Movie Noir Monday

I've been going to bed each night reading further into Rabbit, Run by John Updike, which is one of those odd titles that always puzzled me when I worked in a bookstore, as I had no idea what the context was. I finally skimmed through part of one of the man's stories on Google Books or some such and found the writing style appealing enough, then finally decided to try and track down an omnibus of the four Rabbit novels at some point. I came close, snagging a collection of the first two at the Library thrift store awhile back and diving into it, though I seem to be reading it in fits and starts, so I dunno how long it will languish on the nightstand. I have to say I'm curious where the novel ends up, as the general message so far seems to be that a mid-life crisis is okay as long as you are somewhat charismatic and by the way, enjoy all that new pussy while you're out there. The writing style reminds me a bit of the way Bret Easton Ellis writes, in that the situations are filled with lingering feelings of disappointment and failure, none of the characters feel as though they are truly happy, more as if they are making do with life as it's handed to them, which I find bizarrely comforting on some level that I can't explain. Y'know, as if I may not be the only person who finds himself less than happy for no obvious reason, that nagging ennui that you can't quite put a finger on how to shake...

Or who knows, maybe it is just me.

The phone buzzing on the nightstand woke me this morning, which turned out to be the Plumber calling about popping in to fix whatever was wrong with the hallway toilet, so I checked the message and then forced myself from the bed to see what the wife and Yorkie were up to before I called this guy back. The Yorkie was still kinda moping around the house, which was sort of the same as she had been last night, so we were kind of on alert to her getting sick, which hasn't happened in quite awhile. After catching up with the wife I got the house opened for the day and called the Plumber back, telling him to drop by whenever.

They turned up within a half hour and were here for literally 15 minutes before they gave the toilet a triumphant flush and split. The Yorkie bitched the entire time, as is her custom.

The wife had an afternoon meeting, so I decided to step out and drop some of our plastic recycling and pick up a salad somewhere for my lunch. Naturally the Goddamned recycling bins looked like a major city during a garbage strike, so I just cruised on past there, gritting my teeth in agitation. I hit a drive-thru and picked up some food, then headed back home.

As I walked in I noticed that the Yorkie gave me a weird look and headed off to the Office, which is strange for her, as she normally jumps up and scratches at your calves until you at least stop to pet her. I called to the wife to ask if she was in there acting weird now and she said that she was trying to vomit. I caught her before she barfed on the carpet, moving her onto the tile, where she yacked up some brown, brackish vomit that confirmed our fears that she was experiencing the same hyper-colitis stuff again. She seemed to calm down after that, so the wife and I agreed that I would watch over her while she ran to her meeting, then she would take the dog to the vet afterward.

I ate (which seemed really appealing immediately after cleaning up vomit, let me tellya) in the den while watching a re-run of The Venture Brothers off the TiVo, keeping tabs on the dog to make sure she was still doing okay. We had actually sequestered her in the hallway to keep her from barfing all over the carpet or one of the couches, so I was feeling pretty bad by the time I finished my meal, so I moved into the Office, where she chilled in her bed and stayed pretty still while I worked on a few things online.

The wife came and picked up the dog to take her to the vet about an hour later, so I moved back into the den and decided to watch Out Of The Past, a film that I've always heard of as a seminal entry in the Film Noir genre and recently recorded via Turner Classic Movies. I was keen to see more Robert Mitchum after watching Night Of The Hunter awhile back, so when this turned up I knew I had to give it a go, and I am so very glad that I did. Mitchum starts the film as a gas station owner, dating a local gal but considered kinda shifty by the local law and her parents who don't trust him because he's so cagey about his past. A guy turns up telling him that a man from his past wants to settle up accounts with him, so we eventually learn in flashback that Mitchum used to be a private eye, who went in search of Kirk Douglas' girlfriend, only to fall for her himself, which snowballs into much greater complications and his taking a new identity in a small town running gas station. Douglas wants him to square their previous deal by helping him out of a jam with his shifty lawyer and it gets as convoluted as the average Noir plot always seems to be, but Goddamn if Mitchum doesn't look cool stalking around in the shadows, cigarette smoke curling around his head, delivering his casual acerbic rebuttals to anyone who tries to talk shit to him, it's just so good.

The wife returned with the dog about midway through the film, the dog having recieved the same shot she gets every time something like this happens, so we released her back into the 'wild', just to see what she did. She had some water, then lay on the bed for a bit, hopped down to the little bench at the foot of the bed and proceeded to barf up the water. I swear to God, we have an acre of tile and hardwood flooring in this house and that dog cannot get sick on anything that isn't carpeted or upholstered. It's borderline comical, because nine times out of ten she'll actually walk to someplace with carpet just to throw up, I dunno what happens in her head that makes this happen, it's like the legend that elephants somehow know that it's time to go to the elephant burial ground to die, some kind homing beacon in their brains suddenly goes off.

We got that cleaned up and she chilled for a bit and the wife left for another round of meetings. I decided to pop in a film that owes its' existence to the Noir of the past, so I gave the Blu-ray of Sin City a day in court, only to find that either I've grown past Frank Miller's style of writing for the material, or that I was a bit more forgiving when I first watched the film. A lot of the dialog that I recall reading & enjoying in the comic book source material now makes me wince a little bit, as it's just so wordy that it doesn't roll easily off the tongue, especially when we're talking about a ton of expository narration that's meant to happen as someone walks across a room, whereas a still image in a comic doesn't have this handicap; be as wordy and verbose as you'd like, the visual shorthand works out the kinks for you. The film does capture the look and feel of the comics, but it's cartoonishly over the top at times, almost making me wonder how much of this is meant to be taken as straight up spoof rather than what I at first felt was homage to the genre. I still enjoy it, especially the bit with Clive Owen as Dwight, that was always my favorite character in the comics and he does a good job of selling it here.

The wife returned with a late dinner and the Yorkie continued to mope around, finally barfing one final time, though I heard her little gagging sounds and was able to yank her out of the Office and onto the tile of the hallway before she did a number on the carpet in there. She settled while the wife and I blew through this week's eps of Californication and House Of Lies, then I put she and the wife to bed and got started on this post.

The dog drifted in around 1:30 in the morning and acted as if she was hungry, so I gave her a small portion of food, which she at and seemed to keep down, so I guess whatever the issue was with her stomach has finally hit bottom and she seems to be on the mend.

I'm out kids.

Be seeing you.