Ah, summer in Texas. Or pretty much summer anywhere, probably. These days, anyway. We've hit the 100-degrees-every-day mark, and it shows no signs of subsiding soon. In some ways, I'm happy about it, because I'd like to lose some weight. 20 pounds, at least. But then I'm using the verb "like," instead of something more demanding....my health is reasonably fine these days. It's just that I'm a bit of a chunk, and it'd be nice to not worry about how jowly I look at times. Not that I'm going to work out in the heat, nothing like that....but I have taken some steps.
One is purchasing a recumbent bike/working desk combination. (I think I've mentioned this here previously). So far, so good. I tend to bike anywhere from two to four hours during a work day at home, occasionally even a bit more. I've lost a couple of pounds over the last few weeks, so I'm thinking that the pedaling must be working a bit; my diet certainly hasn't changed. Project work has dried up for the moment, so I'll have to be more conscious of keeping to the riding while I'm working on whatever time-killing grunt work I get. Or just riding while watching a movie - there's that, too.
Last night, the Hickoids played a truly fun one in San Marcos, outside at the Buzz Mill. Hot? You bet. Maybe I lost a couple of pounds last night, as well. We hadn't played a show in a little over a month, and we were on fire. The band before us was largely made up of JaKs skateboard team guys, who were having a reunion in the San Marcos area but currently live in Victoria, BC. They were a really fun punk rock band, keeping the tempos lively, which inspired me for sure. I think I drove all our tempos at least 10-20 BPM faster than normal after seeing them. Didn't hurt.....kept the crowd in it. The night (and our set) ended with our rendition of "Brontosaurus" where, at the end, we throw in the marching snare-driven guitar solo of "Free Bird." About that time, I realized some guys had gotten into a full-on brawl by the front of the stage. For a while, I was certain they would crash back into the drums.....but it didn't happen. They were thrown out right as we were wrapping the song (and set) up. Hilarious way to close it.
Another bit of news: I have ordered the "corn wrap" for my Sonor drum kit. I sent the hi-rez image I found to the company, Bum Wrap, and they said "order away." The end result should be that my plain-Jane Sonor drums will look like corn cobbettes. The only thing that has me a bit nervous is that I have a question concerning the size of the bass drum wrap, and they have not answered my question, even after I sent the question twice. Hopefully, they're just not checking email for a bit, as I received the response to my image submission within 30 minutes. Still, I've already ordered and paid. Answer me, y'all!
One thing I haven't done in awhile is write about movies watched. There have been several, but I'll pick two that have been on my "gonna watch" pile for a bit but just hadn't gotten to. Both were released on DVD by Blue Underground, and both begin with "A." How's that?
"Anguish," from 1987, is something I've read both positive and negative about for quite some time. The plot is nothing too special, although the execution is. For the first 25 minutes or so, you witness a rather meek and nervous optician's assistant who is dominated by his mother. Mom drives him to kill ladies and take their eyeballs. Grisly stuff. Then....out of nowhere....the camera pulls back, and you realize that we have a "movie within a movie"; there's an audience watching this story in a theater. And there's a serial killer in the theater, influenced by the movie he's watching. Other reviewers think the premise for this movie is great but not developed very well.....I disagree. I think the director did a fine job in keepin' it creepy. You never get to know much about the characters, but I do think you develop an affinity for them and even root for, well, the two young ladies, anyway. The inner movie has Michael Lerner (you probably know him from Coen brother movies) as the optician's assistant and Zelda Rubenstein ("Poltergeist"s medium) as his wacky mother. The other cast members are pretty much unknowns (the movie was a Spanish production). I give it an "A."
"Autopsy," from 1975, well.....that's something else, entirely. This is an Italian production, shot in Rome primarily, starring Mimsy Farmer as a doctor dealing with......oh, boy, where to start? Apparently, due to solar flares, people are committing suicide at an alarming rate. When one death comes into the morgue and is examined, the method of death leads Farmer to realize it was a murder and not a suicide. Turns out the dead woman was a mistress of her father, etc. (I think that's true; there are still things about this movie that baffle me.) Farmer also sees visions of dead bodies in the morgue coming to life and laughing at her. The amount of nudity in the first 20 minutes of this movie (and really the whole thing) becomes laughable quickly. But, if you stick with it, the movie gets better in the second half...and becomes a more regular giallo. Still, I'd never heard of the director (and I've watched many a giallo); there might be a reason for that. The cast is pretty good, though, particularly Farmer, Barry Primus as a is-he-a-priest-or-isn't-he, and Ray Lovelock as Ray Lovelock. There is some great location shooting. Michelle and I are hitting Rome in October, so I enjoyed all of that, even if it is Rome 43 years ago. I'll give this one a "C."
I also, after obtaining a rather obscene number of Warner Archive and Kino Lorber titles from the library, watched "He Ran All The Way." This one, from 1951, has the distinction of being John Garfield's last film. Garfield plays a fellow from not-too-good stock, who goes in with one of his crime buddies on a robbery...and that goes wrong, leaving Garfield on the run, and eventually in the house of female lead Shelley Winters and her parents and young brother. He holds the family hostage, and.....well, it goes from there. Good film. Very clearly defined characters, maybe almost too much so, but the movie isn't very long; no time is wasted. At first, it seems Winters is too old to play this role (she was 31 at the time), but as the movie goes on, you realize how perfect she is for the part. I always thought Shelley Winters was an underrated actress, even if she did have two Oscars. Garfield is great in it. I'm still sort of a Garfield newbie; the only other film of his I've seen is "The Postman Always Rings Twice." "He Ran All The Way" rates a "B."
Don't have much else to write today. Feeling pretty drained after last night, but it's good to get "something down." Until next time.....
No comments:
Post a Comment