Sunday Night Movies!

Sunday evening, I was amazingly able to watch two movies on DVD, not one as I had hoped.

I first watched Saturday Night Fever which strangely enough I had bought on Saturday night in downtown Wuxi. SNF is a excellent movie. Watching the film, I was surprised to see how a smaller proportion, than one would expect, of the movie had to do with disco. Its' story could easily have been set in another fashion era. My favorite scene was when the Travolta character Tony Maniro, sitting on a park bench looking at a massive suspension bridge, tells his love-interest-slash-dance-partner how the bridge so fascinates him. A scene I can relate to because I have been accused of having a fetish about bridges that one person, I know, said bordered on a fascination with the common place. It is too bad I can't show the film in my movie class because it is too vulgar.

I then saw an old black-and-white film The Petrified Forest starring Bette Davis, Leslie Howard, and Humphrey Bogart. The film takes place at a service station in the desolate Arizona desert. The film's plot turns on two visits to the station. The first is made by a hitchhiker with a British accent. The second is made by a criminal gang in the midst of a manhunt. The first visit sees the Davis character fall for the Brit. The second visit sees the Brit return to the station to save her. The attraction of the film for me was the literary and articulate British character Alan Squirer played by Howard. Squrier quoted a poem by TS Eliot which I love: The Hollow Man. I won't give the ending away but it was a film well worth watching. Unfortunately, I can't use it in my movie class either because there is too much dialogue

If forced to choose between which film to watch, I would have to go with the Petrified Forest. Watching SNF, brought back crummy memories from my formative years when I would go to the dance clubs. None of the characters in SNF seemed to say to me: this is how to be. The performance of Leslie Howard in the Petrified Forest greatly fascinated me. I can see myself imitating his ironic and detached manner for a few days.


So far, I have had one man volunteer to be Josie's boyfriend. I was expecting a torrent of requests. Watch this video all the way through to see Josie and her astounding admission.