Happy Birthday, Madonna Ciccone!

Happy birthday to Ms. Ciccone!

Sounds like she is rapidly recovering from what was reported as a serious illness and has rescheduled her coming tour dates.  That's excellent news.

We're going to put on The Immaculate Collection and be a true blue fan.

Normally I try to post a recent picture of folks I'm wishing a happy birthday, but me and Instagram weren't getting along.  Anyway, for someone who was recently ill, Madonna looks like Madonna.

PodCast 250: "Crocodile Dundee" (1986) - a 1980's Watch w/ SimonUK, Jamie & Ryan

Watched:  08/05/2023

Format:  Amazon

Viewing:  Unknown

Decade:  1980's

Director:  Peter Faiman

For more ways to listen

G'day! We watch this very long Australia tourism promo, ponder the 1980's, New York City, thongs, bidets, sophisticates crushing on hicks, and what it took to be huge 40 years ago. It's a revisit of a massively popular movie and cultural moment! Jump in the boat, make an ox lie down, and ruin someone's party favors. It's a whole scene!

SoundCloud 

The Signal Watch PodCast · 250: "Crocodile Dundee" (1986) - a 1980's Watch w/ SimonUK, Jamie & Ryan

YouTube

Music:

Main Titles - Peter Best

Overture from Crocodile Dundee - Peter Best 

SimonUK Cinema Series

The Signal Watch PodCast · SimonUK Cinema Series

Croc Watch: Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles (2001)

Watched:  08/11/2023

Format:  Amazon 

Viewing:  First

Director:  Some Guy

In 2001, I recall the arrival of Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles and my own reaction of "what?  why?"  

In 1986, I was an enthusiastic viewer of the original Crocodile Dundee and a dutiful watcher of Crocodile Dundee II a scant two years later.  We're releasing a podcast on Crocodile Dundee this week, and after watching, Jamie showed enough curiosity about the threequel that I was willing to give it a go.  Maybe find answers to that "...but why?"

Honestly - I don't think anyone, even Paul Hogan, really knows why they made this movie.  It's not evident from the film that they had a story to tell or anyone was particularly enthusiastic about the idea.  There's no compelling narrative, but a series of listless and sluggish fish-out-of-water gags that make no sense given the 2 years of Dundee in New York, and a few that are just "hey, you'd also be confused if you were in a high end bathroom with a remote with no instructions" wacky moments.  It's essentially trying to repeat gags from the first movie (substitute a jacuzzi tub for a bidet) to worse effect.  

Whereas the first movie is bifurcated between the outback and Manhattan, this movie spends at least 2/3rds in LA.  Weirdly, it tries a framework of Sue being put in charge of the LA bureau by her dad and swiftly uncovers the guy she's replacing was possibly murdered - but... nobody cares.  Not really.  No one mourns the guy who died, and Sue only seems tepidly interested.  If clues didn't keep shoving themselves in her face, she wouldn't care one way or another.  And Mick's interest seems mostly based in having literally nothing better to do.

So, the rest is, like, Mick stabbing an animatronic snake.  Mick meeting Mike Tyson (if this movie hoped for celebrity cameos, all they get is Tyson and George Hamilton).  Mick using magical powers to wrangle a chimp on a set.

If the first film was all about a big city gal finding charm in the ultra-masculinity of a hickish backwoodsman (and fair enough as a plot.  We discuss this in the podcast and we accept it) this movie has only the faintest echo of that charm.  Linda Kozlowski seems disinterested and uncomfortable in her own skin in a way she absolutely was not in the first two films.  It's like she agreed to be in the movie for continuity, but wasn't really *that* interested in being in it, so she's there in body if not in spirit.

But that can be said for everyone.  

The excuse for the plot we compared to Brigadoon.  It would appear every 30 minutes throughout the movie, as if from the mists, and then retreat for Reader's Digest level non-chuckles for incredibly long stretches.  I don't know what the story is, but the pacing of this movie is glacial.  Like every cut has long pauses between lines and way, waaaaaay too long from start of a scene to the punchline, that just never really pays off.  

The director has done stuff I thought was "fine" to "could have been worse" before this.  Here, he must have been doing work-for-hire and running.

Part of the problem is that Mick isn't supposed to be dumb, but he is.  He's supposed to be clever, but he makes mistakes like a dumb asshole who can't read the room and then leaves the room after causing chaos, mostly unaware of what he's done.  That tension worked in the first film and was moot for the second (if memory serves) as they reversed flow and returned to Australia so Mick could become bushwhacking Batman.  But here?  He's been living with a sophisticate for 15 years.  He's just choosing to be a dummy.

Anyway, the gag doesn't work, and that's all it is.  Introducing a kid into the movie doesn't really improve things, and, in fact, signals the "why" of the softening of some of the humor.  Except that this movie also wants you to know it's about Mick being sexy if knife-wielding saddle bags are your jam.  And your kid commenting on a woman's ass is a good, wry chuckle.

Add in some old white guy racism, sexism and the patented queer-panic and transphobia of the first film, and it really may be that Hogan and Co. were stranded in the outback since the mid-80's.  But you gotta hit those same beats from the first film.

I guess I kind of hated this movie.  

Apparently law suits were thrown around about who had written this, but the only reason that happened was because the writers needed full credit for full pay.  They really didn't want to be associated with the film.

Superheroes Every Day Guest Spot: Iron Man (2008)

Watched:  07/22/2023

Format:  Disney+

Viewing:  Unknown

Director:  John favreau

We guested over at Superheroes Every Day!  

Host Danny Horn was kind enough to have me on for a convo re: the first real Marvel Studios film.

Join us for all three acts of Iron Man (2008)!

Act I:

Act II:

Act III:

Birthday of Lucille Ball

Today marks the 112th birthday of one of the greatest talents of the 20th Century and a true pioneer, who had an immeasurable impact on the world that continues to be felt every day.

If you're my age, you know Lucille Ball from the one endless reruns of I Love Lucy, one the of the templates for television comedy we're still referencing and still trying to top.  Prior to her show, she was a model and movie star - but wasn't aimed to be one of the greats.  If you've seen any of her films, she seems like she's too big for what they're giving her whether it's a comedy or a drama (she appears in a couple of crime movies I've seen).   But my guess is they didn't know what to do with her in a male-forward Hollywood of the time.  

In musicals and comedies, it's weird to see her not given the lead.  I grew up with Lucy as a huge star, so you're retroactively thinking "why can't they give her more screentime?"  

She honed an act with husband Desi Arnaz, and it more or less created the basis for what would become the show they'd take to the networks.  And much like Seinfeld, because it was her show and not one she was cast for, as it became a hit, she was able to build more and more of an empire, setting up Desilu Studios.  

I was reminded that today was Lucille Ball's birthday by Star Trek social media, who has never forgotten that if it weren't for Lucy championing the show and everything it stands for as head of Desilu Productions, we either get no Star Trek or a very watered down show that wasn't what we think of as Star Trek.  And they're still making that show.

But go back and watch some I Love Lucy.  The show is so... good.  Sure, it's a multi-camera show and it doesn't always fit with everything we expect out of a modern sitcom, but in addition to being a female-led show (and produced as Lucy was very involved in *everything*, more so than Desi) it's amazing to see how we're still working bits from the show now.   It's a classic for a reason.

And, very indirectly, Ball is responsible for TCM.  When the network was coming together and they recruited Robert Osbourne to be Robert Osbourne, it turns out that he was a friend of Ball's who had been given the opportunities in Hollywood he'd had because of her largesse paired with his know-how and encyclopedic knowledge of Hollywood history.  And you do not get the TCM of today without Osbourne, pals.

Noir Watch: Shockproof (1949)

Watched:  08/04/2023

Format:  TCM

Viewing:  First

Director:  Douglas Sirk

I was a bit relieved to hear Noir Alley host Eddie Muller mention Tomorrow is Another Day, a movie I'd previously seen, because it turns out that movie just decided to borrow the third act of this movie to wrap up their film.  And that's not the only similarity.  Women change hair color, folks are on the run for reasons that are maybe not entirely their fault.  And neither has a satisfactory conclusion.

But, of course, I was well into the film before the thought of similarities crossed my mind, because there is quite a bit different.  

Cornel Wilde plays a probation officer who is put in charge of a woman just released for a murder charge.  It's widely believe she took the murder rap to cover for a fella who has lived as a smooth gambler and shady guy.  Don't you know it, she's a dish, a bit hardboiled, and morally ambiguous.  

Wilde puts her up in his own home to keep her away from the guy, and begins to fall for her.  And, as luck would have it, she realizes she's falling for him.  Though it's against her parole, the two marry.  But that shady guy is about to call the cops and tell them what his ex is up to when she appears, they struggle and a gun goes off.  

Soon, she and Wilde are on the lam as he refuses to give her up and let her go back to prison.  It's a hell of a decision and what takes the film in an exciting direction.

Like a lot of these films, before they figured out they needed to bring them in for a smoother landing to appease the Breen Office, this one clearly was headed in a darker direction.  Prior to studio interference, this was headed for a Gun Crazy ending that feels the inevitable from the mounting tensions of the film. But studio chiefs demand a happy ending for their star players, and it veers into some law-and-order friendly nonsense.   The ending is both too clever for its own good and utterly unsatisfactory.

All in all, it's an entertaining and tense film, it just pivots way too hard in the last ten minutes into a different, cheesier film from Sam Fuller's intended story.  But I think Patricia Knight is a compelling co-lead, and seeing Wilde's descent is good stuff.

This is a Douglas Sirk film, but it's not what I tend to think of as Sirk.  The gorgeous palette is instead lovely black and white, and it's not a female-driven melodrama.  This is pretty well in the wheel house of what would come to be known as noir, with desperate runs for the border, guys making insane decisions for a woman, and misfired guns.  It's very well directed and never feels like less than an A picture, if not a big budget one.  It's ten years after he fled from Germany, and a few films into his American career, but six years prior to All That Heaven Allows.  

I mean, she just looks like noir

I haven't seen all that many Cornel Wilde films, but I like him.  He seems to be doing more than indicating and I buy him in every scene.  His then-wife Patricia Knight is also, honestly, pretty solid in this film, at least as much so as actors who had lengthy careers.  I'm assuming she had some baggage or was an issue in some way I don't know about, because she's great on camera/ gorgeous.  But, she was in like 10 things and then disappeared shortly after splitting from Wilde.*

It's hard to say which I like batter between this and Tomorrow is Another Day.  I guess it's even-steven for me.  Just two takes on same in their own way.  And both would have been better if they'd not let everyone off the hook in the final reel.

*Wilde had tried to leverage his stardom to get Knight into movies before their divorce, to no avail, so we have to assume there was something else at play, not that he got her blackballed

Jean Hagen at 100

Today marks the 100th birthday for actress Jean Hagen.  She passed in 1977 at only 54.  

Hagen is best known for her role as Lina Lamont in Singin' In the Rain, but she worked in radio before moving to movies and, eventually, television - co-starring in the early hit, Make Room for Daddy with Danny Thomas.

While esophageal cancer would take her life, Hagen was an alcoholic, and it derailed her professionally as well as very personally.  However, after she became gravely ill in 1968, falling into a coma, she managed to stay sober for the remaining years of her life.

Hagen left her mark on the films I've seen her in, and is often a highlight, even in something like Asphalt Jungle where she's one of a dozen memorable performances.  Personally, I think what she was doing was ahead of its time - or maybe would have been best served on the stage in grittier work.  But she also clearly had a knack for comedy - which she managed to parlay into television and numerous other projects.  

But seeing she's in The Big Knife, I really need to get ahold of that movie and watch it through, and I think I will try to for Hagen's centennial.

Mattel Watch: Barbie (2023)

I should start by saying:  I really liked Barbie (2023).  But I am not going to write about everything in this movie.  It's too big.

Our lives have been busy lately and so it was hard to find a minute to go see a movie at all, and right now there's a crazy amount of options, any of which I was equally excited to check out.  But Barbie was something I personally wanted to see heading into the summer, mostly because we live in a fascinating era of massive budgets and writer/directors with excellent credentials being handed the reigns to "franchise" pictures.  Giving Greta Gerwig access to the untouchable Barbie empire seemed bonkers.*

I can make neither heads nor tails of a Mission: Impossible film not meeting expectations at the box office.  I have no idea why people show up for a movie in a world where there's another @#$%ing Troll dolls movie about to hit - that will surely make the GDP of a small country.  But I guess we were ready for Barbie when the movie came, because it's currently at $580 million after a couple of weeks.  Go, Barb!

The movie stars the omnipresent Margot Robbie, and that's a good thing.  She's a talented actor, charismatic and fits the bill, physically, for what's needed here.  She's nailed complicated stuff since I first saw her in Wolf of Wall Street, and I generally think she's just really a star in the best sense.  She's paired with Ryan Gosling, who is just weirdly really good, always underplaying to amazing effect.  I can only imagine what Ken was like in other hands, but as Ken Prime, he's terrific.  But so is everyone.  Issa Rae is just a @#$%ing delight, America.  Oh, and America Ferrera!  Lovely.  Terrific!  

Paul Reubens Merges With the Infinite

Man, this is some sad news I did not expect at all.

Paul Reubens, better known as Pee-Wee Herman, has passed at the age of 70.

Reubens was a member of The Groundlings and became part of the class of breakout stars of his era, alongside Cassandra Peterson and others.  

Reubens created the unique and beloved character of Pee-Wee Herman, a persona who wound up in TV specials, movies, and the excellent Pee-Wee's Playhouse - one of the best things ever on Saturday mornings.  He's responsible for Tim Burton's early big screen success, and co-starred with everyone from Laurence Fishburne to Lynn-Marie Stewart and John Paragon on the Saturday morning show.  

Pee-Wee's run was cut short in the 1990's, but he returned in the age of social media, releasing a final movie, Pee-Wee's Big Holiday, that was as funny as anything he'd done, and maybe freer?

What has surprised me most about Pee-Wee over the years has been that the movies, specials, etc.. get *funnier*.  My first viewing of Pee-Wee Herman content was in elementary school, and every time I watch one of his movies or review clips of any of his work, it doesn't just hold up, it shines a little brighter.  

Reubens also appeared in numerous other projects, playing a wide range of characters.  He's great in Mystery Men, 1991's Blow, and he got the biggest laugh of the movie from me in the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  

On social media, he was very plugged into the same sort of cheerful "look at this weirdo thing" stuff I tend to want to forward to Jamie, all of it in fun.  Lots of retro, lots of outlandish goofiness.  The kind of stuff that would look at home beside Mr. T cereal and pterodactyl puppets.

We'll miss Paul Reubens, and we'll miss Pee-Wee Herman.  Taken way too soon.

Happy Birthday, Arnie

Yesterday was the 76th birthday of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

I don't know if Arnold is necessarily having a moment right now - he has two top-rated shows on Netflix - so much as Arnie is always having a moment of some sort.  And, here in his 70's, he's taking stock of his life and telling his story.  And, during covid, he became much more active on social media and online, and Arnold being Arnold, is turning that into something.

Arnie has always been an easy mark.  Muscle-bound, never the world's best actor, and with an accent he was never going to shake, his place in Hollywood was always strange, even as audiences lined up for whatever movie he was in, action or comedy (or both).  It made it easy to forget - he was born in the wake of WWII in a defeated Austria, became a bodybuilding champion on a few continents before winning the world/ Mr. Universe.  He made his way into real-estate and movies, and wound up somehow marrying a Kennedy.  Somehow, he found his way to the Governor's mansion in California, and wound up doing a good job.  He's an American success story if ever there was one.

Lately he's been working on Arnold's Pump Club, a fitness app and podcast.  And he's got a newsletter that's... really great?  I mean, it is.  Full of sound advice for taking care of yourself and with a convincing level of positive energy that feels oddly authentic in an era of mangled therapy-speak.  

Poor Jamie has to hear about Imaginary Uncle Arnold now, just as I made her go see Eraser when we started dating.  

Anyway, I did not see myself still caring about Arnold Schwarzenegger here in 2023.  But here we are.  Good ol' Uncle Arnie.