The Daily Grand and Sundry

This Blog considers WARLOCK an interesting Western, some consider it a great Western. It has a plethora of acting talent,  Anthony Quinn, Richard Widmark, DeForest Kelly, Dorothy Malone, Dolores Michaels….and HENRY FONDA.

The story line is a variant on Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday, versus the Clantons, with Fonda playing the Earp character(CLAY BLAISDELL) and Anthony Quinn doing a homoerotic version of  Doc Holliday (TOM MORGAN).

All Great Classical Westerns are steeped with the anticipation of violence more than violence itself. The actors in Classical Westerns were adept at conveying the anticipation of the violent moment, in HIGH NOON, Gary Cooper watching the clock,in RED RIVER, John Wayne walking through the cattle herd to kill Montgomery Clift, in THE WILD BUNCH, Ben Johnson, Warren Oates,William Holden and Ernest Borgnine taking that memorable Via Dolorosa to free their friend,in THE SEARCHERS,the EDWARDS family hunkering down their home right before the Comanche attack, with the brave little boy wishing for one thing, that UNCLE ETHAN was there(a Comanche attack never seen).

Classical Western actors conveyed the electricity of the approaching moment of violence, like a fourth and goal at the one inch line. That ability to master the  anticipation of violence seems to be a dying art form in modern actors. They rush to do violence, the ballet has been transformed into a video game.

WARLOCK is a ballet. 

What enthralls me about this blogged scene is the extensive choreography expended in anticipation of violence. It is obvious Sergio Leone watched WARLOCK a great deal.

At the apex of this anticipation is Henry Fonda’s brilliant, benchmark line reading right before DeForest Kelly draws his gun.

“But whose to do it?”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MYtI04vX7k

That line reading combines both the arrogance and the weariness which comes from being the best at a dangerous profession, in this case gunfighting.  The weariness of having to be perfect when imperfection means death. Dale Earnhardt could have said that line, Manolete could have said that line.

In this one line reading Fonda sums up the life, the back story, the hubris, the disappointment,the fatalism  that is being CLAY BLAISDELL.

In one line reading he did all that; that is ACTING.

This Western was Directed by Edward Dmytryk, who also Directed (among others), CROSSFIRE and THE YOUNG LIONS. The screenplay was by Robert Alan Arthur(ALL THAT JAZZ, EDGE OF THE CITY). So there is a lot of film noir and social realism lacing this Classical Western.

In the end,this film is all about Henry Fonda, and that damn line reading about the weariness of perfection; that line reading which  is the standard of perfection.

People agree about Fonda’s performance:’Henry Fonda was GREAT in this(WARLOCK). really a captivating performance. one of his better ones and that’s saying something!”

Some people even like this film more than this Blog:“”(WARLOCK) is one of those little known westerns that captivates you from the opening scene. It has everything you wantin this genre of film: a great story, excellent characters, excellent actors and beautiful scenery & music. I’d never seen this movie and came across it while checking out the cable guide and was attracted to the title because I’m a sci-fi/horror lover. I didn’t know it was a western. When I flipped it on, I noticed what kind of movie it was and almost changed the channel when I spotted DeForrest Kelly of Star Trek fame (I’m a devout Trekker). Then I saw Richard Widmark & Henry Fonda and just stayed tuned. I was taken my this flick and recommend it to anyone. I caught it in the middle so when it was over, I immediately went to the cable guide and searched for when it would be on again and made sure I watched it from beginning to end. WHAT A GREAT MOVIE! Definitely a MUST-SEE!!! “

….. the vehicle ran a red light just southeast of the White House, signaled a turn into a restricted area near the Ellipse and was pulled over a few blocks away. 

The Salahis first made headlines in November when they got past security and attended a portion of a state dinner for the prime minister of India, even though they were not on the guest list. The couple shook hands with the president and got a picture taken with Vice President Joe Biden at a pre-dinner reception. They posted the photo on Facebook.

…..In the meantime, the Salahis are reportedly starring in the upcoming Bravo reality series “The Real Housewives of D.C.,” which they were auditioning for in November.

The show promises to feature women “who have their finger on the pulse of the most important cultural events, political galas, gallery openings and fundraisers in Washington society,” according to the show’s promotional material. A call to its production company, Half Yard Productions, was not immediately returned.”

I have met evil men in my life; my  late brother, God rest his soul, was an expert on evil men. This blog will rely on his expertise about the psychology of evil men.

I return to the Case of the White House Crashers, because this situation is an ideal scenario for President Obama and his team to show evil men they are irrational.

My brother worked under the assumption that evil men do not respect rational men; because rational men will always compromise. Why? Because compromise is always the rational thing to do.

To gain the respect of evil men, you must always do sommething irrational, to show evil men you a wee bit crazy. Evil men will respect your word if they think you are a little bit crazy, or irrational enough to hold some things sacred.

The Soviets always respected Reagan because he had fired the Air Controllers; they knew that was an irrational act. That act jeopardized the entire flight system of the United States, but Reagan did it because he said he would do it. That really impressed the Soviets; he did an irrationl thing to keep his word. No compromise.

The fall of the Soviet Union is directly related to the Reagan firing of the Air Controllers.

Evil men are only respectful, or afraid of other men who are evil, or good men who are irrational when neccesary.

Case in point, with all things being equal, whom do you think the Zeta Drug Cartel will be more afraid of, Elena Kagan or Wyatt Earp? Joe Biden or Andrew Jackson?

Case in point, in World War II you have arguably the most evil man in history, Adolf Hitler.

Who can defeat him? The rational men like  German politician Franz Van Papen, or President Herbert Hoover or British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, or  French Premier  Édouard Daladier? All good men, all competent men, all rational men. Hitler bowled them over.

It took a combination of four irrational men to defeat Hitler; Stalin, who was almost as evil as Hitler, Churchill who had not only killed people, but seemingly ENJOYED killing wogs( please reader, take the time to read Churchill’s THE RIVER WAR, about his service in the Sudan, and  THE STORY OF THE MALAKAND FIELD FORCE, the story of his service in what is now Pakistan, fighting Islamic extremists; Churchill enjoyed killing wogs), DeGaulle, who thought he was the physical embodiment of France(cuckoo) and Franklin Roosevelt( who was so irrational that he still thought he could become President as a polio cripple).

These are the type of leaders necessary to defeat evil men; President Obama has yet to show that touch of irrationality to disturb evil men.

Kim Jong-il has ordered a North Korean submarine to sink a South Korean naval ship, killing 46 South Korean sailors, nothing happens. The President of Poland gets killed in a mysterious accident, nothing happens. President  Mahmoud Ahmadinejad  accelerates the Iranian nuclear program, nothing happens.

 This Blog is not saying something should happen, what this Blog is saying is that these men are doing these things because they believe President Obama can be rolled. And he can be rolled because he is rational; in the end he will always compromise with facts on the ground.

This Blog believes that some show of madness may be good policy, or at least good protection; this blog believes that if these leaders thought Obama was a wee bit irrational, they would not create facts on the ground.

What is a cheap irrational act?, which would impress, Putin, Ahmadinejad and Kim Jong-il? Destroy the White Crashers.

The President must be relentless in their destruction, irrationally relentless, for they the White House Crashers, violated his family, the People’s House, and his guest.

Destroying the White House Crashers is the cheapest object lesson to convey, DON’T MESS WITH ME.

The evil men in the world will understand why President Obama destroyed the White House Crashers, they have all seen GODFATHER II.

http://www.entertonement.com/clips/cqhtrgwzxc–In-my-homeAl-Pacino-The-Godfather-Part-II-Don-Michael-Corleone-

Michael Corleone: You heard what happened in my home?
Frank Pentangeli: Mike, I almost died myself. We was all so relieved.
Michael Corleone: In my home!
[shouting]
Michael Corleone: In my bedroom where my wife sleeps! Where my children come and play with their toys. In my home.

President Obama must be MICHAEL CORLEONE; the White House must be his home; the White House Crashers MUST pay the price.

This WHITE PAPER is the final blog in a series of four blogs about Immigration Reform. 

“Arizona’s legislature  has just passed a measure that would require police officers to check the immigration status of anyone if there is a “reasonable suspicion” that person may be in the country illegally.” 

That basically means,in Arizona, all Mexican looking people must carry papers every time they are in public. This is the most Monty Python law ever passed; how any Arizona cop is able, by sight, to tell the difference between an illegal Mexican alien and a Native American is beyond comprehension. The end result of this law is that Native Americans will be hassled even though they were here before Arizona.

I don’t like that. 

But the people of Arizona are frustrated and angry, because our Federal Government has taken a sophomoric and pedestrian approach to Immigration.

The first of my series of blogs on American Immigration  was Jesus Christ vs. Wyatt Earp

http://gerrymaxeyworkshop.com/blogging/?p=3923

The Graham/Schumer Plan is laughable on its face.

Any Immigration Reform must address three Major Issues:

A- The United States is a nation of Laws; in reality what Graham/Schumer is asking  legal American citizens to do is this , put aside respected laws to accommodate illegals. What I ask of Senators Graham and Schumer is this; how do they expect any legal citizen to respect ANY law when LAW itself can be made capricious by demographics?

B-The Illegal Immigrants, between 11 and 20 million of them are currently residing in the United States. Any immigration reform must address that indelible fact on the ground.

C-Mexico…. America’s biggest foreign problem  is the dissolution of Mexico as a functioning civil society. It is a foreign problem which,very shortly, will be a domestic problem of epic proportions.

America must have an immigration policy reform seen as a fair necessity by both illegal aliens and populist anti immigrants. 

Yesterday I was perusing my email inbox, and received an invitation to attend a seminar in Beverly Hills; the topic was The Image of immigrants, or How Hollywood Presents Immigrants, Legal and Illegal.

One precious, LIFETIME, OPRAH  line  jumped out at me, so sincere: “How Immigrant related stories have moved hearts and minds.”  Right

Next to my computer was the day’s edition of the Los Angeles Times, about how much the hearts and minds in Arizona have been moved by immigrants.

 ”The bill directs police to determine the immigration status of noncriminals if there is a ‘reasonable suspicion’ they are undocumented. Immigrant rights groups say it amounts to a police state.

By Nicholas Riccardi

The bill, known as SB 1070, makes it a misdemeanor to lack proper immigration paperwork in Arizona. It also requires police officers, if they form a “reasonable suspicion” that someone is an illegal immigrant, to determine the person’s immigration status.

Currently, officers can inquire about someone’s immigration status only if the person is a suspect in another crime. The bill allows officers to avoid the immigration issue if it would be impractical or hinder another investigation.

Citizens can sue to compel police agencies to comply with the law, and no city or agency can formulate a policy directing its workers to ignore the law — a provision that advocates say prevents so-called sanctuary orders that police not inquire about people’s immigration status.

The bill cements the position of Arizona, whose border with Mexico is the most popular point of entry for illegal immigrants into this country, as the state most aggressively using its own laws to fight illegal immigration. In 2006 the state passed a law that would dissolve companies with a pattern of hiring illegal immigrants. Last year it made it a crime for a government worker to give improper benefits to an illegal immigrant.”

Hollywood thinks the Immigrant tale is  a cuddly saga; whereas, on the ground,  the brown kid in Mesa will have to deal with an empowered police force, not enamored of giving out hugs. I have been to Mesa.

Next week,  this blog will publish a White Paper on Immigration Reform. Any reform has to address three fundamental problems,

A- The United States is a nation of Laws; in reality what the Graham/Schumer Immigration Reform,(which President Obama is backing), is asking of  native born and legal  American citizens, is this: put aside laws which were passed by a consensus of legal Americans to accommodate people who are on American soil illegally. What I ask of Senator Graham and Senator Schumer is this, how do they expect any native born citizen to respect ANY law when LAW itself can be made capricious by demographics? There has to be a better way than Graham/Schumer.

B-The Illegal Immigrants, between 11 and 20 million of them are currently residing in the United States. Any immigration reform must address that indelible fact on the ground.

C-Mexico….Iran may be the biggest problem in the academic air, but on the ground, where citizens live,  America’s biggest foreign problem  is the dissolution of Mexico as a functioning civil society. It is a foreign problem which,very shortly, will be a domestic problem of epic proportions.

In my opinion, the Graham/Schumur Immigration Reform Package is doomed to failure. Their policy measures are pedestrian, and pedantic,  totally void of imagination or audacity or even rational common sense.

America must have an immigration policy reform seen as a fair necessity by both illegal aliens and populist anti immigrants. Though my White Paper will not be the solution; it sure as hell will be a better starting point than Graham/Shumer.

An email responding to my blog about BREAKING BAD, and Redemption

http://gerrymaxeyworkshop.com/blogging/?p=4038

“Redemption is rhe key. Something Alan Arkin says all good movies have.  Doesn’t mean a happy ending. Doesn’t necessitate a moral but it’s as u say. Ultimately it’s affirming the value of human life.  Even if that means a terminator 3 where the annihilation of much of the human race occurs. …”

S

Thanks S,  I was intrigued by your observation” Doesn’t mean a happy ending”.

This blog’s BEST FILM for 2009 was Henry Jaglom’s neat little gem, IRENE IN TIME, which I called and believe to be a vest pocket masterpiece.

http://gerrymaxeyworkshop.com/blogging/?p=2885

It has a sad ending, but in that sad ending, IRENE, pays a price for a life not lived well. It was an oddly redemptive experience watching her pay that price, in that she finally understood what was at stake in living; it is an important thing to do, and if you do not live it well, you do have options.

IRENE IN TIME fits neatly into Mr. Arkin’s observation, about a sad ending may be redemptive.

“I love your blogs on immigration, but as a student of  the American West, I have to tell you Wild Bill Hickok was a better gunman that Wyatt Earp and should be the American Example”

Vi

Vi is commenting on the immigration blog which mentioned Wyatt Earp as the American philosopher  deeply ingrained in the American spirit.

http://gerrymaxeyworkshop.com/blogging/?p=3923

Well Vi, you may know a lot about the American West, but dare I say it, you don’t know much about the American psyche.

Wild Bill Hickok was THE Greatest Gunfighter who ever lived, and he was murdered by someone who shot him in the back.

My personal American Idol, John Ford, saw Earp as a key American archtype.

Why?

Earp was a bonafide American killer,

 ”…he killed not less than eight of the assassins.”  — National Police Gazette, July 21, 1883 (speaking of Wyatt’s retaliation for the killing of his brother Morgan)

“Wyatt Earp is credited with ten men, ”  — Seattle Post-Intelligencer, July 22, 1900

“[Wyatt Earp] Has killed more than a dozen stage robbers, murderers, and cattle thieves.”  — G. W. Caldwell in the introduction to his interview with Wyatt, 1888

“[Wyatt] Earp has a cemetery which he has stocked with over 30 men, and no one seemed desirous of questioning his word.”  — Los Angeles Tribune, June 2, 1888″

By my research, Earp killed 17 men.

His brothers Morgan and Virgil were better gunfighters, though Morgan was murdered and Virgil was maimed.

I used Wyatt Earp as the baseline for the character development of my protagonist, SETH HOLLISTER in my John Ford Western, LOS PISTOLEROS.

Why Earp is more respected than Hickok, is more the American Icon, is simple, HE WAS NEVER WOUNDED, NEVER.

Not even grazed. 

Earp killed and got away with it; then married the Jewish American Princess, Josephine Sarah Marcus. He lived to be 80, died a natural death in Los Angeles, admired by John Ford.  “John Wayne later told Hugh O’Brian that he based his image of the Western lawman on his conversations with Earp. ”

Is there any better American Dream?

Mrs. Wyatt Earp

Before the Reagan Amnesty, I was dating a fabulous Mexican girl, fabulous, to give it proper prospective for my Mexican amigos, she was a combination of a tame Gloria Trevi and a tamer Paola Durante (she of the Paco Stanley murder).

There is a great Italian neo realistic film, Ladri di biciclette (THE BICYCLE THIEF) Directed by Victorio De Sica.

THE BICYCLE THIEF, ITALIAN STYLE

“ The film tells the story of Antonio Ricci, an unemployed man in the depressed post-World War II economy of Italy. With no money and a wife and two children to support, he is desperate for work. He is delighted to at last get a good job hanging up posters, but on the sole condition that he has a bicycle which must be used for work. He is told unequivocally: “No bicycle, no job.” His wife Maria pawns their bedsheets in order to get money to redeem his bicycle from the pawnbroker.

Early on in the film, Ricci’s coveted bicycle is stolen by a bold young thief who snatches it when he is hanging up a poster.

Antonio thinks that the police will take the theft very seriously, but they are not really interested in the petty theft of a bike. The only option is for Antonio and his friends to walk the streets of Rome themselves, looking for the bicycle. After trying for hours with no luck, they finally give up and leave.

Desperate for leads and with his better judgement clouded, Antonio even visits the dubious backstreet fortune teller that he had earlier mocked, in the hope that she may be able to shed light upon the bike’s whereabouts. However, she merely doles out to him one of the truisms that form her stock in trade: “you’ll find the bike quickly, or not at all.” Feeling cheated, a crestfallen Antonio hands over to her some of the last money that they have. After a rare treat of a meal in a restaurant, Antonio admits to his son that if he isn’t able to work, they will simply starve.

Antonio finally manages to locate the thief (who, it seems, had already sold the bicycle) and Bruno slips off to summon the police to the apartment. Antonio meanwhile, angrily accuses the thief of stealing his bike but the boy denies all knowledge of the crime. When the policeman arrives, he sees the accused boy lying on the floor feigning a seizure and surrounded by irate neighbours who blame Antonio’s accusations for causing the “innocent” boy’s fit.

The policeman tells Antonio that although he may have seen the boy stealing the bike, he did not catch the thief red-handed, nor has he any witnesses and that Antonio making an accusation is not good enough. With no proof and with the thief’s neighbours willing to give him a false alibi, he abandons his cause. Antonio walks away from the house in despair, as the thief’s neighbours follow, jeering at him about his lost bicycle.

At the end of the film in one of the most resonant scenes, Antonio is sitting on the curb outside the packed football stadium. He looks at the hundreds and hundreds of bicycles that are parked outside the stadium and as he cradles his head in despair, a fleet of bicycles mockingly speeds past him.

After vacillating for some time about whether to steal one for himself, he decides he has no other option but to snatch one that he spots outside an apartment. Unluckily, he is seen taking the bike and caught by a crowd of angry men who slap and humiliate him in front of his son. Ironically, this time with an army of witnesses who catch him, he is frogmarched off to the police station but after seeing how upset Bruno is, the owner of the bicycle declines to press charges.

The film ends with the boy and his son, sad and let down from what has just happened, they walk along in a crowd, leaving us with a dim outlook for the two. Holding hands, they both a reduced to tears. ”

THE BICYCLE THIEF, AMERICAN STYLE, IN THE COUNTRY WHERE WYATT EARP LIVED.

“Two bike messengers saved the day for a Los Angeles man Monday when they chased a bike thief for five blocks downtown and then knocked him to the ground, causing him to flee, police said.

Jesus Tobar, 43, said he was working out at 24-Hour Fitness in the 500 block of Flower Street in downtown Los Angeles when he emerged to find his green Iron Horse Desperado Mountain Bike gone.

Tobar returned to the gym to ask if there was any security surveillance video. But two bike couriers had seen his $500 bike being taken and had already set off after the thief.

The couriers pedaled through downtown at high speed on a chase that traversed sidewalks and busy streets, said LAPD Cmdr. Andrew Smith. Eventually, one of the messengers was able to grab the thief’s shirt and pull him to the ground.

The man then took off on foot and the couriers reclaimed the bike.

“This was a wild, high-speed bicycle chase through crowded streets of the Jewelry Mart,” Smith said. “We are now looking for a 30-year-old man with a torn shirt, a possibly sprained ankle, as well as road rash.”

 ….. Last month, bike messengers downtown caught two suspected thieves, teenage boys who attended a local Catholic high school, and stripped them down to their boxer shorts before taking their cellphones, backpacks and clothes.”

– Andrew Blankstein

What can I say? in the most laid back, cool, hip, materialistic city in the nation, Los Angeles, we have vigilantes, even vigilantes with a sense of humor. I like that. 

TRANSCRIPT FROM THE JOY BEHAR SHOW, 02-16-2010, Discussing the Murders at University of Alabama, Huntsville.

“BEHAR: That`s very interesting and a woman professor confronted her too. 

 
JORDAN: Absolutely, a very strong woman — crawled under the table and grabbed her by the legs, got her out into the hallway and shut the door and actually said something interesting. “I`ve helped you before I can help you now.”
And that`s the sort of thing that saved the lives of the rest of the faculty members”
 
FROM THE NEWS REPORT ABOUT THE SHOOTINGS
 
HUNTSVILLE, Ala. – A survivor of a university shooting rampage said the professor charged in the fatal attack methodically shot her victims in the head until the gun apparently jammed and she was pushed out of the room.
 
Associate professor Joseph Ng told The Associated Press on Tuesday he was one of 12 people at the biology department meeting Friday at the University of Alabama-Huntsville. He described the details in an e-mail to a colleague at the
University of California-Irvine.
 
Ng said the meeting had been going on for about half an hour when Amy Bishop “got up suddenly, took out a gun and started shooting at each one of us. She started with the one closest to her and went down the row shooting her targets in the head.”
 
Bishop, a Harvard-educated neurobiologist, was arrested and charged with one count of capital murder and three counts of attempted murder.
 
Killed were Gopi K. Podila, the chairman of the Department of Biological Sciences, and professors Adriel Johnson and Maria Ragland Davis. Two were wounded — professor Joseph Leahy remained in critical condition and staffer Stephanie Monticciolo was in serious condition Tuesday. The third, Luis Cruz-Vera, was released from the hospital.
 
Ng said the meeting was held around an oval table. The six people on one side were all shot.
 
“The remaining 5 including myself were on the other side of the table (and) immediately dropped to the floor,” he wrote.
 
Ng told the AP the shooting stopped almost as soon as it started. Ng said the gun seemed to jam and he and others rushed Bishop out of the room and then barricaded the door shut with a table.
 
Ng said the charge was led by Debra Moriarity, a professor of biochemistry, after Bishop aimed the gun at her and attempted to fire. When the gun didn’t shoot, Moriarity pushed her way to Bishop, urged her to stop,
and then helped force her out the door.”
 
“Moriarity was probably the one that saved our lives. She was the one that initiated the rush,” he told the AP. “It took a lot of guts to just go up to her.”
 
What in the hell has happened to our country? what in the hell has happened to our people?
 
There is a closed room, with twelve people sitting defenseless around an oval table, a nut stands up and begins methodically shooting our friends,  until her gun jams. The survivors stand up, and push her out the room, telling her that they will help her.
 
She is pushed out the room, with her gun, so she is capable of reloading and killing someone else.
 
This woman just shot our friends, and now she is defenseless, and we are bound and determined to try and help her?
 
Not this Brooklyn boy, not the girls and boys from Flatbush, from Erasmus, and Midwood and Wingate. Once that gun jammed, this Brooklyn boy will gather his friends and try to beat the living daylights out of the killer,
as I was taught to do, in the good old days.
 
We Americans, before Reality Tv, were not  sociologically correct when dealing with a killer of our friends. We took that personal.
 
WHAT IN THE HELL HAS HAPPENED TO US AS A PEOPLE?
 
This is who we were….
 
Jesse James, Frank James, the Younger Brothers  rode into a quiet farming town, Northfield Minnesota, to rob the bank. 

 ”During the raid Jessie James killed the cashier, Lee Heywood. Members of the town decided to fight back and they opened fire on the gang. Bill Chadwell, Clell Miller and Charlie Pitts were killed whereas Bob Younger, Cole Younger and James Younger, were all wounded and captured.”
 
Eight of the meanest killers in American history rode into a peaceful town; they killed a peaceful working man, only two rode out alive. Don’t we have any vigilantism left in our national character? Where are the Wyatt Earps? or for that matter the John Gottis? (Please check out what Mr. Gotti did to his next door neighbor who ran over and killed his son).
 
Are we so diluted by Oprah and Reality TV and UNDERSTANDING BAD PEOPLE, that we cannot muster enough courage to fight back?
 
Who are we?
 
The answer is simple, and more evident every day, we are ELOI.
 
These are the key points from H.G. WELLS’ 1895 masterpiece , THE TIME MACHINE. They will sound familiar. 
 
 “The Time Traveller….  meets the Eloi, a society of small, elegant, androgynous, and childlike people. They live in small communities within large and futuristic yet slowly deteriorating buildings, doing no work and eating a frugivorous diet.
His efforts to communicate with them are hampered by their lack of curiosity or discipline, and he concludes that they are a peaceful communist society, the result of humanity conquering nature with technology, and subsequently evolving
to adapt to an environment in which strength and intellect are no longer advantageous to survival. 
 
…. he is approached menacingly by the Morlocks, pale, apelike people who live in darkness underground, where he discovers the machinery and industry that makes the above-ground paradise possible. speculating that the human race has evolved
into two species: the leisured classes have become the ineffectual Eloi, and the downtrodden working classes have become the brutish light-fearing Morlocks.
 
…he explores the Morlock tunnels, learning that they feed on the Eloi. His revised analysis is that their relationship is not one of lords and servants but of livestock and ranchers, and with no real challenges facing either species.
They have both lost the intelligence and character of Man at its peak.”
 
What our parents knew was this…..you help troubled killers by killing them, that way they won’t have to worry about killing again.
 
If you don’t kill the killers, then you are Eloi, waiting to be served up.

This blog is in response to an email from Vicki D, from Newcastle upon Tyne

a-Thank you for your kind words about My favorite Westerns blog.

b-Thank you for your picture, yes it is a wonderful example of female empowerment.

c-I have honored your request and acknowledged you on the blog.

Now to answer your question,Do I consider BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN a Western?

No, even though it was set in the 1960’s West, it is a not a Western but a  drama set in the West, like HUD, THE LAST PICTURE SHOW, BAD DAY AT BLACK ROCK, or even ROAD HOUSE, THELMA and LOUISE.

My understanding is that the Western genre must be set in the  period between 1865 and 1916(the end of the Mexican Revolution, such films as THE WILD BUNCH and THE PROFESSIONALS).

A Western has to be set in the time frame in which the frontier was being tamed, no telephones nor air travel; horses not pickup trucks being  the primary source of  transportation.

Is a rodeo drama set in 1960 Wyoming a Western?
Is a love story set in 1960 Wyoming a Western?
Is a family drama set in 1960, a Western?
Is GIANT set in 1920s Texas even a Western?

I think not, a Western has to be set In its time, just as a samurai film has to be set in Medieval Japan to be a TRUE samurai film.

Now, it seems that  you, like some women, hunger for homoeroticism in a Western, therefore I suggest you find and rent RIDE VAQUERO  in which Anthony Quinn goes bananas when his “brother”, Robert Taylor falls for Ava Gardner. Or find and rent WARLOCK where Anthony Quinn goes bananas when his good “friend” Henry Fonda falls for a woman, Dolores Michaels.  There are tons of Westerns with homoerotic overtones, but RED RIVER is not one of them.  A movie is not a Gay movie just because Montgomery Clift is in it.

Finally, I  have found no homosexual overtones in the relationship between Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp; men who are killers, but who do not think they are bad people, always associate with each other , to reinforce the sense of righteous killing. Earp and Masterson of Kansas, Wild Bill Hickock and Buffalo Bill, the Texas Rangers.

Western killers are not gay; they are just killers.

RIDE VAQUERO, ANTHONY QUINN, AVA GARDNER, HOWARD KEEL, ROBERT TAYLOR

Copyrighted www.doctormacro1.info