Fly Me to the Moon (2024)

Today is the 55th Anniversary of the launch of Apollo 11—the NASA space mission that did, indeed, land the first Earth-people on another world.

A Lie's Still a Lie If Everybody Believes It

or  

"Actually...Leave Them Up. Let Them Think About What They Did."

 

Fly Me to the Moon—which was saved from going straight to streaming by audience surveys—already has a couple strikes against it for me before I even see the movie.

 

1) It's a rom-com, a genre that leaves me cold for its predictability and formulaic structure: Meet Cute; Get Involved; Get Closer; Complications and Misunderstandings; Split Up and Simmer; Coming to Terms—Sacrifice; Ride Off into the Sunset. Two-step drama, with a mere distraction in the middle.

 

2) It floats that old chestnut of conspiracy theorists—the Apollo 11 moon landing in 1969 was faked. I hate that crap. I wasted too many hours online debunking them that I just gave up with some useful links to YouTube people using "facts" and not "feelings" against the absurdist arguments thrown up by others. The best reply is Buzz Aldrin's; he punched one of these nuts in the nose.* I won't waste time on it here, but a lot of the explanation for the origins of this vacuousness (and arguments against) are displayed here and here.  

 

Of course, this isn't the way things should be; one should go into a movie without prejudice, without expectations. I couldn't do that. Bear that in mind.

For the most part, Fly Me To the Moon gets its facts right ("with a lie or two"): there's the standard run-down of what set "The Space Race" up—Russia's Sputnik launch in 1957, America's fears leading to its fast ramp-up and militarization of a space program, and just as we were getting to the stage of moving out of Earth-orbit flights, there was a horrific fire on the launch-pad of Apollo 1 during a test exercise killing the astronauts and causing a significant pause to "get it right." A revamped Apollo capsule was tested, re-tested, and fire-proofed and missions were done to test it, the lunar landing craft (or LEM) and a sortee made around the Moon on Apollo 8. There was a lot of prep, a lot of testing, with the Apollo 1 fire reminding everyone that the mission was "to land a man on the moon and return him safely to Earth."

That's top of mind to Cole Davis (Channing Tatum), flight director at Kennedy Space Center—the place where they assembled the rocket and launched it—Fly Me to the Moon bases the fictional character on Deke Slayton, one of the original Mercury astronauts, who was not allowed to fly because of an atrial fibrillation—"an a-fib" they call it in the movie—a heart murmur. Slayton did not become "Flight Director of Kennedy Space Center" but managed "The Astronaut Office" until he flew on the Apollo-Soyuz joint mission. He is "gung-ho" on the Mission as he was present at the time of the Apollo fire and he takes everything, every nut, bolt, and screw, seriously. And semi-seriously as he's superstitious of the feral black cat that hangs around KSC.

Then there's Kelly Jones (Scarlett Johansson), of "Kelly Jones Advertising." Her job has less to do with reality than it is does with "feelings" and the manipulation of same to win clients and thus, their customers. Like Cole, she's a problem solver, but with a different bent. Her area of expertise isn't science or engineering but psychology—Cole doesn't like weak spots; Kelly loves them. She'll use them to her advantage and if it's a little dishonest, the ends always justify the means. That's how it works in advertising and she sails through her territory friction-less and A-OK.

But, when she's approached by a Man in Black (Woody Harrelson) from the Nixon Administration to "sell" the Moon landing to the American public, she can't resist—it's a government job! And she begins setting up interviews for the press (against NASA regulations but she hires actors to get around that little detail), selling space ad campaigns to willing clients (NASA didn't "do" ad campaigns, but a lot of their contractors were all too willing to crow about it), and doing a little influence-peddling with congressmen voting on funding bills (which certainly happened and is happening today).

For Cole, this is like sticking corporate logos on a capsule to make it look like a NASCAR. It's disrespectful, unnecessary to the program and...just dishonest. It's only when Harrelson's MIB starts interfering that things start turning into a major head-ache—putting cameras on the spacecraft (the idea! Even though*cough* it'd really been happening since Apollo 7). In space you can't change course, but the winds of politics keep threatening to blow things off course.

"You got your notebook?"

But, it's a ROM-COM, and they never stray off track! Cole and Kelly have their differences, so, of course, they have to bend a little and if that's in each other's direction....well...

How is it? Well, as I said on the recent Lambcast about it, it "didn't piss me off" (which, considering I had two strikes against it before entering the theater says a lot about the charm of the thing). Johansson and Tatum could orbit around this sort of material in their sleep, but she never misses an opportunity to display a worry-line and he makes stubborn male obstinancy attractive. Some of the writing is quite clever, the meticulousness of the art direction and the costuming is spot-on (especially for the casual-wear of the males) and Greg Berlanti has a much better eye directing movies than he does producing superhero shows for the CW.

"uhhh...how are they going to stand this thing up?"

(My plastic models of it broke apart in this configuration!!)

But, for criminy sake, one can't look at the movie and think that even the most gullible of audiences won't "buy" some of the stuff they see being shown on-screen. I'd mention some buy they'd be "spoilery" and that's one conspiracy I just won't stand for (some things should be left secret, dammit!).

Let's just say that they got a lot of stuff wrong while maintaining just a bit of the right stuff.

It's a rom-com, so OF COURSE there's going to be a "flying scene!"

* The second best argument is the one for folks who know nothing about the space program (which I grew up watching): Okay...say you fake Apollo 11. Did they also fake Apollo's 12, 14, 15, 16, 17...all of which were larger in scope and covered terrains that couldn't be housed in the BIGGEST warehouse-studios...not to mention Apollo 10 (the dress rehearsal that got tantalizingly close—10 miles—to the lunar service)...and fake Apollo 13, which was a mission FAILURE! 

 

If you seriously believe there was still a conspiracy you're either obstinate in the light of facts, desperate, or certifiable. You need help. Get it. Start with research. 

 

 

2012

Despite what "The Last Word" blurb—at the bottom of the page—says, I don't like writing reviews of bad movies. I just don't. (I don't even like WATCHING bad movies!)

But, I have to admit: I enjoyed writing this one.

Saturday is traditionally "Take Out the Trash" Day.

"...And I Feel Fine"

Earth to Roland Emmerich: "Cut it out!"

Between Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow, and, now, 2012, the German director has personally destroyed the world three times.

Well, enough is enough. Gaea's getting pissed.

And so am I.

Seventeen special effects companies, including Sony and Digital Domain (two heavy-weights and they're not even the first ones listed) were employed to create the global carnage on display in this flick, and there's still a recession going on. The attention to detail and dedication to photo-realism is the only evidence of professionalism in the enterprise. That's entirely appropriate as the only reason to see this monstrosity is to witness things blow up "real good." That they do.

Los Angeles develops wrinkles and cracks that even Joan Rivers' supply of Retin-A can't erase and schlumpfs into the Pacific. Yellowstone faithfully incinerates in a verrry slow pyroclastic flow that the hero can out-run. Las Vegas becomes the new Grander Canyon (they were going to knock those buildings down anyway!). Hawaii's a volcano (but the surfing's great!). Washington D.C. becomes more chaotic than it already is.

I'll admit it. There is a giddy, monstrous 2-year old's glee in seeing the White House (which Emmerich imploded with a shiny blue destructa-beam in Independence Day) being destroyed again—this time by the aircraft carrier John F. Kennedy, propelled on a Potomac tidal wave (That's about as "high concept" as this film gets). And St. Peter's. Tibet.* All the hots spots become much hotter. The fly-over-and-through of Los Angeles over the splintering clover-leafs and under collapsing buildings is a thrilling roller-coaster ride through Hell with digi-people clinging to collapsing floors, all manner of auto-mayhem and even violence by Rolling Donut sign. But if you were to take out all the countdowns to disaster in 2012 ("We've got five minutes before everything blows!!") and just include the disasters, you'd have a 20 minute highlights reel, rather than a 158 minute poorly written series of contrivances and coincidences.

And everything blows, anyway.

You'd almost think the thing was worthwhile with Chiwetel Ejiofor, Oliver Platt, John Cusack, Danny Glover, George Segal and Thandie Newton in the cast. But they're only mouth-pieces for exclamatory dialog with brows a-furrowed. Seems the whole thing starts with a planet re-alignment, which triggers solar flares which sends out neutrino's that miraculously microwave the Earth's core and destabilize the Earth's tectonic plates, reverse the Earth's magnetic field and create monster tsunami's.

Now, in this world-wide scenario, everybody in the cast has only one degree of separation to everybody else, so that they can look with surprise at their monitors and intone "Wait! I know that man/woman/dog!" Coincidences are the order of the doomsday, and little dialog goes unmatched without the appropriate chunk of irony whistling through the air and squishing the speakers with a thud. It's the kind of movie where hubby says to wife "I feel like there's something pulling us apart" right before a fissure opens up between them. When St. Peter's Basilica starts to collapse, the cracks split down the Sistine Chapel right between Man and God's fingers. Roland Emmerich is not a subtle director. No man whose ambition is to make a better "Godzilla" movie can be.

And what Emmerich is re-making here is When Worlds Collide,** a 1950's sci-fi flick that imagined Earth hit by another planet, and its treasures, two-by-two's of animals and a lottery-chosen clutch of humans are rocketed off to the convenient companion planet that precedes it. Here, the art is rounded up, libraries accumulated, animals airlifted, and although a lottery is mentioned, the folks who go in the arks are world leaders (naturally), the folks who can afford to pay 1 billion euros per seat, and anyone conniving enough to smuggle themselves on-board. The Best and the Brightest, The Cream of Humanity. Everybody else becomes part of the new petroleum deposits the survivors will profit from in the future. Talk about your disasters. Imagine a world where among the survivors are Dick Cheney, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Hugo Chavez, Rod Blagojevich, Paris Hilton, Mike Tyson and Pat Robertson, but no research scientists—not even the guys who invented Post-it Notes! That's a version of Hell even Milton wouldn't have conjured.***

It was at this point, I would have been happy to see everybody die, but no such luck. The last few minutes of the film are disaster heaped upon disaster, with survival dependent on the actions of one man—guess who? But, my concern was what exercises I could find to relieve the pain in my eyes from rolling them so much. They don't sell aspirins at the concession stand. Not even chocolate-covered ones.

Truth be told I don't enjoy writing reviews for bad movies, as there's more inspiration in good ones. But I'll leave it with this quote from the director (in a New York Times profile by Tyler Gray) complaining about people's reactions to his making a film like 2012 in a "post-9/11 environment."

"If I cannot destroy a big high-rise anymore, because terrorists blew up two of the most famous ones, the twin towers, what does this say about our world?”

Our world is fine, Rollie, no thanks to you. But it says your priorities are really shitty.

And the only way to make it good to us is to make all your digital models of people caught in wholesale slaughter based on your likeness.

Verstehen sie?

Verstehen sie nicht.

****

"thoughts and prayers..."

* But not Mecca. Fatwa's need not apply. Kinda lily-livered of Emmerich to not risk personal destruction when destroying the world for his art. Don't they have "sins of omission" in Islam?

** And just our luck, that master of the cinematic form Stephen Sommers (The Mummy, Van Helsing, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra) is making his own direct re-make of "When Worlds Collide" to be released in 2010. Oh, the joy. (As of 2023, IMDB lists it as still "In Develpment").

*** Not to politicize too much (or think, God help me) but given the Ark scenario envisioned by the movie, with the whole "two-by-two" concept, I'm imagining the passenger list is restricted to "breeders," meaning there are no gays and lesbians on the boats. Emmerich is gay. What is he thinking?

**** Part of the mission of these reviews is to promote the theatrical experience when it is deemed important to the presentation of the story. It is tempting to say that "The Big Screen" is the only way to watch 2012, because there are so many little demons in the details. But, no. The story is so lunk-headed and gleefully clap-happy nihilistic that the best presentation is merely putting a bow on a cess-pool.

No Country For Old Men

Written at the time of the film's release...

Signs and Wonders

Llewelyn Moss is out on the Texas veldt tracking a caribou he shot, following the blood-trail when it is suddenly crossed by another blood-trail. Following it, he finds a drug-deal gone bad--five vehicles, and several dead Latinos, a truck-bed full of cocaine and eventually a satchel filled with stacks of of money, $10,000 to a stack. Fate is good to him.

Anton Chigurh is hunting, too. He needs a vehicle, and as he's driving a stolen police car, he can pull over anyone he chooses. He walks over to the driver side of the car, carrying a gas canister and a nozzle. "Get out of the vehicle," he says. And the driver complies. "Hold still, please, sir," he says, and the driver complies. He points the nozzle at the man's forehead and fires.

Sheriff Ed Tom Bell has been Sheriff of Terrell County since he was 26 years old, and that was a long time ago. You'd think he'd seen everything, but he's beginning to wonder if such a thing is possible. Looking over that drug deal gone bad while horse-back, he surmises the way things went down. "That's very linear, Sheriff," says his deputy. "Age'll flatten a man, Wendell," he not particularly replies.

The first time I'd heard of the Coen Brothers was a Time Magazine review of their first movie Blood Simple. When it wound up being featured at the Seattle Film Festival I went, expecting great things and their quirky ways of telling a story, like that travelling shot (by future director Barry Sonenfeld) that glided over a bar-top, rising up and over a fallen bar-fly. But what I wasn't expecting was a sequence that is one of my favorite in all of film, and is such an obvious thing to do, I wondered why nobody'd thought of it before. Ray has just murdered his lover's husband and stashed him in the back-seat of his car to take him someplace remote to bury him. But as he drives the long, flat Texas highway at night, the corpse behind him moans and moves. He slams on his brakes, pulls to the side of the road and runs...runs in a panic to get away, into a field. He runs into the dark until he stops, panting in fright and exertion. He stands there, looking back at the car. Now what? He's "safe." He got away. but he's no better off than he was before. He has to go back. And he especially has to go back before another car or truck approach and bathe the scene in light.

He has no idea what he'll find when he goes back there, but back he must go. It's the center of the Big Undecipherable that is the heart of the Coen brothers' movies--when people start to ask "how did I get here? And how do I come out, if I can't go back?" There's no going back to Square One with the Coen's. There is only the going-forward, head up or head bowed.

In its way, No Country for Old Men has bits of other Coen movies all over it. The "cat-and-mouse" games of Blood Simple. The airy philosophy of O Brother, Where Art Thou? The sharply written common dialog of all their films. The questioning law officer with philosophical questions of Fargo, the "what's it all worth" tragedy of Miller's Crossing, and Barton Fink. It stands as a good primer for all that is good in their work.

Is it their best work? The "Masterpiece" that it's been touted as? Hard to say. There seems to be a decided effort on their part to NOT make it that, to undercut the impact that the film could have had had they been more direct, hit things on the nose, as they say, rather than leaving things unsaid and perhaps confounding their audience. They've left room for interpretation and controversy, to make one think about the importance of dreams, of Fate and Destiny. One has to review the film that is, not the film that could've been. And No Country, as is, has some exquisite cinematography (by Roger Deakins--night shooting has never looked more convincing or as beautiful as here), note-perfect performances by just about everybody in the cast, but especially all the leads--not just Tommy Lee Jones, and Javier Bardem and Josh Brolin, but also Tess Harper (where's she been?), Woody Harrelson, Stephen Root, and Barry Corbin.

What makes No Country for Old Men different from the other Coen movies is a departure from the insular, claustrophobic worlds they have presented in the past. Before the films never strayed beyond the orbits of the main characters of their films--the surroundings filled with extras were there as filler. But this feels like a fuller world, a complete world, where every character has worth and life seems to be going on beyond the frame. That's new, and it will be interesting to see where this aspect of their film-making will take them.

It is not as fully realized a vision as Raising Arizona, or Fargo, or even The Big Lebowski. It is not as accessible as O Brother, Where Art Thou? But it far outshines such experiments in style as Barton Fink, The Hudsucker Proxy, The Man Who Wasn't There, or Intolerable Cruelty. No Country for Old Men is a stellar summing-up of where the Coen's have been, even if it doesn't quite rise above it. But the expanded universe of theirs—the more full world they present here—presages bigger and better films still to come.

 

Now You See Me

Written at the time of the film's conjuration.

"Sometimes The Magic Works, Part 2"
or 
The Slightest of Hands

Bullwinkle: Hey, Rocky!  Watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat!
Rocky: But that trick NEVER works!

The tagline for Now You See Me, the latest film by Louis Letterier (who brought to you the modern version of Clash of the Titans, a not too bad film, actually, as empty-headed gladiator-myth movies go) is "The closer you look, the less you see," and, even though that's supposed to be saying something about the power of illusion, it couldn't be more appropriate for the movie it's supposed to be selling. You'll get the most out of this movie if you're asleep during it.*  

Better yet, don't get rooked into it, and do the opposite of the film's title and don't see it at all.  Because there's movie-magic, where you feel the sense of wonder and amazement, and there's the kind that just makes you feel that you've been "taken." Now You See Me makes me feel like a rube.

And that's the mastery of marketing. Great cast, with a bunch of actors who've got taste and have done terrific things before...and James Franco's brother, Dave...so there must be something to this, right? I mean, Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine,** Mark Ruffalo, Mélanie Laurent,*** Michael Kelly, and the Zombieland duo of Jesse Eisenberg and Woody Harrelson. No slouches there.  

But the movie is such a drab circling-camera edit-fest (it feels like it was shot on a Roomba) that you know you're being misled somewhere, and you're being made to not think about what's going on on-screen, because, ultimately it makes no sense whatsoever. The point of the movie is distraction, and there the movie succeeds quite well. It's so busy and flashy, you stop thinking and take in the swirling, swooping actors and camera moves, and let them wash over you...and your brain stops. It's only at the end that you realize that the movie is a white-rabbit and it's disappeared, if it even existed in the first place. Orson Welles said movie-making is smoke and mirrors, and there are plenty of mirrors here, but the result is pure smoke.

What's it about? Four street magicians Daniel (Eisenberg) card-sharp, Merrit (Harrelson) a mentalist, Henley (Isla Fisher) escape artist, and Jack (Franco) pick-pocket, all accomplished, all a little larcenous, are recruited by a mysterious presence (who has surreptitiously observed all of them disguised in a hoodie—what, they couldn't see the face?) to form a guerrilla magic team called "The Four Horsemen." They, after a jump of time, go from nothing to large coordinated shows, bankrolled by an insurance tycoon (Caine). The first, in Vegas, involves the seeming transportation of a French citizen to his bank in France, that results in the sucking of millions of euros out of its vault, and spraying it throughout the large theater crowd...as if by magic. This attracts the attention of the FBI in the form of agent Dylan Rhodes (Ruffalo) and Interpol's agent Alma Dray (Laurent), who pursue the clues and try to ascertain how they pulled off the heist. Along the way, they interview Thaddeus Bradley (Freeman), a magic debunker, who has a vested interest in exposing the Horsemen for a series of buzz-kill videos and reality shows. He shows the agents how it was done, then stops there, being very cagey about what the next scam will be.  As it turns out, it's in New Orleans, where Caine's insurance magnate tries to buy off Freeman to no avail.

At this point, you're wondering not about the "how," but the "why?" What's everybody's motivation in this?  Freeman's stakes are relatively paltry—the group has just gotten started, who would care—so you begin to suspect he's behind it all. Caine's interest in unimaginable, as he's putting out a large outlay of disposable cash for events that have no residual value, and leave him open to accessory and fraud charges. And the agents' zeal is largely enigmatic (matching those of the Horsemen). What's everybody in this for, other than to propel the movie? It's a bit like The Sting (which had the guts to put the motivation up front) only skin-deep and with shallow surface-flash. Letterier and script-writers Ed Solomon, Boaz Yakin and Edward Ricourt provide no fore-thought, but just speed things up and turn on the pyrotechnics, so there's no time for questions and little room for answers, while the actors go through their paces with looks of ambivalence so as not to betray anything.

There's not that much to betray. Once everything has been revealed (save for the fate of the Horsemen), there's no satisfaction, only a feeling of emptiness and pointlessness ("Really? All that for that?") and then you begin to question everyone's behavior during the film, which makes no sense given the actions displayed throughout the movie. One almost thinks that the film might have multiple endings, depending on which cineplex you go to, so tenuous is the resolution and back-story.  It doesn't bear close examination.

But then, we were warned. "The closer you look, the less you see."

And it has nothing, absolutely nothing up its sleeve.

Note from James in 2021: There was a sequel—Now You See Me 2. I didn't.
 * No Morgan Freeman jokes, please...

** Well, Michael Caine, he used to sign up for supermarket openings...

*** ...spent the whole movie wondering where I'd seen her before—Inglorious Basterds.

A Prairie Home Companion

Written at the time of the film's release...

 

  Spiel mir das Lied vom Tod*

or

"What'd He Wanna Do That For?"

"A Prairie Home Companion" is one of the best shows on the radio (the best being "This American Life," but we'll save that for later...or better yet, check it out for yourself on the link). Over the course of its 30 year run, this less-than-"Grand Ol' Opry"-wanna-be has presented home-spun music of all genres--from Gospel to Grand Opera (and has seemingly unearthed every folk-artist extant in the country) and combined spiritual optimism (albeit Lutheran, which takes the joy out of it) with a cynical farm-land realism, all reflecting the philosophy and upbringing of its host Garrison Keillor, whose low story-telling voice is as lulling as cattle moaning in the pasture at night. Keillor writes it all, performs in most of it and serves as ringmaster, finally capping it off with his stool-talk reverie, The News from Lake Wobegon, land of low expectations ("Where all the women are strong, all the men, good-looking and all the children are above-average"). Old time radio techniques and phony commercials--for "Powder-Milk Biscuits" ("Heavens, they're tasty and expeditious!") or for "The Ketchup Advisory Board" wind their way through everything, with just enough toothsome satire to leaven the bitter with the sweet. It's Community-Theater of the Mind, a staple of Public Radio, and manages to embrace and cherish both red and blue states in it's musty woolen blanket of nostalgia. 

In the long string of Saturdays that I've listened I've heard moments of great beauty that I'll never forget,** while, on the other hand, I've wondered more than once why Keillor needs to sing so damned much. It's been a comforting friend on lonely cross-country drives, and it's been known to make a car load of rowdies quiet in contemplation. 

But anyone going into Robert Altman's A Prarie Home Companion or "PHC" is due for a bit of a shock. Written by Keillor (from a story by him and Ken LeZebnik), it incorporates familiar bits and pieces from the broadcasts throughout. Characters come to life in the form of show-stalwarts cowboys Dusty and Lefty (played in the film by Woody Harrelson and John C. Reilly) and private eye Guy Noir (played by Kevin Kline as not hard-boiled, so much as hard-up), as well as the subjects of one of Keillor's Wobegon yarns-the Johnson Sisters (Lily Tomlin and Meryl Streep). There's an old country music type named Chuck Akers (played by L. Q. Jones), who stands in for the PHC perennial guest, Chet Atkins. Why, I even remember the episode the Penguin joke came from. But the radio show itself is used as backdrop to the intertwining stories of the participants on the last night of the show, which overwhelms the conceit of using the show in the first place. 

And then...it's about death, primarily.

Which must make every blue-haired old lady in the audience go, "What'd they do that for? It's supposed to be 'A Prairie Home Companion!!"

A little back-story: Keillor had written a screenplay for Altman called "Lake Wobegon Days," about a local boy coming home to bury his father (it sounds alarmingly like Elizabethtown!)

Altman rejected it, saying: 1) "The death of an old man is not a tragedy" and 2) "I want to make a movie of 'A Prairie Home Companion,' instead!" I can just see the sour-lemon look on Keillor's face when Altman said that! "What does he wanna make a movie of that for?" he no doubt grumbled. "I've been doing that for years! And it's RADIO!"

Yup. But it's also live, which means chaos, and Altman always loved chaos. And it has music, which to Altman means community, and PHC ends, as the show usually does, with a group-sing of an old gospel standard--kinda shaky and maybe a little off-key, but still, it's everyone putting aside their differences and pulling together to make something nice, a trope that goes back to the films of Howard Hawks. And it ends with a grace note—an impromptu final bow from the wings.*** Altman's been making that kind of film for years, and death has always been a player, in M*A*S*H (whose so-familiar theme song is entitled "Suicide is Painless"), McCabe and Mrs. Miller, Nashville, The Player, Short Cuts, and Gosford Park. And The Long Goodbye.

And the reaction is usually "What'd he do that for?"

Amidst the songs by long-time PHC participants, the bits and skits, the players**** hook up and separate and talk over each other in a life-like muddle, Keillor's self-initialed character is constantly correcting the details of the various versions of History that he's concocted, and Death (in the form of Virginia Madsen) wanders the theater. Madsen's a wonderful actress—she deserved her Oscar nomination for Sideways and to win it, as well—but she's not terribly convincing in the part. Not entirely her fault. It's written as clueless and all-knowing, deeply philosophical and naive--Streep would have had difficulty with it. Plus, it's a little unclear just how she operates. Some people who see her, die. Some don't. Some folks who are unaware of her die. It's inconsistent. You'd want Death to have some kind of definite procedure, but I guess that's asking too much of a Grim Reaper. Death doesn't have rules.

But it's significant that before the final song, Death makes one final appearance and she heads our way until she obscures the camera in white.

A Prairie Home Companion was Robert Altman's last film. He died at age 81 on November 20th, 2006.

And as he said, "The death of an old man is no tragedy." Especially one who could still challenge an audience right up to the end.

"Live Every Show Like It's Your Last." The last bow's yours, Bob.

* The German Title of "Once Upon a Time in the West," translated, means "Play me a Song of Death"

** a college chorus group solemnly singing John Lennon's "Julia" will haunt me for the rest of my life, and even a sing-along with a crowd in Buffalo last week, made me dab my eyes and smile at the cleverness with which it was done (It's "Angels Watching Over Me" in Segment 2 of the link)

*** Courtesy of the always-wonderful John C. Reilly. But before that, one of the joys of the film is an impromptu bit by Meryl Streep, where she runs from the stage, grabs Keillor, who's already shambled off, drags him, surprised, back for a short, sweet dance--then turns around and leaves him, his arms holding her memory, as he watches--not sure what to do next. Then he turns and shuffles off-stage again. It feels spontaneous, and it feels perfect for both characters...and for Keillor in real life. 

**** How's Lindsey Lohan, you gossip-mongers ask? Good, actually! How're you?