movie fun
was in supertarget the other night buying xmas prezzies, including a dvd of to kill a mockingbird. now, i'm a great fan of harper lee's timeless classic, having had it read to me by my mom when i was 4 or 5 and seen the movie for the first time a yr or two after that. it was a nice surprise when the gal runnin' reg (who was prolly the same age as my middle dtr) went on 'n' on about how much she dug the book and flick and had introduced her younger bro 'n' sis to 'em and how her 20something older bro was coming over to her mom's house to peep the flick with the family.
conversely, it was, um, not exactly disturbing, but definitely eye-opening to view another longtime fave, cool hand luke, last night (instead of jamming). i first saw that 'un when i was 14 or so (a club i belonged to showed it at our high school) and had always found its depiction of man's indomitable spirit in the face of dumbass brutal authority pert uplifting (in the same way as one flew over the cuckoo's nest can be). last coupla times i watched it, tho, the spin my mind put on the story made it seem more like the tale of a cat who doesn't fit in thru no fault of his own (altho there are allusions to what happened to him during "the war," which'd be ww2, from the vintage of the flick) who winds up being broken, then destroyed by the powers that be, just to show that they can. feh. leave it to growing up to take all the fun out of moviewatching.
conversely, it was, um, not exactly disturbing, but definitely eye-opening to view another longtime fave, cool hand luke, last night (instead of jamming). i first saw that 'un when i was 14 or so (a club i belonged to showed it at our high school) and had always found its depiction of man's indomitable spirit in the face of dumbass brutal authority pert uplifting (in the same way as one flew over the cuckoo's nest can be). last coupla times i watched it, tho, the spin my mind put on the story made it seem more like the tale of a cat who doesn't fit in thru no fault of his own (altho there are allusions to what happened to him during "the war," which'd be ww2, from the vintage of the flick) who winds up being broken, then destroyed by the powers that be, just to show that they can. feh. leave it to growing up to take all the fun out of moviewatching.
posted by stashdauber at 6:59 PM
3 Comments:
Well, I'm going to be that name-dropping guy, but the chain gang scene was filmed on Davis Road, along the ten miles or so between Lodi and Stockton. Unfortunately, instead of dirt and ditches and orn'ry guards, there are tract houses now. Such is life in the Central Valley, where people get rich from the towns joining together. Then again, it probably won't be long before we live in the Dallas-Houston-Fort Worth Superplex.
yeah, eventually it's gonna be one big 'plex from denton to houston.
i'd forgotten how many future stars were in 'cool hand luke': dennis hopper, harry dean stanton, wayne rogers (m*a*s*h), joe don baker (walking tall).
most affecting scene for me since adulthood set in is the one between luke and his mom (jo van fleet).
MIKEY: my dear sweet 'ma still teaches to kill a mockingbird to her 8th grade class every year. never read the book, but the movie was pretty good. think that was one of robert duvall's 1st roles. now he's turned into a dead ringer for skeletor from the old he-man series.
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