Film Reviews from Two Guys in the Dark: May 2021

Thursday, May 27, 2021

The Dry plus Short Takes on Oxygen, suggestions for TCM cable offerings, and other cinematic topics

There’s No Place Like Home (?)

Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke

I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) when they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative.

But first—even though some of you may not care for sociopolitical intrusions into a blog basically about film reviews, but please indulge me if you can—with the recent one-year-anniversary of the murder of Minneapolis citizen George Floyd by his own city’s police force as a symbol of the horrid racial/political divide in our country today—and the 50^th anniversary of Marvin Gaye’s marvelously-honored 1971 album What’s Going On, I just want to acknowledge how Marvin, in the lead single from his album, was so relevant to what was going on 5 decades ago, still is even as he’s sadly no longer with us today (killed in an argument with his father in 1984). Rolling Stone magazine in 2020 ranked the album as All-Time #1 so if you’d like to hear the whole thing here it is. On to the reviews.

The Dry (Robert Connolly) rated R 117 min.

Opening Chatter (no spoilers): As I continue with my current low-level-paranoia about theater attendance (in my defense: I'm male, 73, A- blood type—all riskier for COVID than most other demographics) I’m still searching streaming options, finding some worthy ones (even if they fall short of “fabulous”), bringing results to you in hopes my comments might add to your viewing choices as well. Both of my findings this week have strong aspects, despite being able to nitpick them somewhat. The first is The Dry, giving us a pair of murder mysteries even though many of the townspeople in a rural Australian community think that not only did a local kill himself along with 2 members of his family but also the famous federal agent (Eric Bana) come to help investigate this situation is also guilty of murdering his girlfriend 20 years ago although nothing ever really connected him to that crime; this one’s available on several rental platforms, with a link within the review to help guide your possible destination. In Short Takes you’ll find a review of Oxygen, a French film (yes, subtitles, but please don’t let that put you off) on Netflix streaming about a woman who wakes up trapped in a high-tech-coffin-like-box with no idea of who she is or why she’s there. With the help of an A.I. connected to her situation she soon gets some answers but desperately needs more because her oxygen’s running out as minutes tick down. Also in that section I’ll offer suggestions for some choices on the Turner Classic Movies channel (but too much extra text for line-justified-layout like you see here [Related Links stuff at each posting’s end is similarly-ragged], at least to be done by this burned-out-BlogSpot-drone—oh, tedious software!), with my short dose of industry-related-trivia.

Here’s the trailer for The Dry:

(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge it; activate

that same button or use the “esc” keyboard key to return to normal size.)

If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $. To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid those important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters like this:

⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.

What Happens: Australian Federal Agent Aaron Falk (Eric Bana) has acquired some national fame due to a case he solved, seems comfortable when our story begins with him in his urban high-rise dwelling (in Melbourne, I think; matters not as he’s soon on the road for the rest of the film), suddenly is shocked to learn of the death of his old friend, Luke Hadler (Martin Dingle-Wall), along with Luke’s wife, Karen, young son Billy (which we get a hint of even before he does due to opening shots of a bleak rural landscape, a baby’s cries on the soundtrack, a bleeding woman seemingly dead inside a house) so he’s off to his countryside hometown, Kiewarra, for the funerals with the added emotional weight that Luke supposedly killed his family (sparing only baby Charlotte) in their home before taking his own life in an open field farther away. Throughout the rest of this film there are frequent flashbacks to Aaron as a high-schooler (played then by Joe Klocek), his girlfriend, Ellie Deacon (BeBe Bettencourt), Luke (played then by Sam Corlett), and Luke’s girlfriend Gretchen (Claude Scott-Mitchell)—with the 4 of them swimming in a river, hanging out around a campfire, Aaron and Ellie kissing at school, some shots lingering a bit, others just as brief counterpoints to a current situation—so just know these flashbacks exist as I’ve described them, useful to the flow of the film, rather than me interrupting this narrative flow every time there’s such a past-tense-cutaway.

As Aaron arrives for the Hadlers’ funerals he’s not exactly a welcome presence because Ellie was found dead at the river years ago on a day she was supposed to meet Aaron there so some townspeople assume he killed her—especially her grizzled-father, Mal Deacon (William Zappa), and his surly-son, Grant Dow (Matt Nable) (I’m not clear why Grant has a different surname)—even though there was never any investigation of such; however, Aaron’s dad, Erik Falk (Jeremy Lindsay Taylor), moved them away to escape harassment from Mal. Despite angry accusations from Grant and Mal, Aaron meets up with Gretchen (now played by Genevieve O’Reilly) at the funerals where sparks seem to smolder between them with Aaron given reason to hang around a bit when he’s approached by Luke’s parents, Gerry (Bruce Spence) and Barb Hadler (Julia Blake), to try to prove Luke’s innocence, even as Gerry still thinks Aaron killed Ellie and Luke had something to do with it (Luke did offer Aaron the excuse of them off shooting rabbits when Ellie was killed [not true], although Gretchen feels secure in the idea Ellie committed suicide [a later scene at Gretchen’s place has Aaron unwilling to shoot rabbits even as she does so easily—intriguing connections in this film]).

Working with local cop Greg Raco (Kier O’Donnell), Aaron does a lot of probing around (with the only odd element being the shells found by the Hadler corpses were Remingtons while Luke used a Winchester), gets support from school principal Scott Whitlam (John Polson), looks over Karen’s paperwork at the school (she was their accountant), finds the word “Grant” on the back of a piece of paper, gets the idea Ellie’s hotheaded-brother might be the real killer because there was speculation Grant wanted to buy Luke’s debt-distressed-farm if it became available, although Grant denies the accusation. While visiting Gretchen, Aaron looks through a photo album, sees one of Luke holding Gretchen’s young child forcing her to admit she had an affair with Luke during his marriage, leading to her single-motherhood. ⇒After further probing, Aaron realizes Karen’s “Grant” note referred to her attempt to get grant money for the school (odd he didn't consider that earlier) because Scott had embezzled funds to cover his gambling debts, but when Aaron and Greg go to confront Scott he runs off into the powder-dry-woods near the school, threatens to set himself on fire with the ensuing blaze likely to engulf the nearby-kids, admits he killed Luke and his family—I suppose to keep Karen from exposing his previous crime, then trying to shift blame onto Luke for the deaths, although I’m not terribly clear about that aspect, nor am I really sure why Luke was assumed to be the instigator of murder/suicide to begin with (a key plot point but not one I can explain)—then flares his cigarette lighter onto himself; Aaron and Greg manage to quickly cover him, beating out the flames although this results in a hospital stay for Greg. So, Luke’s reputation is restored, Aaron’s in the process of leaving but makes a final visit to the river area where Ellie was killed, finds a backpack she stashed there years ago, reads in her journal she was planning to run away due to how Mal was abusing her.

This leads to a crucial flashback of Mal and Grant out near the river where Ellie was supposed to meet Aaron, whereupon Mal finds his daughter and kills her, for what reason I’m not clear unless he feared being exposed in his abuse. I’m also not sure if Grant had any idea of his father’s actions, so maybe his decades-long-anger toward Aaron was just the result of Dad’s lies, although Mal seems to have convinced himself of Aaron’s “guilt,” yet that might be the result of dementia because Mal, upon seeing Aaron again, confronted him as if he were the father, Erik, rather than the Falk family son. The film ends with Aaron walking along Ellie's now-totally-dry-riverbed in deep thought.⇐ So, there are some unresolved aspects of this plot (at least to my comprehension), but overall the sense of mystery, the arid atmosphere, the effectively-tense-acting all work to constantly attract your attention.

So What? I couldn’t begin to settle on a more appropriate film to review right now (not because I killed anybody in high school [although some of the girls I dated might have felt somewhat that way at times] or investigated someone else’s alleged crimes [although the guys I hung out with back in those days were considered unsavory by our principal, but that was a badge of honor for us]) because drought conditions in the fictional town of Kiewarra are deadly similar to what’s happening once again in California where rain keeps bypassing much of the western U.S. on its way east of the Mississippi River. Our farmlands are slowly, sadly turning into dust as water’s getting to be in short supply all over the state, lakes/snowpack are at dangerously-low-levels or are already dry. Actually, the drought in The Dry is more of a metaphor for how bleak things are in this rural Australian town where past and present deaths leave a pallor even impacting the presence of our protagonist as bitter attitudes remain for some in the community, assuming Aaron guilty of a crime for which he claims full innocence, even as his dead-old-friend, Luke, is now painted with that same soiled brush.

Given the drought circumstances, the sense our protagonist may not be all he claims to be, his misdirection when he comes upon an important clue, and the general hostility pervading much of this story, I couldn’t help but think a little of minor similarities to Chinatown (Roman Polanski, 1974 [at first glance would easily seem to be the Best Picture of that year—until you compare it to the actual winner of Oscar's top prize, The Godfather: Part II {Francis Ford Coppola}) so if my hesitations about The Dry (noted in the previous section of this review but not further explained here due to my self-imposed spoiler policy) cause you to wonder if you want to pay for renting this current crime-mystery maybe you should just navigate directly to Polanski’s detective-genre-masterpiece instead (consult JustWatch for many options of free streaming or cheap rental, or, if you prefer the physical interaction with a DVD, you can get it at Netflix in that format if you’re a subscriber to their service—you can’t go wrong with any of The Godfather episodes either). If you’re intrigued by the possibilities with The Dry, though, I recommend it for the combination of intriguing story, substantial acting, well-crafted-cutting between past and present actions, overall contemplative tone. Further, you might get clarifying-explanations of my plot-concerns if you read the best-selling-novel of the same name by Jane Harper (2016) but please excuse me of I don't probe that far into background research; however, if you’d like to hear Harper talk about this film—along with Connolly and Bana—there are 2 videos connected to it in the Related Links section far below so give a listen if you like (she used italics in her book to indicate the flashback scenes [clever tactic], but given the easily-recognizable ages of the characters in the film's past encounters you don’t really need any additional visual cues).

Bottom Line Final Comments: The Dry’s been in theatrical release in Australia since December 11, 2020, New Zealand since January 1, 2021, apparently set up for distribution in Europe (hasn’t happened yet as best I know), is now in domestic (U.S.-Canada) theaters with an opening $119,000 gross last weekend playing in only 186 venues (it’s also taken a bit over $17 million in those Down-Under-nations). If it’s nowhere close to you or you’re not ready for indoor screenings yet there are several $7-8 rental options (I chose AT&T’s U-Verse/Direct TV-on-demand) where you get access for a couple of days if you want to watch it more than once or have to put it on hold if the plumbing breaks loose in your basement (Kiewarra folks probably dreamed of floods to help their scorched territory, but even they wouldn’t want new swimming pools inside their homes, so I do hope you’re at least reasonably dry, but not parched, if you should choose to indulge in this film). That’s really all I’ve got to say (unless any conversations get sparked in the Comments box at the very end of this posting), except to note the CCAL’s quite supportive with 93% positive reviews at Rotten Tomatoes, a 68% average score at Metacritic (not bad for those ratings misers, though as I go to “press” they’ve surveyed only 21 reviews [20 for Oxygen just below]; you might check later those sites in Related Links farther below later for possible updates) so to wrap up the review I’ll use my usual tactic of a Musical Metaphor to speak (in clear/plausible/obtuse) terms about the current subject of consideration which, for The Dry, I’ve reached way back to Gene Pitney’s “Town Without Pity” (composer Dimitri Tiomkin, lyricist Ned Washington) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyzAcTUHtvg (the song’s on the soundtrack for the 1961 movie of the same name [Gottfried Reinhardt], nominated for the Best Song Oscar [lost to “Moon River”—composter Henry Mancini, lyricist Johnny Mercer] from Breakfast at Tiffany’s [Blake Edwards, 1961]), which at least was used in Reinhardt’s film, unlike another Pitney hit, “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” not used in John Ford’s movie (1962) of the same name, probably would have sounded a little crass under the final credits of that ironic, melancholy marvel (also well worth your time, a truly significant western; available as a Netflix DVD, free streaming at Amazon Prime, or cheap rental on several platforms).

As for “Town Without Pity,” I understand the song’s originally about 2 young lovers being hassled by adults who “[…] talk about how bad we are,” but yet I still find symbolic connections to how so many of the Kiewarra residents easily think the worst about Aaron and Luke as assumed murderers, making it difficult to understand “How can we keep love alive? How can anything survive When these little minds tear you in two? […] No, it isn’t very pretty What a town without pity can do.” At least Luke’s situation’s given investigation and closure, but even as we see what happened with Ellie and Aaron—although he’s not privy to this significant flashback—will anyone else in this community ever know the truth? Maybe through a police-procedural TV show like CSI Kiewarra? You'll never know.

SHORT TAKES (spoilers also appear here)

Oxygen (Alexandre Aja) rated TV-14 101 min.

We’re immediately thrown into terror territory as the movie opens on a woman trapped in a small enclosure with no idea who she is or how she got there; at least she has interaction with an A.I. device who can’t open her tight box without an authorization code but is able to put her in phone contact with people who might be able to help her.

Here’s the trailer:

Before reading further, please refer to the plot spoilers warning detailed far above.

Imagine a psychological horror movie where a woman wakes up in an enclosed box, has paranoiac verbal exchanges through an intercom with her captor, the audience in high tension as to how she can ever escape. Now, shift genres a bit to thriller mode where the woman’s (Mélanie Laurent) in some sort of high-tech-enclosure (but, still about the size of a coffin) where she doesn’t know who she is, how she got there (wherever it is), and is in frenzied dialogue with her supportive A.I.—MILO (voice of Mathieu Amalric)—that tells her the oxygen supply is at 35%, she’s got less than an hour to live as it continues to decline, and the device can’t be unlocked without an access code she has no knowledge of. That’s the premise of Oxygen, a French movie (so, you know already this one may not be ideal for you if you’re claustrophobic and/or hate reading subtitles) that basically occurs in its real running time, mostly takes place in this one confined location (although we get frequent, brief flashback shots of a child, a man, nature, a mouse—sometimes dead—in a maze) which keeps ramping up the tension for us until we finally get some clarity. MILO’s constrained from giving direct answers to many of her questions, but through careful probes she finds out she's Dr. Elizabeth (Liz) Hansen, a Nobel Prize winner for her work in cryogenics, married to Léo Ferguson. She thinks she might be in this tight chamber in some hospital somewhere (though no response comes to her pounding on its walls), tries to get help from the police (at least MILO can make phone calls for her) but as they trace the serial number of her enclosure they find it was destroyed 3 years ago (?). Then she calls Léo; however, a woman answers, quickly hangs up (!). Liz is getting desperate by now as the oxygen number keeps declining so she tries using makeshift tools to break the seal on her pod, only to be pushed back by electric shocks. As we’re now about an hour into this gripping situation the mystery woman calls back, offers Liz that authorization code, but tells her if she uses it she’ll die.

⇒More explanations quickly follow: Earth is suffering from a deadly virus (sound familiar?) with total extinction of our species in 2 generations; Léo’s already dead; this “Liz” is actually a clone of the real Dr. Hansen—the woman on the phone—traveling into deep space (12 years now) to a distant planet with many other clones intended to preserve humanity on that new home (now we understand we’re in sci-fi-territory with an ultimate goal like we’ve known from previous stories such as Interstellar [Christopher Nolan, 2014; review in our November 13, 2014 posting] and Stowaway [Joe Penna; review in our April 29, 2021 posting], except this time the survivors are all clones, not humans, traveling from Earth; however, a malfunction awakened “Liz” accidently with 2 more years to go on the journey. Following up, “Liz” gets further info from MILO there are almost 10,000 clones aboard in hypersleep, including one of Léo [though a few hundred others died in a collision with an asteroid]). MILO’s set to terminate “Liz” as her oxygen’s about gone when she commands it to divert functions of some sort, allowing her to instead go back into hypersleep to be awakened on the new planet with the other arrivals. In the final shot we see the cloned Liz and Léo together, ready for their new life.⇐

This is a very intriguing movie (if you can tolerate the horrifying, seemingly-inescapable-tension of that first mysterious hour), shows how insightfully-inventive a distressed person can be even in a likely-hopeless-situation, is a bit hard to follow (at least for me) in its technical aspects at the end; nevertheless, all you have to truly care about is whether Liz’s last-chance-solution will work. The CCAL’s solidly-supportive with 89% positive RT reviews, a 67% MC average score, so consider it if you’re a Netflix streaming subscriber. Yes, my Musical Metaphor’s not exactly parallel to Oxygen’s situation but it’s close enough, Neil Young’s “After the Gold Rush” (on his 1970 album of that name) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4-oED1M_n0 (poor video, audio’s fine; live performance with David Crosby and Graham Nash, not sure when but I did see them do this at an Oakland, CA concert a few years ago [could it have been this performance?]) where “Mother Nature” was already “on the run in the 1970s,” the singer’s “hopin’ for replacement” as “Mother Nature’s silver seed [are flying] to a new home in the sun.” Oxygen has no inclusion of “a band playin’ […or] colors flyin’ All around the chosen ones,” but it gives us a clear scenario of what Elon Musk and real scientists say we might be facing far too soon, so let’s get serious about the Paris (Climate) Agreement, capisce?

Suggestions for TCM cablecasts

At least until the pandemic subsides Two Guys also want to encourage you to consider movies you might be interested in that don’t require subscriptions to Netflix, Amazon Prime, similar Internet platforms (we may well be stuck inside for longer than those 30-day-free-initial-offers), or premium-tier-cable-TV-fees. While there are a good number of video networks offering movies of various sorts (mostly broken up by commercials), one dependable source of fine cinematic programming is Turner Classic Movies (available in lots of basic-cable-packages) so I’ll be offering suggestions of possible choices for you running from Thursday afternoon of the current week (I usually get this blog posted by early Thursday mornings) on through Thursday morning of the following week. All times are for U.S. Pacific zone so if you see something of interest please verify actual show time in your area for the day listed. These recommendations are my particular favorites (no matter when they’re on, although some of those early-day-ones might need to be recorded, watched later), but there’s considerably more to pick from you might like even better; feel free to explore their entire schedule here. You can also click the down arrow at the right of each listing for additional, useful info.

I’ll bet if you checked that entire schedule link just above you’d find other options of interest, but these are the only ones grabbing my attention at present. Please dig in further for other possibilities.

Thursday May 27, 2021

10:30 AM The Producers (Mel Brooks, 1967) First version, later adapted to a successful Broadway musical (spawning another movie). Flimflam artist/stage producer Zero Mostel, nervous accountant Gene Wilder seek riches by getting too many investors for a show doomed to fail, Springtime for Hitler by ex-Nazi Kenneth Mars, starring wacky hippie Dick Shawn. But, it’s seen as satire, becomes a hit. Excellent balance keeps this as hilarious, not repulsive; Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.

Friday May 28, 2021

9:15 PM The Best Years of Our Lives (William Wyler, 1946) A highly-deserving Best Picture Oscar winner (along with a cluster of others including Best Director, Actor [Frederic March], Supporting Actor [Harold Russell], Adapted Screenplay, Film Editing, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture, plus an Honorary Oscar to Russell, an actual WW II vet amputee), focused on the difficulties of 3 returning G.I’s each with individual problems (a marvelous example of deep-focus-cinematography by Gregg Toland; I once got a chance to talk with Wyler about his intentions with this visual style).

Wednesday June 2, 2021

12:30 PM Summer of ’42 (Robert Mulligan, 1971) Romantic coming-of-age story set in New England during the U.S.A.’s early WW II years as a teenager (Gary Grimes) becomes fascinated with a young woman (Jennifer O’Neill) married to a soldier who’s just shipped out; she’s nice to the boy but makes none of the advances he dreams of while one of his friends furiously pursues a local girl. What must come next is terribly heartbreaking but I won’t spoil it for you. Won an Oscar for Best Original Score.

5:00 PM The Gold Rush (Charlie Chaplin, 1925) A celebrated success of a great cinema master, even as a silent movie (music and intertitles), as The Tramp’s in the Klondike seeking his fortune, finding many challenges instead, comedy mixed with pathos. Contains the boot-for-dinner scene,

the Oceana Roll dance, plus the teetering cabin scene (it also stars Georgia Hale, Mack Swain).

If you’d like your own PDF of ratings/summaries of this week's reviews, suggestions for TCM cablecasts, links to Two Guys info click this link to access then save, print, or whatever you need.

Other Cinema-Related Stuff: In quick fashion, here are some extra items you might like: (1) Spiral takes the Saw franchise past $1 billion globally: (2) Amazon buys MGM for $8.45 billion. As usual for now I’ll close out this section with Joni Mitchell’s "Big Yellow Taxi" (from her 1970 Ladies of the Canyon album)—because “You don’t know what you’ve got ‘till it’s gone”—and my reminder you can always search for streaming/rental/purchase movie options at JustWatch.

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:

We encourage you to visit the Summary of Two Guys Reviews for our past posts.* Overall notations for this blog—including Internet formatting craziness beyond our control—may be found at our Two Guys in the Dark homepage. If you’d like to Like us on Facebook please visit our Facebook page. We appreciate your support whenever and however you can offer it!

*Please ignore previous warnings about a “dead link” to our Summary page because the problems’ been manually fixed so that all postings since July 11, 2013 now have the proper functioning link.

Here’s more information about The Dry:

https://www.ifcfilms.com/films/the-dry

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6aJ399U-QE (10:50 interview with director/co-screenwriter [with Harry Cripps] Robert Connolly and actor Eric Bana [both are among the movie’s 5 producers also]) and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6qLrae5-VU (15:01 interview with Connolly, Bana, and original novel author Jane Harper).

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_dry

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-dry

Here’s more information about Oxygen:

https://www.netflix.com/title/81277610

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-bJG_l_Qgk (5:02 ending explained; spoilers of course)

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/oxygen_2021

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/oxygen

Please note that to Post a Comment below about our reviews you need to have either a Google account (which you can easily get at https://accounts.google.com/NewAccount if you need to sign up) or other sign-in identification from the pull-down menu below before you preview or post. You can also leave comments at our Facebook page, although you may have to somehow connect

with us at that site in order to do it (most FB procedures are still a bit of a mystery to us old farts).

If you’d rather contact Ken directly rather than leaving a comment here please use my email address of kenburke409@gmail.com—type it directly if the link doesn’t work. (But if you truly have too much time on your hands you might want to explore some even-longer-and-more-obtuse-than-my-film-reviews-academic-articles about various cinematic topics at my website, https://kenburke.academia.edu, which could really give you something to talk to me about.)

If we did talk, though, you’d easily see how my early-70s-age informs my references, Musical Metaphors, etc. in these reviews because I’m clearly a guy of the later 20^th century, not so much the contemporary world. I’ve come to accept my ongoing situation, though, realizing we all (if fate allows) keep getting older, we just have to embrace it, as Joni Mitchell did so well in "The Circle Game," offering sage advice even when she was quite young herself.

By the way, if you’re ever at The Hotel California knock on my door—but you know what the check-out policy is so be prepared to stay for awhile (quite an eternal while, in fact). Ken

P.S. Just to show that I haven’t fully flushed Texas out of my system here’s an alternative destination for you, Home in a Texas Bar, with Gary P. Nunn and Jerry Jeff Walker. But wherever the rest of my body may be my heart’s always with my longtime-companion, lover, and wife, Nina Kindblad, so here’s our favorite shared song—Neil Young’s “Harvest Moon”

—from the performance we saw at the Desert Trip concerts in Indio, CA on October 15, 2016 (as a full moon was rising over the stadium) because “I’m still in love with you,” my dearest,

a never-changing-reality even as the moon waxes and wanes over the months/years to come. But, just as we can raunchy at times (in private of course) Neil and his backing band, Promise of the Real, on that same night also did a lengthy, fantastic version of "Cowgirl in the Sand"

(19:06) which I’d also like to commit to this blog’s always-ending-tunes; I never tire of listening to it, then and now (one of my idle dreams is to play guitar even half this good).

OUR POSTINGS PROBABLY LOOK BEST ON THE MOST CURRENT VERSIONS OF MAC OS AND THE SAFARI WEB BROWSER (although Google Chrome usually is decent also); OTHERWISE, BE FOREWARNED THE LAYOUT MAY SEEM MESSY AT TIMES.

Finally, for the data-oriented among you, Google stats say over the past month the total unique hits at this site were 20,068 (as always, we thank all of you for your ongoing support with our hopes you’ll continue to be regular readers); below is a snapshot of where those responses have come from within the previous week (with appreciation for the unspecified “Others” also visiting Two Guys’ site):

Thursday, May 20, 2021

The Woman in the Window plus Short Takes on suggestions for TCM cable offerings, and other cinematic topics

Seeing Is Believing … Isn’t It?

Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke

The Woman in the Window (Joe Wright)

rated R 102 min.

Opening Chatter (no spoilers): Despite the national CDC relaxation on many mask-wearing-scenarios, indoor (and arena/stadium) restrictions are still in effect for California so I remain in streaming mode (not ready to mask-up for 2 hours in a movie theater trying to take notes through fogged-up-glasses) where once again there wasn’t much of intrigue, although the combination in The Woman in the Window of many respected contributors to lots of previously-successful-movies (including actors Amy Adams, Gary Oldman, Julianne Moore, Jennifer Jason Leigh) and a story based on a popular book (here’s a comparison of notable differences between page and screen; it contains spoilers, though) kept calling to me so I watched it despite being aware of consistent rejection by the OCCU (this article purports to explain why this is so yet only presents quotes from both negative and positive perspectives, but it least they give you a useful overview of the rejections), along with an analysis of why such a vaulted-current-example of the “Old Hollywood System” of noted producer, director, screenwriter, and actors aiming for big box-office along with awards prestige is now passé with such projects heading straight to video if they flop with test audiences. So, was I doomed to waste my time on this confounding thriller about an agoraphobic therapist in NYC who witnesses a murder in the apartment across the street from her home but then is deemed to be borderline-crazy by both the police and the supposed-victimized-family (her steady diet of pills and wine doesn’t help her credibility much)? According to all those blistering reviews, I should have been upset with my decision (even though it didn’t cost anything extra, as I’m already a Netflix streaming subscriber), but—except for a few plot inconsistencies I can’t easily rationalize—I found The Woman … an enjoyable (although tension-filled) way to spend an evening (aided by my own [reasonable?] wine consumption), a nice-enough-escape from COVID and political realities which I’ll recommend for you to do the same. Also, in the Short Takes section I’ll offer suggestions for choices on the Turner Classic Movies channel (but too much extra text for line-justified-layout like you see here [Related Links stuff at each posting’s end is similarly-ragged], at least to be done by this burned-out-BlogSpot-drone—oh, ye tedious software!) along with some industry-related-trivia.

Here’s the trailer for The Woman in the Window:

(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge it; activate

that same button or use the “esc” keyboard key to return to normal size.)

⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.

What Happens: Dr. Anna Fox (Amy Adams) is a child psychologist living mostly alone (she has a tenant, David Winter [Wyatt Russell], in the basement but doesn’t necessarily see him on a daily basis) in a multi-story Manhattan brownstone townhouse; at this point in her life she’s severely agoraphobic so she doesn’t go outside at all, although she’ll cautiously let a few visitors in, including her therapist, Dr. Landy (Tracy Letts [also the adaptive-screenwriter of … Window])—one confusion I have about this setup is how she can maintain this luxurious dwelling when incapable of seeing patients (unless they come to her, but even then she’d need to charge exorbitant rates to a limited number of very wealthy families), though we won’t quibble over that. Anna apparently spends her days washing down her anti-anxiety pills with red wine, talking frequently by phone to separated-husband Edward (Anthony Mackie) and 8-year-old-daughter Olivia (Mariah Bozeman), watching her neighborhood through her front windows when she sees a family move in right across the street. Later, she accepts a visit from new neighbor Jane Russell (Julianne Moore)—there’s more than one Old Hollywood reference in this current movie—who seems easily simpatico as they share wine and extended conversation. On another day she also lets in the Russell son, Ethan (Fred Hechinger), with a gift from his mother; he talks briefly with Anna, indicating some fear about his sometimes-abusive-father, Alistair (Gary Oldman). Suddenly, the story picks up the pace when one night Anna observes (through her window to the one across) Jane being killed (not clear by whom) so she calls the cops, but when Dets. Little (Brian Tyree Henry) and Norelli (Jeanine Serralles) arrive, with the Russells, Anna’s credibility is dismissed due to another woman (Jennifer Jason Leigh) introduced as Jane—saying she’s never met Anna—plus the police awareness of Anna’s pill regiment (with hallucinations as a side effect, especially when consumed with alcohol), and the startling reminder after another visit from these detectives that Anna’s husband and daughter died in a car wreck some time ago (she was driving, got distracted), leading to her current psychosis about venturing outdoors.

Still, there’s suspicion about Alistair by both Anna and us because her Internet searching shows he moved his family from Boston to NYC after an associate of his was found dead (he denies any connection), but the movie's focus is on Anna (her telephoto lens often trained on the easily-seen-Russells) in despair (especially after a photo of her sleeping is sent to her email), who records a video on her cell phone prior to an intended-overdose-suicide but first scrolls through her phone photos, finds 1 of the first “Jane” reflected in a wine glass, sees Ethan outside, calls him in to share her discovery (after having shown it to David who admits this woman is Kate Meli, a meth addict he knew in Boston, had an affair with [he’s now on parole violation by being in NYC, maybe to keep contact with Katie?]; he further reveals Katie is Ethan’s birth mother from a terminated marriage to Alistair, but she’s now stalking the family, trying to reconnect with her son). ⇒At this point, the action intensifies as Ethan’s hiding in the basement (He’s got a stolen key [How? I suppose you could also complain no one in this movie closes their curtains, but then where would we be?], has been slipping in all week, took the photo of Anna sleeping.), kills David, admits to Anna he killed Katie (Alistair and Jane hid the body), enjoys the rush of being a serial killer (also killed the Boston secretary) so she’s next. They fiercely scuffle, make their way to the roof, he wounds her with a rake but she pushes him through a skylight to his death. She recovers in the hospital, Det. Little tells her they’ve arrested Alistair and Jane as murder accomplices, gives her phone back so she can erase her suicide video. Nine months later, Anna’s sobered up, moves out of NYC, onto a new understanding of her life.*⇐

*If you’d like to contemplate this summary of The Woman in the Window—with spoilers included, of course—in a video format (8:57), go here but be prepared for annoying ad interruptions at roughly 3:00, 6:00. However, this link doesn't seem to consistently connect when I try to confirm it; if you can see this video by going directly, the URL is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwmQ9bOOwCg.

So What? In relatively-recent-times Disney purchased the cinematic properties of Fox, renamed the production arm 20^th Century Studios, had intentions of releasing this movie as one of their new acquisitions with high hopes it would be a big draw given the filmic pedigree of those connected to it (a bit more on that topic in this review’s next section) including director Wright (Pride & Prejudice [2005], Atonement [2007], Anna Karenina [2012; review in our December 14, 2012 posting], Darkest Hour [2017; review in our December 14, 2017 posting]) with further interest to come from the original material being a best-seller-novel of the same name (2018) by A. J. Finn (pen-name of author Daniel Mallory, who’s generated some notable controversy by lying about serious medical/family aspects of his background to make himself more sympathetic to a potential audience so elements of his book-now-a-movie are ironically-appropriate). With all of that potential, there was once great anticipation for this adaptation (see the enthusiastic video connected to this title in the Related Links section far below), but poor test-screenings, COVID-disruption of theatrical releases eventually led it to Netflix. However, one aspect that intrigued me is how we might be in the process of being led astray by what’s called in fiction an "unreliable narrator" (a great example is Humbert Humbert in the novel of Lolita [Vladimir Nabokov, 1955] in that he rationalizes everything to his perspective even as we can tell by the events of the story there’s much more going on than he wants to admit; the cinematic adaptations of this book give him little opportunity to bend the truth to his advantage), as Anna lies to herself about her husband and daughter, even as everyone in the Russell family lies to her about everything, so it seemed we’re in for an interesting journey into discourse made more unpredictable by not being able to ascertain the truth of what we presume we heard from these various characters.

In fact, exactly that sort of response is what worked well for me about this movie but not for most critics who almost uniformly blasted it. Curious as to what they perceived but I didn’t, I sought to extend my background understanding of … the Window (beyond what I found in the Screenrant link cited above with several review excerpts) by seeking out extended-analyses from several writers whose opinions I trust (even if I don’t eventually agree with their conclusions) but just found them all to be caustic at best even when attempting to deliver lackluster-compliments. For instance, James Berardinelli says “[…] this is an example of something that can work well on the written page but loses a lot when condensed and brought to the screen. […] Netflix is the perfect landing place – this is the sort of film that works better as a time-filler than as a destination.” Ann Hornaday of the Washington Post is even less generous: “The cinematic references of the original novel here are telegraphed in quick clips, which feels like a missed opportunity for the visual style Wright brought to such films as ‘Atonement’ and ‘Anna Karenina’; a late scene of magical realism is perfunctory and tonally out of place. ‘The Woman in the Window’ is the kind of film that could go places, but sadly never manages to get out the door.” You can find many like this if you wish; I think you get the point.

Nevertheless, I’ll also cite Leah Greenblatt of Entertainment Weekly, who’s supposed to be in the small supportive cluster, according to the staff at sometimes-inscrutable Rotten Tomatoes (see my diatribe much farther below): “Adams, though, is stuck with a protagonist so shrill and chaotic and self-absorbed — the classic unreliable narrator, doubled and dunked in Cabernet […] the final 30 minutes of the film descend into something so bloody and outrageous it nearly works as camp. Still, it's hard not to think of the better movie buried somewhere in Window's odd feints and histrionics, if only its makers had trusted themselves — or been trusted — to tell it.” Why this attitude leads her to the relative heights of a B- grade eludes me (but there’s more to say about reviewers and their scores if you’ll indulge me in that SHORT TAKES commentary). For me, I’ll say I generally enjoyed The Woman in the Window, would recommend you consider it, but if you want an even better take on this kind of story you’ll get it in The Girl on the Train (Tate Taylor, 2016; review in our October 27, 2016 posting), then you can move up to the best option of all (5 stars if I were reviewing it), James Stewart as a photographer stuck in his apartment with a broken leg, using his telephoto lens to snoop on his neighbors in Rear Window (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954). You can find both of these latter 2, either with a Netflix DVD rental or on various streaming platforms (for a cheap rental) via JustWatch.

Bottom Line Final Comments: With my ongoing-pandemic-practice of watching 1 or 2 new streaming releases for review each week there are usually a good number to choose from with the short summary blurbs not always enough to help with decision-making so I do depend a good bit on reviews from other critics. Therefore, had I just taken heed of the overt warnings from the OCCU—a miserable 25% positive reviews (of 138 tallied; no fluke) from Rotten Tomatoes,* a not-all-that-much-better 40% average score from Metacritic—I’d have quickly moved on to something else; however, with the star power in the cast (Oscar-winners Oldman, Moore, nominees Adams, Leigh) and crew (Oscar-winning-producer Scott Rudin,** along with frequently-nominated-others, including director Wright, screenwriter [and actor] Letts, original score composter Danny Elfman) my curiosity was just too strong to pass on this one, so I’m glad I didn’t although of course it doesn’t compare to the movie it somewhat resembles and is often mentioned in reviews due to that fact, Rear Window. The Woman … is just effective entertainment (with some plot-holes that have to be overlooked) whereas Rear Window is yet another masterpiece from the master of suspense, yet this new version of neighbor-induced-paranoia is fun—freighting at times—providing a reasonable assumption of doubt about the mental stability of our protagonist. (As well as questions about our own gullibility as we just assume Anna had a lengthy visit from “Jane” because we saw it all on screen, even if it later might have proved to be simply a well-detailed-hallucination from a woman who’s close to losing all credibility in the eyes of the law—just as we were actually deluded, along with another protagonist, into thinking we were watching many brilliant-mathematical-breakthroughs in A Beautiful Mind [Ron Howard, 2001] when, in fact, some of what we see of John Nash’s [Russell Crowe] “discoveries” are simply illustrations of lifelike-fantasies on the part of this real-life, mentally-tormented academician.)

*For more perspective on trustworthiness/clarity of using applied understanding of RT accumulated-scores on films, however, consult the info in the Other Cinema-Related Stuff diatribe farther below.

**I realize Scott Rudin’s now facing several charges of employee abuse, but if you can separate his private life from his career you’ll find he’s connected with many worthwhile projects including his Best Picture Oscar for No Country for Old Men (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2007). If you’d like to see a list of his many producer nominations and wins look here at his IMDb info; while there you can also look up the awards-records of the others I’ve noted above in conjunction with The Woman at the Window.

So, if you prefer to believe the OCCU sourpusses, look for something else to fill your time rather than The Woman in the Window, but if you’re willing to take a chance on me—and you subscribe to Netflix streaming (that’s your only option for seeing this movie)—I encourage you to give it your consideration, especially if you’re still debating taking off your many-months-long-COVID mask, plunging back into (properly-vaccinated) social activities; however, if you’re still as cautious about going out as Anna is then spend some time indoors with her at your place where, hopefully, you won’t have to deal with the deaths of any of your neighbors. As I hit wrap-up-mode I’ll turn to my usual concluding-tactic of a Musical Metaphor, although I struggled quite a bit in thinking of an appropriate one for this thriller (maybe I should just play the soundtrack from Psycho [Hitchcock, 1960]; are you in the mood for staccato violins?), finally deciding on one I’ve used 5 times before (normally encouraging me to find something else, but given that will only be 6 uses for the 940 films I’ve reviewed so far I guess that’s not too overdone), Phil Collins’ “In the Air Tonight” (from the 1981 Face Value album) at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYV6KZpnEak (live 1990 show); even though its bitterness at some unnamed person isn’t fully reflective of Anna’s situation, she certainly feels toward whoever killed “Jane,” “Well, if you told me you were drowning I would not lend a hand […] I was there and I saw what you did I saw it with my own two eyes,” just as later she understands “[…] the reason why you keep your silence up No, you don’t fool me […] the pain still grows It’s no stranger to you and me.” Anna’s trauma is clearly something that “[she] can feel it in the air tonight.” Want to join her in discovering what haunting possibilities are “in the air”? Netflix streaming awaits.

SHORT TAKES

Suggestions for TCM cablecasts

(The first 3 below are more about cultural significance than cinematic excellence)

Thursday May 20, 2021

5:00 PM Monterey Pop (D.A. Pennebaker, 1969) First huge-audience, major-stars gathering: 1967 Monterey Pop Festival featuring Scott McKenzie, The Mamas & the Papas, Canned Heat, Simon & Garfunkel, Hugh Masekela, Jefferson Airplane, Eric Burdon & The Animals, Country Joe and the Fish, Otis Redding (terrific, even compared to other triumphs); highlights include The Who trashing the stage, Jimi Hendrix burning his guitar, Janis Joplin’s amazing rendition of “Ball and Chain,” Ravi Shankar doing a stunning 20-min. raga. Most only do only one song so the run time’s a mere 79 min.

Saturday May 22, 2021

3:15 PM Stagecoach (John Ford, 1939) Brought the genre up to a more adult level with themes of East vs. West values, letter vs. spirit of the law, a story elevating John Wayne to the realm of major star (but Claire Trevor, as Dallas the prostitute, got top billing). Wayne’s an escaped (framed) jailbird out to avenge dishonor to his family (Indians aren’t treated well here either). Also stars Andy Devine, John Carradine, Thomas Mitchell (Oscar, Best Supporting Actor); Oscar for Best Music Scoring.

Sunday May 23, 2021

5:00 PM Frankenstein (James Whale, 1931) First sound version of the famous story of a mad scientist (Colin Clive) and his recreated human (Boris Karloff) who's initially childlike by nature but feared by his community as a monster, lashes out in defiance resulting in deaths which exacerbate the situation. Not very true to the Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly original novel, except in the man-playing-God-aspect, but begins numerous sequels from Universal and Hammer Studios over the decades (and a more-recent, more-faithful to the book remake from Kenneth Branagh [1994]).

Wednesday May 26, 2021

5:00 PM To Kill a Mockingbird (Robert Mulligan, 1962) Beloved adaptation of Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel with Gregory Peck as a fair-minded Alabama attorney in the 1930s trying to provide moral lessons for his kids during this economically-difficult (and overtly-racist) era as well as a sound defense for a Black Man wrongly accused of raping a White girl (also in the cast: Robert Duvall as elusive “Boo” Radley). Oscars for Best Actor (Peck), Adapted Screenplay (Horton Foote), Black and White Art Direction, was nominated for 5 more including Best Picture and Director. The American Film Institute named Atticus Finch (Peck) as greatest movie hero of the entire 20^th century.

7:30 PM Inherit the Wind (Stanley Kramer, 1960) Based on Jerome Lawrence and Robert Edwin Lee's 1955 play (itself based on 1920s history, the “monkey trial”) in which a Tennessee school teacher (in life, John Scopes) is on trial for addressing Darwinian evolution in the classroom, with the famed prosecutor (Frederick March)—based on William Jennings Bryan—opposed by a folksy-but-effective defender (Spencer Tracy)—based on Clarence Darrow—as the contest becomes Biblical “truth” vs. free thought (Gene Kelly’s there as an opportunistic journalist); nominated for 4 Oscars.

If you’d like your own PDF of the rating/summary of this week's review, suggestions for TCM cablecasts, links to Two Guys info click this link to access then save, print, or whatever you need.

Other Cinema-Related Stuff: I’m bypassing the usual Variety articles here to note some things about Rotten Tomatoes based on a recent article (Andrew Pulver, April 28, 2021) about how Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941) no longer has a 100% positive RT record because they’ve—for some reason—decided to add a May 7, 1941 negative review from pseudonym-critic “Mae Tinee” (as in “matinee”) so now … Kane’s at 99% based on 115 positives, just 1 negative; what displeases me about this (given my continued respect for … Kane as #1 on my All-Time list) is when you go to the RT ... Kane page you not only won’t find the “Mae Tinee” review included (all 115 others are listed chronologically, beginning [as I post] on March 24, 2021) but you’ll also see the last one is Owen Gleiberman’s Entertainment Weekly review listed as May 1, 1941 (actually May 3, 1991). RT was founded in 1998 so any reviews they have of films prior to then either have to be taken from older publications (which I've found rarely to be the case) or must be after-the-fact-revisited-reviews which all of the others about … Kane are but from no later than January 1, 2001, so why has the RT staff suddenly resurrected this 1941 panning-response except as a slap on Welles’ long-established triumph? Certainly they didn’t need to decrease their 100% club by just 1 given there are 396 still in that group (you can get a full list from this Wikipedia page where they tally every RT 100%er from 1920 to today if it has at least 20 reviews [oddly, though, 24 in their list fail under that 20-or-more-rubric—no explanation—while the 19 in red on that list are those not with further Wikipedia entries]).

Moreover, you can explore RT’s focus on 65 of their 100%ers (this group requires 40 or more reviews, must be Certified Fresh [at least 75% positives, minimum 5 reviews from their Top Critics]) that at least contains some of the undisputed-classics—The 400 Blows (François Truffaut, 1959 [64 reviews]), Battleship Potemkin (Sergei Eisenstein, 1925 [49]), The Gold Rush (Charlie Chaplin, 1925 [50]), The Grapes of Wrath (John Ford, 1940 [48]), M (Fritz Lang, 1931 [60]), Tokyo Story (Yasujiro Ozu, 1953 [48])—plus some other memorable cinema such as 12 Angry Men (Sidney Lumet, 1957 [55 reviews]), Frankenstein (James Whale, 1931 [49]), Singin’ in the Rain (Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, 1952 [64]), Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995 [90]), but none of them to me better than Citizen Kane, where at least it’s in good 99% company with Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942 [122 reviews, just 1 negative]) while The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola, 1972 [131 reviews, 4 negatives]) comes in with 97%. If any of this seems confusing or contradictory to you, join me in the "Huh? club.

Considering all of the questionable material presented above (more to come), in RT’s 100% club the champ would seem to be Paddington 2 (Paul King, 2018) due to staying positive in all of its 245 reviews, yet RT then presents a “weighted list” of their Top 100 films (with 40 or more reviews) using an Adjusted Scores system (not explained very well) that puts It Happened One Night (Frank Capra, 1934) in the #1 spot with 99% positives (96 reviews), Citizen Kane at #5 (also 99%), but Paddington 2 at #59 (despite its 100% status). You should also note that in Pulver’s article he says the RT Top 100 list just noted has Paddington 2 at #31, Black Panther (Ryan Coogler, 2018; review in our February 22, 2018 posting) at #2, Lady Bird (Greta Gerwig, 2017; review in our November 23, 2017 posting) at #3, but that actual list (which he links to in his article) has Black Panther at #4 (96%, 521 reviews), Lady Bird at #12 (99%, 395 reviews) while the actual #2 is Modern Times (Charlie Chaplin, 1936 [88%, 108 reviews]) with #3 being The Wizard of Oz (Victor Fleming, 1939 [99%, 145 reviews]). Put all of this blather together—as best you can—(including reading some of the RT reviews, then wondering why their staffers chose a “fresh” designation for something filled with a film’s problems or a “rotten” designation for something a bit negative but not all that much so, as the “Mae Tinee” response to …Kane seems to be [to me at least, from what I've read about it from Mr. Pulver]) and you’ll find these RT percentages to have many unclarified-concerns, although I suppose you can generally trust those numbers if the actual reviews cited do contain consistently negative remarks as is the case with The Woman at the Window, yet even there I have to wonder what hit all of these folks in such a negative manner (yes, I’ve read what they said, but most of it seems off-base to me) for a movie I found effectively-enjoyable, even if nowhere close to a classic. As I note from Plato toward the very end of every Two Guys posting, though, “Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder,” so you should choose to watch anything I recommend at your own considered-discretion.

As usual for now I’ll close out this section with Joni Mitchell’s "Big Yellow Taxi" (from her 1970 Ladies of the Canyon album)—because “You don’t know what you’ve got ‘till it’s gone”—and

a reminder that you can search streaming/rental/purchase movie options at JustWatch.

Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:

We encourage you to visit the Summary of Two Guys Reviews for our past posts.* Overall notations for this blog—including Internet formatting craziness beyond our control—may be found at our Two Guys in the Dark homepage. If you’d like to Like us on Facebook please visit our Facebook page. We appreciate your support whenever and however you can offer it!

AND … at least until the Oscars for 2020’s releases have been awarded on Sunday, April 25, 2021 we’re also going to include reminders in each posting of very informative links where you can get updated tallies of which films have been nominated for and/or received various awards and which ones made various individual critic’s Top 10 lists. You may find the diversity among the various awards competitions and the various critics hard to reconcile at times—not to mention the often-significant-gap between critics’ choices and competitive-award-winners (which pales when they’re compared to the even-more-noticeable-gap between specific award winners and big box-office-grosses you might want to monitor here as well as here due to many 2020 releases being tracked on the 2021 list, although the income situation for 2020’s skewed due to so many award-contenders getting limited or no theatrical releases)—but as that less-than-enthusiastic-patron-of-the-arts, Plato, noted in The Symposium (385-380 BC)—roughly translated, depending on how accurate you wish the actual quote to be—“Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder,” so your choices for success are as valid as any of these others, especially if you offer some rationale for your decisions (unlike many of the awards voters who simply fill out ballots, sometimes—damn it!—for films they’ve never seen).

To save you a little time scrolling through the “various awards” list above, here are the

Oscar nominees and winners for 2020-early 2021 films. (No more links to Golden Globes.)

Here’s more information about The Woman in the Window:

https://www.netflix.com/title/81092222

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhTJLeZFldA (6:24 five interesting details about this

movie, although made before the film’s release giving it much more positive speculation

about what was to come back then than now supported by uniform critical rejection)

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_woman_in_the_window_2020

https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-woman-in-the-window

with us at that site in order to do it (most FB procedures are still a bit of a mystery to us old farts).

By the way, if you’re ever at The Hotel California knock on my door—but you know what the check-out policy is so be prepared to stay for awhile (quite an eternal while, in fact). Ken

(19:06) which I’d also like to commit to this blog’s always-ending-tunes; I never tire of listening to it, then and now (one of my idle dreams is to play guitar even half this good).