Uncategorized

Six Damn Fine Degrees #207: Howard Hawks’ Ball Of Fire Reignited

Alan Kuhl Graham3 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness!

1941’s Ball Of Fire is an absolute gem of a film. Powered by a whip-smart script from Billy Wilder, it tells the story of fusty linguistics Professor Potts (Gary Cooper) falling for the quick-talking Sugarpuss O’Shea (Barbara Stanwyck at her very. very best) as he conducts his own research into slang. It’s a romance that encompasses all the essentials for a great screwball comedy – sassy innuendo, comic misunderstandings, a brilliant ensemble cast, the thrill of crime and, of course, the slow, academic research required in the compilation of Encyclopaedias.

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #205: Witness for the Prosecution

Julie3 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness!

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #201: Once Upon a Time …

Julie3 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness!

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #197: The Umbrella Academy

Mege4 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness!

Warning: There be spoilers.

I haven’t read the comics, but have every intention to do so, but I don’t know why I haven’t praised the many great aspects of The Umbrella Academy (2019-2024). I have insomnia these days (or nights, rather), and so it takes something stronger to keep me watching attentively during the small hours. That bunch of ever-bickering unrelated siblings is a treat with comedy, drama, weirdness, psychological depth and the fear of the end of the world (more than once, hehe).

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #196: Thelma Ritter

Julie2 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness!

“She could reveal to an audience the tragedy of the human condition and do it by being a supreme comedienne” ~ Paddy Chayefsky on Thelma Ritter.

The term ‘character actor’, when applied to women, too often only implies a woman of a certain age. The one who doesn’t get to be the lead, who doesn’t get her own movie romance. If, that is, there are even any parts for her at all. The one who is ‘just’ there for support. But these actors not only have to hold their own against the lead every moment they are on screen, they need to knock it out of the park on every single take. And Thelma Ritter is the real deal. Instantly recognisable with her looks, and the way she sounds: instead of having herself made over to be more palatable for the public, she embraced these things to great effect. Every scene she was in, even her uncredited early roles, however brief, are memorable.

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #191: Natalie Wood, the early years (1938 – 1956)

Julie3 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness.

“How do you separate reality from an illusion, when you have been trapped in make-believe all your life?” ~ Natalie Wood

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #189: Stranger Things

Mege2 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness!

Spoiler warning: I will discuss plot points and revelations from all of Stranger Things‘ seasons, so be warned, or the mind flayer will get you.

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #188: Legenden Lindbergh in the Fotografiska

Julie2 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness.

“This should be the responsibility of photographers today: to free women, and finally everyone, from the terror of youth and perfection.” ~Peter Lindbergh

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #181: Reduce it to its bones

Mege2 Comments

The story goes that Bruce Springsteen recorded his darkest album Nebraska (1982) in his bedroom, most of it in one day. There are absolutely no adornments, no frills, just his voice and his guitar, sometimes a short bit from his harmonica, not much more. He intended those recordings as demo versions, but they just wouldn’t fly when he played them together with his E-Street Band. So the demo version it was for the album for almost all of the songs. Because the Boss is strumming away on his guitar, the effect is one of being there listening, as if it was a live album in a more unusual sense of the word. The same is true for the Cowboy Junkies’ debut album The Trinity Sessions (1988), which was recorded live in Toronto’s Church of the Holy Trinity, and the band gathered around the only microphone. Like with Springsteen’s album, there is an immediateness that would be hard to replicate in any studio.

Continue reading →

Six Damn Fine Degrees #180: The Moon-Spinners (1964)

Julie5 Comments

Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness.

Continue reading →