Passages

[flyonthewall2983]

The title track to Crime of the Century features a harmonica part by Davies towards the end, while a reprise from the opening track “School”, plays again so hauntingly against a song with lyrics and meaning that still applies today. Maybe more than ever in some respects.

[Matt]

Polly Holliday, Flo from "Alice" (and her own spin-off, "Flo").

[flyonthewall2983]

Charlie Kirk

[domino harvey]

Discussion of Charlie Kirk has been moved to the politics thread, which is locked. The last 18 hours have given us a great reminder why. Do not continue the discussion.

[Gregory]

Actor Per Mattsson died today at the age of 77. He worked with directors such as Ingmar Bergman (Fanny and Alexander, playing one of the actors) and Alf Sjöberg.

[hearthesilence]

Per Wellesnet, the last surviving cast member of The Third Man, Herbert Halbik, passed away on September 11. He played "Little Hansel,"

Spoiler

who falsely accused Holly Martins of murder.

[GaryC]

Robin Chadwick, New Zealander actor, on 7 September aged 85. He made a few films, but he was better known on TV, particularly as David Hammond in all ninety-two episodes of The Brothers (1972-1976), which is currently near the end of a repeat run on UK television on Talking Pictures TV.

[Mr Sausage]

Ricky Hatton.

[Colpeper]

Ironic that Mr Benn should get namechecked, because another very familiar name from the credits of 1960s-80s British children's television has just died, in the form of Blue Peter founder and long-term producer Biddy Baxter, at the age of 92.

Just learned from my sister that there is a caricature of a children's TV show editor (producer), in a 2023 episode of SISTER BONIFACE MYSTERIES, that is clearly based on Baxter. They call the children's show JOLLY ROGER, so it sounds like the veil is thin.

[hearthesilence]

Former Illinois Governor Jim Edgar. He was very popular during his time in office and nearly ran for Senate. One reason he didn't may have been health issues - he had to get emergency quadruple-bypass surgery while governor - but away from public office he lived to 79, passing away from pancreatic cancer.

His death is a sad reminder of how much the Republican Party has changed and how comparatively moderate it was in Illinois, which is one reason why Republicans were able to hold on to state government for so long. His administration gave a lot to science education and in private life he worked towards solving environmental issues including climate change. (Before I even enrolled, my own high school was one of many beneficiaries from the funding he secured us, specifically to go towards science education.) On election night in 2002, when the Democratic Party finally ended the decades-long reign of the Republican Party in Illinois, a local news anchor asked Edgar if Republican candidate Jim Ryan hurt his chances by campaigning on a pro-life platform. (Edgar was already at the anchor desk to provide commentary for their election night coverage.) Without hesitation, he said absolutely, immediately adding, "if you want to be governor (of Illinois), you have be in the middle. You have to be pro-choice."

No doubt he had disagreements with others on a variety of issues, but he wasn't a polarizing figure mainly because he governed for everybody, working towards compromises to appeal to the broadest constituency possible and maintaining a civil decorum - none of this seemed remarkable at the time, and they really shouldn't have, but they do now for very sad reasons.

[hearthesilence]

Brazilian composer and multi-instrumentalist Hermeto Pascoal, famed for his innovative blend of jazz and traditional music. At one time, Miles Davis called him the most "important musician on the planet" and featured three of his compositions on his great 1971 album Live-Evil.

[Lemmy Caution]

Edgar's legacy also benefitted from the next two governors going to jail for corruption. George Ryan just died in May. Blagojevich was recently pardoned by Trump. His misdeeds included trying to sell the senate seat vacated by Obama. Illinois and NJ, two of the more corrupt states (Louisiana seems to be consensus leader) had a lot of governor drama in the early part of this century.

Cant say I've heard of the past two ex-govs, Quinn and Rauner. Maybe just my remove, but they didn't seem to have any significant national profiles, unlike Pritzker the current gov who is sparring with Trump and gearing up for a presidential run.

[hearthesilence]

Quinn basically became governor in the most unenviable way - he replaced Blagojevich after he was removed from office and had a shitload of problems to deal with that might've prevented Blagojevich from getting re-elected anyway. He barely won re-election in a very tough year for Democrats in 2010 (when too many people who jumped on the Obama bandwagon didn't bother to vote, allowing the Tea Party to take over both the GOP and Congress and ensuring the remaining six years of Obama's presidency would be severely hampered). The margin of victory for Quinn that year was less than 9000 votes. He should've declined another run, but he didn't even though he lost the broad support of the party and Rauner easily defeated him in 2014. Rauner was basically another Scott Walker (the governor who helped ruin Wisconsin) and like Walker was flat-out awful. No surprise he lost re-election, and he lost by the biggest margin since....Edgar's landslide re-election.

[pistolwink]

Funny enough, Illinois went from a right-wing billionaire, Bruce Rauner, to a left-wing one, JB Pritzger. (Pritzger has really impressed me despite my initial skepticism, and in certain respects he's the best governor in the country right now.)

Anyway...

[hearthesilence]

I'll be honest, I can never fully embrace a multi-billionaire as governor, but sometimes being a great governor is being the right governor for the times, and so far he's been exactly that. (There are actually LOTS of examples in history of inauspicious leaders becoming great leaders because they stepped up and became the leaders we needed them to be in terrible times.)

[Gregory]

One of the few people still alive who worked in Hollywood in the 1930s, Marilyn Knowlden, died yesterday at 99. Never contracted to any one studio, she acted in films such as Imitation of Life, Show Boat, Little Women, David Copperfield, Les Misérables (as the young Cosette), and Angels with Dirty Faces.

[JSC]

Strange, but I happened to come across this article and it doesn't seem to have been mentioned anywhere (you
can let me know if I'm incorrect).

Anne Heywood (who starred in various films including 90 Degrees in the Shade, The Fox, I Want What I Want,
The Chairman, and The Nun and the Devil) apparently passed away in October of 2023.

https://www.thetimes.com/uk/article/ann ... -r5f880hrw

[dx23]

Ricky Hatton.

Hatton never physically or mentally recovered from the Pacquio beatdown. I was surprised to hear that he was supposed to have a comeback fight in December of this year in Dubai.

[dwk]

According to Severin Films' social media, Sergio Salvati died on the 17th.

[colinr0380]

According to Severin Films' social media, Sergio Salvati died on the 17th.

A great cinematographer through Lucio Fulci's best known period of films: The Psychic, Zombi 2/Zombie Flesh-Eaters, the loose trilogy of City of the Living Dead, The Beyond and The House By The Cemetery, and The Black Cat (plus the Fulci thriller Contraband and his early Western The Four of the Apocalypse). At the time of the collapse of the Italian horror (and filmmaking in general) scene in the late 1980s he did a few Empire pictures in the US including Ghoulies II and the first of the Puppet Master series.

And was the dp on that great looking very late Italian horror that was supposed to be a team up/burying the hatchet between Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci (until Fulci's sudden death in 1996), 1997's The Wax Mask, which I wrote up a bit here.

Maybe the two moments that show off the cinematography in the Fulci films the best (and those characteristic eye close ups!) are the bridge sequence in The Beyond and the prowling opening titles of The Black Cat.

[Gregory]

One of the few people still alive who worked in Hollywood in the 1930s, Marilyn Knowlden, died yesterday at 99. Never contracted to any one studio, she acted in films such as Imitation of Life, Show Boat, Little Women, David Copperfield, Les Misérables (as the young Cosette), and Angels with Dirty Faces.

Another one in this same category, Elaine Merk, 94, one of the last remaining Munchkins from The Wizard of Oz. She was interviewed about the experience for last year's doc The Mysteries of Oz.

[TechnicolorAcid]

Larisa Golubkina, most famous for her title roles in Hussar Ballad and Ptushko’s The Tale of Tsar Saltan.

[yoloswegmaster]

Claudia Cardinale

[flyonthewall2983]

Her performance in Once Upon a Time in the West did much to bring me to tears last time I watched it. I noticed having more emotional reactions like this to movies I revere as this highly, but these sort of outbursts of emotion manage to find deeper meaning than I might have seen elsewhere. I can also remember a dream once had, pre-dating the time I saw 8 1/2 for the first time, that resembles symbolically some of what I felt with her scene in the car with the lead.

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

Her performance in Once Upon a Time in the West did much to bring me to tears last time I watched it. I noticed having more emotional reactions like this to movies I revere as this highly, but these sort of outbursts of emotion manage to find deeper meaning than I might have seen elsewhere. I can also remember a dream once had, pre-dating the time I saw 8 1/2 for the first time, that resembles symbolically some of what I felt with her scene in the car with the lead.

Her arrival to America with Morricone's perfect cue makes me cry each time. You're not alone in feeling that way with that particular performance.