More Lemmy for a Friday morning. This is from Lemmy’s days with space-rock giants Hawkwind, recording the vocal for Hawkwind’s most famous song, “Silver Machine.” This is extremely trippy stuff. I take no responsibility if you start to hallucinate (or levitate for that matter).
Here’s Motorhead’s version of the stereotypical ’80s metal video. It has everything you would expect: a scantily clad woman, disapproving parents, home destruction, being chased by the police, motorcycles, etc. Except it has the great Lemmy Kilmister and company bashing it out. Given all that Lemmy has seen and done over the years, I’m not so sure he can be killed by death. In a battle to the death with Keith Richards, I’m putting my money on Lemmy for the win.
A pulverizing and intense cover of Queen’s “Get Down Make Love” by Nine Inch Nails that was sadly thrown away as a B-side of the “Sin” single. The original by Queen was weird and disturbing enough, but Trent Reznor smashes it to bits and amps the creepiness factor up to 11.
There’s just something about the marriage of loud, dissonant guitars and throbbing funk beats that makes the Gang of Four one of the coolest and most innovative bands of all time. You can definitely hear the influence on such bands as the Cure, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Killing Joke.
One of Clint Eastwood’s best and most underrated films, “Tightrope” is less interesting as a thriller (even though it’s a very good one) and more interesting as a character study. The lead character played by Eastwood, a New Orleans detective named Wes Block, who drowns his sorrows over his wife leaving him, by frequenting prostitutes and engaging in sado-masochistic behavior. He’s also looking for a serial killer / rapist whose victims are women that Wes has had some involvement with. There’s even some hints that Wes may in fact be in the killer in question.
Assisting Wes in his investigation is a rape counselor named Beryl, played by Genevieve Bujold, who gets him to confront the hows and whys of his behavior in a mature, non-confrontational way. A key scene that explains his character comes when Beryl asks Wes about his job and his ex-wife. She asks him how dealing with sex crimes in his job affected his private life. He answers that it made him want to treat his wife more tenderly. “How did she respond?” Beryl asks. Wes sadly replies, “She said she wasn’t interested in tenderness.” A quietly devastating moment from a great film.
Comedian Patton Oswalt discusses his fear of getting married in relation to the infamous Stella d’Oro Breakfast Treat commercials of the 1970s. Very funny, but due to some very bad language here, not safe for work or little ones.
“The Great Santini” is a marvelous film adaptation of Pat Conroy’s novel. Robert Duvall gives what is arguably his finest acting performance as Lt. Col. Wilbur “Bull” Meechum, a Marine fighter pilot who excels in his job, but bullies everyone around him, especially his family. Michael O’Keefe arguably gives his best ever acting performance as Meechum’s oldest son Ben. Duvall and O’Keefe were both nominated for Oscars that year, but lost out to Robert DeNiro in “Raging Bull” and Timothy Hutton in “Ordinary People” respectively. The film also boasts great performances by Blythe Danner, Lisa Jane Persky, Stan Shaw, and David Keith.
The scene I’ve included here is the memorable and very painful scene where Ben plays a one-on-one basketball game with his father. Duvall has balls of steel for doing a film like this, because what his character does in this scene is one of the most hateful displays of bullying I’ve ever seen on film. The best thing about “The Great Santini” is that there is no redemptive arc to Duvall’s character. He’s an immature, pathetic, loathsome human being pretty much throughout the entire film. He’s not entirely unlikable, but damn near close.
Dave's Strange World 