Movie review - "Crack Up" (1946) **1/2

 Good tough Pat O'Brien noir directed with enthusiasm from Irving Reis and a confusing plot with an art element - I'Brien is an art critic. Decent cast including Herbert Marshall and Claire Trevor.

Movie review - "Gigli" (2003) * (warning: spoilers)

 A famous bomb. Ben Affleck tries and Jennifer Lopez has never looked hotter which is saying something. Some problems

- there's a lot of hanging around a flat, with a kidnap victim, so the movie has no pace

- Lopez is a lesbian but we spend a lot of time with Affleck and Lopez flirting and then they fall in love.

- kidnap victim Justin Bartha is a Simple Jack character

- there is no pooint to the kidnapping, they do to help Al Pacino then Al Pacino comes along and says "we don't do that" so all the threat was removed.  

I can't see how the film was ever going to work with Affleck falling for a lesbian... and her wanting to be with him. I know why they did it but it was wrong. 

Bartha is never going to get together with the girl at the end. Not really. And she has a terrible Australian accent. 

Martin Brest was not a writer.

A story without stakes, a tricky subject (man falls for lesbian) not dealt with, another tricky subject (intellectually disabled man is kidnapped) poorly handled. 

Movie review - "Studio Affairs: My Life as a Film Director" by Vincent Sherman (1996)

 Highly entertaining book. Sherman was a good director with a second-tier career. This book explains why - he was constantly given "go" projects that weren't always the best and it seems he wasn't too crash hot on script but he was excellent with actors. He would be called in to help on troubled projects.

The book is enjoyably non-discrete - he had affairs with Rita Hayworth, Joan Crawford and Bette Davis.  He did one of Errol Flynn's best movies and I wish they'd worked together again. He was blacklisted. Admits he was a shit to his wife.

Book review - "The Mad Emperor" by Henry Sidebottom (2022)

 Exhaustive. Very well researched. A more linear approach may have been better. A bit academic-y in that it takes a historiagraphy approach a lot of the time instead of getting into character. A serious work though.

Play review - "Misalliance" by George Bernard Shaw (1909) (re-reading)

 Lots of jolly japes and zingers among the rich at a house. Not a lot of plot but fun.

Play review - "The Devil's Disciple" by George Bernard Shaw (1897)

 A cad in revolutionary America redeems himself via an act of bravery to impress a sensible woman. The British officer at the end is fun.

Book review - "Roll the Calls" by Ari Emmanuel

 Starts off brilliantly, written in a pulpy, brief stacatto style, and Emmanuel is full of energy. As it goes along it gets tiring. The feuds. The persistence. The varying moral stances. A person of great ability and tenacity and the book gives you a sense of that. But it began to drag. At least he has a sense of humour.