Friday Flashback: Rec. #149: A Patch of Blue

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: In 1960s Los Angeles, a young, blind white woman falls in love with a black man who befriends her. She is largely uneducated and lives with her verbally and physically abusive mother. He is well-educated and his background is more affluent, being firmly middle class. 

Given those broad plot points, you may be surprised to learn that this is not a melodrama. It has moments of powerful emotion, sure, but in general A Patch of Blue quietly and carefully tells the story of two people facing the precise point where the personal meets the political.

Comparable to: Other award-bait films that Sidney Poitier starred in around the same time include Lilies of the Field, To Sir with Love, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, and In the Heat of the Night.

Representative quote: "I'm sorry. You were much sinned against."

You might not like it if: You were in the mood to watch a melodrama, actually.

How to get it: The film is widely available to rent, stream, or buy. The novel on which it was based --- Be Ready with Bells and Drums, by Elizabeth Kata --- is not quite as easy to find.

[Originally posted 6/22/11.]

Quote from a Fictional Character #73

"I didn't sleep with him for his prose style."

--- Fleur Talbot,

Loitering with Intent, Muriel Spark, 1981

(Rec. #13)

List #53: Happy Birthday, Bryan Fuller

... Sorry your gloriously gruesome experiment in baroque violence (Hannibal) looks like it has an expiration date, but maybe now you can cast all of those people in something that I am able to watch without hiding behind furniture. 

Who: Television writer/ champion of the weird, dark, snarky, and beautiful/ likes writing about death

Dead Like Me, 2003

(See Rec. #375)

Wonderfalls, 2004

(See Rec. #2)

Pushing Daisies, 2007

(See Rec. #233)

Hannibal, 2013

(See List #29: So You Love the Cast of Hannibal, but Wish Watching the Show Itself Weren't So Psychologically Damaging)

Friday Flashback: Rec. #272: Weight

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: Author Jeanette Winterson retells the myth of Atlas and Heracles. A tale of traps and bargains and freedom and trickery! The book is brief, but smart, smart, depressing, and smart.

Comparable to: Weight is part of the The Myths --- a multi-country project of myths retold by critically fawned-over authors, including David Grossman, Margaret Atwood, Ali Smith, and Michel Faber.

Opening lines: "The free man never thinks of escape."

Representative quote: "I am good at walking away. Rejection teaches you how to reject."

How to get it: Buyable, borrowable, Kindle-able.

Connections to previous Wreckage: The Penelopiad, by Margaret Atwood, is another book in The Myths project. It is also Rec. #298.

Also check out Jeanette Winterson's other (non-myth) books, including Art & Lies (Rec. #349), The Passion (Rec. #66), and The PowerBook (Rec. #302).

[Originally posted 1/31/13.]

Quote from a Fictional Character #72

"I just need to pay the mortgage. [The Yuppie Nuremberg defense.]"

--- Nick Naylor,

Thank You for Smoking, 2005

(book: Rec. #87)

Friday Flashback: Rec. #177: The Princess Bride

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: So, this is all going to be based on the assumption that you have already seen and enjoyed the generally beloved and endlessly quotable 1987 movie The Princess Bride. And you're probably sick of people telling you that the original, book version of [fill in the blank] is better, but, really: William Goldman's book The Princess Bride is so much better than the film adaptation. 

This is through no fault of the movie, which is, of course, delightful. The book is just so much more so. For example, Westley doesn't even leave the farm until page 53, and a lot of great stuff happens before that.

Comparable to: As I've said, it's like the movie, but more so.

Representative quote: "The boys. The village boys. The beef-witted featherbrained rattleskulled clod-pated dim-domed noodle-noggined sapheaded lunk-knobbed boys. How could anybody accuse her of stealing them? Why would anybody want them anyway? What good were they?"

You might not like it if: You miss Peter Falk and Fred Savage. (That frame story is based on something from the book, but the book's frame story is more complex.)

How to get it: Buyable, borrowable, Kindle-able. Although, hello, my graphic designer friends? You know what could use a new, excellent cover? This book. Current cover designs do not capture the book's sense of rollicking, snarky fun.

[Originally posted 8/27/11.]

Streaming Suggestion of the Week #15: God Help the Girl

Stream what: Eve, James, and Cassie form a band.

Stream why: The songs are Belle & Sebastian in their ideal context, the British/Scottish humor quirks up throughout, the characterization is deeper than it has to be, and the ending is great. Plus, I love this.

Stream where: Free with Amazon Prime.


Read more: Rec. #361

Also: List #47

Rec. #380: Pulse

What: So, I think I've decided that I like Julian Barnes better as a short story writer than as a novelist. That happens sometimes (I'm side-eyeing you, A.S. Byatt).

The fourteen stories collected in Pulse sweep from the eighteenth century to the twenty-first and make stops in Italy and Brazil along the way. My favorite bits, though, are the four instances of "At Phil & Joanna's," which are largely comprised of scraps of dinner party conversation. As in ...

Representative dialogue:
"Don't get her started on that. You rode that hobbyhorse to death last time, darling."
"Did I?"
"Riding a hobbyhorse to death is flogging a dead metaphor."
"What is the difference between a metaphor and a simile, by the way?"
"Marmalade."
"Which of you two is driving?"

Connection to previous Wreckage: Pulse was part of List #35: A Few of the Best Books I Read in 2013.

Friday Flashback: Rec. #288: Holiday

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: Cary Grant is a young man with a bit of money, about to marry a young woman with a lot of money. Katharine Hepburn is not that woman. And Cary Grant isn't so sure about the money in the first place, anyway.

Comparable to: Grant and Hepburn starred in three other films together: Sylvia Scarlett, Bringing Up Baby, and The Philadelphia Story, and Holiday has something in common with each of them.

It's got the Serious Talking About Self-Examination and Life Plans from The Philadelphia Story; the mixed tone of Sylvia Scarlett (is it a romantic comedy? is it a social commentary? it's both); and the daffy screwball edge of Bringing Up Baby (so. much. tumbling).

Representative dialogue:
"Did you have an accident, Ned?"
"Apparently. I don't seem to have been there when it happened."

You might not like it if: You meant to get The Holiday instead. But no house-trading, no Kate Winslet, no Jude Law here. Totally different movie.

How to get it: To avoid the above confusion, it's worth noting that this film is from 1938 (not 2006) and the title does not contain an initial article.

Connections to previous Wreckage: Holiday was directed by George Cukor, who also gave us Born Yesterday (Rec. #94). And, as if this cast weren't great enough already, Holiday also features the delightful Edward Everett Horton (List #20).

See also: List #42: In Praise of the American Screwball Comedy.

[Originally posted 5/1/13.]

Quote from a Fictional Character #71

"Mona's Law. That's what she calls it. She says you can have a hot job, a hot lover, and a hot apartment, but you can't have all three at the same time."

--- Michael (Mouse) Tolliver,

More Tales of the City, Armistead Maupin, 1980

(Rec. #211)

Rec. #379: Blandings, series (season) 1

What: Blandings adapts a set of connected P.G. Wodehouse stories for television, much as Jeeves & Wooster did in the early '90s (what ho!).

This series plays fast and loose with plots, but makes a solid go of capturing Wodehouse's steady parade of crispy dialogue.

Evidence (representative dialogue):

Exhibit A: "Do you bash the shuttlecock from the feathered end?"

Exhibit B: "Clarence, that doesn't even qualify as a lie. That's just noise leaking out of your face."

Exhibit C:
"I don't quite catch your drift."
"Then I shall continue snowing."

Connections to previous Wreckage: I adore Wodehouse's writing. See List #43 for more.

Friday Flashback: Rec. #214: The Center of Things

I decided to start doing Friday Flashbacks in case you missed some early posts the first time around. You're busy; I understand.

What: As I've previously mentioned, author Jenny McPhee has a knack for delightful and unexpected combinations of themes and topics. In the already-recommended No Ordinary Matter, the combination is soap operas + musicals + private detection + neurology. In her debut novel, The Center of Things, it is tabloid journalism + physics + noir film history + obituaries.

Representative quote: McPhee peppers the book with sly quotes from the nonexistent films of a fictional starlet. A sample:

"I'm so in love with you I wish you were dead." Nora Mars, The Downstairs Room, 1966
"Try everything once, then live to regret it." Nora Mars, Dark Blue, 1965
"Reality is something you rise above." Nora Mars, The Labyrinth, 1973

You might not like it if: You get bogged down by the quantity of quantum mechanics.

How to get it: Library or used book seller.

Connection to previous Wreckage: I mentioned The Center of Things during Personal Wreck Week (List #2). McPhee's second novel is No Ordinary Matter (Rec. #9).

[Originally posted 11/28/11.]

Streaming Suggestion of the Week #14: The Station Agent

Stream what: Indie darling The Station Agent stars acting darlings Peter Dinklage, Patricia Clarkson, Bobby Cannavale, and Michelle Williams. The title character just wants to be left alone, but then there's this chatty hot dog vendor. As there always is.

Stream why: This has Acting with a capital "A" and writing with a capital "W." Plus, you know, Tyrion Lannister before he was Tyrion Lannister.

Stream where: Amazon, Netflix