Latex Free (Mad Men 411)

Peggy's relationship with Abe Drexler marks a point of personal growth on her part which is conveyed through her work on the Playtex account. Whether it be Pete Campbell, Duck Phillips, or Mark Kerney, Peggy's past involvement with men has been characterized by a noticeable level of detachment on her part. For a variety of reasons, something has always kept her from being, as Megan might say, totally in the moment. Abe Drexler seems to have awakened for Peggy an awareness of new feelings.

The Playtex campaign in "Chinese Wall" revolves around "touch" while Peggy and Abe's encounters are pointedly characterized by touching. Abe brushes sand off Peggy's arm in the car. Peggy runs her hands down Abe's back the next morning. And just as the women depicted in the Playtex ads take off their gloves to experience sensuous things, Abe seems to have allowed Peggy to take down emotional barriers which have hampered her previous relationships.

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Original G: (Spartacus)

Today marks the 50th anniversary of Stanley Kubrick’s Spartacus. The 1960 epic set in ancient Rome boasts an all-star cast led by Kirk Douglas and includes: Tony Curtis, Laurence Olivier, Charles Laughton, Peter Ustinov, Jean Simmons and John Gavin. Kubrick was called in to direct replacing Anthony Mann when creative differences with Douglas (who also was producing) caused him to be removed from the project. This may certainly explain why Spartacus doesn’t seem like a traditional Kubrick film. Unlike Kubrick’s other efforts (especially his later films) which tend to observe characters from a dispassionate distance, in Spartacus there's a stronger feeling of being ensconced in the narrative.

Full Post at Edward Copeland On Film...
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Closing Time (Mad Men 411)

Because I teach business courses part-time, I often watch Mad Men and imagine how I'd apply marketing concepts discussed in class to a particular episode. It's been difficult to do this in Season 4. At the risk of splitting hairs, Mad Men takes place in an ad agency, but it's not necessarily about an ad agency. Certainly, the writers do their homework and Men Men gets the advertising stuff more right than, say, Star Trek's regular disregard for the laws of the physics. But, episodes like "The Wheel" — a textbook example of how to sell a product's benefits (sizzle) rather than its features (steak) — have taken a backseat to the development of character-driven storylines. I'm just humbly pointing this out, not complaining.

That said, "Chinese Wall" could be screened in a "Techniques of Selling" class. The different sales calls it depicts are worthy of an academic discussion. One question I'd assign the class to consider while watching it would be:

How would you rank the salespeople depicted in this episode?

...Full Post at Basket of Kisses

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Licence to Pan (Mad Men 410)

When he surprises his daughter Sally with Beatles tickets in "Hands and Knees," Don Draper quips that he'll be wearing earplugs to the concert. Coincidentally, James Bond, another fictional 60's character had the same reaction to the "Fab Four."

In Goldfinger, 007 (Sean Connery) is assigned to observe international smuggler Auric Goldfinger. Bond (being Bond) has a tryst in Miami Beach with one of Goldfinger's sexy employees, Jill Masterson (Shirley Eaton). At one point, he abruptly leaves the bed they're sharing to fetch another bottle of champagne after the first one loses "its chill." When the soon to be gilded Masterson playfully protests the interruption, the secret agent/gourmand explains:

My dear girl there are some things that just aren't done, such as drinking Dom Pérignon '53 above a temperature of 38 degrees Fahrenheit. That's as bad as listening to the Beatles without earmuffs!

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Step One: Don't Buy It

Did Christopher L. Hoyt, the author of How To Raise Your Daughter Without Reading A Book: One Dad's Rules to Live By, realize the irony of its title?

The editor?

Anyone involved in its publication?

I guess not.
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Worlds Collide

Tony Curtis passes away on the same day that the Flintstones turn 50. The "Stoney Curtis" episode is one I still remember from childhood.

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Use The Glasses Luke

I'm calling it. George Lucas is "officially" trying to milk us.

From MTV (bold added):

'Star Wars' Series To Be Re-Released In 3-D

George Lucas plans to roll out converted films one at a time, beginning with 'Phantom Menace' in 2012.

...Lucas' famed Industrial Light & Magic special-effects shop will oversee the 3-D conversion. Considering the flack some filmmakers have received for converting to 3-D after the fact to ill effect, Lucas promised in a press release that the greatest care will be taken not to tarnish the "Star Wars" legend.

Too late.
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Windows to the Soul?

The unfortunate "demon" picture taken of Hillary Clinton is the inspiration for the "Screenshot of the Week."

Caption this photo. Some intials suggestions include:

1. Merrin. Send us Merrin!
2. I must think of a brick wall... a brick wall... brick wall...
3. You're next, YOU'RE NEXT!
4. 'Cause this is thriller, thriller night.

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Facades (Mad Men 410)

A recurring device used in "Hands and Knees" has characters putting on performances for the benefit of others upon exiting private personal conversations. While this device is overtly employed throughout the episode, the last occurrence of it is perhaps the most subtle and interesting.

...Full Post at Basket of Kisses.
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Let's Do The Time Warp Again!

Edward Copeland takes us on a "strange journey" as he celebrates the 35th anniversary of The Rocky Horror Picture Show with an eclectic collection of anecdotes (including one from yours truly).

I propose a toast!
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Out of Sight, Out of Mind? (Mad Men 409)

When Joan and Roger are robbed at gunpoint by an African American in "The Beautiful Girls," they deliberately avoid making eye contact. Roger hopes that by not looking at the criminal, the two represent less of a threat (i.e. they won't be prosecution witnesses later on) and avoid an escalation of violence.

Interestingly, that posture also mirrors Mad Men's use of minorities in Season 4. Nine episodes in and the audience has seen very few black characters. In fact, they've had less an impact on the storylines than previously. Matt Zoller Seitz, a critic and Mad Men fan, touches on this in his recap of "The Beautiful Girl" for The New Republic. He ponders if rather than civil rights in general, women's rights are "the show's true interest" this season.

The only black characters on this show have been domestics and elevator operators—and now a mugger. Even if you take the show’s upper-middle-class white milieu into account, the arms-length respect paid to African American sacrifice feels like an evasion posing as an acknowledgment. The topic is so rich, and still so emotionally powerful, that treating it as a looming presence and nothing more is dramatically risky. Whatever “Mad Men” is doing here, it had better pay off.

He (nor I, for that matter) question the motives of Matt Weiner and company in taking this approach. Nonetheless, it's a choice worth noting.
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Narrative Panache: Game Change

Respected historian Stephen Ambrose liked to tell an anecdote about having been contacted by President Eisenhower to write his biography. However, as reported by Richard Rayner in a New Yorker article, such a request probably never took place. John Eisenhower, son of the late president, said that Ambrose had a "tendency to sacrifice fact to narrative panache."

One of my favorite contemporary "nonfiction" authors, Bob Woodward, writes in a style that often reads like a novel. More than a few people have questioned the veracity of Woodward's reporting. Still, at the end of the day, I can walk away from a work by Ambrose or Woodward feeling that I was given a fair and accurate telling of history.

Not so much the case with this year's Game Change by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin. Heilemann and Halperin's previous effort, The Way to Win: Taking the White House in 2008, was more political analysis than reportage. So, one could forgive the subjective musings which were freely mixed in with factual content. However, Game Change is a purported to be a chronicle of events leading up to Barack Obama's victory over John McCain in the 2008 presidential election. Thus, I held the duo to a different standard in terms of accuracy.

...Full Post at Edward Copeland on Film
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Moscow? Are You Sure?

Here's the first entry in my new "Screenshot of the Week" feature (hopefully I'll keep it going).

It's an unintentionally funny shot from my SECOND favorite accidental nuclear accident movie, 1964's "Fail-Safe." It's good (very good) for 1964. But, it certainly hasn't aged anywhere near as well as "Dr. Strangelove" (also 1964) which feels like it could have been made yesterday. And as last lines go, "Mein Führer! I can walk" after the doomsday device goes off is a million times better than the pilot in "Fail-Safe" ranting "I'm the matador!" as he bombs New York.

The shot above is from the scene in "Fail-Safe" where the pilot opens his bombing instructions after accidentally getting the "go" order. In typical Hollywood fashion, instead of charts, maps or other particulars, we simply see an envelope with "MOSCOW" printed on it.

I submit that Copperplate Gothic Black would have been a much more frightening font.
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By The Numbers

Tonight the premiere episode of "Detroit 1-8-7" airs on ABC. So, I finally decided to figure out what the hell "187" meant. It didn't correspond to anything local I could put my finger on. To my surprise it actually refers to the section of California legal code dealing with homicide.

California legal code?

Jeez. Why have a West Coast term as the basis for the title of a show touted in promtional ads as "Made in Detroit?" After doing a little more digging, I discovered that "187" supposedly has become urban slang for "murder" (as "5-0" is for "police").

Okay, I guess I get it. But, I'm still not sold. To me, it still sorta rings false, -- like "Ford Camaro."

Chad Halcom had a great take on it in Crain's Detroit Business:

Maybe 'Detroit 7-5-0' didn't test well

...the Michigan statute, which presumably our stalwart detective protagonists will be enforcing this fall season, is actually MCL 750.316 et seq.

There is no Chapter 187 of the Michigan Compiled Laws, although three of the most commonly cited “Act 187” statutes here address pest control (P.A. 187 of 1965, MCL 286.501), the proper qualifications of school bus drivers (P.A. 187 of 1990, MCL 257.1801) or the proper wording and form that mortgages, warranty deeds and quit claim deeds must take (Act 187 of 1881, MCL 565.151).

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Do NOT Come Out of There (Mad Men 409)

Miss Blankenship's improved vision after eye surgery was a metaphor for Don's increased awareness of the world around him in "The Summer Man." Her "health" is again used as a motif in the aptly titled "The Beautiful Girls." Similar to how the death of Gene (fascinated by the fall of the Roman Empire) signaled that change would be coming last season, Blankenship's death seems to denote the start of a shifting of mores for women.

I don't think it's an accident that right after Peggy sees Blankenship's head hit the desk, she runs into Don's office to find Sally sitting in his chair. "Do NOT come out of there," Peggy tells Sally. This is ostensibly to spare the young girl from seeing the macabre scene outside. However, on a symbolic level, I'd argue that it also represents Peggy's glimpse at a world where women hold positions of power formerly reserved for men.

...Full Post at Basket of Kisses
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Trick Question

According to The Daily Beast, which of these college campuses is the safest?
a) Harvard
b) Stanford
c) University of Michigan
d) Wayne State

Answer: My alma mater Wayne State University in DETROIT! Go Warriors!!

3. Harvard University - Cambridge, Massachusetts

Total enrollment: 27,651

Murders: 1

Negligent Homicides: 0

Forcible Rapes: 128

Non-forcible Rapes: 0

Robberies: 151

Aggravated Assaults: 170

Burglaries: 909

Car Thefts: 157

Arsons: 1

20. Stanford University - Palo Alto, California

Total enrollment: 18,498

Murders: 0

Negligent Homicides: 0

Forcible Rapes: 34

Non-forcible Rapes: 2

Robberies: 14

Aggravated Assaults: 36

Burglaries: 466

Car Thefts: 136

Arsons: 14

23. University of Michigan-Ann Arbor - Ann Arbor, Michigan

Total enrollment: 41,674

Murders: 20

Negligent Homicides: 0

Forcible Rapes: N/A

Non-forcible Rapes: N/A

Robberies: 249

Aggravated Assaults: 675

Burglaries: 115

Car Thefts: 142

Arsons: 100

32. Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan

Total enrollment: 31,786

Murders: 0

Negligent Homicides: 0

Forcible Rapes: 20

Non-forcible Rapes: 0

Robberies: 113

Aggravated Assaults: 23

Burglaries: 167

Car Thefts: 384

Arsons: 3

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Amazing Grace (Mad Men 408)

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.
"Amazing Grace," John Newton

A very pointed use of metaphor in "The Summer Man," has Miss Blankenship wearing dark glasses after eye surgery. Quoting from "Amazing Grace," John Newton's famous hymn partly inspired by the biblical story of a blind beggar (New Testament hobo) who regains his vision, Blankenship tells Don that she once was blind, but now can see.

The central storyline of "The Summer Man" involves Don's efforts to get his life back on track after seeing what he has become.

...Full Post at Basket of Kisses.
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The Dolly Zoom Effect (Mad Men 408)

I previously posted a comparison between Don's state of mind in Season 4 to "Scotty" Ferguson's (Jimmy Stewart) in Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo.

In Vertigo, Hitchcock visually depicted the unsteadiness caused by Ferguson's condition through the use of what's now known as the "dolly zoom" effect. A camera is rolled in one direction while the zoom level is adjusted in the opposite direction. Steven Spielberg also famously used the technique to show Sheriff Brody's reaction after a brutal shark attack in Jaws.

Geek that I am, I bring up this esoterica because one particular shot in "The Summer Man" employs the effect as well. During the Mountain Dew creative meeting, a dolly zoom occurs as Don experiences a momentary anxiety attack.

Vertigo's Dolly Zoom effect (at 2:05 and 2:15 of clip):


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Viral Gonads

This Axe YouTube "infomercial" had me in stitches.

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Just Do It (Mad Men 407)

Don's rejection of Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali in "The Suitcase" reflects more than the simple bigotry exhibited by Miss Blankenship. There's no denying that the dislike for Ali felt by many whites had a racial component to it. However, I think in the context of the episode, the boxing champion who, like Don, reinvented himself by changing his name hits too close to home (Don bets against Ali right after Stan remarks that "Clay would make one hell of an ad man").

It's noteworthy that the other sports legend rejected by Don is Joe Namath.

...Full Post at Basket of Kisses.
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