How did I not know that there’s a 1985 TV movie called John & Yoko in which Peter Capaldi plays George Harrison

Watching The Way We Were for the first time and Young James Woods as a Marxist student protester who gets cucked at a university dance by Redford is simply beautiful stuff

I met Robert Redford twice. Once I was thrown into a room with him and Cate Blanchett, and when they both turned to look at me for my first question I somehow managed to speak. I have nothing original to say about him except he was incredibly kind and lovely and rest in peace man

From Hyde and Go Tweet, in which the usually more conservative Friz Freleng briefly leans into Tex Avery/Bob Clampett territory

Things funnier than the “Surrender Dorothy” story from Martin Scorsese and Joseph Minion’s After Hours:

I had one of my shittest ever summers — underwent emergency spinal surgery, doctors forbade me from cycling and even fucking swimming, was in lots of orthopedic pain, foot and leg torn up by an uncomfortable brace — but it did end with me seeing Oasis, and goddamn

Still trying to score cheapish Oasis tickets for this weekend. In the meantime enjoying this presumably complete list of songs of theirs that feature “sun,” “shine," "shining," and/or "soul" www.tumblr.com/playmixt/978...

One of the tightest sections of my bookshelves, all heaters

Per J. Hoberman’s Everything is Now, I’ve learned that city activist Jane Jacobs wrote this song with Bob Dylan to protest Robert Moses’ thankfully aborted highway that would have destroyed the Village — a detail not included in The Power Broker m.youtube.com/watch?v=9c09...

I almost cried when after an hour of digital Highest 2 Lowest abruptly switched to 16

Been informed that I’m not allowed to get on my beloved bicycle till at least the end of August because of my Emergency Spinal Surgery from earlier this summer, but when I finally do, after two maddening months, I’ll look like this

An excellent frame from Naked Gun 2 1/2

Finally some good news: I wrote an essay about Neil Jordan for his once-hated, actually interesting escaped con priest movie We’re No Angels for its new blu-ray release by Cinématographe

Crossing off my biggest unseen Hitch. Hitch and most everyone had a miserable time making it, Gregory Peck said it was the only picture he made that he’d like to have seen burned, its rep has long been that it’s the rare boring Hitchcock. How bad could it be?

After my spinal surgery I was given a bland hospital cane, and I need to upgrade. Suggestions are welcome, but for now here is my fancy cane mood board

Me with my post-emergency spinal surgery cane

Beyond relieved someone who wasn’t me in the post-surgery recovery room* asked one of the hospital staff if they enjoyed The Pitt. (They did) * I’m fine, mostly

Listen to me from a few years back revealing my horrible secret that I know way too much about Michael Winner (and some about Charles Bronson)

This is almost certainly wrong

If anyone has tips on how to deal with foot drop, lemme know because I have it partially and I am not a fan. This is me now m.youtube.com/watch?v=XNg6...

What the hell is happening

One of the best lesser-knowns from Brian Wilson’s CV. RIP m.youtube.com/watch?v=pv6Z...

The most mind-blowing thing I learned this week is that William F. Buckley Jr. did not have a Mid-Atlantic accent. His upbringing was less patrician than peripatetic, producing the multi-ethnic blob that is one of the 20th century’s most euphonious sounds

Revisited Hunt for Red October for the first time since either the Clinton or maybe even the Bush I era, and imagining an alternate timeline in which Jan de Bont never became a director, never even did Speed, and just kept making movies look rad. Goddamn this movie is a beaut

Tom Cruise shows off his aging but ripped bod so frequently in Mission: Impossible 8 that it’s his version of Burt Lancaster in The Swimmer

Fans of Alan Partridge and ‘90s British comedy shows know this image from the original Mission: Impossible is very funny

When I was a sheltered kid of 10 and 11 and 12, my favorite TV show was, randomly, about people sitting in a bar. George Wendt was a major fixture of that period of my life. RIP, and though I haven’t myself read it, I have it on good authority that this book is very enjoyable

A 60-something David Niven may or may not have been randomly present at Damo Suzuki’s eardrum-shattering maiden show with Can, and he was profoundly unimpressed

I get voicemail. (Note: I have no idea who this is and these arrived within the same minute)

Was mildly afraid to revisit Buffalo ‘66, but nope, it’s a banger. One of the most singularly beautiful looking films of the ‘90s or ever. Was curious what Gen Z would make of this monstrosity, but they howled during “spanning time” and applauded at the end. Life is good

Sven Nykvist had quite the run here

It’s genuinely rad that in the new print of 8 1/2 the subtitles keep being eaten up by white at the bottom of the frame. Really took me back to watching untold “world cinema” classics on VHS—like 8 1/2—where you couldn’t read a third of the movie. (Except this print is a beaut)

Been revisiting Madvillainy a lot recently, and somehow I never looked up some of the samples. This one blew my tiny mind

Reading a book about the Golden Age of American animation that says it’s “clear” Last Year at Marienbad is a “ritzed-up live-action no-violence child” of the Wile E. Coyote-Roadrunner shorts, and that “the same key unlocks them both,” and yes, sure

The insanely stacked cast of the extraordinarily short-lived Married... with Children spinoff Top of the Heap

The most beautiful words in the English language are not “I love you” but

Last night I took some NyQuil to kill the Cold That Will Not Die. Out before 10pm. Tumbled into a deep, deep sleep, some of the best I’ve ever had. Awoke feeling fully refreshed, ready to conquer the day. I roll over to see what time it is. It’s 11:58pm.

Amon Düül Amon Düül II Amon Düül III: Back in Training Amon Düül IV: Citizens on Patrol Amon Düül V: Mission: Miami Beach Amon Düül VI: City Under Siege Amon Düül: Mission to Moscow Amon Düül: The Series

Always amused there’s a New York City journalist whose name is actually Robert Moses

RIP Wings Hauser, whose turn in Vice Squad as a killer pimp named Ramrod is one of the all-timers

Solid dedication and epigraph in Graham Greene’s The Human Factor, which was subsequently turned into Otto Preminger’s tough but worthwhile and beautifully angry swan song

Pacino in Bobby Deerfield is the look/vibe I want

Fair enough, but you still shouldn’t have bought his dorky car

I’m reading Douglas Coupland’s Generation X for the first time in the year of our lord 2025, and this makes me feel terrifyingly seen

“Better to live without expectations under the Left than in constant fury under the Right” — from Annie Ernaux’s The Years, a fine book about being a perpetually disappointed progressive living through endless albeit sometimes worsening circles

Some personal news. Thanks to all who looked out for me in the meantime or were simply kind. Would gladly do the same should the shoe wind up on the other foot m.youtube.com/watch?v=G_9U...

Pretty proud of this one from a few days back

Very moved that the Famiglia near Port Authority boasts a signed photo from Carlito’s Way

TIL: Gary Cooper’s mom was named Alice Cooper

Rolled out for the Zeppelin doc* mostly to hear Zeppelin through movie theater speakers, and guess what * Pretty good! It’s nice and intimate, with just the boys, Bonham included, talking mostly about craft