Pop quiz!
I've spent the summer going to cardiologists and gastroenterologists, how about you?
I like a hemochromatosis screening in June
How about you?
I dig a cardiac catheterization balloon
How about you?
I love an MRI
And a CAT scan, too
I love endoscopies
Holter monitor EKGs
How about you?
Oh, it's been fun, fun, fun till the doctor takes the Ambien away! Unfortunately, I couldn't come up with a good rhyme for "ventricular tachycardia" that scanned. "Gastric carcinoid" is also tough. But I've really had all those things -- and a colonoscopy and seborrheic dermatitis and daily zombifying doses of Coreg and more -- just since May! Unfortunately, this has put me far, far behind in my movie blog coverage.
For example, did you know that the terrific critic Michael Atkinson, late of the Village Voice, has joined the blogosphere? Welcome, Michael! You'll find him at Zero for Conduct.
And, weeks ago, TLRHB, the splendid blogger formerly known as That Little Round-Headed Boy, transformed himself into The Shamus over at bad for the glass: a culture blog. The Shamus writes about noir and "Chinatown," of course (BTW, I own the domain name badforglass.com -- and egbertsouse.com and sitonapotatopanotis.com, too, for that matter), movies, records and record covers, television, cartoons, and all forms of pop culture. I'd love to link to a favorite post or two but... I can't. As The Shamus explains:
If you like a post, copy it today. It may not be here tomorrow. The Shamus doesn't play by the blog rules. The template will change. Often. No archiving. One other thing: I don't roll on Shabbas. And Walter, will you put down the god-damned gun?I've been meaning to link to this post by the invaluable girish (The Cinema in Your Head) since the end of May, but where does the time go? Who knows, maybe one day I'll even get around to writing about it myself.
Our beloved David Bordwell has a wonderful piece about the tactile pleasures of studying films frame-by-frame -- not on DVD, but on archival equipment that encourages the practice of Watching movies very, very slowly. A snippet:
Viewing on an individual viewer has both costs and benefits. Sometimes details you’d notice on the big screen are hard to spot on a flatbed. But with your nose fairly close to the film, you can make discoveries you might miss in projection. (Ideally, you would see the film you’re studying on both the big screen and the small one.) In addition, of course, you can stop, go back, and replay stretches. Above all, you get to touch the film. This is a wonderful experience, handling 35mm film. Hold it up to the light and you see the pictures. You can’t do that with videotape or DVD.And because it's summer quarter, our Man For All Seasons, the fantastic Dennis Cozzalio at Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule, has posted another pop quiz: Mr. Shoop's Surfin' Summer School Midterm. Questions this time around include:
2) A good movie from a bad director
6) Best movie about baseball
7) Favorite Barbara Stanwyck performance
8) "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" or "Dazed and Confused"?
13) "Salo: The 120 Days of Sodom" -- yes or no?
20) Name a performance that everyone needs to be reminded of, for whatever reason
Oh, and so much more. PLUS two extra credit questions suggested by recent posts at Scanners!
Also, for a taste of the best of past quiz responses, be sure to sample Professor Corey's Honor Society, Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.
And do not neglect to read Dennis's defense/appreciation of Martin Scorsese's misunderstood magnum opus, "New York, New York." As I posted in the comments section: "New York, New York" (after the "Happy Endings" sequence was restored) is a masterpiece. I think it would make a nice (loooong) double-bill with "La Dolce Vita" because both movies are about performance -- creating scenes, playing to the crowd, adopting roles, in public and in private. Those brutal hyper-emotional Scorsese confrontations against mockingly artificial backdrops -- genius. And your selection at this time is a fine tribute to the recently departed Laszlo Kovacs, whose fluid "NY, NY" camerawork is positively musical.
* * * *
I'm mad about polyps
Can't get my fill
Needles in fingertips
They give me a thrill
Holding breath for the ultra-sound
Pooping in Sensurround™
May not be new
But I like it, how about you?
Thanks for the kind words, Jim. I hope all your battery of tests turned out well. As for my stuff, I usually cross-post a lot of the longer pieces over at newcritics.com, so it does stay there forever. But there is something about permanence and blogs that I find odd. Hey, we all need a shtick and that's mine, I guess. I'm just glad you went with Cronenberg instead of Towne on the blog name.
If there's no gastric carcinoid, you're just a spastic paranoid, and ventricular tachycardia beats intestinal giardia.
So have your RDA of ASA or other pain reliever, and remember that (despite the name), at least you don't have Beaver Fever.
Hope your feeling better... my Fezzik moment has passed.
1. Pooping in Sensurround™
2. "...the system generated an almost sub-audible rumble between 5 and 40 Hertz...."
3. "The brown note, according to an urban legend, is an infrasound frequency that causes humans to lose control of their bowels due to resonance. ... Effective frequencies are reportedly between 5 and 9 Hz, below the audible range for humans (generally, adults cannot hear sounds below about 20 Hz), but supposedly in the range of resonance of human body parts.
Gha! Please get better.
You are Very Much appreciated.
I send my ample strength towards you--
the least I could do for the genuine inspiration you've shared.
You've blown this stranger's mind. Thank you.
And watch those Ambien-Mothras... side effects include leveled Japanese cities.
My God, you really have been put through it this summer. However, it's great to read and see the good humor shining through what couldn't have been anything less than a unpleasant and unnerving time for you. I hope you're aware of the appreciation all of your regular readers have for you and what you do here (and if I may be so presumptuous, you may put me at the head of that line). That you could post here as often as you have while going through all that is quite a tribute in and of itself. I hope the rest of the summer goes more smoothly for you, Jim. And thanks for all the nice words about what's going on over at SLIFR too. I maintain that the place has never been the same (in a good way) since the first time you took notice!
Cheers!
Dennis
PS. Speaking of cheer, if you need some, you need go no further than Hairspray, which could be one of the most disarming and delightful movies (especially in terms of all the prejudices and preconceptions I held against it going in) that I've ever seen. I hope to write about it this week.
Hey, what's with your crack about Ordinary People? I saw for the first time not long ago and was quite moved.
Thanks very much for the kind words, all. It occurs to me: Maybe it's better for my health (and spirits) not to read and watch such dark, dark stuff! But, as the scorpion said to the frog...
That said, a little "Lady Eve" or "Ball of Fire" or "Trouble in Paradise" might be just the thing...