Categories
Life(style)

Movie Humour

Things you would never know without the movies:

  • When they are alone, all foreigners prefer to speak English to each other.
  • If being chased through town, you can usually take cover in a passing parade – at any time of year.
  • All beds have special L-shaped cover sheets that reach up to the armpit level on a woman but only to the waist level on the man lying beside her.
  • The Chief of Police will almost always suspend his (sic) star detective – or give him 48 hours to finish the job.
  • A police detective can only solve a case after he has been suspended from duty.
  • All grocery bags contain at least one baguette.
  • It’s easy for anyone to land a plane providing there is someone to talk you down.
  • During all police investigations, it will be necessary to visit a strip club at least once.
  • The ventilation system of any building is the perfect hiding place – no one will ever think of looking for you in there and you can travel to any other part of the building undetected.
  • The Eiffel Tower can be seen from any window in Paris.
  • All bombs are fitted with electronic timing devices with large red readouts so you know exactly when they are going to go off.
  • You are very likely to survive any battle in any war unless you make the mistake of showing someone a picture of your sweetheart back home.
  • Should you wish to pass yourself off as a German officer, it will not be necessary to speak the language – a German accent will do.
  • A man will show no pain while taking the most ferocious beating but will wince when a woman tries to clean his wounds.
  • When paying for a taxi, don’t look at your wallet as you take out a bill – just grab one at random and hand it over. It will always be the exact fare.
  • If staying in a haunted house, women should investigate any strange noises in their most revealing underwear.
  • Mothers routinely cook eggs, bacon and waffles for their families every morning even though their husbands and children never have time to eat it.
  • Cars that crash will almost always burst into flames.
  • All telephone numbers in America begin with the digits 555.
  • A single match will be sufficient to light up a room the size of RFK stadium.
  • Medieval peasants had perfect teeth.
  • Any person waking from a nightmare will sit bolt upright and pant.
  • It is not necessary to say hello or goodbye when beginning or ending phone conversations.
  • Even when driving down a perfectly straight road, it is necessary to turn the wheel vigorously from left to right every few moments.
  • It is always possible to park directly outside the building you are visiting.
  • It does not matter if you are heavily outnumbered in a fight involving martial arts – your enemies will patiently attack you one by one by dancing around in a threatening manner until you have knocked out their predecessors.
  • When a person is knocked unconscious by a blow to the head, they will never suffer a concussion or brain damage.
  • No one ever involved in a car chase, hijacking, explosion, volcanic eruption or alien invasion will ever go into shock.
  • Once applied, lipstick will never rub off – even while scuba diving.
  • You can always find a chainsaw when you need one.
  • Any lock can be picked by a credit card or a paper clip in seconds unless it’s the door to a burning building with a child trapped inside.
  • Television news bulletins usually contain a story that affects you personally at the precise moment that they are aired.
  • No matter what the person(s) in the movie do for a living, everyone has a beautifully furnished, clean home, a new vehicle and a well-to-do wardrobe.
  • Everyone has a well-stocked liquor cabinet. The ice never seems to melt. It’s just always there.
  • If someone says, “I’ll be right back.” they won’t.
  • If you decide to start dancing in the street, everyone around you will be able to mirror all the steps you come up with, and hear the music in your head.
  • Police departments give their officers personality tests to make sure each is assigned a partner who is their total opposite.
  • Large, loft apartments in New York City are plentiful and affordable, even if the tenants are unemployed.
  • One of a pair of identical twins is evil.
  • Should you decide to defuse a bomb, don’t worry about which wire to cut. You will always choose the right one.
  • When you turn out the light to go to bed, everything in your bedroom will still be clearly visible but slightly blue.
  • If you are blonde and pretty, it is possible to be a world-famous expert on nuclear fission, dinosaurs, hieroglyphics, or anything else, at the age of 22.
  • Honest and hard-working policemen are usually gunned down a day or two before retirement.
  • Rather than wasting bullets, megalomaniacs prefer to kill their enemies using complex machinery involving fuses, deadly gasses, lasers, buzz saws and hungry sharks, all of which will give their captives at least 20 minutes to escape.
  • During all crime investigations, it is necessary to visit a strip club at least once.
  • It’s easy to land a plane, providing there is someone in the control tower to talk you down.
  • If you are beautiful, your makeup never rubs off, even while scuba-diving or fighting aliens. However if you are overweight, your mascara will run and your lipstick will smear.
Categories
History Reviewer

Released Today: “The World’s Rarest Movie Posters”


Over 283 color images of vintage movie posters include the extremely rare drive-in theater posters are featured along with the more common one-sheet size. These posters, often very different from the standard posters, were printed in smaller numbers, adding to their interest and value. Auction results from 1989-the present, and other pricing information make this a useful tool for collectors of posters who are trying to make informed purchasing decisions.
A perfect book for lovers of movies and movie posters. Here are images of some of the rarest movie posters in the world. With over 283 color images of vintage movie posters,.the extremely rare drive-in theater posters are featured along with the more common one-sheet size. These posters, often very different from the standard posters, were printed in smaller numbers, adding to their interest and value. All of these posters have less than ten known copies in existence, and many have only one or two known examples. Posters of such favorite movies as “”Alien,”” “”Caddy Shack,”” and the “”Attack of the 50-Foot Woman”” are included, with iconic movie stars Marilyn Monroe, Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. Auction results from 1989-the present, and other pricing information make this a useful tool for collectors of posters who are trying to make informed purchasing decisions.”

Purchase from Amazon.

Categories
Academic Life(style)

Memoirs of a Geisha

Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden (unusually) kept me occupied for several evenings whilst travelling through Asia (I have been known to read 3-4 books in a day!). I hadn’t realised until I started to read it, and found the odd bit of text slipping off the page, that I’d bought one of the notorious photocopied texts so easy to find in South East Asia (not much respect for intellectual property there!).

Stupid as it sounds, it hadn’t really registered in my consciousness that the author was male, and I certainly hadn’t realised that he was American. The author of the book appeared to have got into the mind of a Geisha so well, that many people believe that she was a real character – she’s not, she’s fictional, but he apparently did his research well!

So, last night, I borrowed my friend’s DVD and watched the film and all the extras. I can’t remember the ins and outs of the book, but with the time lapse, I certainly didn’t notice anything particularly jarring/missing, and really enjoyed the film, which was well-paced and intriguing. I enjoyed the extras even more (as always… watching the ‘Making of Shrek’ was very inspirational for writing a chapter on the way an artist approached poster design for my PhD), and it was fascinating to see how the authenticity was approached, with each actress undergoing 6 weeks of Geisha ‘boot camp’, working with Liza Dalby, the only western woman ever to become a Geisha (as a part of her PhD research). 

Even more interesting was that the director/producer said that they looked to establish what were the rules/authenticity, and then looked for ways to re-interpret that in a more modern way that would work for film. 

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