yesterday i highlighted folding star's book review of jane fonda's my life so far and this evening i'm going to highlight other community members of the common ills.
in really great news, blog betty is blogging again at thomas friedman is a great man. as my readers and those who get the gina & krista round-robin or those who read the third estate sunday review know, betty was very bothered by the events/attacks of last week. betty wasn't sure she even wanted to blog anymore.
i got the inside scoop from betty today. she wrote up the 'drama kind of' in her entry 'back from my days of wine and roses.' it worked out because, for those not paying attention of who may have missed the blog, betty writes a humorous blog. the basic story is bettina lives with thomas friedman. bettina doesn't remember much about her previous life. she has fleeting memories from time to time when she's not being pumped with 'vitamins' or when she is on new 'vitamins.'
and recently, she became the writer of thomas friedman's op-eds. he was happy to farm out the work so that he could go around hawking his new book (which didn't make it to number 1 - nah nah nah) (jane fonda's my life so far has had 2 weeks at number 1).
so in last night's installment, something's happened but bettina can't remember what. she knows thomas friedman and nicky k (nicholas kristof) are trying to force her to write what they want her to write. sound familiar?
It was getting very ugly but I just took my vitamins and watched. It was like I was floating and not in the room. Thomas Friedman walked over to Nicky K. and struck him. Nicky K. cried and squealed, "How dare you!" Thomas Friedman said, "You keep whining like a little bitch and I will treat you like one."
Nicky K. whimpered and groveled and Thomas Friedman forgave him. By that time, I had taken half the bottle of pills.
I have to get to work on Thomas Friedman's column. Thomas Friedman tells me I must have done in less than an hour because it must make tomorrow's paper.Hearing that, I swallowed the rest of the pills in the bottle and said, "All gone-gone."
For some reason that was so funny to me. I laughed and laughed.
Then I licked my finger and used it to swipe any residue of vitamins left in the bottle.
so please visit betty's blog if you haven't already. she's a great voice and i'm glad she's not going to be silenced due to a couple of assholes.
now i'm going to turn to the third estate sunday review.
i want to note 3 things from it tonight.
first, as you should know, jane fonda's monster-in-law opens may 13th. in the lead up to the release of jane fonda's first film in 15 years, and her first comedy comedy in 25 years, the third estate sunday review has been reviewing some of her previous comedies.
this sunday, cat ballou was reviewed. i helped with that review and think it turned out pretty good:
Fonda's up for the challenge. As the anchor holding the film together, she provides both the gravity and the light touch and drives the film. Fonda had been the film lead in American films before, in "sex comedies." In the time period, that largely meant you were interested in romance and more but you strongly guarded your virginity. A lot of actresses were capable of that, a lot of actresses weren't capable of more than that. Given her chance to drive a film as the lead, not the female lead, Fonda proves she's to what it takes. (Marvin won his Oscar for best supporting actor.)
Being a 1965 film, sadly, she has to guard that maidenhead but thankfully, Cat Ballou has other things on her mind. Avenging the death of her father being chief among them. She's also got to keep the rag tag band that makes up her "posse" together. But again, her physcality has to be noted. The tension she brings to her body in a potential love scene on the train, the way she's jerkily extending herself only to pull back, prepares the audience for the moment early on when Cat will have to make a choice. It's the body movements as much as the lines they keep you from being shocked when school marm Cat suddenly turns into outlaw of the west. Near the end of the picture, there's a slow walk to a knoose that could go overboard into Joan of Arc-ness but, even then, Fonda had the steady touch and knew how to hold her head and carry herself so that you root for her instead of giving up hope and thinking, "They're going to kill that girl!"
ava and c.i. reviewed the jane fonda and robert redford film the electric horseman:
Don't miss the scene where Hallie's pressed to reveal her source. Fonda plays it perfectly. Hallie realizes where it's going and she's not backing down. Think about Judith Miller's various public pleas, The Charlie Rose Show for one, where she tries to manage the grit and sweetness combo that Sally Field can toss off without breaking a sweat. If Miller didn't veer between that extreme and her infamous bravado ("I was proved fucking right!"), if she showed some of the spirit Fonda's Hallie does, she might make you give a damn about her plight.
Hallie's not playing it modest, but her argument is for a free press. With Miller's public announcements, it never veers from the personal, the I-Judith! (And no matter how she strives for gamine, the fact is Miller's not very likeable and she has her own reporting to blame for that.)We tried to picture how a remake of this film might play out today. (Fonda's Fun With Dick and Jane is being remade.) Brad Pitt would artfully put a straw in his mouth and attempt to look grave while being shot as though Bruce Weber was the cinematographer. Julia Roberts (she's still the only true female star/ leading lady Hollywood's produced in the last two decades -- shh!, don't tell Reese Witherspoon!) would scrunch her brow and try to look serious before breaking out into the smile she's famous for. (Or maybe she'd go the "character route" she went for when she did team with Pitt in The Mexican -- and come off as a dull nag.)
i love ava & c.i.'s writing. they can find something in a film (or tv show) that others might not notice and they can put it into perspective in a fun and educational way that is completely the opposite of the 'cold, historical' approach of so many reviewers. (that's a quote from kat who loves their reviews as much as i do and notes how their reviews are always political and from a feminist perspective).
the third thing i wanted to highlight was the article on gina and krista. if you read their round-robin, you know how great they are. but if you don't, or if you do but want more, check out this article:
From those two, it continued to grow. Currently on Fridays, it goes out to 512 members.
"Krista and I e-mail back and forth all week. On Fridays, we pick what we think were our best discussions and grab some of that. It's another way to look at the issues. And we include inside gossip like Ruth's son's getting married Saturday morning. Or KeShawn's new baby. It's a way for members to get another view about each other."
"And The Apprentice!" Krista adds laughing.
"It's such trash," Gina picks up, "but we are obsessed with that show. Our headline for our two paragraph review of the episode this week was 'nbc to bully boy, you're fired!' So it's just our back and forth. And currently we're arguing over who's going to win."Each round-robin ends with resources for issues and activism. That's as much "footnoting" as they intend to do "because this is just us talking."
They also do sneak peaks of upcoming items. Rebecca might explain what her upcoming themes will probably be for the next week. Betty will answer questions about the outline she's working from. We'll usually let them know what we'll be reviewing here.
i'm a little tired today and, honestly, a little depressed. monday and tuesday, reading the new york times, i saw that polio was on the march again. we've never found a cure for cancer or aids or most diseases. but i thought we'd stamped out polio. now it just seems like we did in developed countries only. once again, it's all about them that's got shall get, them that's not . . .
