Open Thread

I’m not advertising for them, ‘coz that’s not the type of person I am, but the film Platform I use, Mubi, continues to offer provocative and stunning films. I watch irregularly, still trying to get my life here in the Yucatan, Mexico together, things better over the last few weeks, my very smart friend and landlady showed me how not to get ripped off with big currency exchange charges, I got onto a platform linked to my credit union in Cali and paid the last half a month’s rent to her in whole. I won’t annoy people here by boasting how low my rent is, when paid to her in pesos. (Oddly, US currency doing well vis-a-vis Mexico the last 2 weeks.)

Back to Mubi– So, the 1979 movie “Caligula” by Bob Guccione, Jr., porn-king, was supposed to be a Quality product: Script by the great Gore Vidal, great sets, and cast, tho’ I will quibble with all the Celts cast as Italians, a bit odd, Roddy McDowell the protagonist and Peter O’Toole in horror makeup plays the dying monster Tiberius, his grandfather, evidently suffering from several Venereal diseases at once due to his “libertine” blood-soaked lifestyle poisoning family members etc. for political reasons (some blame Livia, see the Robert Graves book or the film(s) I Claudius for that if unfamiliar) . . . so the “Little Boots” character is a Monster from the get-go, but it’s all understandable as he’s swimming with the Epstein Class folks of his own type, all insane and homicidal with few exceptions. A noble warrior named Macro sacrificed to Caligula’s ego and others seen. Plus ca change . . .

Guccione screwed up the entire film originally and it won a lot of Worst Film Ever plaudits, he cut in lots of personal Porn shots that he was excited by, left out the good stuff filmed, totally selfish and idiotic self-indulgence. But this is a “new” reconstruction by a more conscientious crew that restores the Vidal stuff and the relevant film-stock. I’ve only watched the first 50 minutes, haven’t seen the nude Helen Mirren yet (she was sure gorgeous back in the days of The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover, a few yrs. after Caligula) but am enjoying the hell out of it.

The original had Everyone take their name off it, not just Vidal, but the Musical scoring and everyone else. Not all the stuff on Mubi is great, I started watching The Texas Chainsaw Massacre recently, couldn’t get beyond halfway thru. I’ve had some guilty pleasures with Ultra-violence, the Classics, A Clockwork Orange, etc. but TTCM wasn’t for me, just too nihilist. Rob Zombie also not bad, there is some humor in his films, TTCM is just blood-soaked trash, no redeeming content, and bilking that one of the victims is an incredibly annoying disabled man in a wheelchair . . . I guess Tobe Hooper may’ve done better slasher stuff later, a pioneer in the genre. Recently I saw a film also on Mubi by Ti Hitt, born c. 1987, “X” about Texans making a 1975 porn film at the ranch of 2 elderly serial killers, brilliant knock-off of the genre. Saw some great horror films on Mubi last Halloween, however, overall their curation is excellent.

Looking forward to finishing Caligula, Guccione enshitified his own glamor project, glad that a new team could salvage the stellar stuff that was covered in Guccione’s scat.

In other News: saw a beautiful thing here in the Yucatan yesterday, my landlady’s female housecat tried to intimidate a small Hawk that landed just outside the first-floor kitchen, stared down the Cat which knew better than to pick a fight with a bird as large as itself.

And I may not need to leave the country to get residency here, after the Albuquerque Mexican Embassy cocked up all the paperwork that I gave them by deadline, “The supervisor is sick, can you sit around and wait 6 days before leaving for Mexico?” Damn glad I said no now that I’m settling in. I love the Mexican people since I’ve been back here, but the government is nearly as shitty and evil as most of the rest of the world, it seems.

Over the last few years I had recommended the Yahoo AllTheWeb search engine as a good place to find things and look for things. I especially liked how it aggregated mostly relevant images if you typed in (subject of interest) image . . . and gave the URLs to each image.

But just today when I go into my normal good-old http://www.alltheweb.com to find things, it doesn’t let me search anything. It tries to force me to set up an Account with Yahoo first. I will not do that. So I am using Bing for now and seeing if there is anything better.

So Verizon and Verizon’s Yahoo have decided to endiarrheafy their AllTheWeb search. Endiarrheafication. And I couldn’t find a business or customer relations email for them so I could curse them out on line. Maybe I will look harder at some point.

Here is a photo by someone ” hiking in Georgia”. But it doesn’t look like the American Georgia to me. It looks like the Caucasus Georgia. I don’t know why. Just a feeling. Any thoughts anyone?

Went hiking in Georgia. Two strays joined us and hiked 25 mi and ~8k ft across 2 days with us.
https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/1wte1my/went_hiking_in_georgia_two_strays_joined_us_and/