Non Civil War Books and Movies

O' Be Joyful

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Jim Klag

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Just finished a good book by Simon Winchester who also wrote The Professor And The Madman.
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Winchester tells the story of the pursuit of precision in manufacturing. As an example, James Watt is rightly famous for the invention of the steam engine but it didn't work well until a fellow named John Wilkinson created tooling to bore out the cylinders for the steam engine more precisely. Eureka! Tighter tolerances and more precise fit made the steam engine work the way it was meant to do. Improved tools and tighter tolerances led to everything from machine screws, gene splicing, microchips, even the Hadron Collider. Lest you avoid the book because you think it is going to be dry and overly technical, let me tell you that Winchester is a fine storyteller who writes with clarity and pace to deliver a good tale.
 

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Space Odyssey by Michael Benson

This is a detailed account of Stanley Kubrick's making of "2001: A Space Odyssey." Its awesome!

In 1965-66 when Kubrick was making the film, the digital future he conceived didn't exist. Painstakingly, he and his team, for example, animated sequences of diagrams, charts, text, navigation systems, that were back projected on the banks of screens his astronauts consulted. Special effects, that would be computer generated today, had to laboriously constructed practical effects.

Kubrick was a genius, in part because he recruited a team of outstanding filmmakers and partly because he absolutely refused to compromise on any aspect of the film.

I saw "2001" when I was 9, with my even younger brother. Needless to say I was bored stupid and baffled, and we went repeatedly to the men's room and ran up and down the aisles, until an usher(manager?) told us to sit down and shut up. My parents had just dropped us off: it was the 60s man.
 

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I rewatched it yesterday, a fifty year old film about a future that was supposed to happen twenty years ago.

It was wonderful. The banal dialog, the silences, the music, the awesome visuals all have held up. Of course the unforgettable HAL, the computer driven mad, then homicidal. As the one astronaut he couldn't kill begins to disconnect him, his soft modulated voice pleas: "Don't Dave, don't...my mind is going...my mind is going...I'm frightened, Dave."

The book, if you have any interest in film, is highly recommended.
 

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I rewatched it yesterday, a fifty year old film about a future that was supposed to happen twenty years ago.

It was wonderful. The banal dialog, the silences, the music, the awesome visuals all have held up. Of course the unforgettable HAL, the computer driven mad, then homicidal. As the one astronaut he couldn't kill begins to disconnect him, his soft modulated voice pleas: "Don't Dave, don't...my mind is going...my mind is going...I'm frightened, Dave."

The book, if you have any interest in film, is highly recommended.
I second doing both.
 

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Signed up for Disney+ just to see Hamilton with the original Broadway cast. I have to say that few plays/musicals/movies/books have ever exceeded my expectations as much as Hamilton. Juan-Manuel Miranda's soundtrack has been out for a long time, but seeing it performed onstage is a whole order of magnitude better. The songs are mostly production numbers without a lot of solo performances and the music is a cool combination of rap, R&B and Broadway musical schmaltz that really works somehow. There is a little more bawdiness to the lyrics than would have been tolerated by Mickey's creator, but it's just enough to spice up the show. While Jonathan Goff as King George is deliciously waspish, Leslie Odom, Jr. as Aaron Burr and Daveed Diggs as Jefferson steal the show along with Miranda. And the Schuyler sisters (played by Renée Elise Goldsberry and Phillipa Soo) are incredible. The history is well done and the whole thing works so well that you don't even notice, despite the fact that all the historical personages were white, that all the performers are persons of color - black, Hispanic and Asian.
 

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Signed up for Disney+ just to see Hamilton with the original Broadway cast. I have to say that few plays/musicals/movies/books have ever exceeded my expectations as much as Hamilton. Juan-Manuel Miranda's soundtrack has been out for a long time, but seeing it performed onstage is a whole order of magnitude better. The songs are mostly production numbers without a lot of solo performances and the music is a cool combination of rap, R&B and Broadway musical schmaltz that really works somehow. There is a little more bawdiness to the lyrics than would have been tolerated by Mickey's creator, but it's just enough to spice up the show. While Jonathan Goff as King George is deliciously waspish, Leslie Odom, Jr. as Aaron Burr and Daveed Diggs as Jefferson steal the show along with Miranda. And the Schuyler sisters (played by Renée Elise Goldsberry and Phillipa Soo) are incredible. The history is well done and the whole thing works so well that you don't even notice, despite the fact that all the historical personages were white, that all the performers are persons of color - black, Hispanic and Asian.
I saw it too on Disney! Of course my kid has been utterly nuts about it since it came out.
 

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I recently finished Journey Into Wilderness, a memoir by Army surgeon Jacob Rhett Motte in the Creek Uprising and Second Seminole War (1836-1838). Motte is very much of his era in writing style and opinions, but if you're interested in Indian Wars or 19th century memoirs it's worth a read.

The edition I had was from the 1960s was edited and annotated, although it shows its age a little in that regard too. I think it was recently republished in paperback, though I don't know if it was updated at all.
 

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Just finished a good book by Simon Winchester who also wrote The Professor And The Madman.
View attachment 2362
Winchester tells the story of the pursuit of precision in manufacturing. As an example, James Watt is rightly famous for the invention of the steam engine but it didn't work well until a fellow named John Wilkinson created tooling to bore out the cylinders for the steam engine more precisely. Eureka! Tighter tolerances and more precise fit made the steam engine work the way it was meant to do. Improved tools and tighter tolerances led to everything from machine screws, gene splicing, microchips, even the Hadron Collider. Lest you avoid the book because you think it is going to be dry and overly technical, let me tell you that Winchester is a fine storyteller who writes with clarity and pace to deliver a good tale.
Here IA NPR radio show talking to Winchester about this book...


You be surprised about Watts steam engines...
 
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5fish

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I recently finished Journey Into Wilderness, a memoir by Army surgeon Jacob Rhett Motte in the Creek Uprising and Second Seminole War (1836-1838). Motte is very much of his era in writing style and opinions, but if you're interested in Indian Wars or 19th century memoirs it's worth a read.

The edition I had was from the 1960s was edited and annotated, although it shows its age a little in that regard too. I think it was recently republished in paperback, though I don't know if it was updated at all.
A mini bio on Motte:

About Dr. Jacob Rhett Motte
Jacob Rhett Motte (1811–1868) was a U.S. Army surgeon during the Seminole Wars of the early nineteenth-century. He later worked in private practice in Charleston, South Carolina.

In 1836, 24-year-old Jacob Rhett Motte, a Harvard-educated southern gentleman with a literary flair, departed his hometown of Charleston to serve as an Army surgeon in wars against the Creek and Seminole Indians. He found himself transported from aristocratic social circles into a wild frontier.
Motte recorded his experiences in a lively journal, presented in full in Journey into Wilderness. In his journal, Motte relates observations of Indian warfare from southern Georgia and eastern Alabama to Key Largo in Florida. He reports his impressions of pioneer settlements, military fortifications, towns, roads, frontier life and society, and geography. His journal also offers glimpses of the economic, political, and religious trends of the time. A fascinating story and travelogue, it is a rare firsthand account of life on the Georgia-Alabama-Florida frontier.

1845 – Dr. Jacob Rhett Motte purchased Exeter Plantation – Moncks Corner – Berkeley County, South Carolina
1868 – Dr. Motte died of Typhoid Fever at Exeter Plantation
 

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Years after first seeing the movie I just finished David Baldacci's book, Absolute Power. I have to say that reading the book revealed the most egregious case of a Hollywood movie departing in almost every particular from the book on which the movie is purportedly based. In the movie, Clint Eastwood plays the main protagonist (jewel thief Luther Whitney) while in the book he is an important, but supporting character - oh and he is killed in the book. So is the character played by E. G. Marshall. And most interesting of all, the book's main character ( a young lawyer representing Clint's character) and a large number of characters surrounding him are nowhere to be found in the movie. One of the co-main stories is the lawyer's (Jack Graham) struggle to get along with the rich bitch he's engaged to while at the same time trying to reconcile with old flame Kate Whitney, Luther's daughter and played by Laura Linney in the movie.

The book begins with Luther breaking into a mansion to cop some goodies from the safe of tycoon Walter Sullivan (E. G. Marshall) when, out of the blue in pop's Sullivan's much younger wife for a little belly bumping with a guy who turns out to be POTUS. To avoid getting nabbed, Luther locks himself in the safe from where he witnesses, through a one-way mirror, a drunken POTUS beat the crap out of Mrs. Sullivan. Well, the lady takes offense at the beating and is about to take her revenge on the most powerful man in the world with a letter opener when she is blown away by a couple Secret Service agents. The President's chief of staff, Gloria Russell, orders the Secret Service guys to clean the place up and make it look like a break-in gone bad. But in their cleanup, they left that pesky letter opener behind. Luther escapes, with the goods and the incriminating letter opener (got the President's DNA on it) and leads the authorities on a merry chase.

The cops eventually catch up to old Luther and he is charged with killing Mrs. Sullivan. In comes Jack Graham who represents Luther who he knows from his days dating Kate. Also welcome in one Seth Frank, a homicide detective from Sullivan's exclusive community who investigates the crime and comes to find many inconsistencies in the evidence. He eventually comes to doubt Luther's guilt and even begins to like the old guy. Well, Luther is killed on his way to being arraigned by a hitman hired by Sullivan (who is killed as part of the White House coverup).

In case anyone wants to read the book I'll avoid spoilers by saying that after a number of twists and turns, the evil doers are brought down by the good guys. POTUS is NOT forced to commit suicide by Sullivan as he was in the movie.

I'll end by saying that the only similarities between book and movie are the character names, the opening murder scene and good guys win.
 
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Matt McKeon

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Wings of Desire
Directed by Wim Wenders, it follows two angels as they flit unseen through 1987 Berlin. They offer unseen comfort to people facing ordinary challenges, injured in accidents, loneliness, thinking of suicide, cheering up a handicapped child. One, played by Bruno Gaenz, the unforgettable Hitler in Downfall, falls in love with a trapeze artist and decides to leave eternal life to be with her.
 

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Wings of Desire
Directed by Wim Wenders, it follows two angels as they flit unseen through 1987 Berlin. They offer unseen comfort to people facing ordinary challenges, injured in accidents, loneliness, thinking of suicide, cheering up a handicapped child. One, played by Bruno Gaenz, the unforgettable Hitler in Downfall, falls in love with a trapeze artist and decides to leave eternal life to be with her.
Berlin is still surrounded by the Wall, seemingly permanent. Its winter, and beautifully photographed in black and white, although Berlin isn't shown as "scenic" in a tourist sense. When the angel joins the mortals, he sees in full color, human life being much more intense than eternal existence.
 

O' Be Joyful

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When the angel joins the mortals, he sees in full color, human life being much more intense than eternal existence.

I do not intend this as a mean retort--I have not seen the film you refer to--but from your description this reminds me of the beginning and then the end of The Wizard of Oz in reverse.
 

Matt McKeon

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Berlin is still surrounded by the Wall, seemingly permanent. Its winter, and beautifully photographed in black and white, although Berlin isn't shown as "scenic" in a tourist sense. When the angel joins the mortals, he sees in full color, human life being much more intense than eternal existence.
In the mix is a elderly man named Homer, wondering why there can't be an epic of peace, not just epics of war. He also echoes the Odyssey, with Odysseus's rejection of an eternal life.

Most interesting is Peter Falk, playing himself, in a movie about an American trying to find someone in 1945 Berlin. Germans happily cry out "Columbo!" when they see him.

Features song by Nick Cave. Great movie, maybe not for everybody.
 

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The Man Who Killed Hitler, then the Bigfoot
This is possibly the greatest pulp movie title I can imagine. The film itself is extremely dull and mediocre however.

There is an interesting scene. Sam Elliot, playing the who killed Hitler, etc. is speaking to a federal agent. Yes, he shot Hitler, after tracking him for a year. The Germans had a dozen imposters. Operation Vallyrie got one. The guy who shot himself in the bunker was an imposter as well. But it didn't matter. By the time he had killed Hitler, the damage was already done, the evil actions the dictator had unleased played out. The Allied armies stopped the Nazis, not an assassin.
 

O' Be Joyful

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The Man Who Killed Hitler, then the Bigfoot
This is possibly the greatest pulp movie title I can imagine. The film itself is extremely dull and mediocre however.

There is an interesting scene. Sam Elliot, playing the who killed Hitler, etc. is speaking to a federal agent. Yes, he shot Hitler, after tracking him for a year. The Germans had a dozen imposters. Operation Vallyrie got one. The guy who shot himself in the bunker was an imposter as well. But it didn't matter. By the time he had killed Hitler, the damage was already done, the evil actions the dictator had unleased played out. The Allied armies stopped the Nazis, not an assassin.
Man Hunt is a 1941 American thriller film directed by Fritz Lang and starring Walter Pidgeon and Joan Bennett.[1][2] It is based on the 1939 novel Rogue Male by Geoffrey Household and is set just prior to the Second World War.

On July 29, 1939, renowned British big game hunter Captain Alan Thorndike (Walter Pidgeon) slips through the forest undetected near the Berghof, Adolf Hitler's residence near Berchtesgaden. Getting the dictator in his telescopic sight, he pulls the trigger on his unloaded rifle and gives a wave. He ponders a moment, then loads a live round, but is discovered at the last second by a guard, and the shot goes wild.

 

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Man Hunt is a 1941 American thriller film directed by Fritz Lang and starring Walter Pidgeon and Joan Bennett.[1][2] It is based on the 1939 novel Rogue Male by Geoffrey Household and is set just prior to the Second World War.

On July 29, 1939, renowned British big game hunter Captain Alan Thorndike (Walter Pidgeon) slips through the forest undetected near the Berghof, Adolf Hitler's residence near Berchtesgaden. Getting the dictator in his telescopic sight, he pulls the trigger on his unloaded rifle and gives a wave. He ponders a moment, then loads a live round, but is discovered at the last second by a guard, and the shot goes wild.

I've read Rogue Male.
 

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Geraldine Brooks, wife of Tony Horwitz(author of the well known Confederates in the Attic), has written a historical novel of the plague of 1666, told by Annie, a housemaid in a tiny village.

The village is the center of a plague outbreak, spread by a shipment of infected cloth from London. The inhabitants make the courageous decision to quarantine themselves to confine the deadly disease to their isolated village. The bubonic plague ravages the village, killing over half the inhabitants, but is stopped at the "boundary stones" around the town. The novel explores the various ways the villagers persevere through the ordeal, continuing to work their crofts, burying the dead, while Annie and her mistress Ellinor tirelessly tend to the sick and the orphaned. Some turn to intense forms of religious faith, others to charms and magical rites.

From our own mild plague there are parallels, People attend religious services outside to maintain social distancing. Others struggle with isolation, economic hardship and grief. Others hardheartedly take advantage of their distressed neighbors. But only the wealthy Bradfords frantically flee the town.

Based on a real Derbyshire village that deliberately isolated themselves in 1666-7.
 
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