Hm…

Oh yeah — I bought all of Preston Sturges’ movies (that are available), and this is apparently the last of them I haven’t seen.

Heh heh. It’s the shootingest kid.

Good form.

Oh, it’s a musical?

You know, Betty Grable is one of those actors I never can quite place. I bet I’ve seen dozens of movies with her, but I don’t think I would actually recognise her.

I know! Shocking!

Or … perhaps I’ve just seen a handful of films with her, but just remember the name because it’s er memorable — it’s such an anti-Hollywood-made-up-name: Grable.

Hm… this bluray is pretty odd — the black levels are like #333 instead of #000. Hm. Perhaps I can just lower the brightness?

Well, that looks better.

But… this movie is just kinda odd all over. I mean, I think if I were to read a recap of what I’ve seen so far, I would have assumed that it was a hilarious, madcap movie. But instead it’s just… lethargic. There are gags, but you have to tell yourself that: “Yes, I can see that this is a gag. It is even funny. I should probably laugh?”

That is, the pacing is just way off. Grable is doing her best to get things poppin’, but the rest just seem to be mouthing off lines while looking at the director for direction.

I’m normally all for a good yokel bit, but even that fails here.

Sturges’ good movies are wonderful. This just doesn’t work, despite a pretty good script and some scenes that are really funny. It’s like… imagine this movie directed by one of the old studio system workhorses like Sidney Lanfield or George Marshall, who pumped out several films each yea? Craftsmen who really knew what they were doing and did it in a reliably zippy way? It could have been hilarious.

It does have the silliest shootout ever, though — it’s a great spoof of Westerns.

Right:

The film, Sturges’ first Technicolor production, was not well received at the time it was released, and was generally conceded to be a disaster – even Betty Grable bad-mouthed it

Oh, and this was Sturges’ final movie in the US (but he did do one movie more, six years later, in France).

This is a hard one to throw the die on… it’s really not a good movie, but there’s bits that are really enjoyable. So ⚃? Uhm. No, let’s go with:

The Beautiful Blonde From Bashful Bend. Preston Sturges. 1949. ⚂

I think this is basically a bunch of music videos strung together, but I’m guessing none of these videos were shown separately?

I was supposed to be washing my balcony furniture down, but instead I’m sitting here watching these videos… they’re really rather well made. Filmed on video? Hi-def video? They’re well edited and interesting.

I guess the songs here are basically most of the stuff from the Holy Wars album, but with a couple earlier tracks?

I mean, this is a collection of music videos, but I love Tuxedomoon and I quite like these videos — they’re original and interesting. So:

Tuxedomoon: A Thousand Lives by Picture. Bruce Geduldig. 1985. ⚄

Yes, indeed — this is a live King Crimson thing from 1982. And I feel like I may have seen it before? The eight minute long version of Waiting Man seems familiar.

But what the hey — I can watch it again while cleaning the balcony.

Bill Bruford really wants to be at the front of the stage for this movie. But that’s a nice instrument.

And then we get a fifteen minute version of Sheltering Sky? Man, the people in Frejus are patient.

Yes! This is exactly what the people in Frejus needed right now! A five minute drum solo!

Obvs, if you’re not a fan of King Crimson (or King Crimson from this area; most people aren’t), this is gonna be the most boring thing ever. But for me, this is almost an ideal concert movie: No chatter, no audience shots, no interviews with people saying how great King Crimson is.

It’s just fantastic music filmed sympathetically.

But I’m deducting ⚀ because of the rather crappy VHS-like video quality. (The audio quality is great.)

John Carr is the editor, and no director is listed in the credits, so I’m crediting this to him. Hah!

King Crimson: The Noise. John Carr. 1982. ⚄