Author: edbaruch

I was in my favorite Thai restaurant when who should come in but Seth Rogen with some friends. I don’t usually sneak a picture but seeing as he choked and spanked my wife in his last film I decided to risk it. He looked beautiful and one of the last times I saw him he was yelling at my fiancee warning her not to marry me.

Ladies and Gentlemen I give you…Seth Rogen!!!

https://images.app.goo.gl/aAJDFeBeXqxbWr229

“Above all, don’t lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love.” 
― Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

I slowly piece this together from a photo off Babbitts Blog. I tried to have it confirmed but the guy I message said to me…you really have something there, some of the people are still alive and very powerful so I can’t help you. It’s paraphrased. He was nice enough to talk to me. They get more complex as I move along.

There may be a duplicate and some out of order but I wanted it up and I’ve spent enough time on this photo. Enjoy…if you don’t like it…don’t enjoy!

It appears my contract was renewed, as best I can tell. I didn’t know it was up for renewal but people felt I did a good job and was in good part responsible for a more robust economy. This is high praise and something I would strive for.

The audience in Cape May were pleasantly surprised that I was still there, which is about as warm a welcome as I could hope for, which was a clue to the contract renewal…no one thought I’d make it this far. Actually, most of them didn’t believe I’d still be alive!!!

There’s been an upgrade in my title which despite my attempts to downplay with some humility…I like! Me Likee!!!

My pay is unchanged but as Gandhi would say…it costs my friends a fortune to keep me in poverty.

Thanks to all and blessings to all!

ed out

I think we hit a triple threat here. Starting with Succession again; we’ve got Matthew Macfadyen posting a very serious appearance to Tom Hanks, likely father and son. Below that we’ve added Garry Shandling who I previously shown to be Tom Hanks father. Belated thanks to Tom Hanks who came to visit me in the office. He studied me with kind of a stunned quizzical appearance. Nice to meet!!!

I’m watching succession and Rob Yang is a standout, so is everyone but I have a soft spot for Asians and I’m a huge fan of Chinese Cinema and Donnie Yen. So her they are …

Yen and Yang

Hey Hey Kikowitz!!!

(not reviewed for errors in language)

This is a very difficult review to write. All of my favorite actors, great director and at best a “B-” film. I’m not going to pull my punches, I think it would be a disservice to everyone and I’ve regretted doing that before.

I know everyone worked hard on it, it was expensive to make but I also suspect the Hollywood community was not thrilled with it either. Though it wasn’t entirely bad there should be a lemon law for films.

Let’s look at Orson Welles’ hodge-podge of a film, the recently released “The Other Side of the Wind.” A film about the Hollywood Community, almost 50 years old and tremendously captivating. (I periodically see John Huston in my gym who acted in this film. He’s a million years old and supposed to be dead but he doesn’t appear to be. Always a pleasure Mr. Huston.)

Once Upon A Time In Hollywood is also a hodge-podge of a film but nowhere near as captivating. The film drags and in boring for the bulk of it. There are cherries interspersed in it but it’s a Quentin Tarantino film and at the very least I do not expect to be bored. It drags on painfully slowly, so painfully that the fun parts are erased in that pain. It borders on what I would call non-nutritive filmmaking and again, this is Tarantino so I have no expectation of this.

The highlights of the film are most of what Brad Pitt does without Leonardo DiCaprio. I am a huge fan of Leonardo. I’ve seen the majority of his films, loved them all and even spotted him on Dancing With The Stars as Derek Hough and on “The Walking Dead” as Norman Reedus…nice big find. I painfully have to say that I think something was lacking here for him and I don’t think it was Leonardo, I got blame the script, I don’t think it can be him.

Brad Pitt who I strongly suspect is Ron Howard was tremendous in the film. The dog he was with made a terrific sidekick and the two of them were hysterically funny and provided the best action in the film.

Leonardo was probably just playing the role he was handed, probably doing a good job of it but I think some of it fell flat.

The real action started over 2 hours into the film where it went full Tarantino: All the usual craziness, action, violence and again the terrific synergy with Pitt and his pit bull. Great stuff with a flame thrower and some guns but I don’t think Leonardo was grim enough in this film and that may because Pitt held a more grim role and Leonardo played into some of the comic relief. It’s tough to explain why this didn’t work for me since I’ve said he is my favorite actor.

I was pleased to see Margot Robbie in the cast. She’s a terrific actress and very easy on the eyes. I keep a figurine of her on my desk as Harley Quinn and tell everyone she’s my wife, which they laugh at and I tell them it’s no laughing matter because her father keeps us apart.

Margot is underutilized in this film. Come on guys…really?! Seemingly 9/10 of the time she’s just walking around in a short skirt and smiling, just not good enough. Give us more Margot!!

And another thing…how does anyone make a bad film about Charles Manson and his crew? Half the movie endlessly dragged on, great scenery, great TV clips and endless blah, blah, blah dialogue about Hollywood. Really impertinent and again this is a Tarantino film!! Remember Kill Bill? How about Django Unchained? Also with Leonardo. And the man, Quentin, had all the discretion to write the film however the fuck he wanted. He changed much of the story at the end, though the Ranch part was great and seeing Bruce Dern is always a treat but he could have done whatever he wanted with these characters and screw history.

What would I have done differently? The argument that the film was too long does not work for me. “Inception” again with Leonardo is about 15 minutes shorter but no one and I mean no one left the theater to go to the bathroom; pure excitement from beginning to end…mostly.

I would have cut about 40 minutes out, left in the great Tarantino action sequence at the end but added another Tarantino action sequence over at the Tate residence next door. That would be glorious!!! You’d have Sharon Tate there, pregnant who played by Robbie could have put up a hell of a fight. Not a short sequence but one of those on and on sequences that Tarantino is famous for.

I give the film a B-. I thought it a major disappointment. Part of the problem was the coming attractions were so fucking good that the film in contrast landed on it’s face.

Oh, BTW, Sharon Tate is still alive. The whole thing was a sham just like the OJ killing. I hope you guys are enjoying these fake shootings. Fuck you, fuck all of you, really…scumbags in the midst.  

It points out the difficulties of living in Brooklyn.

the situation is not the same, I did not want to get beat up with Billy and I didn’t intervene.

What he did was wrong beating up Billy and what Billy did was ill advised.

I guess there’s a little bit of coward in all of us, or sensibilities

In life you have to pick your battles

If you’re living in anger over this then you have some introspection to do, the issue is about you.

Mr. Towel

Back to Billy Lieberman and his beating. I’m still glad I didn’t intervene, nice or not and I’m sorry Billy took the beating but it wasn’t my fault and in Brooklyn sometimes you had to take a beating to avoid something worse.

Brooklyn could be a very difficult and callous place where kindness was often in short supply.

I got into it once with my homeroom teacher senior year in high school

His name was Mr. Towel, not a precise spell but pretty close. Mr. Towel was a tall thin good-looking guy, 30ish and a bit like a tall Burt Reynolds; and from what I found out later but didn’t know at the time…he was a gym teacher.

I never had words with him; I sat quietly and waited for first class to start. One of the girls in the class used to hang with him off to the side of his desk on some large cabinet and talk every morning.  This girl was tall as well, 17 or 18, also thin and…absolutely gorgeous. I never focused on her or him much, they were engaged in some kind of relationship and in a way were kind of perfect for each other, beautiful together. They had feelings for each other. She would have been out of my league if I got even that far to consider which I never did. I was a senior in high school and all of 15 or 16.

One homeroom they were hanging out as usual. I was sitting in my seat doing absolutely nothing when Mr. Towel, for no apparent reason turned to me, in front of this girl and the class and yelled… “Hey Baruch…you fat Jew boy!!!” He let loose a long smile. The girl looked aghast when he said that to me. She looked me in the eye for a moment with panic, fear and dread…not what I expected from her. She didn’t laugh, she didn’t smile, she didn’t smirk. Again, I had never had words of any sort with this guy and this was about to turn into one of the largest mistakes of his life (by the way I get soundly assaulted in this story despite that).

I looked at him and said, “You’re an anti-Semite!”

He responded, “How can I be an anti-Semite? I’m Jewish myself!” Another big smile rolled across his face with a laugh.

I had just finished a short story by either Vonnegut or Ellison where the protagonist attends a neo-Nazi rally and turns out to be Jewish.

“That’s even worse!” I said, “There are Jewish anti-Semites,” essentially putting a cigarette out in his nose and I looked down at my desk. The bell rang and the girl left in a panic. He was none too happy with me.

I got up to leave and found myself face to face with him at my desk. He towered over me.

He said, “Why did you have to say that?” I must have ruined whatever was going on with the girl.

I exclaimed to him, “You called me an anti-Semite.”

“You know I was only joking,” he said. Then he kicked me in the shins and delivered an evil smile. He was wearing a pair of wooden clogs which was popular in those days. It hurt when he kicked me but I was not one to back down and this was Brooklyn.  

I said something back to him and kicked him back in the shins. He kicked me again. I kicked him back. He did it again. At that point I decided this was futile, going nowhere, and it was starting to really hurt and I knew I’d be bruised for days. I turned to leave, had my books and things in my hands and he grabbed me around my neck from behind and picked me up off the floor by my neck.

I simply could not breathe and he held me up in the air like that. I dropped all my books but I kept my paddle pall racket in my hand. I was really good at the game. My brother gave me the racket for my birthday and it had a heavy band of aluminum around the circumference for added weight and stability. I weighed whether I should smash him in the head with it. That would have made him let me go but I didn’t believe this would go well with my parents, or the police or the school at least initially and I decided to wait it out, he had to drop me sooner or later. I’m guessing I was up there for 15-30 seconds when he finally let go. I fell to the floor and caught up on my breathing while he looked at me with fury and a look that said, “That will teach you.” He dodged out of the room.

I was a mess, in tears going to my next class which fortunately was American History/Economics taught by the assistant dean of students who liked me and I got along with him really well. I waited for him outside of class. Kindness was not in short supply with this man. He saw me in tears, asked me what was wrong and I told him the story. He told me the gym teachers could get rough and that he would handle it. His name was Mr. Hymen, correct spelling, and he was Jewish too and he was a gem! The students really liked him and the girls in the class chipped in and bought him jigsaw puzzle called, “Bridget in the Buff,” which featured a smiling, overweight young lady wearing nothing but a couple rolls of fat! It was a huge chutzpah move by the girls and he was really pleased with the gift and promised to do that puzzle when he got home. It was a really warming moment.

We finished talking. He told me to get myself together and come back to class when I was ready and he would take care of it.

The next day when I went back to homeroom. Mr. Towel was sullenly sitting at his desk. He didn’t look at me at all. The girl was nowhere to be found, probably on the other side of the room. He never bothered me again and he never taught at that high school again. His contract was not renewed. He apparently had run into some other issues as well.

Moral of the story…sometimes it’s better to take the beating.

Thoughts about the event: I’ve had a lot of time to think through these events. I think I handled it well. I never touched the guy except for returning shin kicks. In Brooklyn you just cant let yourself get abused without some fighting back.

Towel spent day after day with that girl. She was young but was probably 18. He was probably grooming her for an affair, maybe smart enough to wait for graduation to get together. I guess I couldn’t blame him for that but he used my back to climb on to get to the girl.

They must have been at the part of the relationship where they were discussing religion. He was Jewish and I suspect she was Italian so Roman Catholic. She must have asked if that was a problem. I believe he was trying to prove to her that it didn’t matter and to prove it decided to show how funny it was when he called me a fat Jew boy and he laughed along gaily. I didn’t find it funny at all. My family was in the Holocaust and it was worse hearing an anti-Semitic comment from another Jew.

In all fairness it probably wasn’t entirely Towel’s fault this happened since it turned out he was born on, “I’m A Big Fucking Douche Bag Day.” So there is that.

Some of the kids from the class watched what happened including two Italian guys I would hang with. They asked me the next day why I didn’t hit him, they saw the paddle ball racket in my hand. I explained my fears and they said they would have stood up for me…they were outraged by the whole thing. This really made me feel good about things. I felt supported.

About the girl…I misread her as a Brooklyn “Hitter” (someone out of Saturday Night Fever which was filmed in my neighborhood) and only recently, reviewing the situation and “watching the tapes” I realized what a truly sweet and delicate girl she really was. He was coarse and grotesque but showed her attention. They looked beautiful together but she was too good for him, young and fresh and a bit naïve at the time. I’m really sorry she was put through that but I did her a favor and I took a beating for it. The man had real issues, she was wonderful and he was lacking.

ed out