Mel Tormé was the co-writer of one of my favorite Christmas songs. Called simply “The Christmas Song”, it’s probably better known by its opening line: “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire”. Mark Evanier has a great Mel Tormé story on his blog that you really ought to check out, just click on that link. I … Continue reading Christmas Songs
Movies
The Downton Movie
I ordered the Downton Abbey Movie Blu-ray from Amazon.com some time back. It was just released a few days ago, and the Postal Service delivered my copy on Thursday. I received the text message that it had been delivered, and within five minutes I went to retrieve it. A word about my building. I live … Continue reading The Downton Movie
Reasonable Doubt
I have to give my eight-year-old self credit. I’m not sure if I knew in advance that the movie was going to be confined to one room with a bunch of men arguing for 90 minutes, but that’s what it turned out to be. And I do remember that I enjoyed it, although I’m sure … Continue reading Reasonable Doubt
Double MacMurray
One of the surprises in Billy Wilder’s film The Apartment was seeing Fred MacMurray playing an out and out heel. Up till then I had only known MacMurray from light comedy parts, such as Disney’s The Shaggy Dog, so seeing him play an unsympathetic role was somewhat jarring. As a matter of fact, MacMurray didn’t … Continue reading Double MacMurray
Please Stop!
On Scriptnotes Episode 412: Writing About Mental Health and Addiction, John August initiated a new feature, which you can hear by following that link and listening to the whole episode (which I encourage you to do because it’s a great episode), or you can just listen to this excerpt: Here’s the excerpt from the … Continue reading Please Stop!
The Birds Is Gone
View fullsize I received several queries as to why The Birds (1963) didn’t make my Hitch favorites list. While there are lots of things I like about The Birds, it suffers from a very anemic script by Evan Hunter.So much to explain there. I’ll start with the movie and its strengths.The Birds contains some of … Continue reading The Birds Is Gone
My Favorite Hitches
View fullsize I’ve gotten into a bit of a Hitchcock mood and for some reason I wondered if I could name my top five favorite Hitchcock films. Somewhat surprisingly they came to me in a flash without having to think about it. Here they are in the order in which they were made:Notorious (1946)Rear Window … Continue reading My Favorite Hitches
Grounds For Justifiable Homicide
I just listened to a 2015 episode of The Incomparable Old Movie Club where the good fellows discussed two of Alfred Hitchcock’s less appreciated films, 1943’s Shadow of a Doubt and 1948’s Rope. View fullsize You have to be looking pretty closely to see Hitch’s cameo right after the opening credits I needed no convincing … Continue reading Grounds For Justifiable Homicide
Predestination
My two favorite science fictions authors when I was a teenager were Isaac Asimov and Robert Heinlein. Actually I think they still are. Anyway, one of my favorite short stories by Heinlein was “—All You Zombies—”, which despite the title has absolutely nothing to do with zombies. It was perhaps ten pages long and packed … Continue reading Predestination