the end of civilization

 

     Apparently in January of this year Paris Hilton appeared in a video where she makes lasagna and -- explains about it.

     The Guardian published a review; here are some of the Reader Comments...

-------------- This is America's lasting legacy.  A legion of idiots made famous and rich.

     I just watched 5 minutes of the video.  We are looking at the end of civilisation.

     Perfect time for the Last Supper then.

     It is quite interesting, when you think of the fall of empires and where the tipping points were, the US is probably just starting its own tipping point in that both the economy and military power are still significant but culturally it's completely bankrupt, and the only way is down, down, down.

     To be fair, you can't blame it all on America.  In the UK we've got TOWIE, Made in Chelsea, The Apprentice, Big Brother, etc. all of which thrived on making eejits famous.

     This comment was removed by a moderator because it didn't abide by our community standards.  Replies may also be deleted.  For more detail see our FAQs.

     The economy is $23 trillion down the tubes and living on a stockmarket bubble.  As for the military, a recent ProPublica article on the state of naval readiness should do it.

     I give up.  The World has gone to shit.  Pull the plug.  Let's get rid of electricity and start again.

     Used to be a time when much of the rest of the world could laugh at the Americans, but not sure that's still the case now.  It's not just the British with their farce in Westminster, but similar patterns all over the world.

     I have just watched the entire 'programme'.  Beyond satire.  Comedy gold.

     Coming soon -- the Donald Trump Fitness Programme.

'I have no idea if Cooking with Paris is a joke or not.'

     It very clearly IS a joke, and an elegant and enjoyable one.  She's taking the mick out of herself and the whole YouTube airhead community, so credit to her.

     She is as thick as the mince in her lasagne.  You have overestimated her intelligence and self awareness abilities by some considerable margin.

     'You have overestimated her intelligence and self awareness abilities by some considerable margin.'

Hello Mr Dunning, hello Mr Kruger.

       It is quite obviously a joke and you have overestimated your own intelligence by a considerable margin.  

If one person produces a satirical video and another can't recognise the satire, it's not the satirist who is the dim one.

Hilton has been sending herself up for the best part of 20 years since The Simple Life.

     I watched the video because of this article, and didn't regret it.  It's completely surreal and hilarious!  Is it consciously done or not is everyone's guess.  If it is, that's a new kind of stand-up comedy.  More please!

—--------------------------

(When the computer makes some words bigger, I don't know how to control that...) 

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a country where they turn back time

 

     An article in The Guardian today talked about '90s shows TV should "reboot" -- one Reader Commented, "'Reboot' = creative bankruptcy.  Modern culture is [messed] up enough without these shambling zombies creeping out of their graves.  Christ, 'Fresh Prince'....

     An answering Comment read, "Sorry, but have to stand up for Fresh Prince.  I seriously doubt Malcolm X, Dr King and other such topics had been talked about in such a way before then (at least on UK TV).  

Sure it was a glossy view of life given the LA Riots, etc but it also played into the aspirational feel of the 90s which has been crushed since.  Episode 1 even talks about the need to resolve climate change (albeit as a punchline) - that bit has not aged so well."

----------------------------------------

     Has the "aspirational feel" of the '90s been "crushed"?

     Here's something:  in the 1958 romantic comedy Indiscreet, the Cary Grant character mentions climate change -- he says, "They're saying the weather's changing."  Or maybe he says climate instead of weather -- have to check.

     1958.

     Aspirational 1990s.

     2020, Year of the...?

     

On You Tube, type in

Al Stewart, Year of the Cat

and play.

On a morning from a Bogart movie

In a country where they turn back time

You go strolling through the crowd like Peter Lorre

Contemplating a crime

She comes out of the sun in a silk dress running

Like a watercolor in the rain

Don't bother asking for explanations

She'll just tell you that she came

-- In the year of the cat

She doesn't give you time for questions

As she locks up your arm in hers

And you follow till your sense of which direction

Completely disappears

By the blue tiled walls near the market stalls

There's a hidden door she leads you to

These days, she says, "I feel my life

Just like a river running through"

-- The year of the cat...

_________________________

"Year Of The Cat" - written by Al Stewart and Peter Wood.  Producer:  Alan Parsons.

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standing still, yet always receding

 

--------------- [excerpt, The Bridges of Madison County, novel by Robert James Waller, 1992 - Warner Books] ----------------

     He looked at his watch:  eight-seventeen.  The truck started on the second try, and he backed out, shifted gears, and moved slowly down the alley under hazy sun.  Through the streets of Bellingham he went, heading south on Washington 11, running along the coast of Puget Sound for a few miles, then following the highway as it swung east a little before meeting U.S. Route 20.

     Turning into the sun, he began the long, winding drive through the Cascades.  He liked this country and felt unpressed, stopping now and then to  make notes about interesting possibilities for future expeditions or to shoot what he called "memory snapshots."  

     The purpose of these cursory photographs was to remind him of places he might want to visit again and approach more seriously.  In late afternoon he turned north at Spokane, picking up U.S. Route 2, which would take him half-way across the northern United States to Duluth, Minnesota. ------------------------ [end, excerpt]

____________________

[excerpt from The French Lieutenant's Woman, novel by John Fowles, 1969 - Jonathan Cape (UK); Little, Brown (US)] -----------------------------

Charles set out to catch up, and after a hundred yards or so he came close behind her.  She must have heard the sound of his nailed boots on the flint that had worn through the chalk, but she did not turn.  He perceived that the coat was a little too large for her, and that the heels of her shoes were mudstained.  

He hesitated a moment then; but the memory of the surly look on the dissenting dairyman's face kept Charles to his original chivalrous intention; to show the poor woman that not everybody in her world was a barbarian.

     "Madam!"

     She turned, to see him hatless, smiling; and although her expression was one of now ordinary enough surprise, once again that face had an extraordinary effect on him.  It was as if after each sight of it, he could not believe its effect, and had to see it again.  It seemed to both envelop and reject him; as if he was a figure in a dream, both standing still and yet always receding.

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he liked this country and felt unpressed

 

One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,

That is, the madman...

~ William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream

-------------------------------------------

     Playing back-and-forth two romantic comedy films from the 1950s, Designing Woman and Indiscreet, led me to review other romantic films that were not comedies -- instead, straight-up Intense Love Stories, sometimes with a strange psychological twist...

       The French Lieutenant's Woman

       The Bridges of Madison County

     (Do they all have to have Meryl Streep in them?  Well -- no, but...they might...)

     Sometimes I go to You Tube to see what other people Comment about a movie...  someone Commented under a clip from The Bridges of Madison County:

~~  "There's always the attraction to what you can't have.  If they could stay together forever, they would have got bored and started to fight."

     (I was feeling like, "No!  No no nooooo!!"  LOL)

_______________________________

     Old Movies:  

               To me, old movies are from Hollywood's Golden Age -- Online Knowledge Guys say that extends from "the end of the silent film era to the early 1960s."

     For "Old Movies," I think of

All About Eve -- Bette Davis, Anne Baxter, 1950

It Happened One Night -- Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert, 1934

Casablanca -- Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, 1942...

     Imagine my surprise when I read a Comment on You Tube, typed in by some kid with a heartfelt attitude:  "Brokeback Mountain is my favorite old movie!"

(turning head slightly; palms up...)

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seem to find the happiness

 

     I want to take Indiscreet (1958, on You Tube) and Designing Woman (1957, Amazon Prime-rent or buy) and watch them both, taking notes on what to discuss about them.

     I say "WATCH" because even though I keep talking about these movies, I haven't watched either of them lately.  I stream them on android tablet, and listen to them while I'm doing things at home ...

     Alfred Hitchcock's polite criticism of verbal films of the 1960s was that they were "photographs of people talking."  He believed films should not be that; they should tell the story visually, where possible.  (You still have dialogue, though....)

     Anyway, I think these two 1950s romantic comedies use visual techniques and "splash" to tell part of their stories, but I miss that because I'm never watching, I'm only listening - while doing stuff.

     Both Indiscreet and Designing Woman are about falling in love.  In modern times, it's been written that there is really no such thing as a romantic comedy anymore because those stories used to be based on obstacles that the couple faced, and in today's society, there are no obstacles.

     But actually, if you see these two 1950s films, they still work today, because the obstacles are ones that have not disappeared with an evolving society.  

     In Designing Woman, the obstacles are simply the two people in love accepting and adjusting to each other's priorities, lifestyles, tastes, etc.  

     And there's the age-old thing where one partner is upset because the other one used to date someone before meeting them.  (It doesn't make sense, but people do that anyway -- at least in movies...)

     And in Indiscreet, it's a question of the two people getting onto the same page as to what the relationship is going to be.  That type of obstacle may change form, with time, but it doesn't disappear.

______________________________

     Something that fascinated me the first time I played Designing Woman from Amazon was, I could notice the influence of not one, but two Katharine Hepburn-Spencer Tracy movies:  Woman of the Year (1942), and Pat and Mike (1952).

     From Woman of the Year, Designing Woman borrowed the scene where the newly married couple has a party and all their friends are there, and her friends are vastly different from his, so it's awkward / funny / weird...

     In Pat and Mike, there are underworld-mob guys interested in fixing sporting events and illegally winning money on them, and they become a threat.  This scenario is mirrored in Designing Woman -- It's played for laughs in both films -- no one is getting seriously beaten up, it isn't the Godfather or the French Connection, right?....

     Indiscreet was directed by Stanley Donen -- the guy who received an honorary award at the 1997 Oscars, and danced with it, singing --

Heaven -- I'm in heaven,

And my heart beats so that I can hardly speak --

And I seem to find the happiness I seek,

When we're out together dancing, cheek to cheek...

     Wow, that was 39 years after Indiscreet....

-30-

romantic comedies of the '50s

 

     Does the expression "back-in-the-day" have to mean the 1970s?  Or can it mean anytime in the past?  I don't know...

     I've been playing, from the Internet, two romantic comedies --

Indiscreet, 1958 - from You Tube

and

Designing Woman, 1957 - from Amazon Prime.

     "Designing" is not to be confused with "Designing Women," plural, TV situation comedy from the '80s.  This 1957 movie is "Designing Woman," singular.

     Both films have beautiful colors -- Designing Woman-Cinemascope; Indiscreet-Technicolor.  And both are what you could call "frothy."  Silly and exuberant.  The kind of stories where some character or other might say, "Where have you been all my life?"  (Or -- "Why haven't I fallen in love with you yet?!"...)

Indiscreet stars Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman.

Designing Woman, Lauren Bacall and Gregory Peck (Atticus Finch in To Kill A Mockingbird).

-30-

where have you gone, Chris Matthews?

 

Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?

Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you

Woo-woo-woo

What's that you say, Mrs. Robinson?

Jolting Joe has left and gone away

Hey-hey-hey

Hey-hey-hey...

     My God, I miss Chris Matthews, the host of the cable show Hardball from 1997 to 2020.  No one else can do what he does!

     There's a common saying:  "No one is indispensable" -- but that is not true.  Some people, they do something that no one else does, and that's that.

     I used to come home and put on Chris Matthews' show -- first on cable TV, and then in recent years, from You Tube instead:  what a pleasure! -- to listen to his rapid-fire, scintillating, staccato "this-this-this-happening in news, government, and/or politics -- Whadda-you-make-of-it??!!" he would demand of his guest.

     So much knowledge, background, and talented analysis.  He was constantly applying history to present happenings and efforts, highlighting significance and adding intellectual texture to our understanding of current events.

     And his enthusiasm!  Chris Matthews is great.  And it is a -- silly tragedy, that he was hounded out of his job because of "me-too."  Me Too is essentially a good cause, since -- Of Course, people shouldn't be sexually harassed at work.  But then one of the outcomes -- collateral damage, maybe you could call it -- is a sort of hysteria, where people start accusing everybody, or something....

     "Why haven't I fallen in love with you yet?" is not "harassment," it's an old-fashioned, gallant way of giving a compliment to a woman.  

     I think the young lady who complained about this was either wanting to get on a bandwagon of accusers -- like mob mentality, or else she is maybe lacking in social skills and genuinely didn't know how to process a certain kind of light-hearted remark.  When Chris Matthews said that to her, he was treating her as if she was at his level of witty repartee.  She was not.

     I just felt totally bereft, not having Chris Matthews to talk-talk (rhat-a-tat-tat) and tell me what's going on and what it means.  Recently I've taken to playing clips from Hardball on You Tube -- I don't care that it isn't today's news, I listen anyway -- Rand Paul talking about something 9 years ago? -- if he's talking with Chris Matthews, and the clip is  more than 3 minutes long, it's gonna get played....

-30-