“I always think there’s a band, kid.” ***** Heard anyone say recently that America isn’t all she’s cracked up to be? That we’re undergoing some sort of identity crisis? That a better name for us might be the United Hates of America? That beneath our status as the world’s number one superpower lies an underbelly […]
3. The Music Man (DaCosta, 1962) Read More »
I used to think that, if you were a Beatles man, you had to be a Beatles man all the way. Never mind that the Beatles and the Stones, throughout their “rivalry,” hung out with each other like they were their generation’s Rat Pack. Never mind that the Beatles and the Stones staked out distinctly
4. Let It Bleed (The Rolling Stones, 1969) Read More »
Sometimes with a movie, it’s all about the tagline: “They’re young … they’re in love … and they kill people.” [record scratch] Say what? ***** Until a couple of weeks after I turned seventeen, Bonnie and Clyde was one of those movies I vaguely knew existed but didn’t know the first thing about. Sort of
4. Bonnie and Clyde (Penn, 1967) Read More »
The English poetic tradition is a long one, but in the vast annals of British verse – a lineage stemming from Shakespeare, Milton, Spencer, and Dryden on to Byron, Shelley, Wordsworth, and Coleridge – only a few scattered lines in a few select works have scaled the heights of linguistic incisiveness and rhetorical dexterity. Though
5. Led Zeppelin II (Led Zeppelin, 1969) Read More »
Uh … didn’t that year happen already? Are they going to update the movie so that it’s accurate? Seriously? You mean I’m supposed to watch some movie that includes a bunch of mistaken predictions? At least when Prince wrote “1999,” he didn’t fill the lyrics with a bunch of mistaken predictions about the year 1999.
5. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968) Read More »
What the white whale was to Ahab, has been hinted; what, at times, he was to me, as yet remains unsaid. Aside from those more obvious considerations touching Moby Dick, which could not but occasionally awaken in any man’s soul some alarm, there was another thought, or rather vague, nameless horror concerning him, which at times
6. The Beatles (The Beatles, 1968) Read More »
You know what I love about Italian movies? I love that I can watch them more than once. American movies? Too easy. Give me one viewing and I’m good. Citizen Kane? Yeah, I knew what time it was. The Godfather? Didn’t need a Ph. D in Best Movies Ever Studies to figure that one out.
6. La Dolce Vita (Fellini, 1960) Read More »
Lou Reed, the lyricist, I like to compare to water flowing downhill: he takes the quickest, shortest path. It’s not always precise, it’s not always artful, but, like a garbage man making the morning rounds, he gets the job done. He cuts to the chase. He shoots first and asks questions later. I don’t even
7. The Velvet Underground & Nico (The Velvet Underground/Nico, 1967) Read More »
I’ve always wanted to hijack a hospital intercom, press the little button and go, “Paging Dr. Zhivago, paging Dr. Zhivago.” Just to see if anyone notices. ***** Some movies are like a snack that tides you over – a can of Pringles, a box of Triscuits, a bag of Pepperidge Farm Goldfish. Doctor Zhivago is
7. Doctor Zhivago (Lean, 1965) Read More »
After initially coming home from the record store assuming I’d purchased either the soundtrack to a new Pixar film centered around a giant, anthropomorphic flamingo, or the latest release from the older sister of early 2000s dance-pop diva P!nk, and finding myself sorely disappointed, I decided to give it a couple of listens anyway and,
8. Music From Big Pink (The Band, 1968) Read More »