Movies, books and some TV too

I tried without success to catch WINTER KILLS (1979) for Screen Enemies of the American Way (I wound up buying Andy Griffiths’ Winter Kill instead) and it would definitely have rated a mention at least: The half-brother (Jeff Bridges) of a murdered president discovers proof it wasn’t a lone gunman, but finds every effort to expose the conspiracy blocked. Not as paranoid as JFK or Parallax View, but effective as Bridges discovers everyone from hotel maids to bicycling moms is in on it, though it doesn’t all make sense (particularly the role of Bridge’s lover, Belinda Bauer). I also wonder if whoever adapted Richard Condon’s novel wasn’t partly parodying JFK conspiracy theories . With John Huston as Bridges lecherous, corrupt father, Anthony Perkins as an executive, Eli Wallach, Sterling Hayden and Ralph Meeker as conspirators, Dorothy Malone as Bridges’ Mum and Toshiro Mifune as Huston’s aide; not classic. “Do you know how many times your brother got laid while he was in office?”
Despite the flaws of Live and Let Die, THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN (1974) is a much inferior film. It’s great asset is Christopher Lee as million-dollar killer Scaramanga, and having Bond thwart an assassination or escape Scaramanga would have been a great film … but instead we have Scaramanga plotting to control solar-power technology, which is a lot less exciting (and even the duel between them turns out to be less Moore vs. Lee than Moore vs. the funhouse effects in Nick-Nack’s (Herve Villechaize) maze of death. Plus several wincable jokes with Asian names and Britt Eklund as the first Bond girl who’s a completely incompetent bimbo. Noteworthy details include Maud Adams as the first two-film Bond girl (returning in Octopussy) and Lee getting the pre-title sequence all too himself. That doesn’t make the movie any better though. “There’s a useful four-letter word, Scaramanga—and you’re full of it.”

THE ANGEL OF MONS: Phantom Soldiers and Ghostly Guardians by David Clarke does a fine job examining WW I accounts of a supposed divine intervention at the Battle of Mons and Arthur Machen’s claim that his story “The Bowmen” about ghostly warriors aiding the British force is the real origin. Clarke proves Machen’s case conclusively: Supposed eyewitness accounts are either second or third-hand (or written years after the event) and the documentary proof that supposedly backs up the legend doesn’t hold water. Clarke argues that even so, the story is significant for what it tells us about our need to believe God’s on our side, particularly when wars go badly.

The second season of MERLIN continues the premise of Merlin arriving as a boy at the court of Uther Pendragon (Giles Head) and using his powers to protect the headstrong Prince Arthur without revealing his forbidden magical abilities. These episodes move everyone closer to their slots in the legend, with Arthur falling for the serving maid Guinevere and his half-sister Morgana beginning to turn against Uther and embrace her own potential for darkness. I’ve already started Netflixing Season Three.
LAND OF THE LOST‘s second season isn’t as good as the first, but it does make for entertaining watching as the Marshall family struggle to survive in their pocket universe, despite the threats from Sleestak, dinosaurs and the ET Zarn (all of which can comfortably be slotted in to the period before they left the Land in the first S1 episode). Of particular note is one of Theodore Sturgeon’s rare TV stories, “Pylon Express.” While my boxed set has S3, I don’t know if I’ll ever bother to watch it, as the quality went way down.