I Just Watched...

[Masha]

not entirely sure why i ask since the directions are clearly in jest, but it seems to me like these ingredients minus the large amount of whiskey would work.

also, when they say WHITE RAISINS do they mean GOLDEN RAISINS?

"White raisins are a variety of raisin that are white in colour. They are often called golden raisins or muscats. White raisins are oven dried unlike the typical sun-dried raisin."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_raisins

[HoldenIsHere]

I haven't seen either version of A Christmas Memory (either the Geraldine Page version or the Katharine Hepburn version in the 1990s)

I didn't know there was an adaptation of A CHRISTMAS MEMORY with Katherine Hepburn as Truman Capote's fruitcake-baking cousin from Alabama.
The thought of that frightens me.

[Andree]

Don't malign the Fruitcake based on 50's-60's "quick, easy" processed candied recipes that resulted in cement bricks.

REAL fruitcake is made with fruit soaked in rum. After baking, the loaf is spritzed regularly with brandy to preserve it for consumption over the long, cold winter.

Real fruitcake is hearty, flavorful & a great source of vitamin C when fresh fruit wasn't available year round like it is now.

I've always been a finnicky eater, so even if it was a fruitcake carefully made with the best
ingredients, I wouldn't want to eat it. There are just too many things in a fruitcake that I
don't like. Even the idea of a fruit cake seems a bit strange. My dad used to buy four or
five store bought fruitcakes for the holidays to give to family and friends. You're a braver
man than me. I'll stick with gooey pecan pie and a trayful of brownies. And any alcohol in
a separate glass.

[Hibi]

I think people are mixing up a telefilm made by K. Hepburn in the 90s based on another Capote short story called One Christmas. Both are set during the holidays, but are different scenarios.

[Swithin]

Betty's of Yorkshire makes some fine fruit cakes. I haven't ordered any, but I've visited their tea rooms in Harrowgate, Ilkley, York, and Northallterton.
https://www.bettys.co.uk/cakes/fruit-cakes

I think Betty's Ilkley is my favorite branch, as it's situated within walking distance of Ilkley Moor.

[dianedebuda]

Wow! I wasn't keeping score, but an interesting observation! I still like your views/opinions & always welcome an opposing view.

Oh I'm not keeping score either. Just funny that what we like seems to be skewed by 180°. Found that back when I was mostly just a lurker on the TCM site. Could be an age thing. I'm designated as QOC (Queen of Coots) on another forum. Still find it fun to read your posts.

I'll stick with gooey pecan pie and a trayful of brownies. And any alcohol in a separate glass.

All that & more here during Christmas when I make fruitcake, so would be no problem for you fit in.

[Swithin]

The Young Offenders (2016)

I just watched this entertaining Irish film, which is alternately hilarious and sad. Two 15-year-old lower-working-class boys (Conor and Jock) have difficult lives in single-parent homes. Jock lives with his abusive, alcoholic father; Conor lives with his mother, who had him when she was 16. Although she does try, she calls him a retard too often, which upsets him.

Conor works with his mother in a fishmonger's market; Jock just steals stuff, especially bicycles. The town (Cork) is filled with crazy characters, include a nut job named Billy, and Sergeant Healy, a cop obsessed with bicycle theft.

When the news reports that a cocaine-trafficking boat has capsized near the coast, Jock and Conor are determined to find a bale and make a fortune. Jock steals bicycles and the two friends begin a bizarre road trip to the coast. (Evidently the cocaine shipwreck is based on a true news story.)

The actors are great, though the two leads seem older than 15.

The film spun off a multi-season television series with the same cast, which I am looking forward to watching.

Just watched Season One of The Young Offenders series, six brilliant episodes. Here's the priceless bus scene from the final episode of season one. Crazy Billy (the local nut job) has highjacked a busload of terrified passengers, leading to this singalong. Two more seasons to go.

[Andree]

All that & more here during Christmas when I make fruitcake, so would be no problem for you fit in.

Thanks. As long as I can get some pecan pie and feed my chocolate addiction,
I'd be happy to donate my share of fruitcake to some worthy fruitcake loving
soul.

[CinemaInternational]

I recently looked for COCOON '85 and it's not streaming free, so got a copy from the library. I talked it up as "Ron Howard's best film" while cautioning I remembered it as "corny". Sometimes corn is OK, but sadly, Cocoon doesn't hold up nearly as well as my memory of it.

It's the story of Aliens retrieving life form "pods" distributed in Earth's ocean and acclimating them in a swimming pool to prepare them for their journey home. The swimming pool is on an abandoned estate next to a Senior Community where a group of old guys regularly trespass to swim for exersize.
(mistake #1- NO ONE would keep up a costly swimming pool full of water/chemicals on abandoned property)

The oldies found rejuvenation from the nutrient rich water, turning back their bio clocks. Soon everyone wanted to swim in the Fountain of Youth resulting in destruction of some pods.

The Seniors realized their mistake and helped the Aliens return the living pods back to the sea so they could be successfully retrieved at a later date. Since there was now room on the ship, a group of Seniors left Earth with the Aliens, presumably to live forever.
Oh, like "heaven"...why not hit us over the head with sappy metaphors?

This wasn't Ron Howard's best film at all-instead it's typical of his work; slow moving, poorly written dialogue but well acted with more corn than Capra would have even dared. I love Ron Howard as a person- a talented actor, but this movie showcases all his failings as a director.

Ron Howard is as manipulative as Schpielberg using self-important lofty music and crazy unnecessary special effects that cheapen whatever message he's trying to convey. I can't believe I ever thought it was a good movie.

Actually, all the Seniors played by great Golden Age Actors was the only piece of this movie that keeps your interest. Brian Dennehy is spectacular as the head coordinator Alien, flashing his big beautiful smile while keeping his eyes "dead" so you always realize he's not human. Other supporting actors & their situations were a total yawn & unnecessary to what would have been a great story.

Cocoon is now tied with Jurassic Park as the worst resulting movie from a promising, imaginative story. At the end credits Mr Tiki said in exasperation, "What the hell was that movie even ABOUT?

I only recall seeing Cocoon once... And as I recall, I kept wishing for more screentime for the veterans, and a little less of Steve Guttenberg and Tahnee (daughter of Raquel) Welsh [actually, one of the other aliens, who barely gets a line in the film, was the son of Tyrone Power]. I still kind of liked it overall, but it's not a masterpiece or anything. It could have been more possibly. Still, it was nice to have late-career comebacks for Ameche, Cronyn, and Tandy.

I think Ron Howard means well with most of his films. But outside of Frost/Nixon (where he did have a decent script to work from), most of his films only move in fits and starts and he has made a few clinkers along the way (why was Backdraft such a hit?). He does usually have an eye for actors though, be it the veterans or Dennehy here, Daryl Hannah in Splash, Dianne Wiest in Parenthood, many cast members in The Paper, Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind, or Glenn Close in the otherwise unbearable Hillbilly Elegy. Howard did write a well received autobiography within the past few years, but his directing career currently seems stuck in a rut, both commercially and critically. [In this, he has some similarity to the man originally appointed to direct Cocoon, Robert Zemeckis. Zemeckis once did several good films like I Wanna Hold Your Hand, Romancing the Stone, Back to the Future, and Death Becomes Her, but ever since Forrest Gump {which does not hold up}, he's been lurching from one forlorn venture after another, with only one satisfying film in the last 30 years]

Spielberg has made some great films (ET, The Color Purple, Empire of the Sun), but also some that just don't work (1941, Hook, Amistad, The Post). And he had two very good films that missed masterpiece status because of one decison (Schindler's List, AI). But hes also done films that are bland and others that seemingly made all the right moves at first, but then fell apart. So it's a mixed record, and he definitely could afford to lighten up somewhat. But at the same time, maybe the heaviness comes from being at or near the top of the industry since 1975. Typically speaking, the more money is spent on a film the heavier it seems to be.

[CinemaInternational]

I am humbled.


I have now watched all ten episodes of the game show: The Floor (2024).

The basis for the contest is that eighty-one people each have a specialist category. Two contestants have a: 'duel' in which they take turns identifying images from one of the two categories. Each person has forty-five seconds for all of their answers. The first one to run out of time loses. The number of images shown varies according to how fast the contestants are answering. It ranges from approx. twelve to more than forty. Play continues until all players but one have lost.

I love learning and I find that game shows are excellent sources of culturally significant factoids. They illuminate also those areas of general interest which I should study further.

I feel that I did well above average in most categories and had more right answers faster than most of the contestants. There were obviously a few things here and there which I did not recognize or did not know their common name.

The reason that I am humbled is that there were several categories in which I had absolutely no idea who the image represented. From one to three dozen images shown for each and I knew none of them! I would have been unable to answer even if given unlimited time because I had absolutely no clue. I did not even know what might be used as keywords to do a google search.

A complete lack of knowledge in certain areas is to be expected because people have wildly varying interest and experience and all people have only cursory knowledge concerning a great many topics. This does not relieve me because all of the game show's material was considered general knowledge.

All episodes are available for viewing for free with commercials on: TubiTV
https://tubitv.com/series/300002258/the-floor
I believe that it is available for streaming on: Paramount but I have read that there are many more commercials than on: TubiTV.

I watched this over several weeks as it unfolded on Fox. Definitely a show with quite a few surprises as one player after another who seemed like they would go the distance cracked under pressure. Some of the categories were easier than others.

[Masha]

I watched this over several weeks as it unfolded on Fox. Definitely a show with quite a few surprises as one player after another who seemed like they would go the distance cracked under pressure. Some of the categories were easier than others.

I was disappointed that the categories for movies and Oscar winners were so heavily weighted towards the last decade. I had no clue to many of them and did not even recognize the names when they were revealed. I did find it odd when the contestant passed when shown the most iconic image from: Casablanca!

I kept track on one episode only: I knew every image shown to both contestants with no hesitation for four of the duels! I know that I would not have won even a single duel in any of varied sports and music categories. "Country and Western", "Hip-Hop" and "One Hit Wonders" were ones wherein I did not know even a single answer. There was one category outside sports and music in which I scored zero but my brain refuses to remember which it was.

I found the format quite intriguing. I do admit that I find it slightly unfair. One contestant won seven duels. Five others each won five duels. The overall winner won only three duels. Which categories were available for each challenge was a matter of luck.

I must wonder if the graphics on the floor were at least partially projections from below or were all added post-production.

There were ten one-hour episodes. Every contestant wore exactly the same clothes in each episode. I know that most half-hour game shows record many episodes in one day but I doubt that they could handle more than perhaps three of these episodes in one day. I learned of this programme by reading a mention of an off-strip book taking bets on who would win the twenty-thousand-dollar bonus in each episode. I wonder how much security the producers had to avoid pre-air reveals.

I am not a fan of: Rob Lowe when he was a darling of Hollywood but I was certainly surprised that he has already fallen so low as to be hosting a game show.

I admit a bit of pettiness that I actually clapped when pink-suit-trash-talker failed so spectacularly.

[CinemaInternational]

I watched this over several weeks as it unfolded on Fox. Definitely a show with quite a few surprises as one player after another who seemed like they would go the distance cracked under pressure. Some of the categories were easier than others.

I was disappointed that the categories for movies and Oscar winners were so heavily weighted towards the last decade. I had no clue to many of them and did not even recognize the names when they were revealed. I did find it odd when the contestant passed when shown the most iconic image from: Casablanca!

I kept track on one episode only: I knew every image shown to both contestants with no hesitation for four of the duels! I know that I would not have won even a single duel in any of varied sports and music categories. "Country and Western", "Hip-Hop" and "One Hit Wonders" were ones wherein I did not know even a single answer. There was one category outside sports and music in which I scored zero but my brain refuses to remember which it was.

I found the format quite intriguing. I do admit that I find it slightly unfair. One contestant won seven duels. Five others each won five duels. The overall winner won only three duels. Which categories were available for each challenge was a matter of luck.

I must wonder if the graphics on the floor were at least partially projections from below or were all added post-production.

There were ten one-hour episodes. Every contestant wore exactly the same clothes in each episode. I know that most half-hour game shows record many episodes in one day but I doubt that they could handle more than perhaps three of these episodes in one day. I learned of this programme by reading a mention of an off-strip book taking bets on who would win the twenty-thousand-dollar bonus in each episode. I wonder how much security the producers had to avoid pre-air reveals.

I am not a fan of: Rob Lowe when he was a darling of Hollywood but I was certainly surprised that he has already fallen so low as to be hosting a game show.

I admit a bit of pettiness that I actually clapped when pink-suit-trash-talker failed so spectacularly.

I kind of expected that the movie categories would skew newer, but I wish they had included some earlier films, because as it stood, it looked as though it could just be recent airings on HBO. It is pretty sad when Casablanca wasn't recognized. And given their enduring popularity, I was shocked that they didn't have images for My Fair Lady or The Sound of Music. Instead, they had Coda, which already feels as though it is little talked-about.

I didn't do well with the sports categories, and Hip-Hop wasn't much better for me. The last category (Fashion) was another that had a lot of faces I didn't know....

I was disappointed by the round of 80s Television, which focused almost completely on fluffy, kid-oriented sitcoms (My Two Dads and Silver Spoons? Really?) while largely ignoring the truly good shows of the era (St. Elsewhere, Cagney and Lacey, Newhart, LA Law, thirtysomething, China Beach, etc.). And they threw in a ringer: The Facts of Life debuted in August of 1979. Oh well, at least Moonlighting and Murder She Wrote were included. But it's surprising that they could not even include Dynasty....

As for Rob Lowe, I know he has kind of been a TV fixture since 1999 wandering from one show to another (West Wing, Brothers and Sisters, Parks and Recreation, 911:Lone Star) and assume he was made host because the latter show is also a Fox show, and they probably got a discount for having him host as well. I think he was fine here, and I did have to chuckle a little when his eyes bulged in the child star round when one of the contestants passed on an image of Jodie Foster, his co-star in 1984's notorious The Hotel New Hampshire.

And yes, the man in the hot pink suit was awfully sure of himself, and then, when it was his turn, he dropped like a stone. Excessive vanity does nobody any favors, and it's irritating to see.

[dianedebuda]

I only recall seeing Cocoon once... I still kind of liked it overall, but it's not a masterpiece or anything.

Agree it's not a masterpiece, but don't think it was made with aims of being anything more than a couple of hours of relaxing entertainment.

Spielberg has made some great films (ET, The Color Purple, Empire of the Sun), but also some that just don't work (1941, Hook, Amistad, The Post). And he had two very good films that missed masterpiece status because of one decison (Schindler's List, AI).

So what was the one decision that made those miss masterpiece status for you? After seeing your brief list of how you rate some of his films, I ventured over IMDB to see a full list of his films. Guess I've seen about 2/3 of them; some I like, some not. A lot of them I only remember seeing after reading the synopsis ... like the A.I. that you mention. So guess that one didn't even come close to masterpiece for me.

[CinemaInternational]

I only recall seeing Cocoon once... I still kind of liked it overall, but it's not a masterpiece or anything.

Agree it's not a masterpiece, but don't think it was made with aims of being anything more than a couple of hours of relaxing entertainment.

Spielberg has made some great films (ET, The Color Purple, Empire of the Sun), but also some that just don't work (1941, Hook, Amistad, The Post). And he had two very good films that missed masterpiece status because of one decison (Schindler's List, AI).

So what was the one decision that made those miss masterpiece status for you? After seeing your brief list of how you rate some of his films, I ventured over IMDB to see a full list of his films. Guess I've seen about 2/3 of them; some I like, some not. A lot of them I only remember seeing after reading the synopsis ... like the A.I. that you mention. So guess that one didn't even come close to masterpiece for me.

AI had trouble with some tonal whiplash (perhaps because it was originally supposed to be a Kubrick project). It's a very dark story, and at times, Spielberg has it waffling toward sentiment, and I'm not sure if it fully comes off in the end.

Schindler's List, on the other hand, the issue is very clear: Liam Neeson is far too low-key and introspective in the role except for his big scene at the end. And as such, the one character that is supposed to be importantgets swamped in the personality stakes by all three of the main supporting players (Kingsley, Fiennes, and Embeth Davidtz), thus creating an imbalance at the center of the film. I wish they had hired some actor who was a bit livelier, like maybe Kevin Kline.

[dianedebuda]

AI had trouble with some tonal whiplash (perhaps because it was originally supposed to be a Kubrick project). It's a very dark story, and at times, Spielberg has it waffling toward sentiment, and I'm not sure if it fully comes off in the end.

From what I read, most of the sentiment suprisingly came from Kubrick. I can't think of a single Kubrick film that I've liked except Sparticus (1960) where he didn't put much of "his" stamp on the movie's tone.

Schindler's List, on the other hand, the issue is very clear: Liam Neeson is far too low-key and introspective in the role except for his big scene at the end. And as such, the one character that is supposed to be important gets swamped in the personality stakes by all three of the main supporting players (Kingsley, Fiennes, and Embeth Davidtz), thus creating an imbalance at the center of the film. I wish they had hired some actor who was a bit livelier, like maybe Kevin Kline.

Disagree. If Neeson's character wasn't continually perceived as low-key, he wouldn't have pulled off what he did. When I watched it years ago, felt his Schindler character was wearing a mask that well hid his innerself. Been years since I've seen this, but that's was my take-away.