Tag Archives: movies

No way out

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Got a call today from a guy I knew from my affiliate relations days. He left the radio business for a couple years but is once again managing a station in southern Missouri. When I mentioned this to Data Daddy David, he said it reminded him those movies where where somebody escapes, is recaptured, and paraded before the other prisoners as the screws take him back to his cell.

“Like in Cool Hand Luke,” I observed.

“I was actually thinking of Steve McQueen in The Great Escape,” DDD replied. “I can see the guy sitting on the floor of his office, bouncing that baseball off the wall, hour after hour.”

I’ve been trying to come up with other movies where someone escapes, is captured, and brought back. Submissions may sent to stevemays@hotmail.com.

Hustle & Flow

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A recent entry in the Sundance Film Festival, Hustle & Flow — written and directed by Memphis native Craig Brewer, and produced by John Singleton– has been purchased by Paramount.

“Djay is a pimp suffering a midlife crisis and although nominally successful, he yearns to record his flow and become a respected rapper. Galvanized by a gospel song, he sets his dream in motion–recruiting his motley crew and building a studio in his home. And though he succeeds in putting his rap, “It’s Hard for a Pimp,” onto tape, the barriers to fame and fortune are many, and getting there becomes an elusive goal.”

Kennett Senior Correspondent Viretta, proudly reports that her baby boy, Luke, worked on the soundtrack. She adds that she’s not bothered that the film is about “pimps & ho’s.”

Three Days of the Condor – Final Scene

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I think the best answer can be found at the end of Sydney Pollack’s 1975 spy flick, Three Days of the Condor. Robert Redford’s character (Joe Turner) is talking to CIA agent Higgins (played by Cliff Robertson) about the no-longer-secret plan to invade the Middle East for oil.

Higgins: The fact is, it wasn’t a bad plan. It could’ve worked.

Turner: Jesus — What is it with you people? You think not getting caught in a lie is the same as telling the truth.

Higgins: It’s simple economics, Turner… There’s no argument. Oil now, 10 or 15 years it’ll be food, or plutonium. Maybe sooner than that. What do you think the people will want us to do then?

Turner: Ask them!

Higgins: Now? (shakes head) Huh-uh. Ask them when they’re running out. When it’s cold at home and the engines stop and people who aren’t used to hunger… go hungry! They won’t want us to ask… (quiet savagery:) They’ll want us to GET it for them.

Pattern Recognition, the movie?

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“Peter Weir wants to direct it, there’s an option deal in place, and Weir has a contract with Warner to…well, not to go ahead and shoot it, but to go forward toward that end. Toward which he’s hired a screenwriter — whose name I’ve forgotten (which is actually a good sign with regard to Weir’s choice) — and has gone to London, Tokyo and Moscow to look at locations.”

— From William Gibson’s blog

Friday Night Lights

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Hard not to come away thinking of Hoosiers. Billy Bob did a very credible job but he’s no Gene Hackman or Dennis Hopper. Still, I can’t recall a better movie about high school football. I think I’d be a little embarrassed if I were from Odessa. All of the beautiful, aerial views of desolate, empty desert must have been to help us understand that “football is all they have” in small, West Texas towns. My favorite line (this probably isn’t verbatim) was: The future is getting ready to start in a few minutes. “Forever’s about to happen in just a few minutes.” Sound track was great. And the movie was shot in what I’ve come to think of as the “Saving Private Ryan” effect. Very effective. [IMDB]