It’s the simple things in life. Today I finally installed BC’s Christmas present: an infrared receiver/transmitter for my home theater. You see, my dvd player sits on top of my desk, at too sharp an angle from my typical viewing postion to pick up the signal from my remote control. I had set up a concave mirror on the bookshelves opposite the player, which bounced the signal from my remote in the right direction most of the time, but not without a great deal of bodily contortion. Well, no more my friends, I just aim my remote right at the screen and with a gentle press of the button–pause! rewind! mute!
Think of the calories I’ll save!
I saw Transamerica tonight with D. It’s a sweet film, and Felicity Huffman is amazingly convincing as a transsexual, both physically and in manner. D wanted to go to Max’s Opera Cafe afterwards, and in the tradition of most of my larger dinner companions, spilled his over-sized iced tea into my lap. I aim for a Cary Grant kind of sophistication, but end up Stan Laurel most of the time.
Yesterday was Shelley Winters appreciation day, with a double header of Lolita and Night of the Hunter. I think that dear Shelley gets killed off in about half of her movies, and most of the time it’s at just the right moment, where if she hadn’t been killed we’d be wishing that someone would just shut her up, but instead we miss her intensely and are left frustrated by her sudden absence. She’s at her best as Lolita’s mom; a controlling shrew burbling below the surface of an unconvincing urban sophisticate. Night of the Hunter is just a masterpiece, a black and white fairy tale about unambiguous good and bad. Every scene is framed for the screen, tight expressionisitc compositions of shadow and light. There’s one incredible scene where the kids are floating downsteam in a boat at night and it seems like it’s filmed in a studio, with exquisitely lighted frogs, bunnies, and owls taking note of their presence. In another scene we see a fishing lure from underwater drifting through a mass of hair-like seaweed flowing horizontally in the strong current of the river. We follow the lure to see Shelley, who was tied up and drowned by her widow-killing sham of a preacher husband, sitting in the front seat of her submerged car, arms tied at her waist, her hair flowing in the current like the seaweed. I miss her so much.