Grandma wallpaper

I was just looking at a listing for a condo (co-op) in Capitol Hill, and saw one interesting detail: wallpaper! I haven't seem much wallpaper since I moved out of an apartment where I lived in Brookline. It's been a really dead decorating idea since the end of the seventies, as far as I can tell. It's regaining some currency as a trendy decorating idea, but would still be anathema to 99% of people looking to decorate their houses or condos.

Anyway, when I first looked at this listing, I thought: "Hey, check out that wallpaper in the kitchen. Nice touch!" And then I looked closer at the dreary old appliances and realized that it was actually just historical wallpaper.I know these photos are small, but it has a nice double-knit quality, doesn't it? And then the bathroom is the real prize:
I don't think I could get rid of these if I moved into this place (which is not going to happen), and not just due to laziness. In fact, I'd think of ways I could accentuate it, to give the apartment a thematic unity.

Hipster beards again

Here is a photo of a local hipster band. I'm assuming that the guy on the right is a new member of the group.

Do girls really like guys with bushy, unkempt beards these days? Does that make these guys the sexiest band around?

"An inordinate amount of needlessly sadistic action"

Beebo and I watched an old Gothic adventure movie called "The Black Castle" last night that we really enjoyed, and I would recommend to anyone. It's funny to look up old reviews of genre films like this--at the time of their release, they're often critically received as warmly as a sequel to "Saw" would be today. Here's the New York Times' opinion:

December 26, 1952

At the Palace

O. A. G.

"The Black Castle," a Christmas day offering of questionable taste at the Palace, is one of those dreary "horror" tales manufactured to shiver the souls of the space-suit set. They won't even blink an unclouded eye at this drivel for they know the hero and heroine—in this case, Richard Greene and Paula Corday—will survive the rigors and tortures administered by a molar-grinding, sadistic Stephen McNally in his bleak Bavarian castle in the Black Forest. And they do live through such assorted stupidities as black panthers, crocodile pits and lethal drugs as Mr. Greene strives to ascertain if Mr. McNally killed some of his friends.

Parents are specifically warned that an inordinate amount of needlessly sadistic action is to be seen in this aberration. Adults can pass it up on the grounds that it is a dull dud. To open Universal-International's "Black Castle" at any time is a mistake; to tender it to the public on Christmas Day is remarkably indiscreet.

***

Getting to see this movie "at the Palace" on Christmas Day 1952 sounds like great fun to me, even if "O.A.G." is appalled!

Beebo and Foulard

Here's a photo of Beebo and Foulard at the Obama-Clinton rally in Unity, N.H. in July 2008. Beebo is the one in the green print dress with the umbrella. Foulard is next to her wearing a brown t-shirt (it had a picture of Obama and says 'UNITY' on the other side--a lucky coincidence).

The Unusual Charm of Valentina Cortese

Valentina Cortese is an Italian actress who's been in countless movies in Italy and the U.S. I've only seen a few, but two stand out in their unusual roles for women in the classic Hollywood studio era (or perhaps, near its end): Thieves' Highway (1949), directed by Jules Dassin, and The House on Telegraph Hill (1951), directed by Robert Wise.

The first is an unusual and tough drama about a WWII veteran (played by Richard Conte) trying to breaking into the vegetable-trucking business in Northern California. It's great on its on merits, but the part that's relevant here is how Cortese, playing a 'bad girl' named Rica, is the sympathetic female lead, and Barbara Lawrence (as All-American blonde Polly Faber) turns out to be a shallow twerp. How refreshing, and probably attributable to the mature viewpoint of writer A.I. Bezzerides. I was relieved and surprised when Rica didn't have to take a sacrificial bullet or step aside nobly so Polly could take over.*In The House on Telegraph Hill, she plays a more conventional role as a new bride who's being mysteriously threatened (à la Gaslight or Rebecca) in post-war San Francisco (also a setting of the first movie). What makes it unusual is that she's a European concentration camp survivor who's stolen the identity of a dead friend so that she can get to the U.S. Richard Basehart (to whom she was married in real life, for nine years) plays the threatening husband. Again our protagonist is an unusual character for viewer identification: she's done something 'wrong', but who could blame her? In Thieves, she may be easy, but she's nice, and loyal (though fortunately not self-sacrificing, so she doesn't have to 'pay' for being who she is). Cortese is also unusual for actresses of the time--non-busty and unusual-featured, she's always interesting to look at, even if you can't decide whether she's actually attractive or not.

*I'm still annoyed at Gregory Peck for throwing Celeste Holm over in Gentleman's Agreement for lame Dorothy McGuire.

Fall is here!

A little late, but I'll take it!

Fall weather on the way for Washington

The Associated Press

Fall weather is on the way for Washington.

The National Weather Service says rain along the coast will move inland by Monday night.

A chance of showers continues through the week with high temperatures in the 60s and lows in the 40s in Western Washington.

Forecasters say cooler, cloudier weather will move into Eastern Washington by Tuesday with high temperatures in the 60s and lows in the 30s.

There's a chance of snow at higher mountain elevations.