Monday, December 5, 2011

Comments not working, and a Review

Argh! I would love to respond to comments, but for whatever reason, Google keeps telling me I don't have permission. This mystifies me. Anyway:
1) Yes, I love TSO. They are the definition of an instant classic. I want to see them although I have no idea when.
2) The St. Philomena design isn't meant to be a literal compass, but that was my inspiration. I was going to use it for a tattoo on my right shoulder blade, before I decided not to. Anyways.
3) More posts in a few days. I wanted to do a few top tens, for original Christmas songs, for covers of standard Christmas songs, and for obscure holiday movies.


Yesterday was lovely. I went for a walk in the park with my cousin's two dogs, and we watched Donovan's Reef at the house. It's a real rule-breaker of a holiday movie: it takes place in French Polynesia, quite a few years after World War II. John Wayne and Lee Marvin star in it, although Dorothy Lamour and Cesar Romero have prominent roles. John Wayne's character, Michael "Guns" Donovan, is having a normal birthday in the weeks before Christmas. At least, until proper Bostonian Emilia Dedham arrives, intent on gathering dirt on her father, (played by Ward Bond) who has recently inherited the lion's share of her family's shipping company. Guessing her intentions, John Wayne, Cesar Romero, and Lee Marvin are determined to hide her half-sisters and half-brother, passing them off as Donovan's for the duration of her holiday visit. The charade can only last so long, and the aftermath is where the heart is.

What I like about it:
1) Although it's not a slapstick yuckfest like National Lampoon, they have some great scenes. John Wayne and Lee Marvin have a magnificent brawl at the beginning of the movie- and there's an encounter with a group of Australian sailors that makes for some of memorable lines, especially when a belligerant Lee Marvin calls them limeys. For the record, that's a very dumb thing to say to an Aussie.

2) The focus isn't so much on the young kids at Christmas, as it is on the grown daughter's relationship with her father. This movie is very unapologetic about showing realistic relationships- that a disagreeable exterior can be an outer shell for vulnerability and wounded affection.

3) For a Christmastime movie, there's something refreshing about all the gorgeous South Pacific shots. Even more refreshing, this is a movie where there's very little in the way of over-used, over-thought Christmas cliches.

4) And when they do use a standard holiday trope, they do it very well- my favorite being the Christmas pageant at the local Church, where it's clear that some Vatican II extremist decided to do a "relevant translation" for the narration. Ahem: "And three kings came from the east: The King of Polynesia...the Emperor of China...and the Emperor of the United States of America." Lee Marvin enters in his normal sailor's striped shirt, but carrying an old-fashioned victrola and wearing a gold foil crown. Cesar Romero's reaction as he reads the script makes it even better.

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