Moore and "Fahrenheit 9/11"

I'm ecstatic that Michael Moore's new film Fahrenheit 9/11 has won the Palme D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. After Disney apparently reneged on the distribution deal, it seemed as if the forces of our free in name only media would conspire to suppress the film. As in many previous cases, the attempt to suppress has backfired, and has attracted reams of free publicity for the film. When it finally gets released in North America, it will be widely seen. And that is a good thing.

Moore is someone we need--willing to dig beneath the bullshit and pose questions about what is going on behind the curtain. His passionate, courageous patriotism--and he is a patriot, no matter what his detractors may say--and willingness to speak out is rare in mainstream media. And even if you don't agree with what he is saying, if you value democracy you should give thanks for people like him. For his greatest strength is posing challenging questions and getting ordinary people to think about politics.

I only hope that voters in the U.S. will do the right thing and get the Bush administration out of office in November. It is a moral imperative, not only for America, but for the safety of the World and the development of policies based on compassion and sanity.

This is my first time.

On a whim I created this blog. I don't know how often I will post, or if this is even worth starting up, but I'll give it a shot. It's always a challenge, staring at a blank page. Exciting--imagine the possiblities! And scary--what the hell do I write?

Ok, I'll tell you this. I recently bought a DVD box set of five old Hitchcock movies. I've watched four of the films so far: Notorious, Spellbound, The 39 Steps, and The Lady Vanishes. I've learned this: Hitchcock was a great director, even from the very beginning. "The Lady Vanishes" opens with a shot where the camera moves over to a mountain village, then travels over and then into the village, finally going to a closeup on a window in a hotel. A great shot. It was obviously done with a model of the village and surrounding landscape, but that doesn't detract from its creativity. Films today use similar effects, albeit with computerized effects work, but here's Hitchcock doing it in the '30s. Amazing.

And don't get me started on Notorious. I knew of this film by reputation. Ebert included it in his The Great Movies book, and it sounded intriguing. But how genuinely suspenseful and interesting could it be? The answer is, extremely. What a terrific film. The characters are constantly operating on several levels. We note what they do, but also have an understanding of what's going on inside them (or we think we do). And the sheer suspense of the set pieces still hold up. There's a scene where Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman are snooping in a wine cellar using a stolen key. Bergman's husband is upstairs at a party. He will go down to the wine cellar when the champagne runs out. As Bergman and Grant are rummaging around the cellar, there are shots of the case of champagne, with the number of bottles slowly diminishing. How simple editing generates tremendous suspense! The final scene on the stairs I will leave you to discover for yourself. All I can say is that this film is a treasure. If the story seems somewhat familiar, it was ripped off in Mission Impossible 2.

All these Hitchcock DVDs are put out by Criterion, a company that consistently develops superb discs that include the best version of a particular film. These early Hitchcock flicks have all been restored and the picture and sound quality is excellent. Several of these films are going out of print in their Criterion incarnations, so pick them up while you can, before they show up on EBay for absurd amounts of cash. Subsequent editions are unlikely to be as good as the Criterion versions.

(I am a film buff, as you will no doubt guess by now.)

Later.