Merry Movie Mayhem

With Christmas and Hanukkah only a few days away, here’s some last minute Merry Mayhem stocking stuffers. As of the time of this writing, a few days before its posting, most were still available and some are available streaming. The movies aren’t necessarily Christmas-related, just good stocking stuffers for those who like to read, write and watch crime fiction. And I’ve tossed in a bunch of non-crime-related movies at the end. All in no particular order. So, roll film:

The Godfather and its two sequels: Godfather I is one of the greatest movies ever made. And Godfather II is even better. Three isn’t as bad as I first thought it was and if one can get around Sofia Coppola’s Valley Girl Mafia chic it’s pretty good actually. You can get them individually, in a set or as the Godfather Saga where they’ve been cut together chronologically. I’ll take my Godfather any way I can get it.

Chinatown and Two Jakes: At the risk of being repetitive, Chinatown is one of the greatest movies ever made. And one of the best and most perfect screenplays I’ve ever read. When task master Amy was trying to get me to pare down on things, she “made” me get rid of a ton of screenplays I had – lots of good ones, too. But one of the few that I kept was Chinatown, which still sits on a shelf in my office for inspiration. Some people don’t like the subject matter, they find it repulsive. But it’s still a terrific movie. And the sequel, Two Jakes, also isn’t as bad as I first thought it was. But it’s best to watch it right after you view Chinatown so everything that it refers to is fresh in your mind. That will enhance your enjoyment of it.

In a Lonely Place: Tied for my second favorite movie of all time (see towards the end for the other second fave). And yes, I like the movie better than the book it’s based on. It resonates with me on so many levels. Back in the day, the Smithereens did a song called In a Lonely Place, inspired by the movie. It even has some lines from the movie. I really like this song. I got a poster of the movie from Pat DiNizio, the lead singer/guitarist/songwriter of the Smithereens. And when I look at the poster I like to think that DiNizio was also looking at that very poster when he wrote that song.

Film Noir 10-Movie Spotlight Collection: Okay, even if you don’t have anyone to get this for, get it for yourself. It’s one of the best collections of noir I’ve seen. It includes: This Gun For Hire, The Glass Key, Double Indemnity, Phantom Lady, The Blue Dahlia, Black Angel, The Killers (1946 version), The Big Clock, Criss Cross, Touch of Evil. There’s not a bad movie in the bunch. And it includes the ultimate film noir imo, Double Indemnity. Plus Blue Dahlia, which Raymond Chandler wrote the screenplay for. But they’re all good to great. Some have commentaries and other features. I’ve given this as gifts to a few people and I’m always envious when I do. I have all the movies, but in other versions, but somehow I still want this set for me. One great set.

Alfred Hitchcock: The Ultimate Collection: If you like Hitchcock and you don’t already have these or know someone who might enjoy them it’s a great Hitch starter set. I say ‘starter’ because there’s so many more. But this includes one of my two fave Hitchcock movies, Vertigo (the other being The Lady Vanishes). And most of the movies here are terrific, though there’s some I’m not all that fond of. Plus there’s lots of extra features. Movies in the set are: Saboteur, Shadow of a Doubt, Rope, Rear Window, The Trouble with Harry, The Man Who Knew Too Much, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Psycho, The Birds, Marnie, Torn Curtain, Topaz, Frenzy, Family Plot.

Pulp Fiction: Everybody knows this one. It’s a terrific movie. And would make a great stocking stuffer, along with Reservoir Dogs.

Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile: Two movies based on Stephen King stories. Not horror tales, like he’s generally known for. And I tend to like his non-horror stories – like these and Stand by Me – much more than the horror ones. You can get these two in a set, both directed by Frank Darabont. A terrific two-fer.

Thin Man Boxed Set: Unfortunately, I think I was wrong about this one still being available. Well, it is still available but it’s over 200 bucks. So maybe another time when it’s reissued. We all know the Thin Man movies. The playful banter and plentiful drink. One of my film school teachers wrote one of them – I always thought that was so cool. There’s other good William Powell Myrna Loy movies as well, especially Libeled Lady and Love Crazy.

LA Confidential: I’m a James Ellroy fan, though not as much as I used to be. This is one hell of a good movie based on his book. And, though I loved the book, after watching the movie about 500 times, I reread it and think I actually like the movie better.

Here’s some non-crime movies that might work, too:

Reuben Reuben: A minor gem and a great satire. Here’s a couple quotes from the movie:

“There's nothing I cherish more than the truth. I don't practice it, but I cherish it.”

And later:

“That’s where they live. (Points to sign that says “Birch Hills”.) And in other subdivisions with names like Orchard View and Vineyard Haven. All of them named, God help us, for the woods and the vineyards and the apple trees they bulldozed out of existence to make way for the new culture.”

After Hours: Something a little different from Martin Scorsese.  The Grateful Dead sang, “What a long, strange trip it’s been.” They might have been writing about Griffin Dunne’s very long, odd night in this movie.

Casablanca: Number 1 fave movie, bar none. Do I really need to say anything about this?

Beatles on Ed Sullivan: What can I say about this? They changed the world – at least they changed my world.

Uncle Buck: One of two John Candy/John Hughes movies on this list. Uncle Buck doesn’t always get great reviews, but I like it. I think it’s funny and warm.

Planes, Trains and Automobiles: The other John Candy/John Hughes film on this list. Also funny with a warm heart.

My Cousin Vinny: I’ve seen this in whole or in part about 1,000,000 times. And I always laugh. It never gets old.

Can’t Buy Me Love: Patrick Dempsey as a high school student who finds out the real price of being popular. And the title is from a Beatle song that’s played in the movie. How can you go wrong?

It’s Alive: Ramones concert footage. Great stuff from a terrific, punchy band. Gabba Gabba Hey! Johnny Ramone came in #28 on Rolling Stone’s list of top 100 guitar players. See why on this 2 DVD set. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/100-greatest-guitarists-153675/johnny-ramone-154110/

They Might Be Giants: A man (George C. Scott) thinks he’s Sherlock Holmes. His psychiatrist, Dr. Watson (Joanne Woodward), might think so, too…sooner or later.

Soldier in the Rain: A special movie, starring Jackie Gleason and Steve McQueen. If it doesn’t touch your heart you don’t have one.

Fred and Ginger movies, individually or boxed: always good for the holiday spirit

Ghost World: My other second favorite movie, along with In a Lonely Place. I’m not a teenage girl, but I totally relate to the alienation these characters, played by Thora Birch and Scarlett Johansson, feel. And for those who haven’t seen it it’s not a horror movie despite the title. (Also w/ Steve Buscemi.)

Sideways: a wonderful movie for writers, even more than for people who hate Merlot.

I don’t think he’s really talking about wine here:

Miles (Paul Giamatti): “Uh, I don't know, I don't know. Um, it's a hard grape to grow, as you know. Right? It's uh, it's thin-skinned, temperamental, ripens early. It's, you know, it's not a survivor like Cabernet, which can just grow anywhere and uh, thrive even when it's neglected. No, Pinot needs constant care and attention. You know? And in fact it can only grow in these really specific, little, tucked away corners of the world. And, and only the most patient and nurturing of growers can do it, really. Only somebody who really takes the time to understand Pinot's potential can then coax it into its fullest expression. Then, I mean, oh its flavors, they're just the most haunting and brilliant and thrilling and subtle and... ancient on the planet.”

Here’s a link to another SleuthSayers piece I did on Christmas movies with both a Christmas and crime element. Some movies you might think are missing from today’s list might be found here: https://www.sleuthsayers.org/2015/12/have-holly-jolly-crime-season.html

I could keep going, but all good things must come to an end and maybe crime doesn’t pay but it pays to watch these movies.

So have yourself a Merry Little Mayhem Murderous Christmas. Happy Holidays Everyone!

~.~.~

BSP: Oh, and maybe a couple stocking stuffer books:

White Heat and Broken Windows

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Discoveries in Dallas and Tulsa

[A quick writer's note. Last month I missed my blog post by a week. It had nothing to do with Rob or Leigh not letting us know our dates, I just blew it thinking I had another week to write. So here is what should have appeared on November 18 had I paid more attention.]

On Halloween Eve, I traveled east to Dallas for Bouchercon, the world’s largest Mystery Fan Convention. John Floyd has already covered some of the highlights and Michael Bracken covered a bit of the controversy that occurred at the Shamus Awards. I thought about asking friends about unintentional, hurtful comments they’ve received over the years and what would the best response/course of action for the offender once they realize/learn about their faux pas. But I am not organized enough to pull this off this week.

So I think I’ll write about a few other things I did on the trip. On Sunday after the conference, I went with friend and fellow short story writer Eleanor Cawood Jones to the Texas School Book Depository. It is the location where Lee Harvey Oswald shot John F. Kennedy from a window six stories up. The museum is a moving experience both emotionally and literally. Patrons are given headphones and walk through different stations starting with Kennedy’s run for office, the politics of the day including the Cold War, Civil Rights, and the Space Race along with the love and hate Texans felt for Kennedy.

Wow, a nice full-page ad welcoming letter

Oh wait…

This "committee" doesn't like the President

Kennedy wasn't beloved by all

The next third documents the long fateful journey the Kennedys took after they arrived at Dallas-Love airport. Some parts in agonizing detail since everybody knows what will happen.

The pièce de résistance is the view onto Elm Street from the sixth floor where Kennedy’s Continental drove by. Two “X”s on the street mark the spots where three bullets either hit Kennedy or the car.

Seeing it person made me realize that it was not impossible for Oswald to have fired both fatal shots alone. He had the training and a rifle with a scope.

Oswald purchased this type of rifle via mail order.

I’m still not dismissing the grassy knoll, completely, but it is possible that Oswald did it all by himself. Regarding the magic bullet that Kevin Costner touted in JFK, I remember reading/listening to a couple of historical books last year for research on an unfinished western. One was about Bat Masterson and Wyatt Earp in Dodge City. Many gunfights were documented and in them bullets radical turns inside bodies. I want to say one gunslinger or lawman took lead to their shoulder and the bullet exited their crotch or lodged into a hip.

The final third of the museum is about the Warren report, conspiracy theories, and Kennedy's legacy. I had to wrap up this final sections a little early as I had a plane to catch. The museum surprised me with the comprehensive look at Kennedy and the assassination. It also left me emotionally exhausted as well.

I left Dallas to go up to Tulsa, my hometown, to visit my family.

A mural with nostalgic Tulsa icons

While there, I stopped by the Woody Guthrie Museum. It’s a must for any fan of folk music and also a great introduction for those who don’t know much about the devastation of the dustbowl. The museum has an immersive virtual reality experience where a person gets to sit on a front porch and live through a dust storm.

The Woody Guthrie Center in Tulsa

My father experiencing the dust bowl.

Other exhibits included short documentaries of Woody, some of the instruments he played, listening booths, many Guthrie drawings, and handwritten manuscripts of song lyrics either recorded or not recorded. While the museum is not that big, there is a lot to read and listen too. In one instance, I took a photo of handwritten lyrics but did not read them until last week. Here is the photo:

Beech Haven Ain't My Home

Do you recognize a familiar name the scribbled words?

Here are the lyrics:

Beach Haven ain’t my home!

I’m just a-driftin’ through!

My wife and angel kids

Are trapped inside these walls

Where I can’t plow nor plant

Nor hang out my family’s clothes!

No, no, no! Old Man Trump!

Old Beach Haven ain’t my home!

Beach Haven ain't my home!

I just cain't pay this rent!

My money's down the drain!

And my soul is badly bent!

Beach Haven looks like heaven

Where no black ones come to roam!

No, no, no! Old Man Trump!

Old Beach Haven ain't my home!

Across Beach Haven’s grass

I see my brethrens pass;

They try to hide their misery

Behind that window glass!

We all are crazy tools

As long as race hate rules!

No, no, no! Old Man Trump!

Old Beach Haven ain’t my home!

When I read the lyrics at home my eyes nearly bugged out. I thought I was reading something wrong. But apparently in the 1950s, Woody was a tenant of the Beech Haven apartments owned by Fred Trump. Yes, that Trump, the president’s father. “Old Man Trump” was not allowing blacks to rent his apartments and Woody, being an egalitarian, saw this for what it was, racist and wrong. I don’t remember that page being labeled as an anti-Trump song behind the glass. And I guess I can see why considering 65.3% the state voted for #45. It looks like it’s up for the visitors to read for themselves. Here is a youtube video of folksinger singing the song. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-j1xreeaFE

As much as I’d like to comment further, I’ll refrain. Below are the lyrics to Woody's most popular song, "This Land Is Your Land."

In summary, I had a few surprising experiences on my trip that I hadn't expected. Also, if you happen to be in Tulsa, I’d also recommend the Gathering Place. It's a privately funded, multi-million park that is open to the public and lives up to the hype. Have you unexpected revelations during a trip?

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My short story, "Them's Fighting Words" came out last month in DARK YONDER: TALES & TABS. The stories revolve around bar owner and southern crime writer, Eryk Pruitt. Proceeds go to the North Texas Food Bank.

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Travis Richardson is originally from Oklahoma and lives in Los Angeles with his wife and daughter. He has been a finalist and nominee for the Macavity, Anthony, and Derringer short story awards. He has two novellas and his short story collection, BLOODSHOT AND BRUISED, came out in late 2018. He reviewed Anton Chekhov short stories in the public domain at www.chekhovshorts.com. Find more at TSRichardson.com

Jefferson in Love

Thomas Jefferson, 1743-1826

Benjamin Franklin may have been a young America’s philosophical sensualist, the ladies’s man of our founding fathers, but Thomas Jefferson had his moments. One of them occurred– where else– but France. In 1784, Franklin tugged Jefferson to Europe as a newly minted diplomat of a fledgling nation reaching out to skeptical countries with hundreds of years of history behind them.

Jefferson was suffering trying times. He recently lost his wife Martha and another daughter and would soon lose yet another. In all, Jefferson fathered eight daughters and two sons, but death took its toll upon his children. Throwing himself into duties of state brought a welcome respite from personal woes.

In France, Jefferson fell in love with its people, the arts, the architecture, and the land. And then he fell in love.

Less than two years into his stay, Jefferson met 27-year-old Maria Cosway. English although Italian born, she was smart, witty, pretty, an accomplished musician and artist, multilingual with a Tuscan accent, supremely talented… and… married. A marriage of convenience, as it turned out, but still married.

Richard Cosway, 1742-1821

She’d wedded English portrait artist Richard Cosway, quite the roué, reputedly a libertine in his younger days and a lecher in elder years. In an artistic sideline, he painted erotic miniatures. Their marriage was not one of romantic delight; far from it.

On an extended holiday in Paris, she was ripe, as the gossips declaim, as was he. Jefferson fell for her hard, and she tumbled for him. How physically far the relationship went that season remains a private mystery of history.

The feelings certainly ran emotionally deep. Even as Jefferson succumbed to his duties as envoy, then Secretary of State, Vice President, President, and numerous post-political accomplishments, Cosway never let the flame she carried flicker out.

After they parted in October 1786, Jefferson wrote a lengthy letter of love. Next time we’ll publish this four-thousand word tome of emotion, his now famous ‘Dialogue Between his Head and his Heart’.

Maria Cosway, 1760-1838

Maria, already smitten, wrote she spent “an hour to consider every word, to every sentence [she] could write a volume.”

In 1789, Jefferson returned to the struggling United States to serve as Washington’s Secretary of State, before being elected to office. Cosway continued gathering renown for her accomplishments. They continued writing one another across the miles and years.

Still corresponding thirty-five years later, Maria was 62 and Jefferson 78. She wrote of their unfulfilled love for one another. “In your Dialogue, your head would tell me, ‘That is enough,’ [but] your heart perhaps will understand, I might wish for more.”

Next week, Jefferson’s famous letter– it’s dense to modern ADD readers, but worth learning the most personal thoughts of the man who would become our third President of the United States.

The Absence of Emily

by Robert Lopresti

John Floyd and I have both  said before that Jack Ritchie was one of the greatest writers of short humorous mysteries.  I just discovered that his Edgar-winning story "The Absence of Emily" was adapted into an episode of the British TV series Tales of the Unexpected.  And here it is!

The Me Too Effects of Status and Gender

This is the third and last of our virtual panel discussions on themes of the stories in Me Too Short Stories: An Anthology. We get down to some plain speaking about the power differential between men and women and how both socioeconomic status and gender play a role in how the women in the stories are treated, just as they can in real life.

Moderator: Elizabeth (Liz) Zelvin Participants: Julia Buckley, C.C. Guthrie, Lynn Hesse, V.S. Kemanis

Liz: Let's start by hearing about the characters in each of your stories. Julia?

Julia: My protagonist, Sophia, her best friend, and her mother are small-town women whose existence is constrained by poverty. Their paltry finances are controlled by men. All the men have some form of leverage.

C.C.: My story is set in the rural South in the 1930s. The women are Lizzie King and her daughter. Two of the men occupy traditional power positions over the protagonist, Lizzie, her daughter, and the lower status men. One is the landlord, the other a sheriff's deputy.

Lynn: My Southern family lives below the poverty line in the projects in Southeast Atlanta. The mother uses the welfare system to survive after her husband disappears. When Jewel, the protagonist, turns thirteen, Bess, her mother, forces her to turn tricks at a truck stop. The son becomes her pimp. Bess abuses Callie too My story takes a non-traditional look at the domestic violence cycle by making the main abuser a woman. Bess herself was abused, sexually assaulted, by her father as a child. In a twisted way, she's getting even. And so the cycle continues.

V.S.: The narrator of my story is Arlene, a middle-class widow and retired career nurse. The woman at risk is her neighbor, Cherise, a young single mother who's being stalked by the father of her child. Cherise’s socioeconomic status impacts her ability to flee from danger. She is strong enough to break away from a dangerous man once, but her poverty limits her options when he continues to stalk her. She lives in a suburban neighborhood, has no friends, and doesn't have a car.

Julia: My fictional town is economically depressed. It offers women limited opportunities for a fulfilling life.

Liz: Very limited, as you've described it. Sophia's choices are marriage, dead-end jobs, and prostitution.

Julia: And there aren't many chances to leave. The town's sagging economy defines Sophia's life. Then she reads a disheartening article on the Internet that says the prognosis for women who live in small, financially-disadvantaged towns is dire.

Liz: That's a turning point in the story, isn't it?

Julia: Yes. She refuses to accept her fate.

Liz: C.C., how important is the socioeconomic factor in your story?

C.C.: In mine, the socioeconomic status of the two men in the power positions is central to the story.

Liz: Lynn, in your story it's more complicated than that, isn't it?

Lynn: I think survival mode kicks in anytime you are hungry, cold, and deprived of shelter, but family dynamics are not controlled by socioeconomic status.

V.S. I believe that instances of men treating women poorly occur across all socioeconomic classes, whether we’re talking about physical aggression, discrimination in the workplace, verbal abuse, or otherwise. The same can be said for instances of good treatment and healthy attitudes toward women.

Lynn: Some of the hardworking, honest, and decent folks I know are poor.

Liz: How much of the power differential in your stories based on gender?

Julia: In my fictional town, the men have all the power. Sophia manages to find personal power through her ingenuity, and this encourages other women.

C.C.: The power differential in my story is based equally on socioeconomic status and gender. The landlord could evict the family and push them into homelessness. He walks into their home without permission. He could file false charges against them, claiming they damaged his property.

Liz: And he could carry out a threat to rape the fifteen-year-old daughter. That's the quintessential power imbalance based on gender.

V.S.: My story is based largely on physical and emotional dominance. Cherise's male stalker is threatening because he's stronger. A woman of greater financial status might have more options available for escaping an abusive relationship but still feel the stigma of societal expectations or have emotional difficulty extricating herself.

Lynn: Upper-class women meet with a more subtle form of discrimination and harassment, but the outcome is the same. I come from blue-collar people in Southeastern Missouri. In some ways, I am fiercely proud of my independent, determined, and inventive ancestors. But women waited while the men went off to war and worked in factories and fields to survive with their children. When the men returned, the women were expected to give back their jobs to men and ask for money to go to the grocery store. My grandmother divorced her second husband and remarried him after he put her name on the deed of the country store they ran together.

C.C.: The group that controls the money has the power. They write and enforce the laws, own property and businesses, and determine who will is hired. Until the last century or so, women, as a group, were excluded from political, social, and economic decision making, which resulted in laws and social norms that disadvantaged them.

Lynn: Power and dominance isn’t solely based on economic freedom, but it helps maintain the balance in a relationship. Recognizing your personal identity and believing in your power are learned skills. Something like your own bank account is imperative. My mother never wrote a check for a bill until my father died.

Liz: My mother came through Ellis Island as a four-year-old immigrant and went to law school in 1921. But when she and the few other women in her class graduated, they couldn't get jobs as lawyers.

V.S.: When I was working in the highly competitive legal system, there were times I was ignored or felt intimidated by male power and dominance in the workplace and in court. Now I worry very much about my two daughters, in their twenties, in the world they live in and the issues they face.

Julia: I think women are still routinely oppressed in environments where dominating male behaviors are encouraged and justified as “tradition.” Whether the patterns are conscious or unconscious, men who limit the agency of women within a social framework perpetuate the pattern by glamorizing or minimizing the oppression. They may call it a form of love, protection, admiration, male pride, or responsibility. Women and men can both fall into the assumption that what is traditional is also “natural,” and this can protect them from any awareness of oppression.

Lynn: Recognizing your personal identity and believing in your power are learned skills. Do you believe you can arrest a two-hundred-pound drunk? I do, and I did.

Liz: That sounds like both physical and emotional empowerment.

Lynn: Mentorship is another tool women overlook as an important component of success. Men cultivate it automatically. I offered to help every female recruit I saw in DeKalb Police Department, and not one officer asked me a question in twenty-three years.

Liz: I suspect that may have something to do with subculture and generation. Neither of my parents believed in mentors. Their line was, "Nobody helped us!" But when I discovered what I was missing, thanks to the women's movement, around 1971—not only mentoring but also networking—I took to it like a duck to water. My career as a mystery author and especially this anthology has been all about networking and community.

Now, last question: Is there a difference between power and dominance on one hand and status on the other?

C.C.: The central element of my story is a powerful man exerting authority over others. You only have to read the headlines to know that it still happens every day at all levels of society. If influential media stars can be threatened and their livelihoods put at risk, then it can happen to anyone along the economic ladder. I believe that when someone attempts to exert power over others, their effort to dominate is firmly grounded in socioeconomic status. Every story begins with the threat, “Give me, or else.” What makes each story unique and powerful is how the victim reacts and the decisions they make.

Julia: You can find the situation my women characters face anywhere that minds are narrow and those in power have a desire to dominate and humiliate. Oppression and socioeconomic realities go hand in hand. An enlightened man with money and power might help women out of a basic sense of equality and justice, while a man oblivious to his own oppressive habits might decide that any aid given to a woman is at the whim of his generosity. This would encourage him to feel kinglike, and he might derive a certain pleasure from seeing that the woman’s happiness or disappointment, her success or failure, lay within his control. In Sophia’s story, I wanted to subvert that idea of power and suggest new ways for the oppressed to find agency in their own lives.

Liz: So our stories, in general, show women acting differently in response to threats and dominance, empowering themselves and, in Julia's phrase, finding agency. And clearly, we believe that women who survive can do this after even the most shattering experiences. For every woman who shows she's a survivor, another says, "Me too!"

"Knives Out": Return of the Country House Murder Mystery

Last week my wife and I got a rare night out without our son, and so we took ourselves out to see Knives Out, Rian Johnson's new twist on an old form: the "Country House Murder Mystery."

Man, this is SOME cast

Johnson, perhaps best known as The Man Who Killed Off Luke Skywalker, has long been a favorite film-maker of mine. In fact, in advance of the release of Knives Out, I recently went back and reviewed his first film, a wicked little indie-noir known as Brick, for Noir City Magazine's recurring column, "My Favorite Neo-Noir."

(Spoiler alert: I think Brick is brilliant. Not to be missed!)

Curtis, Plummer, Johnson & Shannon

I wasn't sure what to expect from Johnson with this outing. Brick was definitely "indie," mostly financed by Johnson's extended family (Construction business), with a terrific a cast of (mostly) unknowns backing up lead actor Joseph Gordon Levitt. Knives Out has garnered considerable advance attention on the strength and depth of it cast alone.

And that cast, under Johnson's direction of a screenplay he also wrote, flat-out delivers.

Michael Shannon & Chris Evans

Christopher Plummer is brilliant as the successful mystery author/family patriarch/requisite dead body/ guy everyone secretly hated. Jamie Lee Curtis shines as his driven, perceptive, angry daughter. Don Johnson is terrific as her "complicated" husband. Chris Evans  as their asshat son makes you want to by turns laugh out loud and slap him. Michael Shannon is nuanced and riveting as Plummer's nebishy-and-none-too-successful only surviving son. Toni Collette nails the portrayal of the flakey New Age widow of Plummer's long-dead other son. Ana De Armas steal scene after scene with a pitch-perfect portrayal of Plummer's pathologically honest nurse/unofficial amanuensis/sole confidante.

And I won't even get into their kids.

Then there are the cops! LaKeith Stanfield is great as the local police detective with the thankless task of running the investigation of the recently departed novelist's suspicious death. Frequent Johnson collaborator Noah Segan hilariously portraying a Massachusetts state trooper/crime fiction fanboy, and Daniel Craig perfectly plays the reknowned private detective improbably consulting with the local cops on this baffling scenario.

Craig busy detecting and Stanfield busy being frustrated

Was the patriarch murdered? If so who did it? Like the movie posters say about the film, "Hell, any of them could have done it."

Ana De Armas and The House

What's more, a lot of Johnson's signature moves were on full display in this film. He loves chase scenes (Check.). Sunset shots/rumination pieces. (Check.). Witty dialogue (Check.). Frequently flashbacks, often to the same scene from different character perspectives (Check multiples times over). Cinematography which owes a lot to classic film noir (dark rooms in a big old mansion, duh, Check!). At least one slow-motion shot (Check.). And a TON of plot twists and turns (Check, check, check!).

I was chewing over all of the above as my wife and I left the theater after the film. Out of the blue, she turned to me and, as usual, neatly summed up the experience in a way that had not occurred to me.

"Johnson," she said, "Made a cozy."

And she was right!

And he even nailed the accent!

Knives Out takes the time-honored (some would say, "tired.") "unexpected death of a person with lots of enemies in a country house" trope and puts it on its head. And it works spectacularly. Like Brick before it, Knives Out manages to serve as both mash-up and tribute, giving viewers a new angle, a different take on what could rightly be considered a shop-worn plot device.

I mean, hey, it's been done before. And it's been sent-up before, too. This film owes equal debts to the likes of Murder, She Wrote, and such parodies of the form as Clue.

That said, Johnson and his cast still manage to breathe new life into both the form and the parodies of it. And best of all, they bring the whole thing off as a clear love letter to the form they're riffing on.

There's so much to like here.

And on that note, I don't want to give too much away, so I'll wrap this entry up here. What else can I say? Knives Out is well worth a look!

Did you see it? If so, what did you think? Please give a response in the Comments section!

See you in two weeks with the de rigueur "End of Year" post. Happy Holidays!

Smiley

"I've got a story to tell you," Ricki Tarr says. "It's all about spies."

I fell into a familiar comfort zone this past weekend, and watched Smiley's People again. I needed something reliable and even stately, after the random disturbances of late.

George Smiley was introduced in Call for the Dead (filmed in 1967 as The Deadly Affair), but he slips out from the wings, almost apologetically, and takes center stage in the Karla trilogy: Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; The Honorable Schoolboy; and Smiley's People. He has a couple of curtain calls later on, but they're essentially cameos.

Smiley's been played by James Mason, Denholm Elliott, and Gary Oldman. For most of us, including John le Carre, Alec Guinness holds the crown. Nor has le Carre been poorly served, for the most part, by the movies. Deadly Affair and Spy Who Came in from the Cold are both excellent. On the down side, the feature film iterations of The Little Drummer Girl, The Russia House and Tinker, Tailor aren't as successful - probably due to the necessities of compression. A Wanted Man and The Tailor of Panama fall somewhere in the middle. The books work better as TV miniseries, when they're given room to breathe. Not that the long form is foolproof. A Perfect Spy and The Night Manager both suffer from being over-faithful and leaving in too much.

Which is where the BBC/Guinness versions of Tinker, Tailor and Smiley's People seem so exact, rigorous narratives that still allow for silence, melancholy, inhalation, even the appearance of accident, although no detail is accidental in George Smiley's world. "Topicality is always suspect," he says, in Tinker, Tailor. In other words, when you buy intelligence product, it pays to be skeptical if the product fits your needs too perfectly. And he's of course proven right: the Witchcraft material is manufactured, it's been carefully massaged to send all the wrong signals.

My particular weakness for Smiley's People is I think due to its structural integrity. It doesn't have, for example, anything like the extraordinary supporting turn by Ian Richardson as Bill Haydon - although Bernard Hepton as Toby Esterhase comes close. It simply seems all of a piece. 

Originally, the producers meant to follow the story arc of the complete trilogy, starting with Tinker, Tailor, following with Honorable Schoolboy, and wrapping with Smiley's People. Schoolboy apparently presented production difficulties, and they skipped it. Quite honestly, Schoolboy is the weakest of the three books, but more to the point, Smiley isn't in fact the lead actor. It makes dramatic sense to move on to book three. (It actually took five years in between.)

When it was first shown on the BBC, radio guy Terry Wogan ran a weekly feature called, "Does anybody know what's going on?" Let's storyboard Smiley's People out.

The old lady in Paris writes the General in London. He, in turn, takes a bullet in the face on Hampstead Heath. George, the old man's former vicar, is called in to clean up the mess and put the whole thing to bed. George smells a rat. What is it Toby Esterhase tells him? Karla is looking for a legend for a girl (a legend, in the jargon, is a manufactured biography, a cover story). And with only this to go on, George begins to tease out the plot.

The plausible back-story, the collateral. Otto's pal in Hamburg, the sex-club owner. The spymaster's mistress, and her hidden child. The secret Swiss bank account and the fumbling Russian diplomat in Bern. The long coat-tails of KGB's foreign operations, and why in this particular instance the organs themselves can't be trusted.

Of course it's a tangle. How not? The method is that we learn only as much as George learns, although he might very well be a step ahead of us, from habit and his larger experience. But how he proceeds has a firm logic. Toby, then Connie Sachs, which leads him to Claus at the club in Hamburg, to the kids house-sitting Otto's place, and the campground, with Otto's boat moored in the shallows and the music unbearably loud, to drown out the torment.

The formality, the inexorability, makes it all the more satisfying. Smiley gathers his resources, and closes his hand. The title is a pun, not simply Smiley's crew, his favored inside team, but his people in the sense that Kipling used it, Mine Own People, Great Britain and the British. There isn't much of the moral relativism le Carre is sometimes faulted for. Smiley's defeat of Karla isn't ambiguous, in spite of the cigarette lighter Karla discards on the cobblestones. The win is personal.

Smiley, then, represents a certain kind of Englishness. Decent and disciplined. The war generation, We Happy Few. They took on Hitler, and then fought the Cold War. "Survivor of every battle since Thermopylae," Connie Sachs says. Le Carre himself might smile, and shake his head, to imagine George characterized that way. But he's said in the past that a country's spy services reflect the nation's character. Mossad, KGB, MI-6, CIA. The way they conduct operations reveals their inner nature and their calculation of political gain or loss.

Smiley is also betrayed by his wife (with his best friend, who's also of course a Soviet asset), and you could make the case that British SIS, once dominant, is the cuckold of the intelligence world, abandoned and orphaned by its CIA stepchild. Or perhaps that's too fanciful. Let's just say that Smiley, like Alec Guinness, is emblematic of his time and class. We might even be allowed to think of class as the key to Smiley, his protective coloration. He navigates the currents, eddies in still waters, and waits his turn.

Pull on Your Galoshes, We’re Headed into the Slush Pile

Earlier this year I joined Black Cat Mystery Magazine as co-editor, replacing the irreplaceable Carla Coupe. Unlike Carla, who performed multiple duties for Wildside Press prior to her retirement, my primary responsibility as the junior co-editor is to read and assess submissions.

This isn’t new territory for me—I’ve edited six published anthologies, including, most recently, The Eyes of Texas: Private Eyes from the Panhandle to the Piney Woods (Down & Out Books), and another (Mickey Finn: 21st Century Noir) that’s scheduled for publication next year. I also co-created and co-edit (with Trey R. Barker) the invitation-only serial novella anthology series Gun + Tacos, and I’m currently reading submissions for Mickey Finn 2 and the second season of Guns + Tacos, and I’ve begun work on yet another anthology to be named later.

There is a distinct difference between reading slush for my own anthologies and reading slush for Black Cat Mystery Magazine. The most obvious distinction is the type of stories appropriate for each. My anthologies have all been themed, and most have favored hardboiled, noir, and/or private eye stories. The stories in BCMM are more representative of the many subgenres of mystery.

The second distinction is the decision-making process. With my anthologies I make the final decisions and the anthologies succeed or fail due to those decisions. BCMM, on the other hand, has two decision makers. Though John Betancourt, as publisher and senior co-editor makes final decisions, the co-editorship is structured such that every accepted story has been approved by both editors.

Though there’s not yet any interesting statistical information to report on my most recent editorial efforts, the seventy-four stories in my first five anthologies earned seven award nominations (Anthony, Derringer, Edgar, Shamus, etc.) and four “Other Distinguished Mystery Stories” or “Honorable Mentions” in annual best-of-year anthologies.

BONA FIDES

All of the above is to establish my bona fides before this:

Editors often discuss the “indefinable something” that separates an accepted submission from a rejected submission. We sit on panels and discuss plot and setting and characterization. We debate whether certain words—such as Dumpster/dumpster—have lost their trademark status and can now be rendered all lowercase. We arm wrestle over the use or non-use of the Oxford comma. We do all of these things when talking to writers and amongst ourselves, but we never seem to mention aloud one of the most telling signs that a manuscript will be rejected.

The manuscript itself.

Sure, we often tell writers to follow Shunn or some similar format, but the appearance of a manuscript when printed on paper isn’t all that we see. With the vast majority of manuscripts now submitted as Word documents, I’ve discovered how little many writers know about using one of the primary tools of their trade.

And, perhaps not surprisingly, the writers least familiar with Word also seem to be the writers most likely to have their submissions rejected.

If I open a file and discover a return at the end of every line as if the story were written on a typewriter, or if I see the title centered on the page through the use of a zillion spaces, or if I see any of several other signs that the writer has not mastered the fundamentals of Word, I’m already negatively predisposed toward the manuscript.

Why?

Because the writing often displays the same inattention to detail.

I read anyhow because I am sometimes surprised. Sometimes.

KING OF THE WORLD

If I were king of the world, the czar of publishing, or in some other authoritarian position to impose my will upon writers, I would do the following: Make it mandatory for every writer to master the basics of Word.

Perhaps we could start by having every creative writing program offer a mandatory class in the use of Word as part of the degree plan. Perhaps we could have every writing conference offer a mandatory seminar in the use of Word. Perhaps we could have every critique group treat themselves to an annual refresher course from their most experienced tech-savvy member (or from someone outside the group, if appropriate).

Perhaps, and this may be a radical thought, we could suggest that writers and would-be writers read the instruction manual, use the help menu, or use a search engine to find instructions on the internet for how to do things such as indent a paragraph, center a line of text, insert an em-dash, insert headers and automatically number pages, and do any of a number of other things that should already be part of a writer’s skill set.

Love it or hate it, Word is the de facto word processing program, and it is a fundamental tool of the trade. If you don’t know how to use the tools of your trade, you hobble yourself. Sure, a brain surgeon might be able to repair your aneurysm with a pipe wrench, but how confident would you feel on that operating room table when he opened up his toolbox?

So, before I’ve even read a word of your manuscript, show me that you know how to use the tools of your trade. Then show me you can write.


Recently published stories include: “The Town Where Money Grew on Trees” in Tough, November 5, 2019, “The Show Must Go On” in Black Cat Mystery Magazine #5, “Who Done It” in Seascape: The Best New England Crime Stories 2019 (Level Best Books), and “Love, or Something Like it” in Crime Travel (Wildside Press).

Earlier this month subscribers to Guns + Tacos received episode 6 of the first season, “A Beretta, Burritos and Bears” by James A. Hearn. Subscribers also received a bonus story that I wrote, “Plantanos con Lechera and a Snub-Nosed .38.” If you want to read all six episodes and the bonus story, there’s still time to subscribe!

The Book Review Jungle

Years ago, publishers sent out about 6000 advanced reading copies (ARC) two or three months before a book's release. Those copies went to the reviewers at newspapers and magazines, and some radio or TV stations that promoted books they liked. I remember when I could open the New York Times and read a thoughtful review by the likes of John Updike or another literary icon. Today, authors still review, but not as frequently.
The prevailing wisdom was that good reviews sold books, which was why publishers produced and distributed so many ARCs. But as fewer and fewer publications have reviewers, you're pretty much on your own getting a review, and if you're indie or self-pubbed, good luck. I invite reviews in the back of my book (An idea I borrowed from another writer), but seldom get them.

Kirkus Review, a once-revered arbiter used by libraries to guide their purchasing, now will review your book for a price. They charge $425 for a review that may appear in 9 weeks, and $575 for a review with a 4-6-week turnaround. They seldom if ever star a review anymore, even for a well-known author, and your review may be buried by hundreds of others with no ranking. They don't guarantee a positive review, either (If they did, I wouldn't even mention them because they would be promoters, not reviewers). For that money, you might have better luck with a blind date through a hook-up site.

Michael Sauret (Google him and his article) discusses his fate with Kirkus and lists other alternatives. Some charge $125 for an 8-10-week return, and some go higher. Some are free, but I've never heard of them. The point is, you may not get what you think you're paying for.

The literary equivalent of Gresham's law has taken over, and bad reviewing has driven out the good. If you don't believe it, look at Amazon or Goodreads. People give a one-star review--sometimes without reading the book--and the entire review is something like "It was stupid/boring/dumb/wrong. I didn't like it."

Even a five-star review might have only a few sentences, and they may use buzzwords, too. "Thrilling, clever, couldn't put it down" seem to say it all.

Those aren't reviews. They're either a puff piece or a drive-by. A few years ago, a Publisher's Weekly article explained at great length why most Amazon reviews were useless. Nothing has changed. I used to review there, but after a couple of ugly clashes with trolls, I removed about 80 reviews from the site and now seldom read a review there for any reason except morbid curiosity.

I do occasionally review for an online site, though, and it reminds me that writing a serious positive review is much easier than writing a bad one. A good review almost writes itself. I give a brief plot overview that shows how well the story works, discuss the major characters to prove they're well-drawn, and mention a few details that make the book either unique or a good representative of its genre. My standard review is between 600 and 800 words.

Bad reviews...wow. Writing a review should be like teaching. Anyone can bash a kid's paper and give him a low grade. But if you're really a teacher, you have to show him WHY something is a weakness or bad choice. Then you have to show him how to make it better. That's hard. And it's why most reviews I read fail.



I have only written three or four very negative reviews over the last two years, and I remember all those books clearly. Why? Because I can write a glowing review after reading a book once, but I always read a book two or even three times before going low. I need to be sure I didn't misread or skip over an important point before I call a writer to task. Sometimes, I find that I did miss something, and it changes my outlook. If I don't find it, I've now read the book two or three times and I'm ticked off about wasting all that extra time.

If you read one of my negative reviews, it should be like the notes I wrote to students back in my classroom. This is what I see you did, this is why I think it's a bad choice, and this is how you can make it better. It's not an exact science, but praise is easy and seldom challenged, while criticism demands proof. It's like a courtroom.

Recently, I did a Highland fling all over a book, and one of my concerns was that it introduced a deus ex machina three pages from the end...which would lead to another book as a sequel. It was a cheat, but I couldn't reveal what it was because it would be a spoiler. Sometimes, you have to find a way around that, too. That review ran to nearly 1200 words because I needed to justify my disenchantment.

Do reviews really help anymore? I don't know. I don't think any of my books has more than four or five reviews, but they're mostly positive (Before writing this, I noticed that one negative review of my last book has actually been removed). Maybe they help, maybe they don't. In a good month, my royalties will fill my gas tank, so who knows.

I suspect that my bad review won't hurt the perennial  bestseller. If it does, maybe the RNC will buy thousands of copies to keep the book on the New York Times bestseller list anyway.

Me with one of my former students and her daughter at a workshop. Time flies quickly.