I Lay There in Pain but I Love It.

Peter Sellers is still a Super Star in our house. Ironically...maybe poetically, it was his absentee role in Trail of the Pink Panther that solidified his status with the Boy. I have always loved him. First, because he made my Daddy laugh...put him in stitches. Being little, few things brought me more joy than watching him writhe around in his chair...gasping and cackling, hands on his stomach, eyes welling...and then the high pitched "haaaaaaw....ohhhhhh."

"Do you have a massage for me?" He'd repeat to himself and be right back in tears. Magic.

Of course, as I got older and the jokes began to reveal themselves...I had my own troubles staying upright. Older still and the complicated nature that he brought to those roles...the subtly he imbued them with...reveal an absolute genius. Clare Quilty in Kubrick's Lolita....



So sleazy....Him and Natasha Fatale there...it might be my favorite exchange of dialogue ever filmed. Then there's Dr. Strangelove. How easily could this character have spiraled out of control...even in capable hands.



When he grabs his right arm and pulls it forward to bring the wheelchair back around...just kills me.

As comedy it's brilliant but there's also something profound in the grotesque nature of it. Never mind the wicked things these old Nazis had done or the highly dubious use of them in the U.S. defense department...what must it have been like in the minds of these f****ers after 1945? Moody I reckon. They had literally sold their souls for a future that was never coming. What a demented existence. It's there in Seller's performance...without breaking the tone of the film, there's something horrifying in the absurdity. .

Just for giggles...he's also playing the president in that scene.

I guess his own existence was slightly demented. I hope some of that has been exaggerated. There's a ridiculous romance attached to the tortured artist, the sad clown but, of course, there's nothing romantic about mental anguish. He does seem to have been genuinely disturbed. Abusing the poppers and cocaine surely didn't help and four marriages would be enough to put anybody in early grave...never mind somebody with a lousy heart.

All of that's over now and what's left is a brilliant legacy...the Goon Show, The Mouse that Roared, Being There, The Magic Christian, I'm All Right Jack, etc...making my son giggle uncontrollably and my Daddy laugh until he cried. I love Peter Sellers...a genius that's all.

Fever Dream

 

The Fight Between Carnival and Lent - Bruegel

 

This was supposed to be a post about the third season of American Horror Story. Set in New Orleans...the writers, for the first time, take great pleasure in slaughtering some of the locals. Locals in the surrounding area...not New Orleans. They all have a kind of shallow affection for New Orleans...generic shots of the Quarter and St. Louis cemetery, vague Jazz notes...but don't have any interest in actually writing a character that would exist there. They do take great care in reconstructing cliché's of Southerners and ripping them limb from limb.

I couldn't get it written...couldn't get a video made...so, there's this. One note...I do not let the Boy talk to me like this...unless I am goading him. Which I was without mercy. Ha.

  

 

We'll try it again tomorrow.

 

Keep Your Head Up!

 

 

 

Don't know why I'm torturing myself with this. It's half a year before another kick off. Usually, this time of year, I can do a pretty good job of pretending it doesn't exist...a duller universe but one that's  more manageable than unremitting anticipation.

 

 

A little taste...Reggie Nelson was one a the great defensive players that have come through Florida. He was a defensive back...part of the Secondary tasked with eliminating the passing game. A Headhunter...one of the best the Gators have ever had. Funny to think that the forward pass was introduced to make the game safer. Around the :40-45 mark you see how good he was when a Wide Receiver he's covering flops to the ground rather than catch the ball and be decapitated....and some LL Cool J. 

I'm still working on getting the colors right...especially the blue and there's a few details to be added but it's blocked in...it's set.