Al Pacino Top Ten

 1) The Godfather - yes, I know, easy choie

2) Dog Day Afternoon - ditto - he's still very good

3)Cruising - I gotta say, he commits

4) Heat -I used to find this hammy now I find it great

5) Dick Tracy - over the top fun

6) Carlito's Way - the film is still underrated, it's terrific

7) Donnie Brasco - this is a very good movie

8) Glengarry Glenn Ross - Pacino had such a 90s hot streak (cf the 2000s)

9) Any Given Sunday - not belivable as a footbal player but lots of fun

10) Scarface - sure why not

Movie review - "Doctor Blood's Coffin" (1961) ** (re-watching)

 Saw this again after reading the book on Sidney Furie. It's competently directed, quite stylish. In colour, set outdoors in Cornwall which is different. Keiron Moore is a lump. He grabs Hazel Court's arse. Not bad.

Book review - "Sidney J Furie Life and Films" by Daniel Kremer

 Excellent book about an interesting filmmaker. He was treated as a bit of a punchline for a long time and Furie has been associated with a lot of disasters - quitting Night of the Juggler, fired off The Jazz Singer, plus Superman 4 and Gable and Lombard and a lot of flops from big stars (The Appaloosa, Little Fauss and Big Halsy)  - but I remember seeing Ipcres File and thinking this was pretty impressive. And his filmogrraphy holds up. Lots of popcorn fun, from Cliff Richard musicals and Iron Eagle to solid biopics like Lady Sings the Blues and flashy spy movies like Ipcress. I have a lot of gaps on my Furie list which I will try to address.

Great stories like Jeannie Berlin walking off Sheila Levine and dealing with Jill Clayburgh on Gable and Lombard and Brando on Appalosa. Interesting that Michael Caine never worked with him again. I presume bad luck.

Kremer skims over his later movies. Just compared to the others.

It's an excellent book.

James Coburn and Australia

 1) The Great Escape - mangled the accent, nailed the attitude

2) Death of a Soldier - Australian film with Coburn as the imported star

3) Payback - Coburn had a good support role in this film from Aussie-when-it-suits-us Mel Gibson - he and Gibson were also in Maverick together

4) Dead Heat on a Merry Go Round - Coburn impersonates an Aussie

5) Babe in th Woods - early TV play written by Aussie Sumner Locke Elliott starring Coburn

6) Major Dundee - Coburn and Aussie Michael Pate have support roles

7) Duck You Sucker - Cobun took a role originally offered to George Lazenby

I'm kind of stretching...

Musicals - Cry Baby versus Hairspray

 Listened to the cast album of Cry Baby - the broadway show. I know it's only going off cast albums but I think I can see why that didn't work and Hairspray did. As a musical that is - I prefer Cry Baby as a film. But it doesn't have a lot of story - the film runs out as is. Also the characters are less vivid - Johnny Depp and Amy Locane are a solid centre, and there's decent villains (the smarmy guy, the fake pregnancy girl) but the others are more a galaxy of types - Hatchet Face, Ricki Lake.

Compare Hairspray - it's got the overweight girl, and her mum and geeky dad, and her best friend and the friend's religious nutter mom, and the cute guy and bitch girl and her mum, and the black singer, and the black boyfriend. Hairspray has a natural playground - the Corny Collins show - and is about two big issues: treatment of fat people and treatment of blacks. There's more to work with. Cry Baby doesn't have these. It's about outsiders.

Also I think the music in the film is better than Broadway. It was rock a billy, catchy, fun, The musical music feels more generic.

Movie review - "Bite the Bullet" (1975) ** (warning: spoilers)

 Richard Brooks had a big hit with The Professionals and went back to the well with another macho, male driven Western in a slightly odd time period (1906 or something like that) with a rousing score. This has neat photography and an interesting cast but you're bound to wonder "why should we care". The Professionals had clear stakes - kidnapped woman, cash. This is about a cross country race. You can give stakes to a race but Brooks can't crack the problem here. 

There's two old mates Gene Hackman and James Coburn, and a callow kid (Jan Michael Vincent), and a hooker (Candice Bergen), a Brit (Ian Bannen), an old poke (Ben Johnson).

It needed more stakes. More character differential. There's some nice scenes and the actors are fine. The horses are pretty as is the scenery But I got lost what the race was about or why we should care or what was going on. Some robbers turn up and that perks things up because it's clear and clean what they want and the stakes are life and death.

At the end Hackman and Coburn cross the line together. It might mean more if we got a sense they were friends, or rivals, or brothers, or cared. Coburn's character could be removed. So could Johnson. Actually Johnson and Coburn could be merged.

Oh, I'm picking. I don't know. It was loud and pretty and kind of lifeless. Burt Reynolds and James Caan were going to be leads at one stage - they would've given the piece more urgency.

Book review - "Eruption" by Michael Crichton and James Patterson (spoilers) (2024)

 Cobbled from notes in Crichton's papers and put together quite professionally by Patterson. I don't know who did what. I'm guessing the heavy volcano mumbo jumbo was from Crichton. He specialised in taking a silly concept and grounding it in as much reality and research as possible. I totally bought it.

The novel started well, with its set up of a Hawaiian volcano about to expode and the reveal that it has gas that would wipe out the world and a plan to blow up the volcano and divert lava.

It gets less effective as it goes on. Main problem - the army and President keep everything hush hush. Why not tell the world and get the world's resources devoted to getting out the gas and blowing up the volcano? It affects the whole world. Why not tell the town and get them to evacuate?

The tough hero scientist Mac is particularly dull. Like he's tough and impulsive and has some girlfriend and... ugh. He's cardboard. I'm not sure why the reporters are Bad or the head of civilians or the volcano experts who appear on (gasp) TV.

The final volcano isn't bad with a decent death toll. They could've had that an evacuatin. But it sets things up nicely for a suicide run then goes into a deux ex machina. Frustrating.

Easy to read. Short chapters.