THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
09/19/08 -- Vol. 27, No. 12, Whole Number 1511
El Honcho Grande: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
La Honcha Bonita: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
All material copyright by author unless otherwise noted.
All comments sent will be assumed authorized for inclusion
unless otherwise noted.
To subscribe, send mail to mtvoid-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
To unsubscribe, send mail to mtvoid-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
Topics:
Blatant Prejudice (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
What Is the Ugliest Part of Your Body? (comments by
Mark R. Leeper)
THE MAN FROM EARTH (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
THE BEAT GENERATION (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
Book Weights (letter of comment by Fred Lerner)
This Week's Reading (THE ESSENTIAL MARCUS AURELIUS)
(book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
===================================================================
TOPIC: Blatant Prejudice (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
I was watching A BRIDGE TOO FAR. This is the film about Operation
Market Garden, one of the costliest battles of WWII. The plan was
intended to bring the soldiers out of Europe and home by Christmas.
Why is it always Christmas? How come you never have a scene with
the young major telling the cigar-chomping generals, "If this plan
works we may just have the troops home for Pesach." [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: What Is the Ugliest Part of Your Body? (Part 2: Animals)
(comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Last week I was talking about what humans find ugly or attractive
in other humans. I gave examples from Chinese culture that they we
notice first Asian eyes. If you were born in China and lived there
all your life the feature on Western faces you would be most like
likely to pick out would be the nose. To the Chinese we seem to
have big noses. And compared to them we do. Presumably other
cultures have other opinions. I would be most interested to find
to what features on my face that a Kalahari bushman or a pygmy
might find particularly noticeable.
But let us go to an even more alien culture. Let us look at
animals. Let me take the most near-at-hand example. I suppose to
the rabbits and squirrels humans are just the most powerful animals
around. I often wonder if they often wonder about clothing. What
is this urge we have to cover our bodies with foreign material? A
squirrel has fur that provides most of the same function. I guess
if I were a squirrel that would be what I would wonder about. I
think they might envy our ability to go around bipedal, and they
will stand up vertically for short times to get the look of the
area with a better view. But are they jealous of our long legs?
Who knows?
Birds may find some humans ugly, if they have had bad experiences
with them. I was just reading recently that some birds have
memories for human faces that last for many years and perhaps the
bird's entire life. Birds treated cruelly in an experiment
remembered the persons who did it for years later. It should not
be surprising that birds have good memories since they cache seeds
in summer, burying them in the ground is hundreds of locations and
seem to remember about 90% of the locations.
But I am asking a more general question. What human features do
animals find least appealing about us? Well, we cannot really ask
them so we do not know. My personal theory is that particularly
unappealing to animals--especially small animals--would be one
feature that we find appealing in each other. If I would a small
animal, the one feature that I would not like in humans is their
smile. What is a smile? It is the pulling back of the lips to
show the teeth. Now a rodent does not have protective spines and
not really long claws. They do not use tools to clobber one
another like we do with our weapons. To them the most destructive
defense weapons are the teeth. It is those hard white things that
probably look to mouse or a squirrel as being so formidable. We
think a squirrel is cute and we smile, but to the squirrel that
probably looks like a threat. It is like pulling back the hammer
on a pistol. It is moving our lips out of the way so that we are
ready to strike. Note that this is what a dog does when he wants
to be threatening.
But that is speculation. There is, however, a feature I have
noticed that animals really do not like about the human form, and I
have some evidence for that. I have found at least one dog and one
horse that have expressed distaste for human hands. The dog was
one that an uncle adopted after it had come from some sort of
background of horrifying abuse. This dog loved to play ball with
humans. He loved to have someone kick the ball and he would run to
retrieve it. But there was one taboo. If the human touched the
ball with his hands, the game was over. The dog would sadly pick
up the ball and walk away with it. I saw the dog only once. The
first time I touched his ball he forgave me, but I certainly could
tell he was not happy. The second time I touched the ball it was
"game over." Apparently when the dog had been abused he picked up
on the idea that these things on the ends of our arms are the
source of our power. They are extremely powerful and flexible
tools to work our wills. And the dog had not learned to trust
humans working their wills. I also encountered a horse that had
the same fear. He wanted to be friendly. He was curious about us.
But if I reached out to pat him he shied away. Hands are what
allow us to put those big metal and leather controlling devices on
his head. Humans can be friendly and nice to them as long as they
do not get their hands involved. This horse, and probably other
horses, does not trust us not to use our hands on them. To a
horse, the hand is the most threatening and ugliest part of the
human body. [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: THE MAN FROM EARTH (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: Thoughtful and thought-provoking, this is a science
fiction film with plenty going for it but no special effects. It
is really just people sitting and talking. Yet it is full of ideas
that will with stick the viewer long after the film is over. THE
MAN FROM EARTH very probably will be one of the best science
fiction films of this decade. A group of college professors and
friends discuss the history of mankind and find out what they have
right and what they have wrong from someone who knows. This is
currently a little-known film that is generally very highly rated
by the small number of people who have seen it. And it *really*
deserves to be seen. Rating: +3 (-4 to +4) or 9/10
For a decade John Oldman (played by David Lee Smith) has been a
popular history professor at a small unnamed university. Now he is
mysteriously giving up tenure and leaving for unexplained reasons
to go to an undisclosed destination. His bewildered friends are
throwing a good-bye party for the charismatic teacher.
John's friends clearly want to pry the secrets from their enigmatic
collegue. The secret is that he has had access to knowledge of
history that they did not--far more knowledge than they could ever
have. Their conversation centers on why he has this information,
but also on how history is not what people might have thought it
was--and what the implications are of his special knowledge.
This film also goes by the title JEROME BIXBY'S THE MAN FROM EARTH.
Jerome Bixby was a good and occasionally great science fiction
writer who published mostly in the magazines. His best known story
was "It's a Good Life," adapted to The Twilight Zone. In that
episode Billy Mumy played a child who was an omnipotent but totally
selfish tyrant making life miserable for everyone else in his town,
which by the way he has somehow removed from Earth. Bixby also
contributed to "Star Trek" and wrote the original story for the
film FANTASTIC VOYAGE. It is said that he was completing the
screenplay for THE MAN FROM EARTH as he was dying. The script is
intelligent and covers politics, science, and religion. It does
not dally with bizarre secret histories. Nearly everything that is
said is at least credible and frequently quite likely. But it is
frequently history as you my have never considered it. The script
is well-written and smart, and never talks down to the viewer.
The cast has no big names but it has some medium names, including
William Katt and John Billingsly of "Star Trek." From the format,
the script could have just as easily been a stage play and could be
produced as such with very little adaptation. It is just
characters getting together, mostly in one room, and talking.
It is clear that nobody knew how to market a science fiction film
that is just actors sitting around and talking. The film played at
film festivals to people who probably were not quite sure what it
would be when they entered the theater. It got some very good
ratings and comment, but only nominal theatrical release that I
know of. It probably went directly to DVD. NetFlix not only
stocks it for rental, they offer it free for "instant viewing"
download. I do not know if it even recouped its modest investment.
This film is a nearly undiscovered gem. It is one of the most
intelligent science fiction films ever made. I rate it a +3 on the
-4 to +4 scale or 9/10.
Film Credits: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0756683/
[-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: THE BEAT GENERATION (film review by Mark R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: This is obviously a decent script mangled by a very bad
production. There are two distinctly different styles apparent in
the writing. One style is a tense police thriller about a serial
rapist. The other is a Cloud-Cuckoo Land cartoon of beatniks.
What is good almost certainly comes from talented writer Richard
Matheson, but the film is more a study of bad filmmaking than the
decent thriller it might have been. Rating: -1 (-4 to +4) or 3/10
Suppose one was to take a painting by a grand master and paint onto
it a mustache, glasses, cross-eyes, etc. The net effect would be
ludicrous. Stroke by stroke the observer would know which paint
strokes were from the master and which by the vandal. And in the
end you would be sorry that you could not just see the painting as
it was at first. That is the impression one gets from THE BEAT
GENERATION. This is a film supposedly co-authored by Richard
Matheson and Lewis Meltzer. Richard Matheson is a good writer of
suspense stories, though he is better known for his science
fiction, horror, and fantasy. He was a frequent contributor to the
original "Twilight Zone". He wrote many of the scripts for Roger
Corman's "Edgar Allan Poe" series. His novel I AM LEGEND has been
adapted three times to the screen. He wrote the scripts for
television's THE NIGHT STALKER and THE NIGHT STRANGLER. He wrote
the novel that was adapted into SOMEWHERE IN TIME. The list of his
film accomplishments goes on and on. And at base there is a good
crime thriller in THE BEAT GENERATION. But repeatedly getting in
the way is a plot super-imposed with the agenda of cartoonish
making fun of beatniks and occasionally adding a religious message.
From moment to moment there is never any question which author's
work we are seeing because the writing is either improving the
effect of the thriller or sabotaging it. Almost certainly Matheson
sold the script and then was helpless to protect it as it was
defaced and ruined by his co-author Meltzer and the filmmakers.
Just a few years later Matheson was more ready to insist he could
have his name taken off of film credits if he did not like the
film, and THE BEAT GENERATION may have been the film that convinced
him to do that.
Stan Hess (played by Ray Danton) leads a double life. He is the
lead poet whose jive verse is the coolest thing to the cadre of
local beatniks. (Example of his poetry: "The sky blooms radiation
gumdrops.") But he leads a double life. He is also an extremely
devious serial rapist. The police know the rapist as the "Aspirin
Kid." He preys on women he knows to be alone, pretends to know a
husband or friend and to be returning money to him to get into a
home. He then feigns a headache and asks for water to have with
his aspirins. When the woman returns he jumps her, beats, and
rapes her. Before he leaves he plants signs that he was sharing a
drink or a meal with the victim so the police think the victim knew
and is shielding her attacker. Investigating is police detective
Dave Cullorah (Steve Cochran). Cullorah unknowingly runs into Hess
and Hess is able to get Dave's address. When Cullorah's wife is
assaulted and then discovers she is pregnant, the game becomes
personal between Hess and Cullorah. The story continues at two
levels. The police story is one of some real dramatic tension,
especially when combined with what then would have been the
controversial issue of whether to abort. Then there are the coffee
house scenes that have no reality at all and area sort of
burlesque. In one sequence they cut back and forth between the two
realities as in a back room of the coffee house the rapist is
attacking Georgia (Mamie van Doran) while in the next room there is
a ridiculous caricature of beatnik dancing.
One can gage the feel of the film by some of the casting. Jackie
Coogan and Sid Melton play cops who work with Cullorah. They might
almost be okay. Bombshell Mamie van Doran is one of Hess's
intended victims who seems less than bothered by her peril.
Professional wrestler and occasional film comic relief actor Max
"Slapsie Maxie" Rosenbloom is completely miscast as the wrestling
beatnik. He seems to be here merely to have a dubious celebrity.
(A wrestling beatnik?) Jim Mitchum is along as someone who
supposed resembles Ray Danton's character. Jim Mitchum does not
look much like Ray Danton, but he does strongly bear a resemblance
to his father Robert. Louis Armstrong also performs throughout at
the coffeehouse and is actually given two or three lines of
ineffectual dialog. William Schallert plays an inspirational
priest who provides spiritual inspiration for Francee Cullorah.
How the usually prestigious MGM ever released this strange travesty
is something of a mystery.
Full of hokey dialog and absolutely no feel of authenticity for the
"beat" movement, THE BEAT GENERATION gets a -1 on the -4 to +4
scale or 3/10.
Film Credits: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0052610/
[-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: Book Weights (letter of comment by Fred Lerner)
In response to Evelyn's comments on trying to have two books open
at once in the 09/12/08 issue of the MT VOID, Fred Lerner writes,
"Library supply houses sell weights that are designed to keep books
open. They
can be used with paperbacks, though they don't work quite as well
as with hardcovers." [-fl]
Evelyn responds, "True, but as you note, there are problems with
paperbacks, especially if the binding is tight and you don't want
to crack it." [-ecl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
THE ESSENTIAL MARCUS AURELIUS (translated by Jacob Needleman and
John P. Piazza) (ISBN-13 978-1-58542-617-1, ISBN-10 1-58542-617-2)
is in some ways riding on the whole self-help advice wave. (The
fact that the blurb by Thomas Moore chosen for the cover starts
"Set aside all your contemporary self-help books and read this
classic slowly" supports this.) I don't dispute that Marcus
Aurelius is worth reading, but the "distillation" of his writings
to a series of brief precepts to live by of the sort one finds on a
pull-off calendar is not exactly what Marcus had in mind.
One of the things Marcus recommends is "to read with precision and
not be satisfied with the mere gist of things." (1.6) In some ways
this is directly contradicted by the translators, who have tried to
extract just the "gist" of Marcus's writings rather than presenting
the full text.
While there is an appeal to having lines like "The noblest way of
taking revenge on others is by refusing to become like them" (6.6),
it hardly seems fair to reduce Marcus's "Meditations" to this.
[-ecl]
===================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
No mistake is more common and more fatuous than
appealing to logic in cases which are beyond her
jurisdiction.
-- Samuel Butler