DeRosaWorld

Happy Birthday Jean-Luc Godard

Jean-Luc Godard was born on December 3, 1930. Godard and is fellow French new wave film directors gave new life to cinema halfway through the 20th century.

Saturday Musings 'Too Much Time On My Hands' Edition

When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.

Whenever the Crazy gets turned up too high for me to deal with, I re-read some Hunter S. Thompson to put my life in perspective. The man knew how to cope.

I work all the time and having four days off in a row over this Thanksgiving holiday has given me time to think... which means it has given me time to worry...My thoughts on the week that just passed.

We have terrorists blowing up trains in Russia.

We have non-terrorists killing soldiers in America.

Tiger Woods wife is taking a golf club to his head.

Glenn Beck is on my TV, my radio and my computer every day. Even the progressive blogs feature every utterance of that man.

Sarah Palin is back and bigger than ever. She even has a porn-side show with her little hockey player.

Oprah is quitting.

Joss Wedon’s new show was canceled.

The dollar is falling.

CHASE bank keeps chasing me around like a fucking PAC MAN eating my banks as fast as I can open a new checking account. Don’t you guys get it. I do not want a CHASE account!

I thought I voted in a liberal President, hell, he was even half black! But instead I get a Republican who happens to not be a neo-con. Is that the best I can expect from the Democratic Party?

I didn’t do any shopping on Black Friday.

I recycle.

I have two fucking 15 year old cats.

I donate to KPFK.

I don’t eat as much red-meat as I want used to.

I grow my own fucking tomatoes.

I fly three thousand miles to see my mother at Christmas and the holiday costs me about $1,500 each year. I've already got the tickets and they cost over $1,200... so I'll be over my limit by 12/24/09.

I buy expensive health care through my job and I can only get one pair of glasses per year.

I don't understand Obamacare.

I’ve had the same three Netflix movies sitting on my TV for two months.

Everyone is getting Frank Sinatra's A Man Alone for Christmas.

I’ve read fewer books this year than anytime since I was 6 years old...

It was at this point I decided to find Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas.

Edward Woodward Has Died

At age 79, the British actor Edward Woodward has died.

Here is a scene from Breaker Morant Here is a promo for The Equalizer

At What Point Do You Just Stop?

 

KPFK in Los Angeles has been in the midst of a Beg-A-Thon fundraiser for weeks. Look folks, I love you all, and support you, but maybe people can't afford to give this year.

I can't listen to the pleading anymore. It becomes pointless after a while. Maybe...obviously... no one is listening and that is what you should be concentrating on.

Sorry.

A Truly American Life

The life story of Crystal Lee Sutton, her entire life, up to the very end is truly an American story in the era of Republican Party politics.

The story of her fight for her labor rights inspired the film Norma Rae and won Sally Field an Oscar.

The movie could have a sequel in which the American health care systems watches Crystal get sick and insured or not,  won't cover the medicine she needs to fight her illness.

A very sad story and undignified way to grow old and sick in America.

POINT BREAK Actor Dies

Patrick Swayze died after battling pancreatic cancer. He had a nice, successful 10 year run back there from 1982-1992. The pictures got smaller after that.

Here is the trailer for Point Break, one of my favorite Patrick Swayze movies.  Via Con Dios.

Morally Objectionable In Part For All

"Creation, starring Paul Bettany, details Darwin's "struggle between faith and reason" as he wrote On The Origin of Species. It depicts him as a man who loses faith in God following the death of his beloved 10-year-old daughter, Annie.

The film was chosen to open the Toronto Film Festival and has its British premiere on Sunday. It has been sold in almost every territory around the world, from Australia to Scandinavia.

However, US distributors have resolutely passed on a film which will prove hugely divisive in a country where, according to a Gallup poll conducted in February, only 39 per cent of Americans believe in the theory of evolution."

The American Film Industry has never been known for standing up for its own.

This story is an embarrassment. What does the rest of the world think of us for letting the crazy few rule our lives.

Ponyo On The Cliff - Trailer

Gake no Ue no Ponyo, literally Ponyo on the Cliff is a 2008 Japanese animated film by Studio Ghibli, written and directed by Hayao Miyazaki.

The plot centers on a goldfish named Ponyo who befriends a five-year-old human boy Sōsuke and wants to become a human girl... complications ensue.

Here is the Japanese trailer. (Walt Disney Pictures is releasing the English language dubbed version for American audiences.)

The Good, The Bad And The Ugly: Writer Budd Shulberg Dead At 95

Boxing writer, novelist, screenwriter, Budd Shulberg has died at age 95. Famous for his novel What Makes Sammy Run? and his screenplays for the films On The Waterfront and A Face In The Crowd.

He worked on preparing film evidence of Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg Trials and supposedly helped arrest Leni Riefensthal.

He boxed with Ernest Hemingway and was friends (to the end) with Robert Kennedy.

An interesting life and a great writer. The one blemish will always be his testimony, along with Elia Kazan's before the House Un-American Activities Committee ... but that was what On The Waterfront was all about.

Here is a clip from A Face In The Crowd.

It Can't ALWAYS Be Politics

Next to Bugs Bunny, one of the biggest influences on my life was Curly, from The Three Stooges. I'm a product of television and that's where I met most of my roll models... from cartoons to movies.