Creative and Over the Top!

Recently I had two awards kindly bestowed upon me. One was the Creative Blogger (aka Kreativ Blogger) Award, passed on to me by Sally of Flying Down to Hollywood. Thanks, Sally! I'm choosing to interpret the rules for this one creatively (since that is the name of the award after all) and to start off I made my own logo. (Have you seen the other one? Really.)


I'm also supposed to name 7 interesting things about me. But since I just wrote 5 things about me with the last award I got, I choose to add on only two more here:

6. I just brought home a pet parakeet and have named him Bogie. I'm hoping to teach him to talk eventually. Maybe I can get him to say "Here's looking at you, bird." or even "We'll always have parrots." (I can't help myself.)

7. I actually do think of myself as a creative person. I love to draw, sew, knit, etc. When I was younger, my mom and I sewed up a black and white houndstooth number that looked just like Lauren Bacall's suit in The Big Sleep. I wish I still had it (and that it fit me).

8. OK, I lied, I'm adding on one more thing: I have a separate blog for my crafty/creative side. You can find it here: Wendymoon Designs.

And now, in lieu of nominating more "Kreativ" bloggers, I invite anyone who's already received this award to steal my logo for it. (Just say I made it, if you please.)

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On to award number two. This one is the "Your blog is Over the Top!" award which was given to me by Caitlin, Princess Fire and Music herself. Thanks so much!


While I take this as a compliment, I don't know that I really have an over the top kind of blog. So, since I'm also creative, I decided to skip the questionnaire that comes along with this award and instead highlight what I consider to be real Over-the-Top-ness with a top five countdown of over the top movie performances/characters.

5. Burt Lancaster as General James Mattoon Scott in Seven Days in May

I tend to think that Burt Lancaster is always a bit of a ham. But his total commitment to the single-minded purpose of the sneaky general really works in this film. (Although he plays unlikable so well, it's a bit hard to see where the character's support would come from. Oh, well.)

4. Orson Welles as Will Varner in The Long Hot Summer

Will Varner's a growling, yelling, bombastic guy played to perfection by Welles, whose physical bulk adds to the larger-than-life feeling of this big daddy.

3. William Demarest as Constable Edmund Kockenlocker in The Miracle of Morgan's Creek

A case could be made for Betty Hutton (and/or Eddie Bracken) in this movie as well, but Demarest holds nothing back with his broad physical comedy here and that earns him a spot on my list.

2. George C. Scott as General Buck Turgidson in Doctor Strangelove

The word is that director Stanley Kubrick always asked George for one over the top take, and Scott wasn't happy when those were all the takes that got used. But it makes for an attention grabbing performance that stands up to (and even outshines) Peter Sellers.

1. The entire cast of It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World

Let's face it, this whole movie is over the top. The title might have been cut back from having a "Mad" for every star in it, but there's still a powerful group of actors here doing lots of crazy things. There's nothing subtle in how Jimmy Durante kicks the bucket, or Jonathan Winters destroying the service station, or any moment with Ethel Merman. Delightfully excessive and the top of my over the top list.

Anyone who wants to take this idea and run with it is welcome to the Over the Top! Award from me. And now, back to our regularly scheduled movie blogging.

If I were a TCM guest (fan) programmer...

Jealous. That's how I feel every time I see a TCM guest programmer introducing his or her favorite movies. And while it's bad enough that TCM has guest programmers that aren't me, now they have fan programmers that aren't me either. How fun would that be, chatting about some lovely film with movie know-it-all (in a good way) Robert Osborne?

Stacia at She Blogged by Night has an interview with one of the chosen fan programmers explaining what the experience was like. She was asked to pick 10 films that meant something to her for TCM to narrow down.

What would my picks be?

The Maltese Falcon - A favorite. I especially love watching Sam's little laughs at Brigid's lies and his interactions with the fat man.

The Third Man - Another favorite. Besides the classic ferris wheel scene, there's also the great buildup to the reveal of Orson Welles' character. And you just have to sympathize with Holly Martins and his situation: "That sounds like a cheap novelette." "Well, I write cheap novelettes."

The Philadelphia Story - For the dialogue and characters.

The Muppet Movie - Because Kermit was too modest to mention it when he was a TCM guest programmer. This is also a movie I remember fondly from my childhood, when I used to watch it on our RCA SelectaVision VideoDisc Player (I can still hum the opening music it had before every movie, and I often remember from the movies we owned the scene when we had to flip to the other side of the disc). I also love seeing all the guest stars, particularly Mel Brooks, Steve Martin, and Edgar Bergen with Charlie McCarthy. How can you not love a movie about friendship and dreams? "Life's like a movie, write your own ending, keep believing, keep pretending..."

Father of the Bride - Spencer Tracy reminds me of my dad, who got me into classic movies in the first place. When I got married, he quoted some lines from this movie that made me cry.

The Hustler - Incredible performances. (And I could also talk semi-intelligently about the novel.)

The Long Hot Summer - More Newman, which is always nice, and a great look at all different kinds of relationships. Particularly interesting is the pressure on Clara to find a husband to satisfy both her heart and head.

Holiday - One of my Overlooked Oldies, which fits right in with the idea of TCM introducing people to classics they should know.

It's Always Fair Weather - I grew up on musicals, and this is a unique one that I think deserves some more attention.

The Major and the Minor - If I could only pick one film to talk about on TCM, it might very well be this one. It's the first movie I brought up in my Overlooked Oldies for a reason. Not only do I find the whole thing charming, but I also think it's significant as Billy Wilder's debut as a Hollywood director. Imagine if it hadn't gone well, what other movies we might be missing out on -- The Apartment, Some Like it Hot, Sunset Blvd. I find it incredible that he was able to write so well in what was not his first language. He manages to satirize and make fun of people while still getting you to sympathize and care for them. Pretty amazing.

What film(s) would you pick if you had the chance to go on TCM? An all-time favorite, even if it was well-known? A lesser-known movie with a lot of personal meaning? A really obscure gem to show off your film knowledge and try and one-up Mr. O? Share your thoughts, maybe TCM is listening for next time...

(And by the way, happy 15th anniversary, TCM.)

I am sad about Paul Newman.

I stopped right in the middle of the grocery aisle yesterday, probably upsetting the lady pushing the cart behind me, struck at the sight of Paul Newman's face on a bottle of Newman's Own pasta sauce. I wondered idly if his recent death had boosted sales and tried to judge it by the number of bottles missing compared to the other brands.

Why am I saddened by the death of someone I have never met? What is the fascination with movie stars, anyhow?

The first thought I had upon hearing of Newman's death (in the airport, seeing it flashed on a tv screen as I stepped out from the plane) was of the actor as a vibrant, healthy young man. It was similar to what you say when someone dies unexpectedly: "But I just saw him the other day!" As if that would make it impossible for the person to die. For me it was something like: "But I just watched The Hustler, and he looked great!" Never mind that the movie is 40+ years old. I tried to do the math in my head. If he was in his 30s then, was he, say, late 70s at his death? Nope. 83. Not a bad run.

What are the stages of grief again? I went from Denial pretty quickly to Acceptance. On to reliving the happy memories of the deceased, which in this case for me means rewatching some great Paul Newman movies. I started my personal tribute with The Long Hot Summer. There he is, strong and sexy and so alive. I remembered why I love this movie, why one time watching it I paused it repeatedly to write down the best lines. ("If you're saving it all for him, honey, you've got your account in the wrong bank.") I remembered a time when I was in a place more like Joanne Woodward's character, single and feeling old and pining away for the wrong guy. Not a bad deal for her, having Paul Newman come along. He really sizzles.

And there's the connection for me. The remembrance tugging at me is not so much of a man I never met, but of the way I felt watching him in different roles. The moment of escape, getting caught up in the story, imagining myself as a part of it. Maybe he didn't share those emotions with me, but in a way, I shared them with him. The movies are fake, but the feelings they conjure are real.

So, even though this loss changes nothing for me (I can still watch his movies, which is all I ever had of him anyway) I guess I'm in a sort of mourning for Paul Newman. How will I cope? Up next is The Sting, and maybe a bag of Champion Chip Cookies. The orange ones.