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Patching up each day
The last day and a half have been much less fun and productive than I was hoping, because I got reinjured during a PT session—which strikes me as the precise opposite of the intended effect—and therefore I have spent far more time than planned lying down under a pile of sheep. Fortunately, some of the time I have been able to do so on a couch in front of which is a TV playing the 1967 BBC The Forsyte Saga.
Agatha Christie's By the Pricking of My Thumbs (1968) is well-named; it's a mystery, but it builds like a horror story, gathering half-remembered urban legends of children who were lost or mothers who went mad into the reality of a village scarred by a never-solved spate of child killings which may or may not parallel the suspicion of a sequence of murders at a nursing home, female figures flickering in and out of the recollections of various characters as if some weird maiden-mother-crone is presiding over echoes of the historical event that must lie at the heart of the puzzle into which our protagonists stumbled for the most prosaic and yet thematically apt of reasons, visiting an elderly aunt. There's some business of a crime ring, but the key is a house in a painting that looks as though no one has ever lived there, even though some people demonstrably do. To my knowledge, Christie never wrote much straight supernatural fiction beyond the collected stories of The Mysterious Mr Quin (1930), but she would have knocked it out of the park if she had made it her specialty.
As we appear to have all three requisite forms of sugar in the house, I am going to see about making cinder toffee.
Agatha Christie's By the Pricking of My Thumbs (1968) is well-named; it's a mystery, but it builds like a horror story, gathering half-remembered urban legends of children who were lost or mothers who went mad into the reality of a village scarred by a never-solved spate of child killings which may or may not parallel the suspicion of a sequence of murders at a nursing home, female figures flickering in and out of the recollections of various characters as if some weird maiden-mother-crone is presiding over echoes of the historical event that must lie at the heart of the puzzle into which our protagonists stumbled for the most prosaic and yet thematically apt of reasons, visiting an elderly aunt. There's some business of a crime ring, but the key is a house in a painting that looks as though no one has ever lived there, even though some people demonstrably do. To my knowledge, Christie never wrote much straight supernatural fiction beyond the collected stories of The Mysterious Mr Quin (1930), but she would have knocked it out of the park if she had made it her specialty.
As we appear to have all three requisite forms of sugar in the house, I am going to see about making cinder toffee.
no subject
Most of my experience of the decade is in film rather than TV. I am not going to argue conversely that it was wallpaper misogyny because the past is always more complicated than the received version of itself and I have seen personally seen women on film in the '60's who were just people as if it were the most natural thing, but the fact that it's all of them in The Forsyte Saga still catches my attention. A lot of media seems able to handle one or two complicated women and then sort of decides it's done its due diligence and goes home.
(I don't find observation rather than judgment an unusual mode; it just happens to be the one I prefer. I am not the target audience for much didactic literature of any decade even when I agree with its point because I feel as though it should still do its audience the minimal credit of letting them try to figure it out for themselves.)
But that said, Galsworthy is a very observational writer. I was too young when I read the books, so I didn't have much patience with them, but I think they would be very interesting.
Good news: I could start reading the entire saga tonight.
Bad news: I actually hate reading novels off screens. To the library it is.
and also for the huge debate over the matter it sparked off across the nation, with plenty of people (as you say) still ready to take Soames's side.
It's fantastically staged: it goes for maximum emotional violence over physical display and part of what makes it so upsetting is that it isn't a cold assertion of ownership or pure jealous rage, it's mixed up with Soames still wanting Irene to love him, which is the last thing that a violent assault will effect. "You're my wife," he’s shouting, so desperately that his voice cracks, "you're my wife," as if he's trying to prove it on both of their bodies and it's not just an awareness of failure in his face as he watches her inconsolably sobbing afterward, it's a kind of shock at himself; cool motive, still rape.
Aw, that is rather lovely. What a great find! And he is beautiful to watch, he really is.
I shallowly enjoyed the fact that he smiles more than once during the interview.
Kenneth More was talking about playing the only nice Forsyte in it and that he hopes he's getting more like Jolyon as it goes on, but he doesn't know how everyone else's loved ones put up with them if that's the case, because they're all horrible!
And some of Jo's decisions also make me want to rattle him like a castanet! I appreciate it.
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Even on my limited film exposure the whole New Wave thing, at the point where it merged into kitchen sink drama and starred Rachel Roberts a lot would also count as that, and also fed very much into 1960s TV drama (although less so the classic lit end, which was very much theatre), so yes. And I've seen some pretty awful things on TV as well, but by and large, if it's counting as serious drama, in my experience so far the main failing is lack of women not them not allowed to be real and complicated when they are there. (It depends what type - serials and less serious things were a whole other matter, but even there it varies.) There's a sort of backflip with all the 1970s Euston Films type things, but even then a lot of regular drama continued to do really well. (That's why I can't stomach The Professionals, which I saw only the first season of - it's probably not the worst, but it was made in 1977, and I could be watching Doctor Who with Leela or Romana, who both put it to shame, or Poldark or The Duchess of Duke Street or any one of a dozen other things that didn't have to be misogyny 101. But, hi ho, even B7 has its Ben Steed, and Survivors had that one writer who was weird about pregnancy.)
So, yes, I'm trying to generalise, which is always dangerous - and far too many of those film were just dodgy things that contained Alfred Burke, and as we both know, that category is sadly unworthy of the man. XD
I am not the target audience for much didactic literature of any decade even when I agree with its point because I feel as though it should still do its audience the minimal credit of letting them try to figure it out for themselves.
Me neither. I can put up with it if it offers me enough other entertainment, but it is tiresome, and even more tiresome when the too many people seem to think that unless it is stated aloud, it can't possibly mean it. /o\
I shallowly enjoyed the fact that he smiles more than once during the interview.
Having only rewatched the latter part where he was, as he said, hunched and with grey moustache and lines like Charing Cross, it was just charming to see him free of all those things, but the smiles were nice!
And some of Jo's decisions also make me want to rattle him like a castanet! I appreciate it.
Shake them all!
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I am glad to hear that the complication of the female characters is not one of the rarities of The Forsyte Saga, then. You've seen more television from the period than I have; I have probably seen more films. I actually deal a lot better with narratives that don't include women than with narratives that handle them badly.
or any one of a dozen other things that didn't have to be misogyny 101.
Always a good life decision.
So, yes, I'm trying to generalise, which is always dangerous - and far too many of those film were just dodgy things that contained Alfred Burke, and as we both know, that category is sadly unworthy of the man.
I absolutely can't imagine Night Caller's female representation is anything to write home about except to make another person understand what you just went through watching it. Speaking of legendarily terrible movies, however, I finally realized last night that where I primarily recognize Kynaston Reeves from is the mad scientist part in Fiend Without a Face (1958).
Me neither. I can put up with it if it offers me enough other entertainment, but it is tiresome, and even more tiresome when the too many people seem to think that unless it is stated aloud, it can't possibly mean it.
"I know writers who use subtext and they're all cowards."
Having only rewatched the latter part where he was, as he said, hunched and with grey moustache and lines like Charing Cross, it was just charming to see him free of all those things, but the smiles were nice!
I'm still in the earlier phases where he looks like himself, but he looks miserable most of the time, so the smiles really stood out! (I also enjoyed watching him shift his body language by three or four decades as he explained it, because I enjoy that sort of thing.)
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It started out quite well with Patricia Haines, but then somehow it ended up as "It's okay to kidnap women if it's for Science!"
I also enjoyed watching him shift his body language by three or four decades as he explained it, because I enjoy that sort of thing.
Yes!