Sunday, August 22, 2010

Squeezing Bourbon from a Stone

I just watched a bit of The Father of the Bride part II with my sister--the one with Steve Martin, not the Spencer Tracy movie (which is actually called Father's Little Dividend). It was the end of the movie, a scene where Steve Martin is bidding goodbye to his daughter, his son-in-law, and his grandchild and I was fascinated by the emptiness. I think Martin's daughter, talking about his new kid, said something like, "She's an aunt, but my little sister, too." Every bit of dialogue was just eerie, plainly stated facts while the soundtrack really worked the strings. There were really ordinary compositions, too--sunset in front of a standard, upscale north eastern house, and there were actually bits of slow motion on Steve Martin, limply trying to squeeze some emotion from the scene. As I said to my sister, it all felt like part of something, and weird to be taken as a whole. Like, okay, we're establishing themes of birth and parenthood or something so now there needs to be murder--my sister said maybe their pet is resurrected at the pet cemetery--something. I imagine the people digging this movie--their thought processes must just have a certain barrier. It's really creepy, actually.

I couldn't help thinking of the Artie Lange clips I was watching this morning, and Artie's "Guy Who Laughs at Everything";



I can't believe Artie's been gone since December. It's so weird how he's just utterly gone not only from the Stern Show but from the public eye entirely. There's been nothing except the restrained updates on him on the show since the New York Post wrote about him checking out of the hospital in January. I guess it's pretty selfish wishing he'd come back to work after a suicide attempt, but damn, listening to five hours at a time of a guy talking, having that voice suddenly silenced, possibly forever, it's really sad.

Last night I watched the last three episodes of the Doctor Who serial "Inferno", first with some really shitty sake, then with Wild Turkey as I decided I wouldn't stand for two bit inebriation I was getting on my Saturday night. I discovered any and all faults I might see in Doctor Who dissolve rapidly in alcohol. I loved everything I already loved, and I stopped noticing how Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart reminds me of Graham Chapman's military characters on Monty Python, and felt genuinely overjoyed when the Doctor was reunited with his good friends at the end of the serial.

I'm a little surprised to learn there were people in real life named Lethbridge.

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