August 31, 2008: Les Amants & Charlie Wilson's War

Recently Viewed: Les Amants (The Lovers), directed by Louis Malle (1958). Okay, I'll get the first bit out of the way: Yes, I, Jim Finley, Europhile, Jeanne Moreau idolator, and general French film nut, had never seen Les Amants until two days ago. But let us not dwell on my inadequacies and instead revel in the glory that is this film. I don't give a hoot that it's "naive" (and I think that's arguable anyway), nor that it's "sentimental" nor that it's "dated". What film from 1958 isn't? What it is is an incredibly honest, even brave, portrayal of a woman's sexuality made in a day when many people still flinched at the thought of a woman's arousal. Though it's rather PG-13 by today's standards, it was scandalous in '58, and its presentation in American cities brought charges of obscenity to a couple of theater owners. This was the one that was fought all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court where it was declared not obscene and where Justice Potter Stewart wrote in a concurring opinion: "I know it when I see it, and the motion picture involved in this case is not that." Certainly not, but I can see how this film might have seriously upset the 1950's status quo: First, the film features a beautiful woman who has been cheating on her husband for some time before she falls head over heels in love with a complete stranger. Secondly, the film not only refuses to punish said woman for her indiscretions (as the American Hayes code would have required) but seems to reward her with a new love and a new life as she abandons her husband, her child, her other lover, and her bourgeois status altogether. And lastly, it treats this woman's sexual desire and fulfillment with utter candor: the camera doesn't pull away for once, and we see her undress her lover, embrace him, and enjoy his kisses on her breasts; we even see her face and hear her moans as she climaxes. It isn't prurient (but so what if it were?), it isn't gratuitous, it isn't immoral, and it sure as hell isn't obscene. I'm largely of the opinion that if a film or book or painting is scandalous, then it probably needs to be, and we all need to be scandalized occasionally. Great art, if it's doing its job honestly, will always be at some level subversive--for real honesty is almost never welcome. And as to charges of the film being naive, etc., I don't think it is. I know that Louis Malle in interviews looked back on the film and cringed a little bit at it's innocence, but I'm not sure he's the best judge of what he created. I saw that look Jeanne Moreau gave Jean-Marc Bory just after she kissed her sleeping child goodbye--it was a look that said, at once, "I'm scared to death. I don't know why I'm doing this, but I must. You are making me do this, and I might hate you one day for it." And I don't buy for a minute that the lovers are necessarily heading into a fairytale future--as the story ends I'm not at all certain that Jeanne Moreau has made the correct decision or that this love will last. Does the fact that she doesn't regret (for now) what she's done really mean anything? All I know is that something in her life compelled her to take this step, for better or worse. The film doesn't show us a fairytale or a tragedy: that's not its purpose. Its purpose, in my opinion, is to strip away the artifice that surrounds our perception of what a "fallen" woman is--a perception constructed by 18th-19th century novels and dramas and 20th century film melodramas--in order to give us a glimpse, for once, of an honest-to-God female human being. ****1/2.

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Charlie Wilson's War, directed by Mike Nichols (2007). Mike Nichols may have made The Graduate, but he also made Day of the Dolphin (Faaa love Paaa...!) which is right up there vying with Exorcist II, Star Trek V, and Tarzan, The Ape Man for worst movie I've ever paid to see. (Now that I think of it, perhaps I didn't pay to see it...hurrah!) Anyway, my point being that I really never know what to expect from a guy like this. As it turns out, the film is neither The Graduate nor Day of the Dolphin but somewhere between them--probably on the level of Carnal Knowledge or Wolf or Silkwood. The performances by Hanks and Roberts are solid enough, but lacking in depth of sincerity, I think. There's something about snappy dialogue and punchy pacing that strikes me as a cheap way of making a story seem more intelligent than it is. Maybe it's the work of script doctors. In any event, this film was merely entertaining when it could have been profoundly moving. I liked it for P.S. Hoffman's Oscar nominated performance, mostly. He is so damned watchable that he just dominates whenever he's on screen. Why is it that the camera can love this freckly, blonde chubster so? Something in the eyes, I think. There is a menace there--always--sometimes animal, sometimes intellectual, sometimes just flat psycho. I can't even think of a role he's played where it doesn't come through. He's never going to be the harmless, likable, fat guy who's everyone's friend and no one's lover. The guy's too dangerous. ***
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Five great roles of Philip Seymour Hoffman: (1) Brandt, in the Coens' The Big Lebowski. The nimble-thinking, toady, yes-man of Jeffrey Lebowski (not to be mistaken with "The Dude"). Watch as he anxiously wrings his hands while The Dude fiddles with various plaques and pictures on Lebowski's wall of memorabilia. Priceless. (2) Freddie Miles in Anthony Minghella's Talented Mr. Ripley. A marvelous snob--played pitch-perfectly. The true snob is never actively concerned with dominating the inferior classes--he does so passively and with a dismissive bemusement. In this case, of course, he has no idea who he's dealing with! (3) That poor slob in Boogie Nights. Again the menace is there despite the character's dimwittedness--it's in his dull, flat glaring eyes. (4)That other poor slob in Cold Mountain. The only thing I really liked in the film. (5) Capote. Well, of course.

Adios,
JBF

August 26, 2008: Intermezzo & Peter T.

Recently Viewed: Intermezzo: A Love Story. (1939). This is the English language remake of the 1936 Swedish film also starring Ingrid Bergman. A low-key melodrama about a concert violinist (Leslie Howard) who falls for his daughter's piano teacher (Bergman), though her love turns out to be a mere "intermezzo" in his life. Yes, a little sappy and dated (the camera even turns away from the first extra-marital smooch) but it first introduced Bergman to English speaking audiences and lets us tear-up at the sight of the soulful Leslie Howard as he skulks in the shadows of the house where he once enjoyed a domestic bliss (it always amazes and delights me that folks of yesteryear thought Howard a romantic lead). The cinematographer was the outstanding Gregg Toland, he of Citizen Kane fame, and his skills are on full display, earning him an Oscar nomination. The music by Louis Forbes was also Oscar nominated. My favorite scenes: Howard and Bergman dueting for the first time at a private party--shot, at one point, from behind the piano, so that the open top forms a triangle framing the two soon-to-be lovers; the "goodbye" scene between Howard and Bergman, shot from behind them as they look into the window of a bric-a-brac shop: she tells him to not turn around and then slips away into the dark streets behind him--an unexpected and astonishingly powerful moment. Now I must see the Swedish version and offer a comparison. (I'm stopping the letter grading system I've used for films up to now--it just seems unsavory and school-marmish--and going with a five star system): ***1/2

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Now Spinning: Pete Townshend Live: A Benefit for Maryville Academy (1999). I'm just now exploring a lot of what PT did in in the late 80's, 90's, and oughts. I had an intense love-affair with PT and the Who all through high school and on into the mid 80's that was effectively killed with the one-two-three punch of the wretched album It's Hard, a shamefully overblown "farewell" concert tour which I saw at Seattle's Kingdome in, I think, 1982 or '83, and the arrival of R.E.M. in my world. From then on I followed at a distance what PT and the band were doing--always taking a look, but seldom buying the records. The last PT stuff I can say I really enjoyed were All the Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes and his Scoop records (which I think are really marvelous). This little live album, already nine years old, is hit and miss for me. It's fine to hear the big hits, but does he really need to do "Magic Bus" and "Won't Get Fooled Again" again? This recording even gives us a "bonus disc" that features "Magic Bus" a second time, and with Eddie Vedder on board...I mean, really, enough already. So here are five things I especially like about the album (and since I bought it for only five bucks, each one's worth a dollar): (1) The opening cover of Canned Heat's "On the Road Again" (which, when I saw the title, I thought would be Willie Nelson's song! That might have been interesting too)--it's a really cool cover; I love it when a band pulls a cover out of the blue and suprises you with it. (2) PT's duet with Eddie Vedder on "Heart to Hang Onto": A great song from a great album ("Rough Mix"). Ronnie Lane is dead and gone, but EV sings well with Pete. I like EV when he sings softly--you can hear that power being restrained--it adds to the song's poignancy. And PT sings with a lot of raw emotion as well. (3) The Empty Glass hits "Let My Love Open the Door" and "A Little is Enough"--two great heart-warming eighties numbers. (4) The two Quadrophenia numbers "Drowned" and "I'm One"--some of the best writing on that album. (5) The slicey-diceyness if it all. Okay, what I mean is, I like it that PT is not afraid to rearrange and tinker with approaches to the songs in his catalogue. For instance, his update of "Anyway Anyhow Anywhere" is fun and interesting--with its softer rhythm guitar and bluesy harmonica coloring, it sounds more like a Rough Mix number than the mod, punk song that it is--and I like that. It's ballsy. Why continue to pretend to be the street tough you never were? He even added a lyric in the midst of the pop-art-noise-jam session: "This is what we used to believe. We thought we'd live forever." It takes nothing away from the original and gives us, really, a whole new aesthetic experience. Likewise, though I whined about the inclusion of "Won't Get Fooled Again," I do like the playful synthesizer intro--giving the audience just enough of the iconic sound to make them wonder if WGFA is underway or not. It's a fun move--it's what the Who and PT always did best in live performance, unfixing the songs from the records and giving them a new life.

~

Who's this old geezer?

Adios,
JBF

August 21, 2008: Food & Booze & Koehler

Jeff Koehler arrived Tuesday night, driving down from Seattle in pouring rain the likes of which this spot of earth hasn't seen in many a day. He was the same as always--talkative, full of odd stories and curious, jaunty energy. On Wednesday I took him up to Clark College where he read his piece "The Lotus-Eaters" that had been published in Tin House a few years ago and then re-published in Food & Booze: Essays and Recipes, an anthology put out by Tin House Books. He also took questions from the small audience, covering topics such as how he got into food and travel writing, the relationship of food to culture in the Mediterranean region, and the pitfalls involved with photographing the food you're writing about. It was a very pleasant hour. Afterward, we went shopping for the evening's meal at Trader Joe's and New Seasons. It's always a great pleasure to shop for food with Koehler as he loves to chat with the grocers and the butchers and wine sellers, nosing out interesting morsels of information. The wine shopping was particularly fun: I took him to my favorite wine shop, Vino, in Sellwood. He met the proprietor, Bruce Bauer, a man who had read Jeff's work and followed some of his dining suggestions while visiting Barcelona not long ago. Bruce (as we all are now) became a big fan of Bar Pinocho in Barcelona's Boqueria, the large central market just of La Rambla. He and Jeff effected a trade: a bottle of wine for the recipe for a Pinocho dish containing chick-peas and blood sausage. I've had it too, and it's worth a whole case of wine, if you ask me! For lunch, we went across the street to Kiko's Taqueria, a taco cart on the corner of Spokane and 13th. For my money, the best one dollar street tacos in town. Jeff loved them.

In the evening, Jeff cooked us two risottos--one with scallops and mushrooms and the other with parmesan and herbs. For a starter we had fresh figs, melon, and prosciutto. For dessert, K made wonderful lemon pudding cakes. We finished the evening with some Trillium absinthe, an Oregon product. We followed the time-honored ritual: glacier-cold water poured over a sugar cube into a shot of the liquor. The result is a green cloudy drink tasting strongly of anise--not unlike ouzo in flavor--but, for me, tastier. Alas, no green faeries appeared to waltz me into the stratosphere; I just found myself slack-jawed and dozing off in a livingroom chair.

I took Jeff to Powell's City of Books this morning so he could look up a few volumes on the history of Latin America, part of the research he's doing for a future book project. Again, it was great to prowl those hallowed aisles with him. Before hand we had a coffee and a treat at one of my favorite Portland bakeries, The Pearl Bakery, just a block away. He enjoyed one of their award winning gibassiers. I, however, avoiding anything licorice flavored (ahem) was quite content with a chocolate croissant.

Adeu, Jeff Koehler! I look forward to that next visit--possibly in a year--to promote Rice, Pasta, Couscous: The Delicious Heart of the Mediterranean Kitchen.
~

Whether or not distilled wormwood really has hallucinogenic properties is debatable, but there is no debate that these five things get me "high": (1) Taschen books. My favorite publisher of art books. 25th anniversary editions (at very affordable prices) are out now: Matisse, Schiele, Expressionism, Two Volumes of European sculpture--these have all come my way. (2) The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Irving's story is an American classic, and as we know, and as Hemingway once pointed out, that means it has been relegated (unfairly) to the children's shelf of the library. LSH is a rich, complex, and hilarious metafiction written two hundred years before the postmoderns invented that word. (3) The character Tom Ripley in Patricia Highsmith's novels (which is really to applaud her artistry in the creation of him). How did she make me admire--to the point that I envy him--a murderous sociopathic epicurean expatriot con-artist? (4) Salted and oiled Marcona almonds . We bought two packs of them at New Seasons the other day and I cannot stop eating them. Are they the finest almonds in the world? No doubt. (4) Robert Graves' poem "The Naked and the Nude". I often have my poetry students read this to illustrate to them the idea of connotation. How is it that the "naked" are simply without clothes but the "nude" are up to something?

The Naked and the Nude

For me, the naked and the nude

(By lexicographers construed

As synonyms that should express

The same deficiency of dress

Or shelter) stand as wide apart

As love from lies, or truth from art.

Lovers without reproach will gaze

On bodies naked and ablaze;

The Hippocratic eye will see

In nakedness, anatomy;

And naked shines the Goddess when

She mounts her lion among men.

The nude are bold, the nude are sly

To hold each treasonable eye.

While draping by a showman's trick

Their dishabille in rhetoric,

They grin a mock-religious grin

Of scorn at those of naked skin.

The naked, therefore, who compete

Against the nude may know defeat;

Yet when they both together tread

The briary pastures of the dead,

By Gorgons with long whips pursued,

How naked go the sometime nude!

--Robert Graves

Clearly nude!

August 14, 2008: Darjeeling Limited; Bronzino

Recently Viewed: Darjeeling Limited, directed by Wes Anderson.

WA's films are always worth seeing, it seems to me. This feels more in the vein of its predecessor, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, than his first three, though it probably doesn't hold together quite as well as LASZ. Even so, WA is a highly skilled filmmaker and story-teller who can create characters with real psychological depth and develop compelling plots built on their needs, desires, hang-ups, what-have-you. And here's what I like best about WA: He gives a shit about death. Is there any other American filmmaker who explores the power, meaning, and wonder of death more sensitively? I know WA is often criticized for his "quirky" approach to story-telling and characterization, and I agree that at times he borders on the precious, but his quirky (I hate that word--how about "idiosyncratic") angles of approach allow him to access the human condition in ways more formulaic story-tellers usually don't. In other words, he risks preciousness in order to get into the nooks and crannies of the psyche that we often don't find our way into, and I applaud him for that. Grade: B+.

~

Yes, the heat will be brutal today, tomorrow, and the day after that, but remember these 5 air-conditioned havens: (1) Ikea. What better place to shop for cheap Swedish products you probably don't need and will replace in 6 short months? What other big box store offers you meatballs and lingonberry sauce? (2) The Portland Art Museum. Love that Bronzino. (3) Trader Joe's. No better reason to hang out in their fab freezer section. Buy a few tamales while yer at it. (4) Rejuvenation. Do I ever buy anything here? Almost never. But I'll wander around with a coffee and drool to my heart's content. (5) My office at Clark College. With my books, my computer, my coffee, my tunes, and my A/C blasting, what better place to be?

~

Agnolo Bronzino (1503-1572). Madonna and Child with John the Baptist.

Ciao,

JBF

August 13, 2008: Congrats to Sasha!

I want to give a shout-out to our friend Sasha Samuels who won Best of Show at the Sun Valley Arts and Crafts Festival over the weekend: Congratulations! Here are links to the festival and an article about the festival: http://www.sunvalleycenter.org/arts/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=53&Itemid=75; http://www.mtexpress.com/index2.php?ID=2005122108. Well done, Sasha. Her paintings beautify our walls and her jewelry amplifies the beauty that is K.

Sun Valley gets me thinking about Hemingway, naturally, and thinking about Hemingway gets me wanting to read him. Last night we drove over to K's mom's little farm. K watered the animals while I stayed back in the car and watched the baby (asleep) and read a couple Nick Adams stories--"The Light of the World" and "The Battler"-- under the overhead light. My God it was wonderful to return to those stories after a passage of, what, 15 years? More? I know it's fashionable to diss EH these days, but the short stories are undeniably brilliant in their simplicity, grace, and power. Good on him and pooh! to the nay-sayers. 'nuff said.

Ciao,
JBF

August 12, 2008: I Love Gorges.

Returned last night from 3 days in the Inland Empire (as it once was called)--Spokane and Coeur d'Alene. K went to her ??th class reunion while I sat through one of the most spectacular lightning storms I've ever seen at Lake Coeur d'Alene. K, Ian, and I saw old friends too: Scott Orme, English prof at SCC, and Tod Marshall, ditto at Gonzaga University. Tod, in fact, has just sealed the deal with the University of Michigan to publish his second book of poems. Here's a link to his last book, Dare Say, on amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Dare-Say-Winner-Contemporary-Competition/dp/0820324620/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218561692&sr=1-4

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Now Spinning: We've bought a butt-load of CDs lately, both K and I. Here's what's being added to the I-Pod: Sweet: Best of Sweet. The Pogues: Red Roses for me; Rum, Sodomy, and the Lash; If I Should Fall from Grace with God. Green on Red: Green on Red; Gas, Food, Lodging. The Three O'Clock: Sixteen Tambourines; Baroque Hoedown. Iggy Pop: New Values. Brook Benton and Dinah Washington: You've Got What it Takes (3 disc set). Pink Floyd: Piper at the Gates of Dawn; Saucerful of Secrets; Soundtrack from the film More; Atom Heart Mother. The Ramones: Leave Home; Rocket to Russia. Squeeze: East Side Story. I don't have the energy to comment much on these other than to say it's typical us--a little bubble-glam, a little punk, a little indie-rock, a little new wave, a little classic rock, a little psychedelia (both first and second wave), a little jazz (a lot o', I should say). Some of these acquisitions replace LPs and EPs I once owned, while with others I am exploring more fully records only my friends had copies of when I was younger. Some, alas, are things I'm listening to for the first time ever--even 40 years removed from the original release date (How sad, eh? But that's the way it is with some things.) I will comment on one record in particular--the Pink Floyd soundtrack from More: Though I have only read the synopsis of the film in the album's liner notes (it sounds dreadful--I can't wait to see it) the music is excellent--much better than many of the luke-warm reviews on Amazon would have you believe. It made fine driving music as I made my way through the Columbia Gorge last Friday. It also makes a fine companion to the album of psychelelic Italian film music Delirium of the Senses (see July 23). Is there a connection in all of this to Antonioni's Zabriskie Point? I wonder, since PF did music in that film too. So much to investigate--stay tuned.

~

Though John Edwards would have made a fine attorney general if he hadn't revealed himself to be an utter cad (though I have to say, something deep inside of me is not surprised), remember the drive between Portland and Spokane contains wonders such as these 10: (1) Multnomah Falls. The Indian legend that says the waterfall memorializes an Indian princess who sacrificed herself to the gods may be a complete fabrication (it would be interesting to make a study of such things), but there is no arguing that the waterfall is a spectacular must-see on the trip. (2) The Columbia Gorge. Well duh. As K.D. Laing once put it so well, "I love gorges." (3) Maryhill Museum & Stonehenge replica. As I wrote in an article some years ago: "Maryhill is home to wild contrasts--peacocks and rattlesnakes, Rodin sculptures and basalt boulders, French fashions and cowboy hats, chess sets and Native baskets. Such juxtapositions declaim most eloquently that there is no place where great art does not belong." (4) The tree farms between Irrigon and Umatilla. Weird, I know, but somehow I love seeing these endless rows of trees and wish I could pull over and take a walk in their strange cathedral aisles. (5) Barges full of grain moving down river. (6) Fishing for shad at John Day dam. (7) G&J Dairy Freeze in Umatilla. Second time on this list! (8) Smell of sweet onions between Irrigon and the Tri-cities. (9) Basalt scablands from Ritzville to Cheney. (10) The view of Spokane coming in from the west on I-90, as you descend into the valley. Always a pleasure.

Ciao,

JBF

August 6, 2008: Here Comes Koehler

Here's the official announcment of Jeff Koehler's visit to Clark College on Aug. 20th. As the director of the Columbia Writers Series, I feel it's my duty to promote the program through my own blog. (Perhaps I should start a blog for the series itself?) I hope, dear reader, you can come!:

The Columbia Writers Series welcomes author, cook, and photographer
Jeff Koehler
August 20, 2008, 12:00 p.m., in Room 213 of Clark College’s Gaiser Hall. Admission is free.

Jeff Koehler is the author of La Paella: Deliciously Authentic Rice Dishes from Spain’s Mediterranean Coast (Chronicle Books)—listed by the New York Times as a noteworthy cookbook in 2006—and of the forthcoming (and tentatively titled) Rice, Pasta, Couscous: The Heart of the Mediterranean Kitchen (Chronicle Books, 2009), a unique hybrid of cookbook and culture study. Koehler writes about food and travel for many magazines and newspapers, including Gourmet, Saveur, Food & Wine, EatingWell, the Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Atlantic Monthly, Christian Science Monitor, Tin House, and Dwell. He also writes regularly for the Spanish government publication Foods From Spain News and for Continental Airlines’ in-flight magazine. Some of Koehler’s pieces have been anthologized, including one on the Lotus-eaters of Djerba in Food & Booze: A Tin House Literary Feast alongside works by Francine Prose, Steve Almond, Lydia Davis, and Grace Paley. Last winter the book had its European launch at Shakespeare & Company Bookshop in Paris where Koehler joined other expatriot writers for a public reading.For Koehler food is an ideal subject: “Writing about it – especially here in the Mediterranean – is writing about culture. It is the window through which almost any story can be told.”

Koehler is also a photographer whose images have illustrated many of his own and others’ articles, his cookbook, La Paella, Teresa Barrenchea’s The Cuisines of Spain (a 2006 IACP Cookbook Award Finalist in the international category) and Braiden Rex-Johnson’s Pike Place Market Seafood Cookbook.

Jeff Koehler grew up north of Seattle, studied at Gonzaga University in Spokane in the early 1990’s , and then spent four years on the road traveling throughout Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Eventually, he settled down in London to study at King’s College and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. There, in the kitchen of a shared Hampstead residence hall, he met another foreign post-grad, a Catalan woman named Eva. When she returned home to Spain to do her PhD, Jeff followed. They married not long after, and for most of the past decade they have lived in Barcelona. They have two girls, Alba (six) and Maia (four).

Visit Jeff Koehler’s website: https://exchange.clark.edu/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://jeff-koehler.com/ , and learn more about his writing, photography, and upcoming projects.

~

Because you can't stow yourself away in Koehler's suitcase and accompany him back to Barcelona, here are five things about that magnificent city you can daydream about: (1) Pinocho in La Boqueria. The greatest food kiosk I've ever visited and one of the best restaurants in that city. Be greeted by Juanito, eat a custardy-pastry, drink a cafe con leche, and order up a dish of fried baby squid or sardines or blood sausage. Fantastico! (2) The Boqueria itself. Endless stalls of produce, seafood, breads, pastries..the sights and smells are unforgettable, and walking through the place with Koehler nosing out good buys is an utter joy. (3) La Rambla, the walking street that runs through the core of the city, full of musicians, vendors, cafes, street performers, pickpockets, and every age and condition of human being. And flanked on both sides by the endlessly fascinating architecture (old and modern) of the city. (4) La Sagrada Familia, the greatest work in progress in Europe. Spectacular even in its incompleteness; visit the Gaudi exhibition in the crypt (?) and marvel at his plans and designs. (5) Picasso Museum. An amazing collection of his juvenilia and immature work--many oils on wood panels, done in the impressionist style. The museum is in the Born, the city's medieval neighborhood, and housed in a 13th century merchant's house. How wonderful is that?

Adeu,

JBF

August 4, 2008: Happy Birthday K! & Brideshead Revisited

A clever and insightful piece appeared in Slate the other day, a love letter of sorts, from the ready pen of Troy Patterson (http://www.slate.com/id/2195923/pagenum/2/ ). His object? Evelyn Waugh's novel Brideshead Revisited, and, more importantly, the outstanding 1982 British TV miniseries adapted from it. Now, imagine me in Spokane in 1981-2: a senior in high school, a football player, a carouser, driving an International Harvester Scout, wearing my hair curly and long, blasting Montrose as loudly as my piddley little car stereo will let me...and totally addicted to a PBS miniseries about a bisexual Oxford student and his romantic misadventures with an English aristocratic Catholic family whom he both loves and loathes. Ah, but ain't that America...

BR remains, in my mind, the high water mark of the BritTV period drama genre. Not only was it a great drama served up in 13 glorious, languid hours of excellent performances and stunning locations, it was a mighty fine stand-in for the novel. Indeed, as Patterson points out, it follows it almost scene-for-scene, and between the faithful dialogue and the constant voice-over narration, the soundtrack could serve as a pretty good book-on-tape abridgement. The series features an up and coming Jeremy Irons as the enthralled lead, Charles Ryder; the soon to be sadly underused (in cinema, anyway) Anthony Andrews as the object of his affections, Lord Sebastian Flyte; and Claire Bloom as the domineering and devout Lady Marchmain, a woman who elevates passive aggression to the level of a martial art. The cast is rounded out with Brit TV/theatre/cinema stalwarts Diana Quick, Phoebe Nichols, Nicholas Grace (unforgettably), Simon Jones, Charles Keating, and, most wonderfully, John Geilgud and Lawrence Olivier in smaller roles as the respective fathers of Ryder and Flyte. I bought the DVD box-set of the series a couple years ago and was exceedingly pleased that the series was every bit as good as I had remembered. Indeed, though I'm curious to see how the new cinematic version presents the story (Patterson lambasts it), I can't help but feel the excellence and comprehensiveness of the '82 version will probably remain forever unparalleled. One amazing rumor I've heard (and I have trouble believing that it's true) is that the new film skips past most of the Charles/Sebastian relationship and moves directly to the Charles/Julia relationship, which, if it's true, is troubling. The miniseries (like the novel) makes the former relationship the platform for all other actions in the story; indeed, Charles never really fully recovers from Sebastian, and all that happens after he leaves the central story is so deeply overshadowed by his absence that I can't even conceive of a retelling of BR that does not fully explore the significance of this love. I do hope the rumor isn't true.
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Whenever Hollywood gets ahold of one of your favorite novels and makes of it a "vomitous stupidity," remember that there exist in this world (1) Loaves of Trader Joe's English Muffin Bread. Why choose between crisp toast or chewy English muffin when you can have both in a single slice? (2) The most amazing veggie tacos, taken from Annie Somerville's Everyday Greens (and improvised on by K, mistress of the grill), which give you grilled plaintains, butternut squash, peppers, poblano chilis, and onions in one gorgeous mouthful after another. (3) Louise Brooks' bangs. (4) Those great big wooden supports that are set-up under very old tree branches. (5) Bookshops filled to the rafters with old Penguin paperbacks (scrumptious orange and cream covers), such as the one I happened into once in Inverness, Scotland.
~
HAPPY BIRTHDAY KATHLEEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love, Jim.