Michael Reed

#NowWatching Blow Out (1981) with John Travolta, Nancy Allen, John Lithgow. A movie sound recordist accidentally records the evidence that proves that a car accident was actually murder and consequently finds himself in danger.

Easiest Strands ever.
Wordle 1,516 4/6

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Connections
Puzzle #794
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Strands #528
“Hitchcock festival”
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#NowWatching Compañeros (1970, Italy/Spain) with Franco Nero, Tomas Milian, Fernando Rey, Iris Berben. A Swedish arms dealer and a Mexican peon team up to rescue the intellectual leader of the Revolutionary cause, while taking part in numerous misadventures along the way.

It is well worth getting a "roomette". Privacy, comfortable sleeping, and it is considered a first class ticket, so all meals included (or, at least they used to be, it's been awhile).

Post one of the most haunting shots in movie history from a film made before the year 2000.

#NowWatching Thief (1981) with James Caan, Tuesday Weld, Willie Nelson. After years in prison, ace safe-cracker Frank owns a car dealership and a cocktail lounge, which are fronts for jewelry heists. He wants to complete one last big heist for the Mob before he goes straight.

#NowWatching Cries & Whispers (1972, Sweden) with Harriet Andersson, Ingrid Thulin, Liv Ullmann. When a woman dying of cancer in early twentieth-century Sweden is visited by her two sisters, long-repressed feelings between the siblings rise to the surface. (Not a White Stripes album cover)

#NowWatching Better Off Dead (1985) with John Cusack, David Ogden Stiers, Kim Darby, Diane Franklin. Guy gets dumped by his girlfriend, and doesn't adapt to it very well.

#DarkShadows, ep 252, airing June 13, 1967. I get a kick out of this storyline: Elizabeth Stoddard is blackmailed into getting engaged to Jason McGuire. To get back at her mother, Carolyn starts hanging with Buzz, who is in a motorcycle gang.

#NowWatching Summer With Monika (1953, Sweden) with Harriet Andersson and Lars Ekborg. A pair of teenagers meet one summer day, start a reckless affair and abandon their families to be with one another on an island for a summer. An Ingmar Bergman film.

#NowWatching Coup de Chance (2023, France) with Lou de Laâge, Niels Schneider, Melvil Poupaud. A Woody Allen film. Fanny and Jean are the ideal couple: Great professional life, they live in a magnificent apartment in the beautiful districts of Paris and unfailing love. But...

#NowWatching Kings of the Road (1976, Germany) with Rüdiger Vogler, Hanns Zischler. 3rd of the Wim Wenders Road Trilogy. A projector repairman works theaters along the East German border. He meets with a young man whose marriage has just broken up, and the two decide to travel together.

3 letters, starts with a T, ends in an M.
@tcmtv.bsky.social

#NowWatching Wrong Move (1975, Germany) with Rüdiger Vogler, Hans Christian Blech, Nastassja Kinski (in her 1st screen appearance). Wim Wender's 2nd in a trilogy of road movies. A writer goes on a road trip across West Germany with a group of eclectic people he meets enroute.

#NowWatching Alice in the Cities (1974, Germany) the first in a road movie trilogy by Wim Wenders. With Rüdiger Vogler, Yella Rottländer, Lisa Kreuzer. A German journalist is saddled with a nine-year-old girl after encountering her mother at a New York airport.

Well worth a look
www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

#NowWatching a very popular musical (but not the one debuting on @tcmtv.bsky.social tonight). Saturday Night Fever (1977), the biggest movie in my senior year of high school. Didn't like it then, but appreciate it more, now.

Phew!
Wordle 1,505 6/6

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Connections
Puzzle #783
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Strands #517
“Pretty as a picture”
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#NowWatching Terrestrial Verses (2023, Iran) with Gohar Kheirandish, Majid Salehi, Hossein Soleimani. Follows everyday people from all walks of life as they navigate the cultural, religious, and institutional constraints imposed on them by various social authorities in Iran.

My library has a copy available, so thank you for the tip!

I try really hard to be nothing but positive about any film, so it's rare that you see me diss something. But, The Betsy (1978) is such a waste of talent; it has pretty much no redeeming features. In other words, it is glorious late-70's trash. Here is a shot showing a boom mic at top of frame

#NowWatching The Betsy (1978) with Laurence Olivier, Robert Duvall, Katherine Ross, Tommy Lee Jones, Lesley-Anne Down. The aging, retired founder of an auto giant comes out of retirement to try to develop a safe, fuel-efficient car. 5.2 star rating on iMdb: wasted talent?

I believe in freedom of choice. If you want to see The Wizard of Oz all cut up and altered with AI, then go see it. If you don't, then don't go see it. Myself, I am #NowWatching The Wizard of Oz (1939) the way it was meant to be seen: on a scratchy VHS tape.

I need a nap after today's puzzles.
Wordle 1,502 5/6

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Connections
Puzzle #780
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Strands #514
“You've got that right”
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#NowWatching The Constitution (2016, Croatia) with Nebojsa Glogovac, Dejan Acimovic, Ksenija Marinkovic. While recovering from a homophobia-driven assault, a gay Croatian professor confronts his own xenophobia after agreeing to help his Serbian neighbor prepare for citizenship.

That was a tough one!

Ann Sheridan to Richard Whorf: I never forget a face. But, in your case, I'll make an exception
#JukeGirl

#NowWatching Juke Girl (1942) with Ann Sheridan, Ronald Reagan, Alan Hale, George Tobias. Melodrama amongst tomato growers in Florida. 2 migrant workers get jobs: 1 with a powerful grower, 1 with an independent grower. Of course, the powerful grower plays dirty.

Phew
Wordle 1,500 6/6

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Connections
Puzzle #778
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Strands #512
“Inch by inch, row by row”
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#NowWatching Tristana (1970, Spain) with Catherine Deneuve, Fernando Rey, Franco Nero. Shortly after her mother's death, an innocent and youthful woman becomes the ward of a middle-aged nobleman who wants to control her. A Luis Buñuel film.