Vonnegut

I just wanted to offer another remembrance to Kurt Vonnegut on what should have been his 85th birthday.

He shared a birthday with the 4th anniversary of the Armistice ending World War I. I wish that the end of a war was something we still celebrated. Honoring veterans is good, but doesn't it seem as though we should honor the end of war more? To prevent making more veterans?

Here are my posts about him from the time of his death. (Huffington Post, This Divided State)

It still chokes me up a little bit.

So it goes.

Vonnegut

Here's another snippet from Man Without a Country.

I loved the book and I think Kurt Vonnegut is a king among writers. Here's a good snippet:

And I realise some of you may be having trouble deciding whether I am kidding or not. So from now on I will tell you when I'm kidding.

For instance, join the National Guard or the Marines and teach democracy. I'm kidding.

We are about to be attacked by al-Qaida. Wave flags if you have them. That always seems to scare them away. I'm kidding.

Within a day or two we'll also put together a list of Sundance movies that we are planning on seeing. Whether we get to or not is anybody's guess. But we'll also get some reviews up for the ones we like.

Kurt Vonnegut and Neil Diamond

Here's a new essay (sort of) by Kurt Vonnegut that "In These Times Published."

Here's an interview with Neil Diamond that was on "Fresh Air" today. (This one's for you Neal.)

Both unrelated, both really interesting.

Vonnegut

It's been awhile since I laid down some Kurt Vonnegut on everyone, so here's something I found in Jailbird that I quite liked:

"What could be so repulsive after all, during the Great Depression, especially, and with yet another war for natural wealth and markets coming, in a young man's belief that each person could work as well as he or she was able, and should be rewarded, sick or well, young or old, brave or frightened, talented or imbecilic, according to his or her simple needs? How could anyone treat me as a person with a diseased mind if I thought that war need never come again--if only common people everywhere would take control of the planet's wealth, disband their national armies and forget their national boundaries; if only they would think of themselves ever after as brothers and sisters, yes, and as mothers and fathers, too, and children of all other common people--everywhere. The only person who would be excluded from such friendly and merciful society would be one who took more wealth than he or she needed at any time."

You're right, this probably isn't possible, but it's an ideal we can work towards.

Things would be a lot better.

Kurt Vonnegut and 2001

I came across this in an essay Kurt Vonnegut wrote about the Space Program back in the late 60's.



















"I remember the apes in the great Cinerama motion picture 2001. I remember their bloodshot eyes and their fears at night, how they learned to use tools to smash in each other's skulls. And I suppose we're not much past that on the scale of evolution, even though we now have the Cinerama."

DAILY LINKS Sat, Aug 2nd

Murder Trail: The "He turned my cat gay" defense.

Kurt Vonnegut: How to write with style

Johnny Depp as THE RIDDLER?

How People Die

GhostBusters with Steve Irwin

REVIEW: Salvador

About two years ago I purchased the box-set of Oliver Stone's complete works. It's been gathering dust on a shelf since then. There's always another movie I seem to want to watch. What with the recent trailer from "W" making it's rounds on the internet, I thought it was time to break out the set and start chronologically through Stone's career.

I've only seen a few of his movies, you know, the one's everybody's seen (Platoon, JFK, U-Turn...) Ok, maybe not everybody, but those are it. So, I didn't know what to expect on his first outing as a major film director with a budget and I had no idea what Salvador was about.

Salvador is a biographical film about photo-journalist Richard Boyle (who helped Stone write the script) during the failed revolution in 1980 and 1981. (It's widely emphasized that Reagan's policies had a lot to do with this, in fact, the Fascist leaders in the country praise Reagan's election.) But the film plunges you into 1980 El Salvador and really gives you a taste of how shitty things were (and in some cases, probably still are) in Central America at the time. It's sad, really.

And James Woods delivers the performance of his life as our lens for the politics of the film. Yeah, he's a liberal guy, but he's got a soul and a conscience and when he lets loose with his moral outrage against the military and CIA stooges, you can feel it. You get pissed. And the stuff that the American's turn a blind eye to is enough to make you sick. When the fascists order a group of American nuns to be raped and killed for...whatever reason... It's just disgusting. The American Ambassador (played competently by Michael Murphy, whom I've enjoyed in a couple of Woody Allen movies, particularly Manhattan) tries to cut off military aid to the fascists, but the military and the CIA and the Reagan-ites back him into a corner and force him to relent, thus shattering the peasant uprising, for fear that communism might spread.

At the end of the day, this film really just pissed me off in all the wrong ways for absolutely the right reasons.

I also found it startling how much that period in US foreign policy seemed like today. The US was perpetrating terror. And when they weren't perpetrating it personally, they were enabling the perpetrators.

It really makes me sad that America hasn't wised up.

For anyone that has a moral compass I would recommend this movie. It puts fire in your belly.

(For related reading (only in subject matter, not geography or time) I would recommend Kurt Vonnegut's essay's about the long-since passed country of Biafra.)

Armageddon in Retrospect

The new (and, sadly, probably the last) Vonnegut book came out today.

I picked up a copy this morning. I'll read it tonight and have something to say about it tomorrow. Also, be on the look out, I've got advanced tickets to Scorsese's "Shine A Light" tonight.

So, until then, I'm going to go steal a mirror.

Pan's Labyrinth

I have witnessed genius this evening.

I saw Pan's Labyrinth and it was sad and sweet and heartbreaking.

It was everything I like to see in a movie, good guys, bad guys, imagery that will knock your socks off and an ending that will cleave your heart in twain.

I'm madly in love with the setting. I have been since "The Devil's Backbone." And the way Del Toro uses the setting to tell his stories is enough to take your breath away.

There isn't much I can say about this film that I'm sure others haven't said better, but I was struck by a few things in particular. Chiefly, it reminded me very much of the general thesis of Kurt Vonnegut's "Cat's Cradle." It would be presumptuous of me to boil it down to a sentence or two, but allow me to try: It seems that even though organized religion (or a more base belief in the fantastical, in the case of Pan's Labyrinth) is completely fictional, as long as it causes a relief of pain and suffering and makes people feel better about themselves and their situation, it's a fine thing indeed. It truly is the opiate of the masses, but in a good way, generally.

I felt that this story fairly well re-affirmed that sort of idea. Perhaps Ofelia is dreaming everything, but if that makes things better for her, in the end, who are we to argue?

Like most works of art, it also remains as a stinging indictment against the preposterous indignities of wars. It seems that any film that has anything to do with any war, anywhere from any time, shed light on the idea that the people calling the shots aren't exactly in tune with things like empathy or humanity or really, anything worth being in tune to.

There are hundreds of things I could praise in a review of a film like this, but what would the point be?

At the end of the day, when you like a movie as much as I liked this one, all I can do is say, "Go see it for yourself." And when you do, all I can ask is that you like it as much as I did.

Read PART TWO here.

Movie Recomendation

I'm going to suggest a movie, just for Duckie because he felt so jilted by my endorsement of Rocky Balboa.

So, here you go, here's three movies you should see and in no particular order, because I like them. (I didn't specifically choose movies in the theatre, because in my area, nothing is really out.)

And none of them are sports or sci-fi or superheroes or anything like that.

So, here goes:

Seven Samurai: My absolute favorite non-Star Wars movie. Kurosawa's seminal classic from the fifties. It has every kind of story you could want in it: Romance, Action, Drama, Coming of Age, Politics. Seriously, it has everything. (Also, just for fun, after you watch this, go watch Pixar's A Bug's Life. Seriously.)


Notorious: Alfred Hitchcock directing Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman and Claude Rains in a Nazi spy thriller. It's really, really good. Aside from North by Northwest and Shadow of a Doubt, it's one of my favorite Hitchcock films.


Mother Night: This is probably the finest adaptation of any Kurt Vonnegut material to the silver screen ever. And the red band trailer on the DVD for this film is (aside from Star Wars trailers) probably the best cut trailer ever made. Nolte stars as Howard W. Campbell, Jr., an American spy who must pose as a very public Nazi propagandist. It's an amazing journey and one of my favorite films.

So...

There you go, try those on for size. I hope these redeem my opinion of movies for all of you who felt I missed the mark on Rocky Balboa.

Sacco and Vanzetti

Has anybody heard about this movie?

Kurt Vonnegut first introduced me to the story of Sacco and Vanzetti and I've been fascinated with it ever since and now I want to see it.

So...

Yeah...

Here's the trailer.

Rex Harrison Presents Stories of Love

I'm reposting this. No One had any information about it before. Our hits have gone up hundreds a day since I last posted this. Maybe someone has an idea.

Does anyone have any information about this or any idea how to get a hold of it?

Apparently Rex Harrison tried hosting this unsuccesful show, but they actually filmed Kurt Vonnegut's short story masterpiece EPICAC. I don't know if any of you are familiar with EPICAC, I think it's been published in a couple of places, principally Welcome to the Monkey House (It might be a different collection, but I'm putting money on Welcome to the Monkey House). It's about a government super-computer that learns what love is and then kills itself. It's great.

But if anybody could even give me an idea as of to how I can get a hold of it, that would be dynamite. (I'm almost positive that there is no way I'll ever be able to see it, but one can dream can't he?)

And is it just me, or is anyone else thinking: "What business does Rex Harrison have hosting stories about love? Especially in 1974?" That's comedy in and of itself.

Raging Bull

Raging Bull was one of the most amazing theatrical experiences I've ever had. The sound design was awe-inspiring, the editing was astonishing and the acting was second-to-none. It's no wonder that Robert DeNiro, Joe Pesci and Cathy Moriarty all got nominations for Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress, respectively. Sadly, only DeNiro won. Thelma Schoonmaker won the only other award for the film in the category of Best Editing. It saddens me that what has been widely regarded as "the best movie of the 80's" has been languishing in obscurity. I find myself introducing this film to so many people. I feel like they should know it without any help from me.

It's a hard thing, trying to stay sharp about film for would-be filmmakers in my generation. Especially when you're geographically handicapped and don't go to film school. I have to discover films by myself, and what I get ahold of is limited to what I can find on DVD (I don't own a VHS player.) There are no revival houses. There is one art house within driving distance. There is a lack of quality at the local multi-plexes. (Lack of quality doesn't manage to stop me from going to the multi-plexes anyhow.) I watch a movie (or two) almost every day. Once a week my brother and I drive the 45 miles to the Broadway. Another day a week I go to the first-run multiplex and see almost anything that has come out out. Yet another day a week I find myself at the discount theatre seeing all the drek I managed to miss at the first run theatres. Another couple of times a month, I'm at Elias' house watching movies with him. Any night I'm home alone I'm watching movies. (Kurosawa and other foreign fare, as long as the missus isn't around.)

I love film. I love everything about Cinema. When I see something perfect on screen, I'm filled to the brim with joy. It fills me with tremendous exhileration to see cinema done right. As I watched Raging Bull, I found myself laughing with it, with it's perfection. Not because it was cheesy or bad, I wasn't laughing at it, I was so overjoyed with it's un-erring perfection that I had to express it somehow and it invariably comes out in awe-struck gasps and laughter.

I don't know how this post turned into a rant about my love for film, but I guess that's okay.

The ending to Raging Bull was literally breathtaking. It ended with that self-reflective etcetera that my favrotie stories always end with. (Kurt Vonnegut novels mainly (more recently, Neal Shaffer has taken to mastering the technique.)) And DeNiro was such a loose cannon as LaMotta...

I could rant like this for days about the film like this, but instead of me doing that let's do this: Please, leave me a suggestion for an obscure film I should seek out.

So in the comments, leave the title of your favorite obscure film and I'll try to get my hands on it.

(Just for clarification, Raging Bull isn't obscure, it just seems like it sometimes.)

Deadeye Dick

This is something almost straight out of Kurt Vonnegut's novel.

The story is bizarre. The book is good.

I would advise reading the story and then reading the book.

Cinema Paradiso

It's no secret that I'm a fan of Neal Shaffer's. Neither is it any secret that Elias and I have spent the last six months working out details and carefully negotiating with him to try and get his graphic novel One Plus One on the silver screen with Elias and I in the drivers seat. (that's another long story, and if more comes of it than talk from anyone, you'll all be the first to know, but we're working hard to try to make it a reality)

What seems to have been a secret is that Neal has a hidden body of work online. Aside from his blog (which is quite insightful, if not a bit infrequent) I discovered a trove of articles he'd written for various places. I found one that I thought would be worth all of you reading. (They're all worth reading, but this one seemed a bit more special.)

So, click this link and read it. I'll wait for you to get back.

You're back? Great. I think this is the sort of journalism that needs to be done more often. It's not groundbreaking, but it really gives you a sense of the event and makes you want to be there to experience it yourself. Hell, more than a few times while reading this I asked myself why there isn't anything like this around me. I think we need to do more things like this as communities. Could you imagine 4,800 people sitting in a parking lot or a park, watching a great movie for free? I think we'd have a much stronger sense of community. (I'm with Vonnegut and his crazy notions of massive extended families.)

Anyhow, I just wanted to turn you onto something that I thought was cool. And I know Neal occasionally reads this blog, so I want to disclaim that this is in no way me trying to kiss his (or your) ass.

UPDATE: Apparently the link to the article was bad. It was my fault. But this blog is so well read, no one informed me of it until Neal in his comment. Thanks Neal.