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Movie: Shoot The Piano Player (1960)
A fairly standard story of escape from vengeful gangsters is the format for a lot cinematography that seems progressive for the time, and interludes of sincere philosophical conversation between all the characters, good guys and bad.
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Low Water Mayem on the Arkansas
After a leisurely breakfast and some logistically challenging car shuttling, we put in to the Arkansas River in a 14′ raft and a kayak. Pete, Jess, and David have all spent a lot of time on the Arkansas, and the water is as low as anyone has seen it. ‘Bony’ seems to be the word…
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Parakeet Belay at Rainbow Rock
We join our friends Pete & Jess, Jess’ brother David, and his daughter Alex at Ruby Mountain campground on the Arkansas River today. It’s a little cool for floating so we rally to Rainbow Rock, a wall of pumice cliffs along the river, for some climbing. There are a couple of anchors good enough for…
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2000 Excel 33TRO
We met the owners of this used Excel fifth wheel tonight. It’s smaller than the one we were looking at on the Windish RV lot, but much closer to our price range! We might even be able to afford the tow vehicle they’re selling. The idea of rejecting the unwheeled lifestyle is starting to become…
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Movie: The Motorcycle Diaries
To me this is a retelling of the fable of Prince Gautama’s early forays from the castle – young men venture out into the world for the first time and encounter human suffering there. The scenes on the road are irresistable to me. The earth is a character, and the they become lost in it…
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Pray It’s The Last
Something that rarely happens to me occurred today – I thought of a joke. I know it’s not a joke to be proud of, but it makes me marvel at my own odd sense of humor. Why do I laugh at stuff like this? I have no idea. Unfortunately this a computer-geek joke as well,…
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Movie: Monster (Il Mostro)
This movie makes you think that just following Roberto Benigni around on the street would be exhaustingly funny. We had to take a break halfway through this farcical tale of mistaken identity and sexual perversion, but I sure wouldn’t want to miss the closing scene…
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Movie: The Third Man
I thought I’d had enough film noir for a while, but wanted to get this one last classic in. Well worth it. Best of all, the sound track is mostly guitar instead of orchestra. The reparte may not be as snappy as a Dashiell Hammet story, but there’s also less melodrama here, which makes for…
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Movie: The French Connection
We seem to be catching on to controversial 70’s movies lately. This one would be good just as a drug bust movie, but it’s excellent as a scathing attack on the war on drugs. Like Dog Day Afternoon was revealing of Al Pacino’s early career, here Gene Hackman shines 10 years after his debut. It’s…
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Movie: Mrs. Brown
For me this movie was a good history lesson about Queen Victoria and the labor and tory parties, with some really good performances.