Friday, July 27, 2007

MR. SHOOP’S SURFIN' SUMMER SCHOOL MIDTERM

(Courtesy of Sergio Leone and the Infield Fly Rule)

1) Favorite quote from a filmmaker?
"In England, I'm a horror movie director. In Germany, I'm a filmmaker. In the US, I'm a bum." ~ John Carpenter

2) A good movie from a bad director?
I'll go with one I've just seen, The Silent Partner directed by Daryl Duke. Of course, the only other work I've seen by him is the Thorn Birds, which, at 8 years old, left me wanting to tear my eyes out. This movie, though, is pure goodness.

3) Favorite Laurence Olivier performance?
Also my favorite Ira Levin adaptation (it's true!), The Boys from Brazil.

4) Describe a famous location from a movie that you have visited. Was it anything like the way it was in the film? Why or why not?
Accidentally stumbled into Snoqualmie, WA on a trip with my parents. It's home to good pie, decent folks and a damn fine cup of coffee. Just as advertised.

5) Carlo Ponti or Dino De Laurentiis (Producer)?
Dino's given me some of my all-time favourite good-good, good-bad and bad-bad movies.

6) Best movie about baseball
I probably like The Scout more than I should. Maybe I'll go the safe route and choose Bad News Bears.

7) Favorite Barbara Stanwyck performance?
Jessica Drummond in Forty Guns. Truly, no man can tame her.

8) Fast Times at Ridgemont High or Dazed and Confused?
Um... there are moments in FT@RH that I'll take to my grave, but Dazed and Confused wins it in a cage match.

9) What was the last movie you saw, and why?
Zodiac at home and Ratatouille theatrically. Z. because I've been dying to see it since it came out--was better than I had even hoped. R. because I agreed to go with a most hungover buddy. Also top notch.

10) Whether or not you have actually procreated or not, is there a movie you can think of that seriously affected the way you think about having kids of your own?
The Brood helped me to keep it my pants for a while, but it hasn't seriously shaped my thinking on the matter.

11) Favorite Katharine Hepburn performance?
Suddenly, Last Summer or African Queen.

12) A bad movie from a good director?
Most directors have one or two of these in their closets, but Jack made me pity and hate FF Coppola for a year or two.

13) Salo: The 120 Days of Sodom-- yes or no?
Yes, unapologetically.

14) Ben Hecht or Billy Wilder (Screenwriter)?
Wilder could write the hell out of his own movies, but I'm gonna go with Hecht as he had to survive on his ability to craft any number of screenplays.

15) Name the film festival you’d most want to attend, or your favorite festival that you actually have attended?
I really want to go to Rotterdam.

16) Head or 200 Motels?
I'll take the Monkees over Zappa any day.

17) Favorite cameo appearance?
I'm going to cheat and choose my favorite, uh-hem, extended cameo. That is Screamin' Jay Hawkins in Mystery Train. I hear women can get pregnant just by watching it.

18) Favorite Rosalind Russell performance?
I'm bad because I've never seen anything she's in... yes, including The Front Page.

19) What movie, either currently available on DVD or not, has never received the splashy collector’s edition treatment you think it deserves? What would such an edition include?
Chimes at Midnight. It should come with a tankard of ale.

20) Name a performance that everyone needs to be reminded of, for whatever reason?
Paul LeMat in Melvin and Howard, or Jeff Daniels in Something Wild. J. Demme might be the best of his generation at directing, and shooting, actors.

21) Louis B. Mayer or Harry Cohn (Studio Head)?
Cohn

22) Favorite John Wayne performance?
I like Rio Bravo, Nicole prefers his turn as Genghis Khan in The Conqueror.

23) Naked Lunch or Barton Fink?
Fink's more fun, but there's a little more gristle with Lunch.

24) Your Ray Harryhausen movie of choice?

The Valley of the Gwangi
I met him once in Boulder. Couldn't have been more of a gentleman. And what a storyteller.

25) Is there a movie you can think of that you feel like the world would be better off without, one that should have never been made?
Pretty Woman sure messed up a lot of heads...

24) Favorite Dub Taylor performance?
I guess from The Wild Bunch

25) If you had the choice of seeing three final movies, to go with your three last meals, before shuffling off this mortal coil, what would they be?
Gremlins, Once Upon a Time in the West, and Miracle at Morgan's Creek. Wild Things or The Wolf Man as alternates...

26) And what movie theater would you choose to see them in?
The late, lamented CineMolly. The movie theater of my childhood, responsible for introducing me to the joys of Police Academy 5, Popeye and La Bamba.

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