Open the Pod Bay Doors, HAL

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Tuesday, May 4, 2010

The Space Needle considered as an unguarded ham sandwich. Or maybe a squirrel.

By Mark Bourne
Tags: Elizabeth, Kai, Seattle
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Mark Bourne
Open the Pod Bay Doors, HAL is my "mostly movies" blog. It's a work in progress, but then aren't we all?

I'm a Seattle-based writer who enjoys, well, a lot of things: movies, theater, books, astronomy, science fiction, a sense of humor, the lambent amber of firelight through Bowmore Darkest Islay, dogs, the combination of chocolate and orange....

My main site: www.markbourne.com
Email: mark[at]markbourne.com
Twitter: @BourneInSeattle
View my complete profile

Previously on Open the Pod Bay Doors, Hal:

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    • ►  October (22)
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    • ►  May (24)
    • ►  April (12)
    • ►  March (20)
    • ►  February (11)
    • ►  January (4)
  • ▼  2010 (134)
    • ►  December (8)
    • ►  November (8)
    • ►  October (13)
    • ►  September (9)
    • ►  August (10)
    • ►  July (15)
    • ►  June (15)
    • ▼  May (14)
      • Talk about having an old friend for dinner...
      • Pic pick: "Chungking Express"
      • Close Encounters of the Cool Job Kind
      • Blazing Saddles (1974) — Excuse me while I whip th...
      • From A to Zuul
      • The Circus (1928) — Chaplin between the mirrors
      • Mashup: Clip from Buster Keaton's "The Navigator" ...
      • The Fall (2008) — Paint me a story, Singh me a dream
      • Scenes I love: French Cancan (1955) — Renoir, c'es...
      • Alternate universe movies: "The Maltese Falcon" wi...
      • When Peter Cushing played the chap in the TARDIS...
      • The Spirit of the Beehive (1973) — Spanish class
      • Pic pick: We've all had days like this
      • The Space Needle considered as an unguarded ham sa...
    • ►  April (24)
    • ►  March (18)

Popular feature posts

  • Alternate universe movies: "The Maltese Falcon" with Gene Tierney instead of Mary Astor
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  • Bedazzled (1967) — Giving the devil his due
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  • Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) — Mint julips and hot slips
  • Charley Bowers — Breaking a few eggs
  • Eugene O'Neill with a Groucho chaser; or, Hello, I must be blogging
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  • For that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives
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  • Freaks (1932): Sex and the single freak
  • Happy 90th birthday, Ray Bradbury — A bit about Mr. B and me
  • Hoffman (1970) — What fits in the middle
  • Hugo — Dear Martin Scorsese: Thank you for making a movie just for me
  • I Love You, Alice B. Toklas (1968) — Making a hash of it
  • I'm All Right, Jack (1959) — For the benefit of Mr. Kite
  • Junebug (2005) — Family happens
  • Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949) — Murder by numbers, 1, 2 ... 8
  • Notes while watching "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" for the xxth time since childhood
  • Octoberfilms: House of Usher & The Pit and the Pendulum (1960, '61) — Poe-try in motion
  • Octoberfilms: Häxan / Witchcraft Through the Ages — Danish diabolism
  • Octoberfilms: Night of the Demon (1957) — The hell you say
  • Octoberfilms: The Abominable Dr. Phibes & Dr. Phibes Rises Again (1971, '72) — Curses!
  • Octoberfilms: The Haunting (1963) — In the night, in the dark....
  • Octoberfilms: The Innocents (1961) — The screw turns
  • Octoberfilms: The Masque of the Red Death & The Premature Burial (1964, '62)
  • Octoberfilms: The Tomb of Ligeia / An Evening with Edgar Allan Poe (1964, '70)
  • Of lighthouses and foghorns and beasts from evocative fathoms
  • Our Man Flint (1966) and In Like Flint (1967) — double-naught spoofs
  • Petulia (1968) — Uncommon
  • Random thoughts on "Midnight in Paris"
  • Scenes I love: "The Third Man" — a slice of Lime
  • Scenes I love: Charlie Chaplin's science fiction movie (from "Modern Times")
  • Scenes I love: French Cancan (1955) — Renoir, c'est moi‎!
  • Scenes I love: WWBD
  • Shortbus (2006) — Think kink
  • SIFF — 7 films: Detective Dee, Young Goethe, Lovecraft, John Cleese, and more
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  • SIFF — Natural Selection
  • SIFF — Paper Birds (Pájaros de Papel)
  • SIFF — Perfect Sense
  • SIFF — The Names of Love
  • SIFF — The Thief of Bagdad: Re-imagined by Shadoe Stevens with the Music of E.L.O.
  • SIFF — The Trip
  • SIFF — Troll Hunter
  • Some Like It Hot (1959) — The sweet end of the lollipop
  • Stephen Tobolowsky's Birthday Party (2005) — Bing! And many more
  • The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989) — Going somewhere on hot air and fantasy
  • The Circus (1928) — Chaplin between the mirrors
  • The Crawling Eye (1958) — Set LASIK blasters on "poke"
  • The Fall (2008) — Paint me a story, Singh me a dream
  • The Iceman Cometh (1960) — Mr. Robards, meet Mr. Lumet, and get that Redford kid in here
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  • The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming (1966) — It's a Vlad, Vlad, Vlad, Vlad world
  • The Spirit of the Beehive (1973) — Spanish class
  • The Time Machine (1960) — Taking you where you want to go
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  • Things to Come (1936) — H.G. Wells explains it all for you
  • Tis the season for Sherlock
  • To Kill a Mockingbird (1962) — Another man's skin
  • Watching "The Artist", feeling the "Vertigo"
  • When Worlds Collide (1951) — Apocalypse Whoa
  • Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942) — It's a grand ol' film
  • Yeah, I know, and such small portions
"Jack Cole's 'Plastic Man' belongs high on any adult's How to Avoid Prozac list, up there with the best of S.J. Perelman, Laurel and Hardy, Damon Runyon, Tex Avery and the Marx Brothers." — Art Spiegelman, The New Yorker

"You know what your problem is? It's that you haven't seen enough movies. All of life's riddles are answered in the movies.” — Steve Martin, Grand Canyon

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Nick: "I'm a hero. I was shot twice in the Tribune."
Nora: "I read you were shot five times in the tabloids."
Nick: "It's not true. He didn't come anywhere near my tabloids."
— Myrna Loy and William Powell, The Thin Man


"I always dress appropriately and impeccably for all occasions. I would show you a snapshot of myself in a G-string, taken at Simm-La, with a flying wombat, dingo dog and a wily platypus." — Professor Posthlewhistle (W.C. Fields)

"Humor can get in under the door while seriousness is still fumbling at the handle." — G.K. Chesterton

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"Those are my principles, and if you don't like them ... well, I have others." — Groucho Marx

“Liar, liar, liar, liar, liar, liar / Truth is hard and tough as nails / That's why we need fairy tales.”
— from Munchhausen (1931) by Weimar Berlin cabaret composer Friedrich Hollaender

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