taxpayer subsidies for millionaires

Robert De Niro mugging for the camera in his American Express TV commercial

Robert De Niro on suggested cuts to the NEA :

Robert De Niro ripped into the Trump administration’s plans to chop funding to the arts tonight at a gala benefit in his honor at Lincoln Center on Monday night. In his acceptance speech, De Niro called for health care and referenced Donald Trump’s comments about Meryl Streep following her own honor at the Golden Globes earlier this year, but he reserved the bulk of his ire for lamenting to strip funding to government support to agencies supporting the arts.

“We make movies to entertain audiences. Audiences vote by seeing them; critics vote by writing about them; and then posterity takes its time to decide if they’re art — or not,” De Niro said while accepting the Film Society of Lincoln Center’s 44th annual Chaplin Award. “I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately because of our government’s hostility towards art. The budget proposal, among its other draconian cuts to life-saving and life-enhancing programs, eliminates the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. For their own divisive political purposes, the administration suggests that the money for these all-inclusive programs goes to rich liberal elites. This is what they now call an ‘alternative fact,’ but I call it bullshit.”

Who could imagine rich liberal elites wanting subsidies for rich liberal elite multimillionaires?

Robert DeNiro (net worth $200,000,000) is a founder of the Tribeca Film Institute and a member of it's board of directors. According to the NEA grant search for "Tribeca Film Institute" :

In 2017 they received 3 grants totaling $50,000.
In 2016 they received a single $50,000 grant.
In 2015 they received a single $15,000 grant.
In 2014 they received a single $40,000 grant.
In 2013 they received a single $50,000 grant.
In 2012 they received two grants totaling $95,000 grant.
In 2011 they received two grants totaling $90,000 grant.
no grants in 2010 and 2009
In 2008 they received a single $40,000 grant.
no grants from its founding in 2002 to 2007
In total that is $430,000. That is an average of $43,000 per year from it's first grant to 2017.

According to the NEH grant search for "Tribeca Film Institute" :
2010 the received $65,000
2011 they received $350,000
2013 they received a supplement grant of $75,000
2014 they received $20,000 ($40,000 approved but only $230,000 awarded)
In total that is $510,000 from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Together from the NEA & NEH it comes to $940,000 over 10 years or an average of $94,000 per year. I wonder if he mentioned in his speech that he is complaining that his pet project would lose out on getting government money?

Here is Robert De Niro in a Subaru car TV commercial

Here is Robert de Niro in a Docomo dVideo Japanese TV commercial

Here is Robert De Niro in an American Express commercial

Here is Robert De Niro in a Santander Bank TV commercial


Clearly, he is willing to show up in exchange for money as the above ads show as does his work in the movies Dirty Grandpa (2016) and Joy(2015).

I know what you're thinking, without grants from taxpayers whose net worth and yearly income is far, far less than his; will his children go hungry? Good news! Robert De Niro owns 2 or possibly 3 restaurants : Nobu, Tribeca Grill , and the Greenwich Hotel which houses a restaurant. His kids can bus tables and eat other people's leftovers.

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Let's look at another liberal elite multimillionaire : Robert Redford net worth $170,000,000

According to the NEA grant search for his "Sundance Institute"
2017  3 grants worth $270,000
2016  3 grants worth $270,000
2015  3 grants worth $280,000
2014  3 grants worth $225,000
2013  2 grants worth $95,000
2012  2 grants worth $180,000
2011  2 grants worth $180,000
2010  2 grants worth $225,000
2009  2 grants worth $180,000
2008  2 grants worth $175,000
2007  2 grants worth $155,000
2006  2 grants worth $150,000
2005  2 grants worth $150,000
2004  2 grants worth $150,000
2003  2 grants worth $133,000
2002  2 grants worth $127,000
2001  2 grants worth $125,000
2000  3 grants worth $132,000
1999  1 grant worth $100,000
1998  2 grants worth $161,750

Robert Redford has said that the founding of Sundance was helped by NEA grants. They have received NEA grants every year since 1981 but unfortunately anything before 1998 isn't included in the NEA grant search. A search of the NEH grant database returned nothing. Between 1998 and 2017 the Sundance Institute has received $3,463,750 or an average of $173,187 per year.


here is Robert Redford's image and his voiceover in a Honda ad

here is a Robert Redford voiceover for a United Airline TV ad

Like Robert De Niro, Robert Redford is capable of making money selling his talents,

Robert Redford's reaction to the prospect of NEA cuts :

In 1981, the National Endowment for the Arts played a fundamental role in helping me create Sundance Institute. The NEA generously contributed a $25,000 grant to assist us in launching the very first labs for independent filmmakers to develop new work (programs that continue to this day).

That first promising investment from the NEA, and their belief in my project was vital to launching programs that now support tens of thousands of American artists working in film and theater and new media....

...[cuts to the NEA] would deprive all our citizens of the culture and diversity the humanities brings to our country

He describes the NEA's investment as "vital" to his pet project. Does anyone believe that if the government hadn't thrown in some cash then the famous millionaire would have said "well, I could hit up Paul Newman for that $25,000. Or I could beg for money from business associates and coworkers. Or just work more. But no matter how much I think the Sundance Institute is a good idea; getting cash from taxpayers is indispensable! If I don't get at least $8.50 from the government then screw you clowns, I'll just scrap the whole thing!"

In 2015 they received $280,000 from the NEA. In context, this is a small amount to the Sundance Institute as their revenue from all sources was $45,661,608.  That means in 2015 less than one percent, a mere 0.61%, of the Sundance Institute's budget was from NEA grants but apparently that is enough to "deprive all our citizens of the culture and diversity the humanities brings to our country." Not giving a famous millionaire actor money deprives all our citizens of diversity?

One last thing, according to the filings posted by CharityNavigator.org the Sundance Institute received $2,306,564 in 2015 from government grants (7.6%). That leaves $2,026,564 in taxpayer money that they received but with a government so large and opaque I don't know how or why or where they received it from.

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In contrast, this 2012 article on celebrity donations mentions Alec Baldwin giving over a million dollars to the cleverly named Alec Baldwin Foundation. The foundation then issued grants  of $50,000 to the NY Philharmonic, $42,500 to Waterkeeper Alliance, and $250,000 to the Carol M Baldwin Breast Cancer Research Foundation.

The NEA grant search returns zero results for "Alec Baldwin." He's putting his money towards his personal interests without demanding uninterested taxpayers also give money according to his whim. Good for him.

movie notes : Crumb (1994)

from the commentary track of the documentary movie Crumb (1994) (around the 24 minute mark)

Terry Zwigoff, director :  This guy Skutch he's talking about [a high school bully from the Crumb childhood] is another guy I tried to track down and interview in the film and I actually found him. He was living outside Milford, Delaware; close to where he'd gone to high school. I got him on the phone and I said to him I'd doing a documentary about this guy Robert Crumb and his brother Charles and Max and do you remember him from high school. He said "yeah vaguely" I said what do you do for a living? I may come out there and interview you if; we're trying to raise more money at the time... He said he ran some sort of salvage operation; I couldn't tell from that whether it was some sort of like a  progressive recycling situation or just a city dump. I couldn't tell. We were so short on money I just sort of let that go. It could have been good, I don't know.

it is an interesting distinction to draw into importance. Now, I may be being uncharitable but it seems like he sees a "progressive recycling situation" as something wonderful while a city dump/scrap yard/salvage operation is simply and distinctly déclassé. But is there a difference?

There is to some. Not a practical difference; both are recycling. Both are about reuse. Both are about not being wasteful. The difference is an arbitrary one of social standing.

This is much like those who are fascinated by "tiny houses," even those with wheels so they are mobile but somehow the phrases "mobile home" or "trailer home" are studiously omitted.  The difference between a tiny house and a mobile home is often defined as being able to afford minimalism vs not being able to afford something other than a mobile home.

Again,  I may be being uncharitable (and a little unfair as I am not a mind reader) but he did feel it necessary to interrupt his fellow commentarian to put this little bit of information out there (and the above transcript is the full statement he made about the man).  I sense he was thinking of the meme of the bully in high school who peaks in those years and then declines into obscurity while the victims of the bully have a documentary film made about them.

movie notes : Dark Star H.R. Giger's World

as seen in the movie Dark Star H.R. Giger's World (2014)

H.R. Giger, designer from the movie Alien and painter of the weird and macabre,  at home

Yeah, that's H.R. Giger in a selfie with his cat

movie notes : mirror movies

Ever notice how sometimes vaguely similar movies are released within a short time of one another? I suppose the idea is to piggyback on the publicity of the other movie.

Some examples (not an exhaustive list) :
Abyss (1989) vs Leviathan (1989) vs Deepstar Six (1989)
1492 (1992) vs Christopher Columbus : The Discovery (1992)

Volcano (1997) vs Dante's Peak (1997)

Antz (1998) vs A Bug's Life (1998)
Armageddon (1999) vs Deep Impact (1999)
Mission to Mars (2000) vs The Red Planet (2000)
White House Down (2013) vs Olympus Has Fallen (2013)

for your consideration :
Prometheus (2012) vs Small Apartments (2012)

Prometheus vs Small Apartments - So far my list of  similarities includes that they both have a pale, hairless character who is a "big fella" and runs around nearly naked (the skintight underoos of the Engineer in Prometheus and the white underpants of Franklin Franklin played by Matt Lucas in Small Apartments)

movie notes : Jerry Seinfeld in the Bee Movie

This would have been a much better movie if it had been about the travails of Jerry Seinfeld, etc making a B-movie while wearing fluffy bee suits rather than what was finally made.

movie notes : the Pruitt-Igoe Myth

The Pruitt-Igoe Housing Project being given up on as a failure and imploded after only 18 years after taking over $300 million (in 2013 dollars)  to build.

The Pruitt-Igoe Myth (2011) was imperfect but still an interesting documentary about rise and fall of the Pruitt-Igoe public housing project. One thing that stuck with me is that the introduction and conclusion assert that blaming modernist architecture, the welfare state and residents as causes of the decline of Pruitt-Igoe were mythical and that there were other external reasons for the decline. Interestingly, while watching it, it seemed that a fair amount of the material presented does point some blame in the direction of the so called myths.

I've strung together a few clips that I found interesting. Below is a partial transcript of those clips and some commentary.

The Myth of the Pruitt-Igoe Myth

clip one - introduction
The Pruitt-Igoe public housing development in St Louis, Missouri was opened in 1954 and demolished in 1972.

"What caused the failure? The Pruitt-Igoe myth begins here. … Some blame the architect, Modernist high rises like Pruitt-Igoe the say created a breeding ground for isolation, vandalism and crime … Others attacked the welfare state. Big government, the problem and Pruitt-Igoe the result. … Many stated flatly that the residents were too poor, uneducated or rural. That they caused their own problems and had taken Pruitt-Igoe with them. … Long after the dust settled and the site was cleared this was the Pruitt-Igoe that remained. The mythical Pruitt-Igoe with a fatal flaw, doomed to failure from the start."

here is your myth checklist :

• modernist architecture
• the welfare state
• the residents caused their own problems

clip two -  conclusion (starts at 3:25)

"The implosion footage was so shocking just because there was still in people's minds the idea that this had been the solution. It was a very painful moment of truth to see that failure. That's why in many ways that Pruitt-Igoe is not just the national and even the world symbol for the failure of American public housing it's also been a symbol for the perceived failure of well intentioned government policies in general. And that's why I think its so important to look beyond the famous pictures of the towers being destroyed and really try to understand what failed and why. In some ways Pruitt-Igoe failed because housing alone couldn't deal with the most basic issues that were troubling the American city. There was just no way to build your way out of that tragedy. I think we have a responsibility to understand those failures and to learn from them and to do better." – Robert Fishman (urban historian)
…
"We don't want people to think of Pruitt-Igoe as a failure if they're going to then to translate that failure into all public housing or all government programs or all social welfare or all modernism. That is what Pruitt-Igoe has been freighted with. If we want to say that this one project, in this one place, for this one set of reasons declined to the point where people thought it was necessary to tear it down that's one thing. But that's simply not how we've told the story."

What a bizarre standard for judging failure!  If someone suggests a systemic problem then people should pretend Pruitt-Igoe was a roaring success? That attitude makes me doubt how much some people want to learn from the failure if they refuse to consider some potential causes. 

The bigger story is in fact the decline of the city overall. What happened to St Louis was tragic. It's kind of a slow motion Katrina in a way. St Louis lost half its population and had a devastated tax base and a drained economy over the course of 50 years from World War II even to the present. It's no wonder Pruitt-Igoe declined in those circumstances. I mean, it would be hard to imagine a public housing project surviving under those conditions" – Joseph Heathcott

Did other housing survive? Did other neighborhoods in St Louis survive? If so then it suggests that there might have been something unique to Pruitt-Igoe being a government project and in being a political project. 

clip three - planning and control (starts at 6:11)

"Before we moved into Pruitt-Igoe, the Welfare Department came to our home, they talked with my mother about moving into the housing project but the stipulation was that my father could not be with us. They would put us into the housing projects only if he left the state. My mother and father discussed it and they decided it was best for the 12 children for the father to leave the home. And that's how we got into the projects"  – Jacquelyn Williams (former resident) 

Gee, what could go wrong.  Surely, the Welfare Dept. didn't see itself as splitting a family apart and positioning the government and/or modernist architecture to be a replacement parent. I bet the Department was mostly concerned not with any consequences but if it could recruit enough residents to meet the bureaucracy's expectations. Unfortunately, the filmmakers didn't let us know if her parents came to regret that decision.

"The Welfare Department had a rule that no able bodied man could be in the house if a woman received aid for dependent children. If a man lost his job and was looking for work he still had to leave the home. There was even a night staff of men who worked for the welfare department whose job was to go to the homes of the welfare recipients and they searched to find if there was a man in the home."  – Joyce Ladner (sociologist)

"There were so many restrictions. We couldn't have a telephone. We couldn't have a television."  – Jacquelyn Williams (former resident) 

The rules of the housing project concerning TVs were changed a few years later. I'm not sure about the phone rule. Sometimes control is about control.


clip four - "unbreakable" (starts at 9:45)

"I think it created a mindset for the inhabitants that they weren't cared about and I think that manifested itself in a way that caused more harm to the tenants than an other entity. The vandalism that existed at Pruitt-Igoe came from that environment. Things allowed to just deteriorate and people not really caring. And so management decided, well instead of  trying to enhance their existence we'll just make things so they can't be destroyed. Everything had to be protected. Light fixtures; no light exposed and shields around them with mesh metal protecting the bulb. Y'know, the fact that it was indestructible made you want to try to destroy things."  – Brian King (former resident)

This does seem inherent to public housing as when most people destroy their own property they find that they have to spend their own money to replace it.  The modernist dream of regimenting people into designated communal areas led to a tragedy of the commons.

"There was a screen around the lightbulb that kept you from breaking them. Y'know, kids'll be kids, find a way to break 'em. … they took all the lights off the elevator, put 'em, recessed them up into the ceiling and then they tried to cover that up with plexiglass but sometimes people would try to set that plexiglass on fire. Sometimes instead of taking the trash and putting it inside the incinerator, they just set it on fire right out there in the middle of the floor… After I moved away from Pruitt-Igoe, I went on to become a police officer with St Louis City… I do remember people calling the police and trying to come into the buildings and the would drop just anything they could find. Trash; throw trash out the window. I remember that. I remember them throwing firebombs out onto the police cars. I remember they did that.  So there is enough blame to go around."  – Valerie Sills (former resident)

"I don't think that people rationalized that somebody's house burned down or people could be killed. I think they just saw that firetruck or that  police car or that ambulance as the enemy. It was just bitter people, angry people and that was a way of making a statement. We're not happy here and we want you to know it. And the way you gonna know it is these bricks and bottles will rain down on you no matter who it's saving , no matter how relevant or important it is. We want you to understand you're not welcome here."  – Brian King (former resident)

Contrary to Le Corbusier and the Modernists, communities are built through human interaction and individual decisions and do not spring into existence as soon as an architect declares something to be communal property.  I don't think it would be too harsh to suggest that some of the residents "caused their own problems" as I think most would consider their home being on fire to be a problem.

The movie suggests that the problems with Pruitt-Igoe were caused not by modernist architecture, the welfare state or some of the residents but by was racism, housing discrimination, segregation and the rise of suburbanism. This seems less convincing when one realizes that blacks lived in places other than Pruitt-Igoe and lived there successfully without lighting the place on fire or shattering their own light bulbs. It is true that a person can die if they have no food for a month but that does not mean that it isn't also true that a person can die from a lack of oxygen.

From the Housing & Urban Development publication Creating Defensible Space by Oscar Newman (April 1996) p11 (PDF)

"Across the street from Pruitt-Igoe was an older, smaller, rowhouse complex, Carr Square Village,  occupied by an identical population. It had remained fully occupied and trouble-free throughout the construction, occupancy, and decline of Pruitt-Igoe."

movie notes : Prometheus

spoilers abound below the fold

movie notes : The Wolverine

spoilers below

movie notes : Man of Steel

spoiler alert below the fold

movie trivia game

Here's the game : describe a movie in a way that is specific enough for most people to recognize it but generally enough that it can also describe another movie.  Ideally, the second movie is radically different than the first (ie. referencing sequels is cheating).


example one
Description : a young man leaves home and goes far, far away to save a community under siege by an old guy and some monsterous creatures trying to take over and along the way gets wise advise from a little green guy.
Answer : Star Wars
Alternative answer : the Muppets (2011) 
a young man (Luke Skywalker/Walter) leaves home and goes far, far away to save a (Ewok/Muppet) community under siege by an old guy (The Emperor/Tex Richman) and his lackeys (Stormtroopers/henchmen muppets) and his monsters (bounty hunters/henchmen muppets) trying to take over and along the way gets wise advise from a little green guy (Yoda/Kermit).


example two

Description : Milla Jovovich plays a peculiar woman who doesn't seem to understand the prevailing customs, she shows up to help this guy (and he helps her) and she thinks she is a savior for the cause  all among a barrage of violence. 

Answer : The Fifth Element

Alternative answer : Messenger the Story of Joan of Arc

Milla Jovovich plays a peculiar woman (Leeloo/Joan of Arc) who doesn't seem to understand the prevailing customs, she shows up to help this guy (Korben Dallas/the Dauphin)  (and he helps her) and she thinks she is a savior for the cause  all among a barrage of violence (the Mangalores/the Hundred Years' War). 


example three

Description : An archaeologist will go any distance to find ancient relics and along the way he climbs in ancient ruins, befriends a small boy, meets a girl and fights an evil villain and his henchmen.

Answer : Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

Alternative answer : Stargate

An archaeologist (Indiana Jones/Dr. Daniel Jackson) will go any distance to find ancient relics and along the way he climbs in ancient ruins, befriends a small boy (Short Round/egyptian kid), meets a girl and fights an evil villain (Thugee high Priest/Ra) and his henchmen (Thugee cultists/animal head guards).


Example of what not to do : 
Description : a guy goes away to fulfill a task, faces a challenge where his actions decide the fate of others, and in the process overcomes something.
Answer : it might be easier to count the movies that don't match the description.

A French accent isn't that hard

A French accent isn't that hard and there is such a thing as French actors (and there is even such a thing as unpretentious French actors) so I don't understand why some movies have people speaking with a British accent when the character is French.  If it were an all-British production it would be more understandable but even the American actors put on a British accent. Almost everything is in English except they will say "monsieur" and "mademoiselle" instead of Sir and Madam and French proper names, some or all written text, and the names of locations are said in French.

They could simply make the point that the setting is France with a graphic in the beginning that says "Location : Paris, France" and then carry on in English. Or they could do it in French and subtitle it.

I assume the reasoning is due to one of or several of the following :
a) A shortcut to let it sound foreign and yet understandable.
b) Hollywood has a very, very poor grasp of geography.
c) A ploy to piss off the frenchies.

A couple examples from the movie Hugo (2011)  (keep in mind that every single character is supposed to be French) :

As I recall, another example would be the 1998 movie version of Les Misérables which had a mess of accents, mostly not French – specifically, Liam Neeson didn't bother putting on an accent and Claire Danes' French character alternated between an American and a British accent.

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It's an interesting poster/mural from the movie Hugo.  A globe, a chubby body with something exiting his heart, a blob and a VU on either side. It looks vaguely familiar but I can't place it. I'd love to know what it is.

on musicals

Above is "Life's a Happy Song" from the Muppet movie with music & lyrics by Bret McKenzie (the beardo half of Flight of the Conchords aka NOT the sideburns dude from Flight of the Conchords) and it sounds like it. Bravo.

The problem I have with musicals is that not everything is sung. If everyone always sang then there would be a single point of suspension of belief : these people are crazy good at rhyming, improvisation and performing. Since everyone doesn't always sing then that implies it is still a difficult task requiring forethought and training.

Everything goes along like a normal day only occasionally, out of the blue someone will burst into song and then random people in the background will do a little back up singing and, of course, a bit of dancing. (not really out of the blue, it is usually at a significant event or preceding a significant event. Rarely, if ever, is there singing about eating breakfast or putting on socks)

Does this happen every day? Is that how everyone knows the words and have seemingly well practiced their synchronized dance moves? Are the back up singers/dancers paid or is there some social obligation that if someone starts singing then everyone else is expected to join in?

Are the songs made up impromptu or do they hire writers? Choreographers? Rehearse? Do they keep singing basically the same song everyday and eventually it gets better?

Sometimes, does one of the lonely background people decide to start singing and then does everyone else join in or is that reserved for certain people? Could someone jump up onto a table and start singing and dancing and then that would make everyone else believe they are part of the "star" social class?

What happens to those who can't sing or dance; are they shunned? Or when the dancing starts are they required to leave the room and hide or pretend to be a tree until the number is over?

Future Oscar Winner

Joe Hildebrand on how to win an oscar :
"Of course if you’re a member of the Academy and spend your life at sushi dinners talking about how challenging French cinema is you can’t actually take into account whether a film is good or not. You just have to make sure it either contains a Nazi, a homo or a retard."


My response :
You are right that what would be golden would be the story of a gay retarded nazi. Here's an excerpt from the rough draft of my soon to be Oscar winning script :

Hans : B-but why George? Why do you want to take away George the bunny? George the bunny is my very, very best friend next to you, George
George : Nein! Nein! Das ist jewish bunny!! Das ist verboooooten!
Hans : But George...

(in walks Gretchen, George's stern female superior officer dressed in her heeled leather boots, black stockings, black garters and a shiny black leather uniform. She slowly walks about the room while reckless swinging her riding crop. She is to be played by someone other than Claire Danes who would probably intermittently use a british accent)

Gretchen : Hey guys, whatcha doin'?
George : Vat are you doing here?
Gretchen : I was just stopping by to see if you've been a naughty boy... and maybe inspect some privates. (she suggestively runs her hand up George (not the bunny)'s chest and to his fashionably starched shirt collar) You know, it's my job to know if anyone here needs a spanking? (she is staring intently at George's lips and lightly touches them with her fingertip as George cringes) Anyone?
Hans : (raises his hand)
George : Errr... Vat is it you are zinking, Frau Gretchen?
Gretchen : Zinking? You bitch! I've been dieting all week and you think I look like a boat!

(Gretchen smacks George on the butt with her riding crop. George instinctively fights back - he holds his elbows next to his body and slaps his hands ineffectively. He looks like a very gay dog doing a very gay dogpaddle. She realizes he is still gay and storms out.)

Hans : (still staring at the door she exited) Gee George, that Gretchen must be the prettiest guy in the whole German army
George : (changes the subject by pointing menacingly at George the bunny) Das ist jewish hasenpfeffer!! (hasenpfeffer is german for rabbit stew)
Hans : No, George, no! Look George, look, George the bunny likes eating frankfurters! A jewish bunny wouldn't eat a sausage with pork in it, would he George!
George : (sighs) Ja. Ja, vell ve all like der viener...

Repo Men

The upcoming Repo Men movie is a science fiction story about how artificial organs can be bought on credit and if the payments aren't met then the organ gets repossessed.

My prediction : at some point in the movie they kill someone, stand over the corpse preparing to remove the organ, and say "Sorry, it only has a lifetime guarantee."

Shall We Dance

from the movie Shall We Dance (1937) (which btw also has the "You say tomato, I say Tomahto" song and "They Can't Take That Away From Me").

Fred Astaire decides if he can't dance with Ginger Roger's character then he'll dance with her image. He does his dance number with 20 girls who each have a realistic mask of Ginger's face. And boy, was that creepy.

word

Recently, I turned on the TV, switched to the old movie channel and a moment later the word "SLUT" appeared on the screen. I was shocked and, of course, hurt and confused. The TV and I had always had a good relationship, at least I thought so. To call me a slut was uncalled for and, I would argue, not a very accurate. I pondered getting written statements from witnesses to testify to my mostly good character.

But then it turned out to have been the last bit of a Danish movie and "slut" is the danish word for "end." TV and I are back on speaking terms.

And now I can argue with someone, make my case and signify the end of my statement by saying "Slut!" Or criticize their lack of knowledge and signify the end of my statement by saying "Ignorant! Slut!"

Action In The North Atlantic

"Action In The North Atlantic" is a war movie made in 1943. I have yet to see the whole movie in a single sitting but It could be considered a war propaganda move except that it is a pretty good movie. Humphrey Bogart commands a Liberty Ship on his way to the Soviet Union during WW2.

items of interest :

•The germans in the U-boat spoke german! Not even subtitled! At first I thought it was done to dehumanize the germans, make them less easy to relate to, but then the Russians didn't speak english either (except for "Liberty Ship" which somehow they picked up)

•Bogie punches out a guy in a bar who was gossiping about ship movements. In some movies he would have been a Nazi paid informant sent by Hitler himself and the essence of evil. In this, he was just a drunk talking about what he saw. I suppose in the modern version George Clooney would whine about a conspiracy against free speech.

•It ends with Bogie lighting his own merchant ship on fire (Really! to lure the U-Boat to the surface) and then he rams his ship into the U-Boat. Once they get to the USSR everyone is happy but Bogie. He's thinking about "the trip back."

•The Nazi submariners die a horrible death and there is not even half a moment of grief about it.



The Russian pilot sees the Liberty ship and pumps his arm while giving the peace sign. Almost.