Michael Cimino (1939-2016)
I watched Heaven’s Gate a few years back to see for myself. No amount of re-editing, re-imagining, or explaining can save it from being the trainwreck that it is. It is a Western with a five minute roller-skating sequence in it. It is 325 minutes long (and I mean long). Joe Queenan writes about it here, in what is the funniest movie review I’ve ever read. It bankrupted a studio and ruined several careers, including Cimino’s.
Cimino was, by all accounts, an autocratic, difficult, Ayn-Rand-loving director and human being. And now he’s dead. RIP.
Viewers of a Certain Age will also recall contemporary criticism of Deer Hunter for being a wee racist in the POW camp scenes. Presuming, that is, you survived the longest wedding in cinema history.
If he made The Fountainhead then I can’t imagine it not being Heaven’s Gate 2.0 while most of the critics would recreate Christopher Walken’s most famous Deer Hunter scene.
Still might check out the final director’s cut Cimino helped put together back in 2012 just to, as Bloggie said, see for myself. Life is short, sure, but I’m a sucker for controversial/infamous movies.
/BREAKING/ Gretchen Carlson sues Roger Ailes for sexual harassment. Did not see that one coming. Good for her.
@mellbell: oh no you don’t – you watch the 5+ hour version or at least the 3+ hour version … you do not get away that easily.
@mellbell:
I see Jabba the Hutt and a bottle blond Leia.
@ManchuCandidate: Thanks, pal. I was happily not envisioning anything.
Tell Jabba I’ve got hiz munnie.
@blogenfreude: Don’t worry, it’s still over three-and-a-half hours long.
@mellbell: Yeah, but you have to watch the original theatrical release to truly understand how awful it is ….
Soooo….
Checking in. Been a long time, I know.
I’m feeling really sick at heart right about now, and just so confused and outraged over this Dallas thing and the murders that caused it. Some of the sweetest and kindest people I’ve known post here, so… I’m kinda hoping it’s okay to try and enter this community again. I need help figuring out how to get involved, because I can’t sit by and let the country that I love tear itself to shreds. Mostly, though, with all these terrible killings by police, I just need someone to listen to, and to have someone nonjudgmental listen to me as I try to figure out how to help this mess get solved.
Even Benedict, as I was wont to say once upon a time.
@Tommmcatt Au Gros Sel: Welcome back. We’ve missed you, Tommy. Hugz.
I just read the headlines in the American corporate media now, not the stories. Couldn’t turn it off completely since I’m a news junkie, but it helps.
@Tommmcatt Au Gros Sel: I do listen to the CBC on my headphones at work every day. They do an amazing job of presenting the news in a nonsensationalized, rational way.
cbc.ca
Thanks Andree.
Man, what a day yesterday. And how do they respond?
By summarily executing another dude.
Where have all the flowers gone….
@Tommmcatt Au Gros Sel: The murders in Dallas are tragic but also maddening. The killers, by targeting white police officers at a Black Lives Matter-affiliated protest, have provided racists who want to criticize BLM without appearing racist the perfect cover, because now they can make a “public safety” argument that conveniently implicates the entire movement, whose members are, of course, overwhelmingly nonviolent. Grr!
Gingrich, Trump, and Rubio are starting to talk the talk on these issues. My optimistic side views this as a surprising glimmer of hope while my pessimistic side questions their sincerity/motives.
@mellbell: I keep waiting for Glen Beck to jump out of the bushes in blackface shouting “April Fool”!
@Tommmcatt Au Gros Sel: I love you.
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