Pricey Stuff

I have little reason to read the Business Pages of the newspaper but since I read the newspaper pretty thoroughly I do at least glance at Business. I was caught by one article. In it was quoted some woman who had her hair cut and styled at the cost of $150. Further down was an item about a purse for $1650. What have we come to? People are starving around the world, some even in our own United States. I rarely talk about social issues in this blog, but this just caught me wrong (or maybe right). Lady, get a $40 cut and style and send the other $110 to Doctors Without Borders or CARE or the charity of your choice. And as for the $1650 purse....

Lest the men think they are any better...notice how many Hummers there are on the road? And how about the salaries and perks for CEOs and the $4M mansions or the exclusive clubs, gold or otherwise that have memberships at $4-5K a year. I shall now get down from my soapbox.

Tin Tin Movie

I read in the newspaper the other day that Steven Spielberg is making a movie of Tin Tin. Or maybe has just acquired the rights. Either way, the news is exciting. I presume that the movie will be live action. Finally we’ll get to see Tin Tin, the boy adventurer, and his white terrier, Snowy, on the screen. And possibly the detective, the Thompson Twins, the professor and other characters from Tin Tin’s various adventures.

The characters were created by the Belgian artist, Herge, who created twenty-one graphic novels over his career. Very successful, fun to read, and still in print after many decades. I hope Spielberg hurries the process forward and that I get to see the movie before long. After all, I’m an old guy. Something to look forward to.

Rider on the Rain

I watched the movie, Rider on the Rain last evening. It was a French film made in 1960 and starred Charles Bronson and Marlene Jobert with Jill Ireland, Bronson’s wife, in a major supporting role. Marlene Jobert is followed and raped while her husband is absent. Later she discovers the rapist still lurking in the basement of her home. She kills him with two blasts from a shotgun. Soon Bronson shows up, hinting that he knows she murdered a man. He says he is not the police and it quite a long time into the movie before we find out who he really is. He hounds her constantly and she begins by denying the murder and consistently denies to the very end. The film has quite a few twists and turns and almost a satisfying ending. At least for me.

I can barely remember 1960. It must have been a good time because the skirts were short. Marlene Jobert wears hers jauntily, as does Jill Ireland, playing her mother. Jobert is not beautiful, but rather cute in her short haircut and wearing her all white clothes well. She has a wonderful figure to carry it off with elan.

The story is from Sebastien Japrisot, a French mystery novelist, not very well known in this country. A few years back the film A Very Long Engagement was made from one of his novels.
This is an offbeat film which I enjoyed very much. There was some discussion of the film on Imdb and I gather that the original DVD was pretty bad and had some scenes cut from it. I commend it to those who are looking for an offbeat mystery. I should warn you that the music track has a warble and is a bit distracting, but the dialogue is just fine.