Capitalism - Feudalism without the Kings
 Tax the Rich

Movie Monday - Did it all go wrong in the 1930s?

I'm going to be referring to the Hollywood morals code, commonly known as the Hays Code, which came to full bloom in the early 1930s in Hollywood. If you are unfamiliar with it, just click on any of these sites for information:

http://www.callmefatty.com/id8.html   

 (Good Frank Rich column included.)

http://www.und.edu/instruct/cjacobs/ProductionCode.htm

(Just the facts.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code

(Lists the "Shall Nots.)

 

I know we are celebrating Martin Luther King's birthday today even though he was born on January 16 and Googles  home page is mum on this (no MLK icon). Funny, I'm not thinking about MLK but about J. Edgar Hoover today. That truly great American (snark intended) who made King's, and so many more Americans', life miserable. 

Weird, you must be thinking, today is Movie Monday and how is Hoover connected with Hollywood? Well, he is, especially in his maniacal push to remove all vestiges of communism from this "great country" and that definitely included any "left leaning" Hollywood types. Google the Hollywood Ten for more on this.

However, Hoover comes to mind more in the aggregate, as a symbol of the never ending stream of "shall nots" coming from US moral standard bearers which often include powerful government figures and unfortunately become banners for our treatment of the rest of the world.

Last night, I watched the final chapter in Oliver Stone's The Untold History of the United States. I have the book and now I want to fill in the spaces by reading it. Stone thinks there were times in recent (75+ years) US history when we could have moved away from the rabid communist witch hunt which fueled our thoughts and our economy (the growth of the military-industrial complex) for so, so many decades.

I don't know if I agree with him that things may have been different if Henry Wallace had been FDR's VP and he, not Truman, become president in 1945 or that things may have been different with Vietnam if JFK had not been assassinated. But just watching his series made me take out my copy of Howard Zinn's opus and, this time, really read it and also to buy Lies My Teacher Told Me (love it), the Caro books on LBJ and the above-mentioned Stone book. Stone got me researching historically again and that is always good.

But keeping with Stone's theme that things might have been different, might have been better for this country, the should-of, could-of type of thinking, I decided to apply these thoughts to two old-time movies I watched on TCM this week.

The first is Fast and Furious, 1939, a horrid who-done-it with Ann Southern and Franchot Tone playing a husband and wife amateur sleuth team. It is very worthy (or unworthy) of a plethora of horribly-acted, unhumorous, married amateur sleuth B movies (not included are the first few Thin Man movies) from this period, which is just after the Code kicked in around 1933.

By the time of F & F in 1939, Tone and Southern have the obligatory twin beds, no hanky-panky, and a plot with a perchant for domestic violence or intended domestic violence, which I guess if it wasn't sexual violence was then, as now, OK with the censors.

This movie was directed by Busby Berkeley who was reduced to directing non-musical dross by 1939 since the interest in that genre had declined. (Truth note: I hate almost every musical ever made except Cabaret, Les Miserables, and Moulin Rouge- all of rather recent vintage. But the first heyday of the musical was mid-1930s (followed again in the 1950s as a reaction to the advent of TV) and I believe this was a direct result of the Code; musicals were safe and almost Hayes Office proof.)

Fast and Furious was also another example of the movie studios' unbelievable ability to crank out films constantly. For while the best hits from this time period are still touted, F & F type movies were needed in droves back then because if you went to the movies in those days, you got two movies, a cartoon, a short, dish prizes, etc., etc. - or so I've been told.

Which brings me back to those moral standard bearers I mentioned earlier, back to the time they were just gaining power in the early 1930s, and to the second movie I saw last week: The Phantom of Crestwood (1932.)

It's a typical old house, stormy night, murder mystery with Ricardo Cortez as a gangster who is forced to be a good guy detective here (and it is implied that he is able to walk away at the end) and Karen Morley as a high-class hooker. There is no sugar-coating of her profession since this movie got in just under the wire with the Code. In Phantom, Morley's character, Jenny Wren, would probably have gone on to a happy, monied retirement if she wasn't needed as the murder victim. That is, once the Code really kicked in, Morley would be punished because she was a bad woman, not because her death was needed as a plot point.

Some features that make this movie so much more memorable than F & F: Cortez realistically uses his wits to solve the crime, the people assembled in the old house are not one-dimensional evil, the 1929 stock market crash is alluded to and Jenny Wren is not a typical cold-hearted bitch; in fact, she has sympathy for the Johns she is blackmailing. Even today, 80 years later, there is a freshness to Phantom; it's stuck in its genre but not its time period.

However, in just a year, all this would change and except for classic works where "bad" women, Anna Karenina, Camille, etc., would be presented sympathetically since they will "kick the bucket" in the end, typical Hollywood movies caved to the Hayes Code because as Frank Rich stated in his column re: Hollywood and the Code: It panicked.

So returning to Stone's contention that attitudes may have been different in this country if certain events had occurred, if certain other men had been our leaders, my jury is still out on this POV. 

However, I do think there is stronger proof that the Hays Code had a long term ill effect on American memes/attitudes. Today, in the independent internet age, it may be difficult to understand that there was a time before the internet and television. While information also came the press and the radio during this time,  for almost 50 years, millions and millions of Americans went to the movies weekly, perhaps daily. They sat there and watched how the world "lived." It was from what they saw and heard in those darkened theaters that they received their code of values to live by. Unfortunately, starting in the early 1930s, the strongly religious-backed Production Code set up this values and all the memes which followed from them.

I'm stopping here because I don't want this to become a polemic but I'd like to revisit this theme in some other blog. Like Stone, I'm fascinated as to how and why things happen and how things might have been different. Of course, I would also love it if my movie package could get some better movies so I could return to just plain reviewing. Unfortunately, if they keep offering turkeys like Hysteria (no it's not horror; well, I guess it really is a horror!), that ain't gonna happen.

See you next week.

 

Capitalism - Feudalism without the Kings

 Tax the Rich

 

Knitting Friday

 

Talk about a total snafu. I'm half-way through writing this post today, with pictures no less, when I discover that the directions I'm giving you for wrapping and turning do not match one of the pictures I have as an illustration. Yes, the cats out of the bag, I was going to do a mini-lesson on my new BFF, the wrap and turn procedure. I had been practicing that procedure for an eternity with very frustrating results but last week - I got it!

 

#1 fullness at middle top

I love wrapping and turning! For those who don't use it or know about it, wrap and turn (w & t) means you work short rows. That is, you work just so many stitches in a row of stitches and then you turn your work around and work back to the beginning of the row. #1 shows the fullness you get with these short rows:

 

You could use this for more fullness in the bodice area, socks, or this shawl (Night Bird Scarf) found here:

 

http://www.lionbrand.com/patterns/L10316.html?noImages=

It's Lion Brand pattern so you have to register but it's easy and free. These shawl directions just say to knit a number of stitches and turn. There is no mention of wrapping a stitch, which would be the first stitch on the left needle where you turn. I know you don't have to wrap stitches with textured yarns but this shawl is shown in plain yarn. With plain yarn in stockinette you'll get a hole where you turn. So when I make it, I'm going to wrap and turn - because, now I can!

But enough about the wrap and turn procedure before it becomes really confusing. I'm just going to take that one  correct picture and post the directions next week.

Since I planned to talk about wrap and turn today, I don't have a lot extra for this week. But I do have a final picture of the blue top I was making as a prototype of the New Year's Shrug because I wanted to practice on that lace/cable pattern. The New Year's shrug can be found here:

http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/new-years-shrug

 

I hope you got this pattern when it was free because it's a great stitch but now it will cost you $2.

 

#2 New Year's Shrug pattern

 #2 shows the blue top and you can see I worked the NY shrug's lace/cable pattern, starting from the top, as one repeat, then two, then three. I have no idea why I did that but it did seem like a good idea at the time. This is my ubiquitous top-down top pattern (which I love.) However, since I make prototypes first in this blue 25% wool yarn, I now have 4 tops and one cardigan done in this yarn. I am such a scaredy cat about making a garment the first time in good yarn!

#3 NY Shrug prototype

That's why I'm now working on #3 which is another prototype. This time it really is the New Year's Shrug but in DK yarn. I wanted to make the prototype first because the directions have you knitting a rectangle and then sewing up each side for the short sleeves. Since I'm soooo lazy, I started with the sleeve in the round and in seed not garter. In #3, the part on the needles (top) shows my working towards the body of the shrug. The part at the bottom is the joined sleeve so I'll have no sewing up later.

 

#4 You can see the seed ribbing

#4 shows at the bottom seed ribbing better. Plus you can see that I'm continuing the seed borders throughout the shrug. (The original borders are worked in garter.)

Well, that's all the pictures I took since I never thought I wouldn't be talking about wrap and turn today.

I know I promised a finished picture of the shawl which was only a tiny piece last week but that will have to wait for two weeks now since next week is w & t. However, I'm wearing that shawl as I type (so warm and cozy) and I have two more in the works.

Happy knitting. See you next week.

#5 Miss L is leaving in 13 days

P.S. 13 more days before Miss L leaves us to start the second phase of her Seeing Eye training. She is going on to do needed work but it's very sad.

 

Capitalism - Feudalism without the Kings

 Tax the Rich

Website Wednesday

Before the kids get home from school, if I'm watching TV, I like to have on a educational channel because I know when the kids come in and see this they always think: Wow! After a long day at school, just what I want to see, Ed TV! It just makes me want to be a better educated human being. 

So yesterday, I had on a lecture show from the Aspen Institute which is sometimes very good, and was yesterday. The speaker was from Microsoft and he showed examples of global warming by showing photos of the world's glaciers but the twist was: he showed photos taken in the 1920s and then the same spot as it looks today. Very revealing. But what I took away from all this was his introduction where he talked about global warming/climate change deniers. With them he felt, after just a few minutes of conversation, you realized no facts, no science, nothing, was ever going to change their minds.

I can't speak for the rest of the world but in the US, ideas seem to scare people. I believe thinking is still allowed in schools (maybe not) but the US is heavily peppered with cocktail party conversations of inanity.

This brings me to my first Wednesday pick:

http://www.viruscomix.com/page474.html

which is sort of a longish read but it raises some very important talking point thoughts.

If you're an adult and living in an industrialized country, but not under a rock, you know where this story is going from the get-go because whenever man's inhumanity to man or the acceptance by a civilian population of atrocities is allured to, you can be sure the Nazi regime in Germany, 1930s - 1940s, will be trotted out.

Present day drone bombings of civilians, calling child deaths "collateral damage" in attacks by "our guys" or embargo policies which punish whole populations because our government is pissed with their government is never mentioned but those bad Nazis are because we all know we could never be like those bad Nazis.

So read this story, which is set in Nazi time, and see if you get what I gleaned from it: Today, way past the time of this story, have humans really changed? Maybe it's not possible for our species to listen to each other after all.

OK, on to guy stuff because I do ignore you in picks sometimes (sorry) and I did lead the week with a discussion of two movies which empower young girls (The Hunger Games, Tomorrow When The War Began.)

http://www.justaguything.com/100-great-movies-every-guy-should-see

On this page, you'll get 100 movies guys should see. It's a fun read and I like that each movie pick is followed by Best Line in the Movie.

If I say: You can't handle the truth can you name the movie?

And then, go to their home page which looks interesting (OK, I'm not a guy, what do I know?) and pretty current (1/8/13).

http://www.justaguything.com/ 

Under Advertise, I found: Are you looking to reach an influential audience of 18-34 year old men interested in fashion, dating, entertainment and fitness? Look no further than Just A Guy Thing's growing audience of 3000+ subscribers and tens of thousands of unique monthly visitors.

They say they have sponsored posts and reviews and regular articles. But, hey, this is supposed to be fun, not rocket science. (P.S. The Huffington Post has sponsored links.)

And finally, the photo post:

http://www.trekearth.com/

This page tells us every thing we need to know about TrekEarth: TrekEarth is dedicated to fostering a global community interested in photography from around the world. 

You get people, places, animals - over 1 million pictures of them.

As you know, I love to lazily sit at my computer or TV and travel the world with pictures. TrekEarth is a great way to do this. They have photos which make you linger and a long "caption" to give the scene more meaning.

Enjoy. See you next week. 

 

 

 

Capitalism - Feudalism without the Kings 
Tax the Rich 

 Movie Monday

I might have skipped writing this post today because, well, movies have been god-awful lately. But also right now I've become obsessed to write out clear directions for the knitting procedure called wrap and turn (W & T). Which is what I was doing just before I started this posting and which I was reluctant to leave.

OK, I know you're not reading this for knitting tips but I would love to to able to find good, no great, directions, for W & T. If you read me on Knitting Friday this week, you can tell me if I've nailed this complicatedly simple knitting trick.

Lately, I've been reading more than movie watching. Either I'm tread milling, Librivoxing and knitting or just Librivoxing and knitting. However, movies are a first love for me and I still yearn for some great ones though I'm becoming cynical enough to think that outside of a very, very few, the entire medium is more prone to propaganda than greatness.

Reading Lies My Teacher Told Me by James W. Loewen  isn't helping my acceptance of the Hollywood (and I'm using Hollywood as a metaphor here) fibs and fables it has foisted on its viewing public since the get-go.

A great example of how Loewen's contention that US school textbooks perpetuate the myth of the European white hero-savior vs. a savage, primitive world is still being used in Hollywood today is shown in the much touted new movie, Lincoln. It depicts the angst of this tall, ugly, white US president as he, without the help of any pesky people of a "darker skin persuasion", gets the Emancipation Proclamation passed and single-handedly makes life sooo easy for the "black folks." OK, that's an oversimplification but you get where I'm going: the US has a difficult time living and understanding beyond the white hero myth and Hollywood has been a major player in fostering these misconceptions.

Since I got to see teen movies during the last week and weekend, I'd like to look at three of them for a glimpse at a subsection of the above paragraphs. That is, Hollywood's take on how teens see the world. My three teen movies are: Breaking Dawn Part I, Tomorrow When The War Began and The Hunger Games.

With the first, BD, Pt. 1, I shudder to think how its hormone-raging teen fan base is going to adjust to adulthood but with the other two, I see a lot of hope.

First, I always like to turn to Box Office MoJo to see how the world accepted these films in the area of the only important coin of the realm: the box office gross:

Breaking Dawn Part I brought in 6+ times more than its $110M budget with 60% of this coming from foreign (non-US) sources.

Tomorrow When The War Began has pretty dismal figures with a $27M budget and a $16+M worldwide gross. Of course, this is an Australian production and I have no idea if the Aussies possess a Hollywood-style PR machine. (Note: Wikipedia says it was Australia's 2010 highest grossing domestic film.)

The Hunger Games grossed over 8 times its $78M budget, this time with a flip: the domestic gross (I'm assuming this means US) was 60% and the foreign only 40%.

So in my limited knowledge of  movie financial hijinks I would say that if they could add a Part 3 to Breaking Dawn (Part 2 grossed more than 6 times budget also) they would. Additionally, The Hunger Games was a success and unlike The Golden Compass flop, its two other books will be made into movies.However, there are seven books in the TWTWB series and I wonder how many of those will become films. (Again, according to Wikipedia, a second movie is planned.)

Getting back to Loewen's premise that in US history the myth, not the facts, are taught, only one movie listed above, BD, Pt. 1, is heavily moored in the molasses of myth. Not the historical myth like the presentation of Columbus as the great white explorer but not as the rapacious plunderer and murderer he was, but in the social myth that women will find their perfect mate who will care for them so much that only their needs/wishes/whatever will matter to him. (OK, I did give a pretty positive review to BD Part 1 some time ago but, believe me, on second viewing, it did not age well.)

So while Loewens says textbooks should present history as it is, not how the public wants it to be; the Hollywood myth machine very seldom takes the time to present human relations as they really are, let alone present a hero with major flaws. (I know that genre movies, western and gangster, can have multi-flawed heroes - who often are dead by the final credits.)

I'm sorry that TWTWB was not a success because I thought it captured the confusion, the horror, the hopelessness and then the resolve of a group of ordinary young people who discover their country has been invaded. Max Hastings in Inferno, The World at War 1939 - 1945 captured the same feelings as he described the slaughter of fleeing refugees by the invading Germans. It's not pretty nor comfortable to contemplate but it's so much more important to understand than the June/moon/syrup spoon feelings expressed by Edward Cullen at his wedding in BD, Pt. 1: It's an extraordinary thing to meet someone who you can bare your soul to, and who'll accept you for what you are. I've been waiting for what seems like a very long time to get beyond what I am. And with Bella, I feel like I can finally begin. 

I'm happy that The Hunger Games matched BD, Pt. 1 in gross because they are antithetical in messages. With BD, you get the part one finale of a saga of perfect love, really perfect love because the rest of the story, after the last page is turned, will be peopled by beautiful vampires who never age and never die.

The Hunger Game is also steeped in myth. We have the brave, reluctant hero, a stalwart in western mythology but this time he's a young girl and, as such, is shown with a mufti-dimensional, and not necessarily romantic life. Also, in TWTWB, a young girl takes the lead and becomes the first with "blood on her hands." 

Are the roles of women in The Hunger Games and TWTWB all just political correctness? Possibly. But then isn't it time that girls take a role in the history they live and not just as figures to swoon over Andy Hardy and Edward Cullen? 

OK, I'll just leave you with this food for thought and get back to that traditional role so perfect for us, gals, explaining a needlework procedure. See you next week.

Capitalism - Feudalism without the Kings

 Tax the Rich

Knitting Friday

Very little going on for Knitting Friday since it looks like the flu may have struck us. The boy stayed home from school yesterday and either sat at the computer, lay (lay, lie, who cares) in bed with his iPod or took three very long naps. He said: You're treating me like royalty. And I realized this may have been the first day he missed school, ever. 

Anyway, no knitting pictures got taken yesterday since I spent my time carrying food and medicine up to him (that was the royalty part - I made him stay upstairs and rest - and we all had ice cream.) I got a lot of stair-master exercise and cooking done, but not much else.

#1 Done, in fact, done twice

So I'll make this short since you all also may be very busy, hopefully not with the flu. Though that Google map of where the flu is in the US is getting filled up scarily fast.

Two quick progress reports, with pics from last Friday. The top on the left is done. First, I worked 20 rows of stocktinette below the lace pattern at the bottom of the picture. And finished it off with about 10 rows of single crochet done with a J hook. It came out long and flaring. So I ripped back to only 5 rows of stockinette past the bottom lace and using a G hook worked 5 rows of a single crochet hem. It looks better but I haven't tried this version on yet.

#2 When it was tiny

 On the right is the shawl from last week. Right now, it's almost done and I'm debating on the type of ruffle I want to use as the border. More on this next Friday.

And almost finally. The below link takes you to the famous Lenny Kravitz and his  hot, hot scarf, again:

http://www.zimbio.com/pictures/Ep_a92EULyb/Lenny+Kravitz+Sports+Scarf/BeNmlSdB-TQ/Lenny+Kravitz

And these links will take you to a knit and a crochet version for it (So it was decided by some Ravelers):

Knit:

http://www.lionbrand.com/patterns/kwetq-mossStitchAfghan.html

Crochet:

www.lionbrand.com/patterns/cwetq-mossStitchAfghan.html 

These are Lion Brand free patterns and you have to join to get on their site but that's simple to do.

I would just use the pattern stitches and wiggle the cast on to make it in a huge scarf size. Also, I want to try the crochet pattern since the knit moss stitch is sooo boring while the crocheted version look like it will keep you awake.

#3 Miss L, the puppy days

And really finally, Miss L will be leaving us on January 31 to start her second tier of training. So here's another picture. I tell her she's going on to do good work but her eyes tell me she knows that with us, to paraphrase the boy, she was treated like royalty and the hard work is a-coming.

See you next week.

 

 

 

Capitalism - Feudalism without the Kings

 Tax the Rich

 

Website Wednesday

 

I'm thinking about the worth of the human species today and also shopping for a Vera Bradley bag on sale. What a multi-tasker I am!

 

Last night, iPad snug on pillows, earphones securely placed and functioning, I listened to, and slept through, Lynn Hunt from UCLA start an excellent course on modern civilization. Here's the link, if you are interested: (The first lecture starts with some bad audio which doesn't last long.)

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZEThKsOtEw  

 

I clicked the course because the French Revolution was listed as the first course. It wasn't there however, though I did get hear a slant on modern history which was very enlightening. I guess you could say she made me think differently and more deeply about modern societies. Unfortunately, I have a feeling my education is going to be spotty with these lectures because it looks like we skip from lecture 1 to lecture 5 and then to lecture 10. Oh well, you can't have everything.

 

But from her lecture, I got to thinking about that last line in Candide again. You know, this one:  "Excellently observed," answered Candide; "but let us cultivate our garden." and I finally went to the most reliable site for knowledge on the web, Wikipedia, (snark alert) and discovered that I was wrong (once again.) Just because Candide deals with a young, naive man, it was not written in Voltaire's youth (how did I get that impression?) but when he was 71.

So now I have the choice of viewing that last line as satire or the resigned ennui of an old, tired philosopher.

Therefore, I'm happy I stumbled on Professor Hunt's course at UCLA since I finally cleared up one puzzle.

Listen to the first Hunt lecture if you can. You'll have to listen through some of the "must-do" list for the students in the room but she rapidly gets into her subject.

On to a wacky Wednesday pick first:

 

http://www.beazer.com/metro-landing/metroid=new-jersey?LeadSourceID=1031&wt.srch=1&wt.mc_id=5513&utm_campaign=display&utm_source=google_content_network&utm_medium=cpm&refcd=GO000000516027022c_new_homes&tsacr=GO28076469955 

 

Time for a confession first: I love to look at house floor plans. OK, I know it's nutty but I get, perhaps, a football watcher's joy from looking at them and thinking: Oh, I would make that the family room and move the bedroom here.........

I have no idea how I got onto this Beazer home site abvoe but if you click on the Community Website link for each development in NJ you will be sent to the floor plans of their homes!

I know there are better floor plan sites out there but most of them want specifics from you as to the square footage, the # of baths, bedrooms, garages, etc. you are looking for. Here, it's all laid out for you. Joy is only one, the most two, clicks away. (P.S. I warned you it was a wacky pick.)

 

 http://www.stefanbruggemann.com/exhibitions/030/018.html

 

On a visceral level, the above nihilistically barren site appeals to me. (Click the link below to get an assorted of Bruggemann's work.)

 

 I have no idea what I think about Stefan Bruggemann, a Mexico City born artist, photographer, philosopher, all three??, but his works are definitely worth the visit. You can never go wrong by looking at art "out of the box."

http://www.stefanbruggemann.com/work/textpieces.htm

And finally in keeping with this "going all over the map" Website Wednesday, (did I have too much coffee this a.m?), let me end with:

 twentytwowords.com 

which describes itself with the four Cs: Curious, Cute, Comical, Crazy and says about itself: 22 Words is your source for 10-12 crazy, curious, cute, and comical posts a day. The content here is a blend of the viral hits you need to see to keep up with everyone else on the web and more obscure (but equally awesome) pictures, videos, articles, and more. Our goal is to inspire equal parts WTF, OMG, LOL, and Awwwwww… (Disclaimer: Their About section sounds very familiar but I can't find this site among my long list of previous picks so I'm going to assume it's a new pick, though we all know what assuming does to us.)

It's a current website with a variety of photos, cartoons, short captions  and very little verbiage. One thing I learned fast from this site: seals have ferocious looking teeth. These fellas are not cuddly puppies.

That's it for today. I think there's something here for everyone. See you next Wednesday.