But there's no glory in watching you implode
Even if the rest of the film were forgettable, Howard Hawks' Red River (1948) would be worth it for the climactic fight scene where Montgomery Clift and John Wayne are tragically and brutally and patriarchally beating one another's brains out and just as the audience, consisting in this case of me and ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rushthatspeaks, decides it cannot take another second of this senseless macho bullshit, Joanne Dru can't either and not only says as much, she holds both combatants at gunpoint until they cut the machismo and admit they love one another. It was a thing of beauty. ("You'd better marry that girl, Matt.") Factor in the gun-comparing scene between Clift and John Ireland and other not infrequent moments of no heterosexual explanation and the whole thing was a nice break from today's otherwise relentless grind of work, even if we weren't totally sure at the outset. It is not easy to watch a movie in the company of an active and presently tired and cranky eleven-month-old, but we managed. In other news, Fox these days is freestanding, fast-moving, can hang upside down by the knees if an adult holds them, and appears to be taking against the entire concept of pants. They like honeycake, though.
Autolycus is being heartbreakingly plaintive right now. He has a vet appointment early in the morning and it requires fasting, which is an impossible concept to explain to a cat. I let him graze all day and gave him a proper dinner at the absolute last moment, but he is attempting to convince me that, actually, in point of fact, he starved since then. We should find him some kind of special treat after the appointment, for being so brave and honest. Last night he and his sister shared in the Rosh Hashanah chicken. All cats are lunisolar.
In honor of the High Holidays, here is a post on Jewish superheroes and here is a brilliant riposte to the rather short-sighted question "How can you be Black and Jewish?"
Back to the relentless grind. At least it is almost autumn.
rushthatspeaks, decides it cannot take another second of this senseless macho bullshit, Joanne Dru can't either and not only says as much, she holds both combatants at gunpoint until they cut the machismo and admit they love one another. It was a thing of beauty. ("You'd better marry that girl, Matt.") Factor in the gun-comparing scene between Clift and John Ireland and other not infrequent moments of no heterosexual explanation and the whole thing was a nice break from today's otherwise relentless grind of work, even if we weren't totally sure at the outset. It is not easy to watch a movie in the company of an active and presently tired and cranky eleven-month-old, but we managed. In other news, Fox these days is freestanding, fast-moving, can hang upside down by the knees if an adult holds them, and appears to be taking against the entire concept of pants. They like honeycake, though.Autolycus is being heartbreakingly plaintive right now. He has a vet appointment early in the morning and it requires fasting, which is an impossible concept to explain to a cat. I let him graze all day and gave him a proper dinner at the absolute last moment, but he is attempting to convince me that, actually, in point of fact, he starved since then. We should find him some kind of special treat after the appointment, for being so brave and honest. Last night he and his sister shared in the Rosh Hashanah chicken. All cats are lunisolar.
In honor of the High Holidays, here is a post on Jewish superheroes and here is a brilliant riposte to the rather short-sighted question "How can you be Black and Jewish?"
Back to the relentless grind. At least it is almost autumn.
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I remember being really amused by Dunson threatening to brand Matt like his cattle, and loving the scene where Tess and Dunson meet. The characters are all so entertaining. This is making me want to watch it again.
It was both very Hawksian and actually in continuity with the way the story had bent since its confidently imperialist opening, but so totally sideways for the conventions of the genre, it was a delight.
Yes! I love the ending. Without that ending, it would just be an entertaining Western; with the ending, it's rightfully a classic of the genre.
re Matt and Cherry Valance: I'm pretty sure I've read Yuletide fic about it, and honestly knowing that fanfic exists about a Western from 1948 is enough to entertain me.
It sounds like it would be! If you have not read the book mentioned in the article—Danny Fingeroth's Disguised as Clark Kent: Jews, Comics, and the Creation of the Jewish Superhero (2008)—I was sent a copy by ladymondegreen a couple of years ago and I highly recommend it.
I have read it, actually. I'm pretty sure I picked it up at the museum gift shop but I also used to buy popular non-fiction and books of essays about comic book superheroes. I can't remember what I thought of the book but I'm pretty sure I liked it.
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Yes! We weren't expecting that, either. None of her scenes behave the way the traditional uses of women in a Western lead you to expect them to, which I think is the point, but it's still electrifying to watch. And her dealing cards one-handed the whole time, Matt's bracelet that was Dunson's bracelet on her wrist. "I stole it . . . I got it in the rain."
Without that ending, it would just be an entertaining Western; with the ending, it's rightfully a classic of the genre.
It's necessary for a good film to stick the ending, but I feel like it's rare for an ending to be the thing that makes the film. This one really did, though.
re Matt and Cherry Valance: I'm pretty sure I've read Yuletide fic about it, and honestly knowing that fanfic exists about a Western from 1948 is enough to entertain me.
It does! I am delighted. I will read it in the morning, after Autolycus' appointment. My brain appears to have OT3'd Cherry/Matt/Tess while I wasn't looking.
I'm pretty sure I picked it up at the museum gift shop but I also used to buy popular non-fiction and books of essays about comic book superheroes.
Okay, awesome. It is a book I wish I had read at the time of Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay (2000), but since I read the novel the year it came out (and have been wondering for a couple of years now what happened to my copy, incidentally, since I don't remember packing it with the rest of the C's), there are some timeline problems with that.
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Get an illustrator for your dreams! I'd read that.