Hannah Gadsby: Nanette

Nanette at IMDB

My wife watched this, it's on Netflix world wide, and then liked it so much that she wanted to watch it again with me. So we watched it together.

It is billed as "stand up comedy" and starts like stand up, but it doesn't finish like stand up. I went into it not entirely cold, but not knowing where the show would go. (I did know that she'd rail against Picasso and talk about her family in Tasmania.)

Despite being in the title, Nanette is not mentioned past the first thirty seconds or so. It's just a name, not an indicator of content. The content takes a dark turn as Gadsby explains where her stand up material came from; ending up with content probably not easily titled.

I enjoyed it, but don't think of it "stand up." There's humor, but there's rage, too.

Isle of Dogs

Just saw it this morning (well, partially in the morning; 11am start). It was very, very Wes Anderson. I did not, however, think the puppies at the end looked cute. They looked like sick guinea pigs to me.

My favorite part was how the Oracle dog had her visions. 32 out of 37 military-grade tooth-bullets. I liked it, but I certainly don't feel the need to rewatch anytime soon. I think I might have prefered fewer recognizable voices.

The Hunter

Quoting: P. J. O'Rourke, Republican Party Reptile, first published 1978, pp. 128-137:

You have to get a car that handles really well. This is extremely important, and there's a lot of debate on this subject -- about what kind of car handles best. Some say a front-engined car; some say a rear-engined car. I say a rented car. Nothing handles better than a rented car. You can go faster, turn corners sharper, and put the transmission into reverse while going forward at a higher rate of speed in a rented car than in any other kind. You can also park without looking, and can use the trunk as an ice chest. Another thing about a rented car is that it's an all-terrain vehicle. Mud, snow, water, woods -- you can take a rented car anywhere. True, you can't always get it back -- but that's not your problem, is it?

Steve McQueen's rental car treatment is no better in The Hunter: movie clip at youtube.

I just watched The Hunter. Not McQueen's best, but a good showing nonetheless. (It was his final film.) Watching him parallel park in that film is great, at least if you know it's McQueen. The combine sequence is a good bit of the fun, but there's a good Chicago sequence, too.

The Hunter at IMDB

Supposedly mostly true. Queen here plays a bounty hunter nicknamed "Papa. The real life "Papa" makes a cameo as the bartender.

Thunder Road

After Two Lane Blacktop and Vanishing Point there was a suggestion to watch Thunder Road because it was often double featured with those.

Now having watched it, Thunder Road was better than Vanishing Point, but they sure picked some bad music for drive sequences. Some scenes came across almost as Looney Tunes with that accompaniment. It also left me enough time to wonder, before the movie was even over, about some of the details. A 250 gallon tank, in that car? Did they take the back seat out to fit it? Is he getting 000 for a single 250 gallon shipment? That's /gallon, presumably wholesale rate. Is that cheap booze for 1950-something? I'm not sure. But if it's not cheaper than taxed liquor, there's no reason for moonshine.

I later found out that the alcohol tax in 1954 is the same as the alcohol tax now. It's never been raised even as inflation has diluted the dollar. So what was onerous then is not as big a deal today.

So far, for classic driving movies I have watched (roughly ranked, best to worst, in my subjective opinion):

• Two Lane Blacktop
• The Wages of Fear
• ...
• Thunder Road
• Death Race 2000
• ...
• Vanishing Point
• Damnation Alley

Obviously "classic driving movies" is a broad and idiosyncratic collection. I'm not including things just with good chases, like Bullitt, Or motorcycle films (Easy Rider). Of those above, I think only 2LB does not have a named character die. The one death is an unknown person, shown only in the grisly aftermath of the collision. That scene packed a punch.

Really, the only reason to watch Damnation Alley is for the vehicle (or the unintentional humor).