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Owlwise's Replies
Nobody could. Darren McGavin made & owned that role.
Your argument is invalidated right out of the gate by calling songs like I Am The Walrus "utter rubbish" -- every song you mention is a good one to the vast majority of listeners.
He later came to regret having said that.
This is it exactly. The film is so emotionally powerful because it doesn't succumb to facile, crowd-pleasing overplaying. It trusts the viewers to have enough depth & sensitivity to read & empathize with its characters, without forcing those characters to call obvious, self-aware attention to each dramatic moment.
I agree, this one's a lot of fun from the get-go, and saving Godzilla for the final sequence actual works to its advantage. The characters are engaging & likeable all on their own!
Sowing the Seeds of Love has to be one of my three. The other two? Too many great songs to easily choose from!
I won't go so far as to call it a rip-off, more like "highly influenced" by the Beatles, as were so many songs back then. :)
But I definitely agree with "brilliant" all the way!
For a similarly unique artist who never got her due, I'd recommend Judee Sill. She also fused the spiritual with the sensual, but took a somewhat different approach to it than Laura did, with a Jesus-as-lover-and-cosmic-cowboy-outlaw in many of her songs. Not only a distinctive songwriter & performer, but also a brilliant arranger of her own work.
That is her most deeply personal album, I think. How I envy you for having had the chance to see her live!
Yes, the jazz influence is definitely there, I'd say. Miles Davis was a fan of hers, apparently; there are pictures of him visiting her in the Columbia recording studios they both used at the time.
I understand what you meant by her looks, given the way so many pop artists today are judged more by their looks than by their singing ability. I didn't take your comment as anything remotely disparaging to Laura, just as an honest observation. Looks mattered even then. But it's true that quirky or non-standard looks were much more accepted & even encouraged then, as well. It was always the delivery that mattered most. And she could always bring it. :)
Great post! And I completely agree. I was a teenaged boy when Laura's early albums came out, and I loved them deeply, as I loved all heartfelt, honest music. Nothing against the Fifth Dimension, who were quite openly grateful, saying, "Laura Nyro has been very good to us." But Laura herself brought a wrenching, beautiful passion to her music than no one else could ever match. As you note, she could bring an immense amount of intense, soul-wrenching feeling with just the right pause, or the slightest emphasis on a single syllable held just a split second longer than expected.
As for looks, to me she had the beautiful face of a pained, been-through-it-all-and-came-through-stronger street Madonna (the religious one, not the 1980s one), both ethereal & earthy. Few singers could combine the sensual & the spiritual in the way that she could.
While he's well aware of the practical necessities of life, given his background, he also understands that there's more to life than just the practical necessities. He worked hard to get an education himself, to open up the range of possibilities before him; obviously he sees that doing this for others, who might otherwise end up going into pre-slotted & dead-end lives, is a worthwhile pursuit. He also know that while it's entirely possible to get the engineering job & leave it later, all too often, once people make the "sensible & pragmatic" choice, it's easy to become stuck there, losing hold of your deeper dreams & possibilities.
I'm retired now, and I saw this happen with many people I worked with—they were good at their jobs, respected by their peers, certainly making good money, not displeased with their overall situation ... but they also felt the loss of something that had once mattered deeply to them. For some, it was merely a lingering regret, one they could live with; for others, an unhealed & always painful wound.
Sir made the choice that was right for him.
It's a slice-of-life film, one that's focused on a threshold moment for everyone, which means that their own lives are not quite in focus, but in flux. In part, they're trying to cling to what they know, even as they understand that it's over; in part, they're uncertain but still preparing to move forward, even as the present moment already begins to turn into idealized nostalgia. Letting go of any stage of life is complicated, and all the more so at 17. The film captures this beautifully.
That was always my impression as well.
This is it exactly. It's indeed a calling, practically a spiritual one, certainly an existential one. Roy HAD to follow it in order to be true to himself. If he hadn't, he would have become a tortured shell of a man for the rest of his life, and in no way a useful or meaningful father or husband. He would have brought them far more pain by staying than by leaving.
Looking forward to this one! I was a teenager of 16 when the trial took place, following it every day in the newspapers & on TV. Still seems just like yesterday in many respects.
For me, science explains the way the physical universe works. More is always being learned; but with that comes the knowledge that there's even more to learn. It's an ongoing process.
Religion, or spirituality if you prefer, is about the inner universe of meaning, personal experience, awe, wonder, etc. It's about psychological/emotional reality for human beings, not literal, tangible reality. It's as much poetry & art as anything else, and it shouldn't be put in opposition to science. Only fundamentalists do that, which always results in their literalist view not standing up to science.
An example: science can explain the biochemical, neurological, physiological aspects of being in love. That tells us what's happening physically when we're in love. But it can tell us nothing about the experience of it, which will be generally similar but still very intimately personal for each individual. Is your love for your spouse, children, parents, etc., <b>just</b> something physical? I know some people might say so. I don't feel that's enough. I don't deny the physical aspect by any means, but it falls short of the whole experience for me, which is more than just the sum of its parts.
Science tells us how things work. Religion, in its best aspects, gives us ways to talk about what those things mean to us, why some are considered important, others not so much. Psychology, philosophy, the arts in general, are all part of that. Science is mechanics, often dazzling & wondrous to observe & contemplate, certainly capable of inspiring awe in us. But assigning/finding/making meaning, purpose, value? That's a function of the inner universe.
At least, that's how I've always seen it. And while it works very well for me, I won't insist that anyone else should or must subscribe to my worldview. That would be succumbing to blind, rigid dogma. It would also reveal a fatal insecurity within me, by insisting that my worldview <b>must</b> be the only valid one. Why should it be? It's valid for me, and that's enough for me.
Anthony is still one of the creepiest, scariest monsters I've ever seen on TV or at the movies.
Too loud for you, at least. Sounds just fine to me.
I'd like to see more of its kind today myself!