Neil Young & Crazy Horse Perform “Cortez the Killer” in 1991

One of the things I really enjoyed when I was posting shows every day was posting certain artists on certain days of the week. I am a man of some organization. I like to have my ducks in a row as my mother likes to say. There was something nice about knowing that on Mondays I’d be posting Bob Dylan shows, and on Wednesdays, I’d post the Grateful Dead, etc. I kind of miss that.

So in my ever-changing plans on what to do with this blog, I thought it would be fun to try to do something similar again. No, I won’t be posting new shows every day and thus I won’t be posting Neil Young shows on Thursdays. But maybe I can post a Neil Young video on some Thursdays. Or links to interesting Neil Young news.

I like the idea anyway. So here’s a terrific version of one of my favorite Neil songs, “Cortez the Killer” in 1991.

Links of the Day: January 5, 2023

Vulfpeck Cover Bob Dylans “Gotta Serve Somebody“

Why did the Grateful Dead stop playing ‘St. Stephen’?: Far Out Magazine

American Songwriter Readers Vote for the Best Female Songwriters of All Time: American Songwriter
Number one isn’t surprising but it is nice to see mygirl Lucina Williams in there.

Star Wars The Bad Batch Season 2: Is Captain Wilco From the Movies or Clone Wars?: Game Revolution
We’re big fans of The Bad Batch in my house so I’m pretty excited to see Season Two show up.

The Last of Sheila (1973)

the last of sheila

Rian Johnson listed this film as an influence on Glass Onion, his recent Knives Out sequel for Netflix (which is excellent, I highly recommend it) so I thought I’d give it a watch. Almost immediately the influences come flying right at you from the television screen.

The story involves a group of rich, beautiful, (mostly) young people who have found success in the movie industry. They’ve been invited by their friend Clinton (James Coburn) for a week aboard his yacht where he had prepared some delightfully complicated game.

The game involves revealing select secrets from each person (alcoholic, ex-convict, homosexual, child molester, etc) and will conclude with the revelation of who ran over Clinton’s wife one year prior and didn’t have the decency to stay with her and maybe call for help. Everyone more or less enjoys the game until someone actually dies and then it becomes a very real murder mystery.

Glass Onion is a lot bigger, a lot bolder, and a lot more fun, but The Last of Sheila is rather delightful in its own way. The cast includes James Mason, Ian McShane, Raquel Welch, and Dyan Cannon. It was shot on location in the Mediterranean. It was written by Stephen Sondheim and Anthony Perkins of all people.

Clinton is a movie producer and he has an idea bout making a movie about his dead wife’s life. He wants everyone he’s invited on the boat to help him make it. They, scriptwriters, directors, and actors all, desperately need him and this movie to help their sagging careers. It is full of twists and turns, mysteries and reveals. The cast is clearly having a good time.

It isn’t quite as punchy as I’d like it to be, and the direction by Herbert Ross never excites. He certainly doesn’t make great use of the beautiful setting. It feels very much of its time. One of the big secrets is the character is homosexual which wouldn’t be a big deal now, but in 1973 could be quite detrimental for a celebrity working in Hollywood. That is more scandalous within the film (as is being an alcoholic and a shoplifter) than the revelation that one of them is a child molester which is shrugged off by the characters and the film. But mostly the film is a lot of fun and if you liked Glass Onion I highly recommend it.

Anna Christie (1930)

anna christie

Greta Garbo was one of the biggest movie stars of the silent era. She had a mysterious, luminous on-screen persona. Despite this she, or perhaps the studios, were reluctant to bring her into the sound era. She was born and raised in Sweden and didn’t speak a word of English when she first came to the United States. By 1930 she was fluent in the language but still spoke with an accent, which no doubt created fears in everyone’s mind that audiences wouldn’t take to the actress once they could hear her talk.

If you’ve ever seen Singin’ in the Rain you’ll know what they were worried about.

The fears were unfounded for Anna Christie her first “talkie” movie was a rousing success and she remained one of the biggest box office stars for the next several years.

MGM played up Anna Christie by promoting it with the tagline “Garbo Talks” (nine years later they’d play with that tag when she made her first comedy, Ninotchka by promoting it with “Garbo Laughs”.) Her famous first line is “Gimme a whiskey, ginger ale on the side, and don’t be stingy, baby.”

For all that, the movie is actually kind of dull. Garbo plays the titular Anna who was abandoned by her father (George F. Marion) at a young age and sent to live with her cousins on their Minnesota farm. They abused her and she moved to St. Paul by herself where she became a prostitute. After a stint in a hospital, she moves back to New York in hopes her father will take her in and let her rest.

He does and they reconcile she meets a sailor and they fall in love. The big drama comes in whether or not these two men will still love her once they find out about her past. The ending is fairly typical for its time period but somewhat shocking as seen through modern eyes.

Garbo and the rest of the small cast are quite good. The story lacks any real emotional punch and the direction is mostly flat. There are a couple of interesting visuals including one scene on a roller coaster where the camera sits in the seat in front of Garbo looking back at her. The other gives us a bird’s eye view at one of those strongmen uses a hammer to ring a bell contraptions. But mostly the camera stays in fixed positions while the characters do a lot of talking. Presumably, the camera doesn’t move much because this is an early sound picture and they were afraid to much movement might hit a microphone or the characters might move to where the mic couldn’t hear them. Again if you’ve seen Singin’ in the Rain you’ll know what I’m talking about.

Actually, you’d be better off just watching Singin’ in the Rain again. Unless you are a big Garbo fan, this one is quite skippable.