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ulht1
Enough to do same in History. enough sense not to. Same for math. Science, though I made sure to certify in, as well as media - and teach/do both.
Love movies, acted in a couple (semi-pro), Assoc. Produced one (a short).
Taught media on and off for several years - one stint with a heavy emphasis - my choice re: my students- on Black film history. Love Oscar Micheaux.
Very interested in Comedy and forms/writing of same. 63 or so - depending on when you read this, if you do.
Reviews
The Story of Robin Hood and His Merrie Men (1952)
The Goose Girl
Besides this being a very entertaining film and a real classic, I recently found out about a character in it who I cannot find in it. She played the young maid at the end of the 1953 Scrooge movie who a lot of people wanted to know about - she was found finally a very few years ago - Theresa Darlington and her only other film was this one . Problem is I have run the film more than once and there are very few small part women in it and none has any visible connection with geese that I can spot. If anyone knows more about that, please post it.
Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries: Away with the Fairies (2012)
Shows way too short to cover the stories. Makes them look bad.
I have not yet seen the series - nor any of the episodes, but I am very thankful for the notification of what has been done to the books - and more specifically the only book I had obtained and read (so far). It is not possible to make a functional 60 minute story of Away with the Fairies so I have no problem accepting that it was done poorly. I hope some day that movies of the books will be produced that do it justice - and do the other volumes justice also, but I am not going to be ordering this series from Amazon as I had at first intended. This is pathetic and extremely unfair to the author (or, if the author knew what would be the result, extremely unfair and will likely turn off potential future readers of the books.
Poirot: Murder on the Orient Express (2010)
Pathwtically British current PC rubbish
Starts off by showing three civilized persons (Poirot and two other main characters (the lovers))observe local trash/murderers catching and stoning a woman - one reviewer says for adultery, but there is no translation of any of the language so she could just as easily have made a bad dinner - and neither is the slightest justification for stoning among anything I consider human or nearly so. My fear is that my next statement may harm tender Brit PCer's eyes so look away/stop reading if knowing that I would happily have gunned down the rock throwers/watchers not trying to save the woman starting at knee height and dropping heavy items on their heads after they had time to writhe a while and think about the evil they had tried to do will bother you.
Then, to make it even worse, Poirot actually considers overnight turning in to the police the civilized persons who had very logically arranged a group execution of a piece of fecal MATTER who had killed a 5-year old child and caused the deaths of other actual people. I will not give details to indicate how genteelly they went about it compared to the education a thing like that would receive at my hands, but it is safe to say he would have been constantly verifying that he was learning that he had done wrong and trying to persuade me to end the lesson in a permanent way. I will say that various grades of sandpaper and salt would be involved in the process as well as a variety of cleaning chemicals.
The "writer/s" of the drivel (non-Christie) parts have the same kind of skill as the one's who have messed up Marple, made Tuppence a common drunk and generally have been somehow convinced that they know more than Christie about successfully writing and selling mysteries. As Poirot, Marple, Harley Quinn, Sherlock Holmes, Phiilip Marlowe, Mike Shayne, et. al. would possibly note: "I see no evidence at all to support that theory!!:
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Beulah (1950)
Wonderful show
I'm white - no real life experience with non-whites until the late 50's and I was born in '46. Though no real life, I watched Amos and Andy and Beulah. What I learned from them, as they were my only contact with the subject, was: there are people with skin darker than mine, they talk slightly differently than my parents and relatives in(state I was born) but a lot like my relatives in (state we moved to just before I turned 6), some are smarter than others, they are more likely to be helpful, most of them are trustworthy (I refer to those not Kingfish/partners in small cons),they have lives like my family and me.
In other words, with only those shows as data, during the time most likely for it to happen, I had no racist beliefs and a quite positive view - which nothing later changed. I understand in the vaguest possible way the NAACP attitude, but, for me, those shows were very positive!! I firmly agree with that Hazel connection - though Hazel was not one of my favorites and Beulah was.
Elizabeth David: A Life in Recipes (2006)
Elizabeth David rocked!!
It gets 8 of 10
because Elizabeth David rocked - but I have not yet seen it because BBC American doesn't seem to require programming skills in their higher ups (and after what all the stations/public did to Benny Hill, they don't deserve him - but thats for another time). Basically, like MFK Fisher in the US, Elizabeth - almost single handed - saved British cooking after WWII by bringing back decent cooking/food preparation and a respect for (particularly) French and Italian Cuisines. Fisher was born about two years earlier than David and both died within a five or less month period in 1992. Both are worth reading and reading about and a biographical film about Fisher would not be at all amiss. Oddly, though they apparently never met, supposedly David disliked Fisher - no idea if Fisher felt the same or not.
EZ Streets (1996)
Yes, it may have been excellent and a classic, but.....
I accept that it was well written, but I personally have a problem with crime, gangster and terrorist television shows and films. I do not want to see the trash winning, treated as human beings, etc. (add gangs to that list - and religious fundamentalists of any persuasion who act on their beliefs). I have no interest in the above except to see them totally destroyed, preferably not quickly, so what they do/try to do to real people cannot continue. I freely admit to being a student of television and film who avoids Wiseguy, Godfather, EZ Streets, Munich (although it is closer to being my type since I believe the Israelis tried to do the right thing (i.e. I am unmoved by the message of the film as I understand the reviews. but I support the actual deeds except the killing of the child - accidental but avoidable by using a better method.)etc. In addition -and probably the actual reason it was canceled - where have any of the shows' supporters gotten the idea that shows succeed on the basis of good writing and acting. Sometimes it happens- at a rate that suggests that that is pretty much random - but that is the best you can say. It was not canceled because the network didn't value it but because its' business value to the network was at best negligible and more likely negative.
Into the Badlands (1991)
perfect Italian/Spanish western!!!
Unfortunately I have only - at this point - seen the last 35 minutes of this film but based on that it is undoubtedly the finest spaghetti western ever made - or the best not done to be funny parody of one. cinematographer, director , make-up and sets duplicated the look and feel of the Italian films, threw in some marvelous Felliniesque and neo-realism, as done the in the late 40's /early 50's, and made New Mexico pass beautifully as the plains/deserts of Spain. Have to have this in my collection!!! (Just in case, yes I know it is an American made film.) That is the only important thing that needs to be said about the film but read on if you must . Bruce Dern gives a quite interesting version of his bad guy persona (though he is the good guy) and the only flaw I personally found in the 35 minutes was in a bar scene where Dern has pulled back his coat to show an obviously well used gun and he stops when a bad guy shows he is holding a shotgun - by the barrel with the stock on the floor. Sorry guys (writing problem) from that position any halfway decent gunman could take out the shotgunner and at least one person of normal ability without concern. Ah well - it stretched the action a little!.