My Condition...

It was the extreme shortness of breath that got my attention. I was admitted to the hospital in atrial fibrillation with a heart rate of 180. They rather quickly drained 1.4 liters of bloody fluid from my right lung. They have subjected me to dozens of tests, and ruled out many possible causes of this, but they still don't know what went wrong. I am still in atrial fibrillation, but with a heart rate under control using 3 drugs. I am home waiting for some of my medication to reach the proper level in my system, then I may have another hospital stay to try and convert my heart to normal rhythm.

I am able to spend some time at the computer, and am again reading my Email.

Tuna

Twenty Bucks (1993)

Baritone: "A story 58 years in the making ... "

Endre Bohem was a Hungarian immigrant who became a screenwriter back in the 1930s and eventually migrated into television, where he wrote for The Cisco Kid, Rawhide, Gunsmoke, and other classics of early TV. He lived long enough to see his son Leslie become a successful screenwriter in his own right, and it came to pass that one day the father showed the son a movie script he was proud of, one written in 1938 but never produced. This film. The son was impressed by the script, and eventually shepherded it into this very film, after more than a dozen re-writes and years of plugging away. The father lived to be 90, but that was not long enough to see the realization of a screenplay he wrote when he was in his thirties. He died in 1990. The film was finally made in 1993.

A lot of other people must have been impressed with the script as well, because the final product features a massive ensemble cast including many once and future stars who must have agreed to work for peanuts in order to bring this film in for six million dollars. The cast includes William H. Macy, David Schwimmer, Melora Walters, Elisabeth Shue, Spalding Grey, Brendan Fraser, Christopher Lloyd, Steve Buscemi, Linda Hunt, Jeremy Piven, and Gladys Knight sans Pips. Oh, yeah, and about a zillion more people.

The reason for the monstrous cast is the gimmicky nature of the film's premise. It follows a twenty dollar bill from the time it is minted to the time it is burned and destroyed, and thus the story constantly moves from one episode to the next, forming into a series of vaguely interconnected short stories, each with a separate cast. Especially memorable is the story which features Christopher Lloyd as a straight-laced professional with none of his usual eccentric mannerisms, but with a rather unusual career - he's a liquor store robber ... and a perfect gentleman. Sometimes the script drops characters altogether when they lose possession of the twenty, but at other times, it brings them back for cameos in one or more of the other stories. In at least one case, a character appears in several of the stories. A homeless woman (Linda Hunt) appears many times and actually possesses the bill twice.

That basic concept had the potential to be a recipe for a shallow and/or pretentious disaster, yet another one of those gimmicky, "high concept" Hollywood movies. I would suppose that many of you, having read the general description, have already decided that the film probably sucks. I was in the same boat, but this is a case where the author's skill allows the charm of the characterization to rise above the gimmicky nature of the premise. Leslie Bohen was right about his father's script. It was worth the effort he expended to re-write and produce it. It is a light drama which provides some good moments and actually manages to develop some audience identification with a few of the characters, and it really lightens the load by serving the drama with a very large helping of comedy. The screenwriter knew exactly which moments to focus on, and managed to weave the comedy seamlessly into poignant, economical, self-contained stories. I can see why so many stars were impressed with the script.

The film works just fine, and is well worth a watch. It is also an amazingly full-featured DVD, given the obscurity of the film.

• Thumbnails
• Melora Walters (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12)

Other Crap:

• Attack of the $1 DVD's
• Lawrence O'Donnell reveals that the Valerie Plame outing was done by top White House mastermind Karl Rove.
  • I don't know if O'Donnell actually knows because - well, frankly, because he's pretty much of a windbag - but if he's right it could be jolly fun! The maximum possible charge in this case would be treason. The punishment for treason can include the death penalty, so the Democrats will undoubtedly indulge in some hilarious mischief with this.
  • I think a public hanging of Karl Rove for treason would be great for the economy. Think of the advertising rates the networks could charge. And what about the product placement charges? Imagine this: "Is there anything you would like to say before the executioner does his job?" "Yes, could I have one last Coke? Coke - the real thing! (sips) Ah, that's good. The taste worth betraying your country for!" How much would Coke pay for that?
  • Plus, cutting Rove from the herd would be a political masterstroke for the President. I think his popularity could go back up to 90% if he were to punish one of his own who betrayed the country, thus showing that he is decisive about cleaning his own house, and is always placing the country over petty personal matters and partisan politics!

  
  All kidding aside: even if Rove did provide the leak, it is questionable whether he committed any crime. He may have, but the entire issue hinges on his intent.

  • It would not be treason unless he was attempting to advance the cause of the enemy (not likely).
  • It would not even be criminal unless it can be proved that he knew Valerie Plame to be a covert agent. Bob Novak has stated that he thought Plame to be an analyst at the CIA, not a covert operative — the difference being that identifying an analyst is not a crime because they are not undercover. Rove might make the same claim.
  • At this time there is no point in speculating about perjury since (a) it is still not certain that Rove was the leaker; and (b) even if he was the leaker, nobody really seems to know for sure what he said (or didn't say) to the grand jury.
• If you haven't seen it, here's a video of O'Donnell revealing the Rove connection
• Lawrence O'Donnell's Blog confirms Rove outing. Oops. Maybe "outing" was the wrong word to use in Rove's case.
• In the interest of fairness, please note that Rove's lawyer says: "Karl didn't disclose Valerie Plame's identity to Mr. Cooper or anybody else. Who outed this woman? ... It wasn't Karl."
• Vatican considers declaring John Paul II a martyr
• The Sun has assembled a slideshow of all the best nudity from this year's Big Brother U.K. Now THAT'S journalism. To hell with Woodward and Bernstein. I throw down the gauntlet to the Washington Post to match the Sun's elevated journalistic standards.
• Does your beer taste like aass? Find out at The Oxford Bottled Beer Database.
• It's too late for Father's Day, but any day is a good day to give dad a new Ghillie Suit
• War of the Worlds kicks some ass.
  • It pulled in about the same amount as the rest of the Top 12 added together. The other new film, Rebound, opened in a weak seventh. It took in less than Madagascar, although they are in approximately the same number of theaters and Madagascar is in its sixth weekend.
• Sign Fucking - Volume 1
• Now THAT'S a Tattoo
• First reports (and pics) back from the set of The Da Vinci Code
• Taxpayers Fund Squirrel Sex Study. "A University of Central Florida professor has a $600,000 grant to study the sex lives of African ground squirrels."
• War of the Worlds: The Lost 1938 Version
• Shlockmeister Uwe Boll gets $60 million to make his next film. What is the deal with this guy? His movies are critical and commercial failures, and he is even compared to Ed Wood, but he keeps moving up the ladder. He has to have compromising pictures of someone.
• 125 Questions: What We Don't Know
• The trailer from Wolf Creek, "A chilling, factually-based, story of three road-trippers in remote Australia who are plunged into danger when they accept help from a friendly local."

Other Crap archives. May also include newer material than the links above, since it's sorta in real time.

Click here to submit a URL for Other Crap

MOVIE REVIEWS:

Here are the latest movie reviews available at scoopy.com.

• The yellow asterisks indicate that I wrote the review, and am deluded into thinking it includes humor.
• If there is a white asterisk, it means that there isn't any significant humor, but I inexplicably determined there might be something else of interest.
• A blue asterisk indicates the review is written by Tuna (or Junior or Brainscan, or somebody else besides me)
• If there is no asterisk, I wrote it, but am too ashamed to admit it.

Today we return to "Flower & Snake" for a new "Babe in Bondage". This time it's Misaki Ito Yozabuko who is in a heap of trouble. She loses her clothes and gets a little electro stimulation to her breasts.

Not forgetting the "Hankster Light", from the same movie we also hae the sexy Aya Sugimoto out of bondage and dancing stark naked in the final scene of the movie.

• Misaki Ito Yozabuko (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)

• Aya Sugimoto (1, 2, 3, 4)

Just couple of quickies today...
Don't know if you have seen these before, but I cannot recall them being run in the Funhouse. Here are 'caps of Lina Romay in a 1975 movie entitled Rolls Royce Baby. In my opinion, these 'caps of Romay shaving downtown are must-sees!

• Lina Romay (1, 2, 3)

At while I'm at it...This is a collage made from images found on the web of Madeleine James in scenes from the Aussie movie "Maslin Beach" (1997).

• Madeleine James

Kimberley Warnat
(1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)

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