A SEA OF DREAMS
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Most of my best memories of my dad are connected with the sea, especially the sea off the coast of North Carolina. Here he is with my mom, my sister Lee and me, once upon a time. Click on the … Continue reading
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WESTERN TRAILS: THE ALAMO
Click on the image to enlarge. Passing through San Antonio I decided to stop at the Alamo, preserved in a park in the center of the city. It’s a lovely, haunted monument. Lieutenant Colonel William Barret Travis, commanding the garrison … Continue reading
THE VIRGINIAN
It would not be an exaggeration to call The Virginian, by Owen Wister, from 1902, the most important work of Western fiction ever published. It almost singehandedly made the Western novel respectable and almost singlehandedly created the modern myth of … Continue reading
CAROL FOR ANOTHER CHRISTMAS
Paul Zahl weighs in with some seasonal thoughts about a TV show written by Rod Serling: CHRISTMAS COFFEE WITH ROD SERLING Anyone who likes Christmas has got to like Rod Serling. Serling was no Grinch! In fact he liked Christmas … Continue reading
200,000
Just passed 200,000 visits to the blog since it rebooted on 3 April of this year. Thanks to all who’ve come by to have a look. Click on the image to enlarge.
SHOCKING
BONJOUR TRISTESSE
Otto Preminger’s body of work is wildly uneven but at his best he was a master of cinematic style — something the critics and directors of the French New Wave celebrated tirelessly but which has been largely forgotten in our … Continue reading
AN LP COVER FOR TODAY
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THE ROSE OF THE WORLD
William Butler Yeats’s take on the Eternal Feminine: Who dreamed that beauty passes like a dream? For those red lips, with all their mournful pride, Mournful that no new wonder may betide, Troy passed away in one high funeral gleam, … Continue reading
JET SET
Los Straightjackets have a new album! Fun dance music of superior quality — and it’s in stereo! With thanks to Paul Zahl . . .
TEMPEST
Bob Dylan was never comfortable with the label “voice of his generation”. He always transcended generations, which tend to define themselves by ephemeral attitudes and fashions. But he always spoke to and from the heart of his times, expressing them … Continue reading
COURAGE
If qualities have odors the odor of courage to me is the smell of smoked leather or the smell of a frozen road or the smell of the sea when the wind rips the top from a wave. – Ernest … Continue reading
SAINT JOAN
I finally got around to watching Otto Preminger’s Saint Joan — which has at last been made available on DVD by The Warner Archive. It’s not a great film but Jean Seberg’s performance in it is stunning, pitch-perfect — she … Continue reading
ANATOMY OF A MURDER
This is a really cool film. The coolness starts with the first chords of Duke Ellington’s quirky and brilliant score, which plays over Saul Bass’s famous credit sequence of bold animated graphics — coolness on top of coolness. Ellington even … Continue reading
DRINKING WITH HEMINGWAY
This is a Papa Doble, a Daiquirí that Hemingway was fond of drinking at the Floridita Bar in Havana. I made it from a recipe that A. E. Hotchner wrote down one day while hanging with Papa at the fabled … Continue reading