What the Cats Missed this Week

Published on by D. G. Hart

I am a fan of Canadian cinema and a lover of cats. This combination made Good Neighbors a reasonably good pick. The movie is set in Montreal and is film noir lite, with cats playing important parts in the story line. I could have done without the slasher aspect of a couple scenes, aging metrosexual that I am. But still worthwhile.

I also took a look at the original movie version of Graham Greene’s The Quiet American. It is set in 1950s Saigon and explores dimensions of the civil war that will entice the United States to fight communism in Southeast Asia. Greene’s depiction of American idealism and naivete about foreign policy is particularly astute, though it may also stem from resentment that the Brits are no longer running the world. This is a better movie than the remake, though Craig Armstrong’s soundtrack for the 2002 version may tip the scales in the other direction.

For anyone who cares about Breaking Bad, I took another try at episode five of season one. I began to see a little more of the appeal. But I also identified two reservations that may prevent me from jumping on the BB bandwagon, and they are related. First, unlike The Wire, Breaking Bad has no urban credibility. I understand it is not supposed to be set in a city or in the Northeast. But without an urban dimension, the show so far lacks an edge. Meth in the suburbs just doesn’t grip the way that heroine in the city does. And this leads to the second reservation. The show has no obvious sense of place. If Breaking Bad doesn’t want to tap the rhythms and sense of Baltimore drug-running, or the New Orleans music scene (Treme), fine. But how about giving us a feel for the Southwest? Maybe I have not paid close enough attention, but I have not yet identified the actual city, suburb, or state in which the show takes place. For (all about) me, without this sense of place, Breaking Bad will always come up short compared to The Wire.

One last comment. Isabelle and Cordelia do not sleep through my listening to Phil Hendrie, the funniest man in North America. I subscribe to his website and so can stream his shows whenever I want, which is usually at the end of the day before dinner. It a talk-radio show where Phil is the voice both of the host and guest who talk about a crazy premise and elicit flabbergasted callers who think the interview is real. He has almost 60 different characters, from Margaret Grey, a syndicated columnist who writes “A Little Bird Told Me,” to Jay Santos, a Brigadier General in the Citizens Auxiliary Police. Phil does three hours of comedy gold every weeknight, which means he does more material in one week than Larry David does in an entire season of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Anyone interested should know that Phil now has a free website where people can listen to clips from old shows. I also hear that you can make Phil Hendrie a radio station at Pandora.com.

55 thoughts on “What the Cats Missed this Week”

  1. Breaking Bad is not about place, though it is set in New Mexico. Nor is it about a suburb being ravaged by drugs. It’s about a man choosing, step by step -for various reasons shed along the way- to plunge. A show about the searing of a conscience won’t appeal to everyone, I suspect. But the sense of morality (and its admitted rejection) hanging over every decision is rare in a show. Am thankful it ain’t set in the east or west coast, as the southwest gives it a peculiar feel with some explicit western genre elements at times, which come more into focus later. Carry on!

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  2. Good tips. BB is set in Albuquerque. It was probably set there for budgetary reasons. Kind of like “One Tree Hill” being shot in Wilmington, N.C. I think I’ll have to give up my middle-aged man card after admitting I know that…

    The episode where the Cain & Abel-like rivalry between Dan & Keith come to a head is one of the best developments I have ever experienced in a series, though.

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  4. Thanks for the heads up on Phil Hendrie. I’ve been having to settle for Roy D. Mercer prank calls. BTW, you want to know what a southern redneck is, Roy D. Mercer’s your huckleberry.

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  5. Alright Darryl,

    We need an auditory marker/signal for when a CTCer comments on a post, I propose a gregorian chant. Have one of your T.A.’s get that done. I have a whole dialogue built on that acronym but I’ll refrain. I can’t believe I’ve gone this long without listening to Phil Hendrie! Yeesh, some sort of sin I’m sure.

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  6. Breaking Bad can also be looked upon as intelligent middle class suburbia meeting higher up and sophisticated yet brutal and ruthless drug culture as the show progresses. It is not only a searing of conscience but an attempt at outsmarting the cultural system that won’t allow Walt to provide for his family after being diagnosed with cancer and the drug culture and black market which is producing havoc in the culture and the economy. Why shouldn’t he try to profit from this messed up world? This is the rationalization which allows Walt to overcome his pangs of conscience and plunge into a world that is foreign yet familiar at the same time. Walt is deeply challenged and the worlds he enters into become more exciting and eventful than his otherwise uneventful and boring life. As he finds that he can succeed and benefit greatly financially in this new culture it wraps it tentacles around him tighter and tighter. He’s fallen and plunged and he can’t get out. Or, is there ultimately a way out? For anyone whose daily struggles with situations at work and the bureaucracy that seems to stifle your goals and ambitions for a better life then the story grabs you and you can imagine how something of the same sort could happen even to you, ie., getting sucked into situations that get totally out of control.

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  7. John,

    Good summary. I especially identified with Walt early on when he struggled with the “good” news that his cancer was in remission; that the excitement of his new drug venture might vanish, and he might be forced to return to the boring and depressing world of being unappreciated. What middle-aged man cannot relate? Now, when are we going to start talking Walking Dead and In Treatment around here?

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  8. One thing about BB that doesn’t ring true is that he is a public school teacher and doesn’t have good insurance that would cover his cancer. Yeah, and he probably isn’t represented by the teachers union either. They should have made him a small business owner who is paying the property taxes that pay for the public school teacher benefits that the small business owner can’t afford anymore. This message brought to you by Re-Elect Scott Walker 2014…

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  9. Todd, I have not watched Walking Dead but I have seen every episode of In Treatment. That has been discussed here before- you must have missed it. I feel as though I have been through a therapy session myself after watching each episode. And its free too. You really get involved in the stories of each case.

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  10. Erik,

    I don’t want to give away any more of the story of BB but the fact that Walt has not been hunted down and done away with by the competing drug cartels seems rather unrealistic too.

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  11. In a recent interview on NPR’s “Fresh Air,” Dean Norris from BB said that the show is shot in New Mexico, but is actually set in Southern California. They shoot in the desert simply because it’s cheaper.

    “I am a fan of Canadian cinema.”

    Kept waiting for the punch line on that one.

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  12. Serious M-G, it is not a set up line. See Ararat, Thirty-two Short Films about Glenn Gould, or the Far Side of the Moon. No joke. BTW, U.S. condescension to Canada is unbecoming.

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  13. Actually, I’m just teasing. I, too, am a Canadian film enthusiaste, and I wish there would be more of it. Maybe that help improve the quality of what is produced here, south of the border. When it comes to cross-border condescension, though, we’ve got nothing on our neighbours in the Great White North.

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  14. D.G. readily admitted he is an aging Metrosexual so we should not be surprised he is an enthusiast of the virtues of our neighbor to the north.

    A Canadian movie I enjoyed was Louis Malle’s “Atlantic City” (1980) starring Burt Lancaster & Susan Sarandon. It was basically made to take advantage of a Canadian tax credit. From writing to completion it was put together in something like 9 months. One of my all time favorites – “Meatballs” – was also Canadian. “Are you ready for the summer?”

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  15. SMG, far be it from me to correct Hank, but BB is both produced and set in NM. There’s nothing SoCal about the show.

    But whatever criticisms aside, the crux and beauty of it has always been its Calvinistic theme: guy who feels pretty comforted by his false sense of humility (and has everyone else pitying him) discovers he’s got it in him to poison his neighbors and justify it to the bitter end. Just like those he always thought were the really bad guys.

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  17. Phil Hendrie is a genius. Sadly, this was lost on the Minneapolis/St. Paul radio market and he didn’t last long here. I hope his stuff is available via podcast.

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  19. Just signed up for the free Phil Hendrie podcast. Should make my commute a bit more interesting. I found him accidentally on the radio in LA in about 1995… one of the funniest men alive, no doubt.

    Darryl, I just finished the first disc of the first season of BB. No doubt suburbia fails in comparison to urban vibe of the Wire. But perhaps it is nonetheless a character in the series. It is an expression of Walt’s “failed” life, and Meth is after all still mostly a suburban / rural blight. And more Americans (or at least TV watching-Netflixsters) live in suburbia, so it is in that sense, more realistic.

    There is NOTHING sexy about meth in Albuquerque. I mean, would the show be as near depressing if Walt at least got to hang out in some cool strip joint with rocking blues blaring in the background?

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  26. Not sure if anyone mentioned this, DG, but Breaking Bad, in my opinion, does get more interesting in the second season. Has Tuco Salamanca shown up yet? He’s a charmer.

    I was put off a little by Hank’s character at first, because I couldn’t shake the sense that he was trying too hard to be Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now.

    Also, having read Beautiful Boy, a biographical account of a father’s struggle to save his son from meth addiction, the portrayal of meth use in BB seemed much too easy. Meth lite.

    Having said all that, I can’t put the show down, as it were. On Season 3 now.

    I plan to rent The Wire one of these days, and, like others mentioned, I also am going to check out this P Hendrie character.

    rlk

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  27. Darryl,

    As much as I loved season one of In Treatment, it was difficult for me to get over Dr. Weston not calling the authorities when he learned about Sophie and her coach. It failed to ring true that he refused to report a crime when he was obligated to do so. But other than that I am over it and in the midst of Two, the show is too well done to give up on.

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  28. “Nightline” did a segment on “The Big Lebowski” and “The Dude” tonight.

    Watched Todd Solondz’s “Happiness” today (to see P.S. Hoffman). Not recommended – at all. Jerry Sandusky themes before we knew anything about Jerry except that he was a good coach of linebackers.

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  30. Starting Breaking Bad Season 4.

    “He carpools? He carpools…to a job…at a meth lab?” – Skyler not buying Saul’s explanation about the missing Walter.

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  31. Erik, not to spoil anything for you, but episode 7 (Problem Dog or Counselor in the Hands of an Angry Meth Head) includes Jesse taking some issue with his therapist’s false gospel of self-acceptance. No true gospel proffered, but he does get the law right.

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  33. Finished Season 1 of “The Big C”. O.K., but not great.

    Also finally watched “Seven” reminded me of three of Fincher’s other movies a bit — “Fight Club”, “Zodiac”, and “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” — all shot pretty “dark”. Also remined me of “Minority Report” for some reason. “The Social Network” was a big transformation for Fincher. “Seven” has got to have about the most dismal ending for a movie that I have ever seen.

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  34. It’s interesting the insights you can get watching TV & movies. I’m in Season 4 of “Breaking Bad” and Hank is disabled and being really impatient with his wife. It makes you realize how easy it is to be impatient with our wives when things aren’t going well for us. He forgets that she is really his biggest ally and he should really appreciate her, not lash out at her just because he is having a rough time.

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  35. How Gospel Coalition of you, Erik. Now step into Hank’s gait trainer and offer Marie a little perspective. Men are people, too.

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  36. The Best thing about “Bad” is the pacing. It is a very writer-driven show. They take their time with the scenes. You just don’t see this kind of writing on network T.V. Only on cable. It’s even better than movies because they have so much time to work with in a season or multiple seasons. It’s like literature, especially if the writers have a complete vision from the beginning to the end.

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  39. Phil Hendrie has a lot that’s funny, but there’s too much of taking the Lord’s name in vain. I’m too weak.

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  41. Thinking about people who grew up Reformed made me think of Paul Schrader who grew up in Grand Rapids in the CRC. Schrader wrote probably the only movie to feature a Reformed Youth Convention, the Five Points of Calvinism, and the porn industry. It’s called “Hardcore” and it’s pretty good. George C. Scott plays the lead and at one point he explains the five points of Calvinism to a hooker. He’s gone to LA to find his daughter who disappeared during an RYS type convention. It’s R for some nudity but is worth seeing if you can stand that sort of thing.

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  46. Finished the excellent season 4 of “Breaking Bad” last night. I wrote a blog post on it – “The Offense of Unforseen Death & Disfigurement of the Body”.

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  52. And to think it’s not gritty enough for D.G.

    Walt definitely hit a new low last week. He’s reaching mass-murderer status. The people in his circle of influence aren’t doing much better than those in Tony Soprano’s did.

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