Steady Diet of Film

I don't blame you, Connie

Holy f!  I procured a massive, hard-to-find box set (only released in Germany, geek for life!) of Connie Francis rarities, and discovered a most peculiar thing.  Check this out:

Leadbelly - In The Pines [mp3]

Connie Francis - True Love, True Love [mp3]

OMG!  It's just like that scene in Dreamgirls when the white people (Everly Brothers, right?) stole the song and then whited it out!

imdb facelift

People have been discussing it on the internets for a couple of months now but imdb.com has completed implementing their design changeover.   I'll be the first to admit I'm a curmudge who hates almost all change especially when it's just trend-chasing nonsense.  Has the Web 2.0 evolution become entirely aesthetic?  My thoughts:

• A terrible amount of wasted space.
• The banner ads are getting oppressive. 
• Message boards now have to be clicked into instead of being displayed on each actor/title page.  This is actively discouraging the only social networking aspect the site really had. 
• Site still does not allow users to add their own tags.
• Left navigation bar text is way too small (I'm not afraid to say I love button images.  You're pressing them, so why not just make them buttons?  I'm just saying.)

       +I do think it was a smart improvement to add more titles and use images for the recommendations section though.

Overall grade: D+
 

He's bringing psycho back

Awesome, Justin Timberlake ran through every black recording artist to steal from so now he's just copping OJ Simpsons's style. 

Peter Boyle, 1935-2006

Read Peter Boyle's NYT Obituary here:

Peter Boyle was born on Oct. 18, 1935, in Northtown, Pa. After graduating from La Salle College, he became a member of the Christian Brothers order and entered a monastery as Brother Francis. He later recalled praying “so hard, I had calluses on my knees.” After three effortful years, he left the monastery — he later called it “an unnatural way to live” — and, after a brief period in the Navy that ended in a nervous breakdown, came to New York City to try the life of an actor.

There, he studied with Uta Hagen, worked at whatever jobs he could find, toured with a road company of Neil Simon’s “Odd Couple” and wound up in Chicago, where he joined the Second City troupe and immersed himself in improvisational theater. He was living in Chicago at the time of the Democratic National Convention in 1968 and never forgot the ensuing explosion of violence and the reek of tear gas in the streets. Early on, he described himself as a “conservative radical.”

I think it's also worth mentioning Boyle's film debut was in Sydney Lumet's adaptation of the Mary McCarthy novel The Group.  Also he was in Taxi Driver, your favorite movie!