Happy Valentine's Day (3 of 4) A Pop Culture Salute.....

Ten MoviesPlusMovies: We Hope These (Somewhat) Work

Greetings once again! We are coming to you today live from the main public library in Denver, Colo. (ok, not really where we are at!). Last week, on Twitter, we saw that hashtag MoviePlusMovie was trending and after a brief bout of confusion, we came up with tons and tons of idea. So, we said, to heck with Twitter, let's post them on our two blogs!

The poster above are for: 1) "The Darn Cat!" (the original Disney movie with the late Dean Jones who is still alive, our apologies to Mr. Jones if he stumbles onto this blog); 2) Blacula, a '70s Dracula ripoff, which is every bit as amusing as the Turkish film "Drakula in Istanbul" that was made in the '50s; and "The Gods Must Be Crazy," a great South African cult comedy that came out in the mid-1980s.

Here is our list:

1) That Darn Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

2) Blacula: Dead and Loving It

3) The Gods Must Be Stir Crazy

4) An American Psycho in Paris

5) All is Lost in Space

6) High Anxiety Society

7) The History of the War of the Roses, Part One (yes, that makes three Mel Brooks films we have referenced)

8) There Will Be Buckets of Blood

9) No Country for Grumpy Old Men

10) Alice in Wonderland Doesn't Live Here Any More (our apologies to Martin Scorsese)

http://denverlibrary.org/

Last Ten Films We've Seen (as of Sept. 22nd): Some Pretty Violent Films

Greetings to our blog readers in Ireland, Jordan and Japan.

With two gangster films ("Killing List" and "The Drop") plus one horror film (the "Carrie" remake/reboot) in addition to a Turkish film dealing with domestic violence ("The Confession"), there are some quite violent films on the list.

But, there are light films as well, and since Ben Stiller's film "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty," a remake of the 1947 Danny Kaye classic, is about daydreaming, we thought we'd post a photo of a Turkish babe in a hot black bikini, I suppose in Yemen, this entry will be censored.....oh well!

Boris Spassky, the great Russian chess player (top image) is being used in conjunction with "The Master," one of the great films in the acting career of the late Philip Seymour Hoffman, and conversely the yellow crayon is for "I Am Curious Yellow," a steamy left-wing experimental Swedish film from 1967 which includes footage of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Here are the last ten films we've seen (as of Sept. 22nd):

1. The Master. 2012. Director: Paul Thomas Anderson

2. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. 2013. Dir: Ben Stiller

3. The Lego Movie. 2014. Dirs: Phil Lord; Christopher Miller

4. The Drop. 2014. Dir: Michael R. Roskam (last film of James Gandolfini)

5. Killing List. 2011. Dir: Ben Wheatley

6. The Confession. Turkey. 2002. Dir: Zeki Demirkubuz

7. I Am Curious Yellow. Sweden. 1967. Dir: Vilgot Sjoman

8. The Great Beauty. Italy. 2013. Dir: Paolo Sorrentino

9. Nathalie. France. 2003. Dir: Anne Fontaire

10. Carrie. 2013. Dir: Kimberly Peirce.

Top Sunday Comic Strips from the Roanoke Times: The Satan Gag Works!

Greetings to our blog readers in Wales, Estonia and Thailand.

Today, we once again look at our favorite Sunday comic strips, and this week, we focus on the comic strips found in Sunday, Sept. 21st edition of "The Roanoke Times," the daily newspaper for Roanoke, Va. The Sunday strips include strips aimed mostly at children ("Garfield," "Family Circus"), adults ("Dilbert" and "For Better or For Worse") and people who are 112 years old and living in a nursing home in Christiansburg, Va. ("Hi and Lois" and "Pickles").

We imagine "Pearls of Swine" may have received the wrath from Rev. Johnny Robertson from Martinsville, Va., which is just barely in the Roanoke newspaper's circulation area in which a woman who is dressed like the devil convinces the devil character rat to engage in mischief. "Pearls" is our strip of the week. (Yes, it is the reason for our poster from "The Devil," an amusing Turkish remake of "The Exorcist," no Linda Blair in the remake though).

Other strips in our top five include "Speed Bump" which has a take on what it would be like to be Icarus (center image) and visit a tanning salon, "Doonesbury" which has an American 'helping out' against radicals in the island national nation of The Maldives, and "Funky Winkerbean" which takes on a high school stage production of "Macbeth," aka 'The Scottish play.' Since, Criterion Classics announced it was releasing the vintage Roman Polanski film version of the Shaekespeare play, we though we'd include a poster from the film here.

Here is the top ten:

1) Pearls Before Swine

2) Speed Bump

3) Doonesbury

4) Funky Winkerbean

5) Non-Sequitur

6) Zits

7) Agnes

8) Get Fuzzy

9) Dilbert

10) Mutts

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.criterion.com

http://www.funkywinkerbean.com

http://www.doonesbury.com

For our look at Sunday comics from "The Washington Post," be sure to visit our sister blog "The Daily Vampire" at: http://www.nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com

The Last Ten Films We've Seen......Imports and Exports

1. Dark Horse. 2011. dir.- Todd Solondz w/ Selma Blair and Christopher Walken.

2. The People vs. George Lucas doc. 2010. dir- Alexander O. Philippe

3. Dust Devil. 1992. dir- Richard Stanley

*4. Bal/Honey. Turkey. 2010. dir.- Semih Kaplanoglu

5. They Might Be Giants. 1971. dir- Anthony Harvey w/George C. Scott and Joanne Woodward

6. Wrong. 2012. dir.- Quentin Dupieux (the director of "Rubber," a film about a tire that kills people)

7. Cave of Forgotten Dreams. doc. 2012. dir- Werner Herzog

8. King of California. 2007. dir. Mike Cahill w/Michael Douglas

9. Between Us. 2012. dir- Dan Miriush w/Julia Stiles

10. Locke. 2013. dir- Steven Knight

*-Film we have previously watched before

http://www.imdb.com

http://www.filmcomment.com

http://www.netflix.com

The Best Films of 2012 (in my view)

Here are our list of our 20 favorite films that were released in our market place in the United States (we are a smaller city than New York or Los Angeles); let's jump in the pool:


1. "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia"

2. "We Need to Talk About Kevin"

3. "Jiro:Dreams of Sushi"

4. "The Perks of Being a Wallflower"

5. "Silver Linings Playbook"

6. "Zero Dark Thirty" (first image)

7. "Argo"

8. "A Separation" (Iran)

9. "Django Unchained"

10. "The Kid with a Bike" (France; second image)

11. "Pina"

12. "Beasts of the Southern Wild"

13. "The Dark Knight Rises"

14. "Damsels in Distress"

15. "Robot and Frank"

16. "Skyfall"

17. "Arbitrage"

18. "Moonrise Kingdom"

19. "The Master"

20. "Haywire"

Chuck Norris vs. Cuneyt Arkin (4 of 6)_ The Biggest Punch

Good morning to folks in Dubai, and good afternoon to those of you in Hong Kong.

We continue our series of trivia questions relating to the films of Turkish '70s superstar Cuneyt Arkin, 75, and American '80s action film icon Chuck Norris, with a look at "En Buyuk Yumruk/The Biggest Punch" (1983), which somehow has a 6.6 on the Internet Movie Databse.

The film was made one year after Arkin teamed with awful director extraordinaire Cetin Inanc on "Durnyayi Kurtaran Adami/The Man Who Saved the World," also known as "The Turkish Star Wars" since it ripped off "Star Wars."

So, which actor won Best Actor when Arkin made this film 29 years ago; is the answer?:

A) Robert Duvall

B) Robert DeNiro

C) F. Murray Abrham

D) Steve Martin

E) Michael Caine


The answer to the last segment in this series is C) Richard Dreyfuss, who won the Best Actor Oscar in 1977.

SIDEBAR: The answers to our "Dexter" quiz are as follows: 1) D 2) A 3) C 4) B

Ten Films Worth Watching on DVD

Those of us who are dedicate cinephiles will be happy to learn that "Film Comment" magazine announced in its dvd section that the rare, hard-to-see cult classic "Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment" with Vanessa Redgrave is available. Though many films like "Pretty Poison" (1966) with Tuesday Weld and Anthony Perkins that were very difficult to see for years are now available through Netflix several others, such as the cinematic version of "The Subject Was Roses" (1969) are still hard fish to put in the net.

Here is a list of ten films I recommend at the moment. We are including the spaghetti western "Bullet for the General" (1969) since J.Hoberman wrote a great piece about the subgenre in the same current issue of "Film Comment."

Here is the list:

1. Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment (1966. Dir-David Mercer)

2. A Bullet for the General (Italy. 1969. Dir-David Damiani. w/Klaus Kinski)

3. Blow Out (1981. Dir-Brian DePalma)

4. Contagion (2011. Dir- Steven Soderbergh)

5. Bal (Turkey. 2010. Dir- Semih Kaplanoglu)

6. Trollhunter (Norway. 2010. Dir.-Andre Ovredal)

7. Being There (1979. Dir-Hal Ashby)

8. Senna (doc. 2011. Dir-Asi Kapadia)

9. A Dangerous Method (2011. Dir-David Cronenberg)

10. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011. Dir-Tomas Alfredson)http://www.filmlinc.com

Happy Halloween...

Happy Halloween to everyone!

Many people are surprised to know there is a Turkish film version of the Dracula story called "Drakula Istanbul'da" (Dracula in Istanbul). The 1953 film is actually based on a novel called "Vlad the Impaler" by the Turkish novelist Ali Riza Seyfi
(1879-1958).

Atif Kaptan (1908-1977) played the Bela Lugosi role, and according to a book I read by cult film authority Pete Tombs, smoke scenes were devised when the film's director Mehmet Muhtar (1925-1995) told crew members to smoke lots and lots of cigarettes!

In his later years, Kaptan appeared in several action movies with the Turkish cinematic icon Cuneyt Arkin.

Happy Birthday, Cuneyt Arkin

Today, we celebrate the 74th birthday of '70s Turkish action movie icon Cuneyt Arkin who turned 74 on September 7th. Arkin was born on this date in 1934 in Eskisehir, Turkey.

While he has over 300 films to his credit, we only have time to mention four here.

The first one is "Hayatim Sana Feda/My Life is For You, Feda" (1970),a romantic comedy, melodrama which was likely influenced by 1950s Hollywood melodramas, which were often directed by Douglas Sirk and starred Rock Hudson.

In this film, a Romeo who has burned his bridges has a chance to reclaim his Juliet, a female Turkish lounge singer played by Turkan Soray, the queen of Turkish cinema who often starred with Arkin, after she goes blind.

In 1973, Arkin starred in the first of what would be several films based on the popular "Kara Murat" comics, including "Kara Murat Versus the Black Knight" (pictured here). The basic plot is that Kara Murat, an ancient warrior in the days of the huns, goes after the bad guys and kicks some major ass in the process.

Turkey and Greece went to far over Cyprus in July of 1974, which lead to the production of many action films with nationalist themes. This would include "Once Vatan/My Country First" (1974) in which Arkin plays a Turkish agent who goes to Cyprus and goes kung fu on the Greek villians. Such films were, to my knowledge, also made in Greece around this era, with the roles reversed. And, yes to answer your question, "Once Vatan" is basically a Turkish Chuck Norris movie.

Lastly, Arkin will always be best known for "Dunayi Kurtaran Adami/The Man Who Saved the World" (1982), which is also known as "The Turkish Star Wars." The film borrows music and actual sequences from the George Lucas classic, but the similarities end there. The plot is a very strange one to summarize, but the film has aliens in muppet-fleece who decide that central Turkey is for unexplained reasons the best place to invade. But, they are no match for Arkin's gymnastics tumbling and kickboxing abilies.

Ten Films That Might Be Worth Watching on DVD

Here are twn films, most of which have been recently released on dvd, that might well be worth your time:

1) "Zazie dans le metro" (1960. France. dir-Louis Malle). I must profess that I forget if I've seen this film or not, just as I forgot Bill Clinton, the only president I forgot to name on mentalfloss.com presidents' names quiz earlier today. But, Malle was a great director, especially during the French New Wave years.

2) "Blue Valentine" (2010. dir-Derek Cianfrance). I was actually in the minority of 'haters' on this one (well, I would give the film two and a half stars). But, this dark romance with Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling might merit a second look for those of us who saw it in cinemas, and certainly it is worth a first look for those who have yet to see the film.

3) "The Ilusionist" (2010. France. dir-Slyvain Chomet). This looks like a good animated film.

4) "Mickey One" (1965. dir-Arthur Penn. With Warren Beatty)- I saw this film several years ago at the Virginia Film Festival with Penn, who has since died, in attendance. It is noteable for being the first pairing of Penn and Beatty who would go on to work together on "Bonnie and Clyde."

5) "Cedar Rapids" (2011. dir-Miquel Arteta). This is a fairly good satire of convention life on the road; it is, of course, set in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

6) "Cul de Sac" (1966. dir-Roman Polanski). It appears that all of us cinephiles may actually get to finally see this Polanski film after all these years, perhaps!

7) "Life During Wartime" (2009. dir-Todd Solondz). I am an unabashed admirer of Todd Solondz films, even in the rare times when they don't work. This is not his very best film, but it's great dark humor that makes the Coen Brothers' "Fargo" look like "Bambi."

8) "Potiche" (2010. France. dir-Francois Ozon). Actually, I had nil interest in seeing this film until I found out it was a period piece set in the 1970s, the decade I find most interesting, perhaps because I was born in 1970.

9) "The Wiz" (1978. dir-Sidney Lumet). Why this supposedly silly movie?, you may ask. Well, the Lincoln Center in New York has been showing retro-screenings of Sidney Lumet's films since the veteran director died earlier this year. It's bound to be better than "Rubber," a new bad movie about a killer tire.

10) "Takva" (2006. Turkey. dir-Ozer Kiziltan). I have been disappointed with both the limited number of Turkish films that have been released in the United States and the artistic quality of these films. But, aside from Nuri Bilge Ceylan's work (the director of "Distant"), this film about Islamic fundamentalism in Turkey (the film was made by secularists) is perhaps the most remarkable Turkish film one can find on Netflix.

My Choice for the Best Films of 1971

I had no intention of having two blog entries within a few days featuring fruits, but since we had problems finding a good image of Malcolm McDowell's Alex (and there were other snafus while putting this together!), we thought we would opt for (what else?!) some oranges.

McDowell lists his personal favorite guilty pleasures in the current issue of "Film Comment" and two of the films are ones that he was in. Amazingly, he did not list "Caligula."

Generally, we don't go with popular films for our own choices for the best films of a given, but "A Clockwork Orange," my own personal favorite Stanley Kubrick film, and I say this expecting a full rebutal from my friend Bilge Ebiri who prefers "Barry Lyndon" (1975), is also my favorite film from 1971, a year when I was just one year old.

Many people have said that 1971 was amazing year in cinema, and I have to agree. For whatever reason, filmmakers around the world, made amazing films and many of the films which will not make the cut on the list, such as "Two-Lane Blacktop" and "Sunday, Bloody Sunday," could have been the best film of years with few good films, such as 1989, which only had a few memorable films like Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing."

Here are my choices for the best films of 1971:

1) "A Clockwork Orange" (dir. Stanley Kubrick)

2) "The Last Picture Show" (dir. Peter Bogdanovich)

3) "Harold and Maude" (dir. Hal Ashby)

4)* "The French Connection" (dir. William Friedkin)

5) "Death in Venice" (Italy. dir-Luchino Visconti)

6) "Murmur of the Heart" (France. dir-Louis Malle)

7) "McCabe and Mrs. Miller" (dir. Robert Altman)

8) "Punishment Park" (dir. Peter Watkins)

9) "How Tasty My Little Frenchman" (Brazil. dir- Nelson Pereira dos Santos)

10) **"Baba/The Father"(Turkey. dir-Yilmaz Guney)

*-Oscar-winner for Best Film

**-"Baba" is only available on VHS, and in very limited supply, in the United States.

The Next Ten Films in My Netflix Que

Just in case you were wondering, Humpty Dumpty is for Eliot Spitzer; the Norwegian fiag pin is for the Norwegian horror film "Hidden." We wanted something more flamboyant for the Norwegian film, but oh well!

Here is the list; I have yet to see any of these films yet:

1. "No One Killed Jessica." (2011. Dir-Raj Kumar Gupta. India)

2. "Angel's Fall." (2005. Dir- Semih Kaplangul. Turkey).

3. "Hidden." (2009. Dir- Pal Oie. Norway)

4. "Irreversible" (2002. Dir- Gaspar Noe. France)

5. "A Tale of Springtime." (1990. Dir- Eric Rohmer. France)

6. "Les Bonnes Femmes" (1960. Dir- Claude Chabrol. France).

7. "The Baader Meinhof Complex." (2008. Dir- Uli Edel. Germany.)

8. "Marwencol" (2010. doc. Dir- Jeff Malmberg).

9. "Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer." (2010. doc. Dir- Alex Gibney).

10. "Dogtooth." (2009. Dir- Giorgis Lanthios. Greece).

Special Quote of the Week- Albert Camus

Today, we conclude with a spillover entry from the month of May, in which we posted quotes from famous novelists, with a quip from the late French writer Albert Camus
(1913-1950). Like the subject of our other entry on our other blog who was George Orwell (1905-1950), both writers were born abroad and died at age 46. While Orwell was born in India, Camus was born in Algeria. He often wrote about the plight of the north African country which remains an area of concern today given the political upheveal in neighboring Libya. Prior to the Libyan mess, there were earlier uprisings in neighboring Tunisia, which lead to the 'Arab Spring."

In addition to his criticism of colonialism, Camus was an outspoken critic of the death penalty, saying that it would never deter perspective murderers because 'the instincts that are warring in man are not, as the law claims, constant forces in the state of equilibrium.'

Alas, the likes of Gov. Bob McDonnell (R-Va) and Gov. Rick Perry (R-Tex.) and others on the anti-intelllectual right will assuredly always find a way to dismiss any logic that challenges their self-righteous Christian hypocricy.

McDonnell will be speaking at the Virginia United Methodist Assembly Center in Blackstone, Va. on June 11th, according to Eskii Kebede of "The Collegiate Times," the Virginia Tech student-run newspaper in Blacksburg, Va. The topic will be the faith of the founding fathers. Assuredly, any arguments about how a man who sees himself as an upstanding Christian can support the morally inconsistent pro-death penalty argument will not be brought forth.

Camus, who recieved the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957, is known for three novels "The Stranger" (1942), "The Plague" (1947) and "The Fall" (1956).

Surreally enough, the much-heralded Turkish film director Zeki Demirkubuz loosely adapted "The Stranger" into his well-recieved 1999 film "Yazgi" ("Fate). I'm sure Camus would have been proud; here is his quote:

"An intellectual is someone who mind watches itself."

Happy Republic's Day (Turkey)

Today is the 87th anniversary of the founding of The Republic of Turkey. I once participated in a Republic's Day parade as a child back in 1978 in the industrial town of Zonguldak Eregli on the western Black Sea coast. (I was actually born in Roanoke, Va., but I lived in Turkey-my late father's country for two years as a child).

The scene above is likely from one of the four Princess Islands near Istanbul. They include Kinali, Burgaz, Heybeli and Buyukada.

The Turkish author made Heybeli Island more famous since some of his stories have taken place there. The island was the subject of controversy due to a propsed closing of an ehtnic Greek papal school. Heybeli is also home to one of Turkey's largest naval academies.

My family has long resided on Buyukada, the largest of the islands (there is also the tiny island of Sedefadasi adjacent to Buyukada, which is primarily a hangout for seagulls). Buyukada was, at last report, home to the Lale Sinemasi (Cinema), which is one of the last remaining outdoor cinemas in Turkey.

I believe I watched several action films starring Turkish movie idol Cuneyt Arkin there as a child (There was another outdoor cinema on Buyukada which closed some 10-15 years ago). In 2008, I saw a screening of "The Other Boleyn Girl" with Natalie Portman and Scarlett Johansson there.

No cars are allowed with the exception of police and emergency vehicles on any of the islands.

Silly Photo to Fill Space- Jack-O-Lantern

Of course, October is a great time of the year to visit a nice country town like Abingdon, Va., where the Barter Theatre is currently performing the stage version of "The Full Monty" (admitedly not my cup of tea, but my 70-year-old mom would probably enjoy it).

However, if one is staying home because they are overwhelmed with cleaning house, grading papers or awaiting a call from an All-State agent, they can watch lots of horror films.

Even many fellow film fanatics are a bit surprised when I tell them there is a Turkish version of "The Exorcist!"

The film called "Seytan/Satan/The Devil" was made in 1974 a year after Linda Blair shocked cinema audiences around the world. The director Metin Erksan was actually one of Turkey's most accomplished filmmakers at the time!

The plotline from the film which is available from Netflix (which is how I saw it on dvd) revolves around a troubled girl named Gul, played by Canan Perver, who becomes possessed by the devil.

Perhaps, the most singular cultural difference between the two versions is that Gul is saved by a shrink rather than a priest which seems appropriate given that Turkey is a Muslim country!

Silly Picture to Fill Space- Minnesota Vikings Mascot

Today's Silly Picture to Fill Space is dedicated to the mascot of the Minnesota Vikings. We came up with this idea while watching the 1958 cinematic guilty pleasure "The Vikings" with Kirk Douglas, Ernest Borgnine and Tony Curtis, all of whom are still alive even all of them are at least 85 years old (Curtis is the youngest of the three). Amazingly enough, Borgnine plays Douglas's father even though he is just one year younger than him! Both actors are now in their mid-90s!

There is also a 'great' 1971 Turkish cinematic guilty pleasure called "Tarkan Versus the Vikings" based on the Turkish comic book "Tarkan" (not to be confused with the famous pop singer Tarkan who took his name from that comic book), which has very nationalist themes.....but is historically inaccurate as Norway has, to our knowledge, never tried to invade Turkey.

The Minnesota Vikings won their last game over the hapless Detroit Lions by a 24-10 score last week. They have the week off, but they head to The Big Apple (well to New Jersey, actually) to face the New York Jets on Oct. 11.

Even though the Vikes have the fifth best winning percentage in NFL history, they have yet to win a Super Bowl. Their current quarterback Brett Favre is actually older than me! (I am 40; he's 41).

SIDEBAR: One of our "High Schools of the Week" is Eden Prarie High School in Eden Prarie, Minn., since the Minnesota Vikings are headquartered in the Twin Cities' suburb.

The school which opened in 1981 has some 3,280 students according to Wikipedia. The team's nickname is The Eagles. The principal is Conn McCartan. Famous alumni include "American Idol" semi-finalist Casey Carlson.

Happy Birthday Cuneyt Arkin

Cuneyt Arkin, Turkey's leading machismo action movie hero of the 1970s turns 73 today.

We are big fans of Arkin who is perhaps best known in the rest of the world for his gymnastics stunts that he performed as the lead in the famous/infamous 1982 film "The Man Who Saved the World," which is also known as "The Turkish Star Wars" since it was a rip-off of the George Lucas mega-blockbuster.

Arkin, who has appeared in more than 250 films, made his debut with "We Are Not Alone" in 1964. Up until the '70s, he was predominantly a romantic leading man along the lines of Gregory Peck or Rock Hudson with Turkish cinema goddess Turkan Soray often playing his conquests.

But, that quickly changed when Turkey's brief war with Greece over Cyprus in 1974 caused a nationalist frenzy in Turkey which was illustrated through Arkin's film of the period, most notably "Once Vatan/My Nation First" (1974).

Arkin also starred in "Little Cowboy" (1973), which is perhaps the ultimate oxy moron- a Turkish Western!

Though none of his films are available in the United States except through Turkish good distributors like tulumba.com, several of his films like "Lion Man" (1975) and "Holy Sword" (1982) have developed underground cult followings.

SIDEBAR: The world basketball championships are underway in Istanbul and both The United States and Turkey have performed well so far. Turkey beat France 95-77 and the team will next face Slovenia on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Team America, with NBA players like Kevin Durant, bounced the African nation of Angola out of the tournament with a 121-66 win in which a former Montana State player named Divaldo Mbguna scored four points for the losing side.

Turkey also won a road game by a 3-0 score against Kazakhstan (which is where the fictional journalist Borat hailed from) in a European Cup qualifier on Friday.

Happy Star Wars Day! (with Kudos to Tom Angleberger)

Since I found out through Twitter that today is Star Wars Day, which I'm sure my friend Chris Knight of Reidsville, NC, is recognizing (he once dressed like a Jedi knight to a local school board meeting to protest a proposed dress code ordinance), I thought I would plug my friend Tom Angleberger's new book (Tom and Chris are actually my only two friends-nudge, nudge, wink, wink) "The Strange Case of Origami Yoda."

Angleberger, who previously wrote another children's book under the pen name Sam Riddleberger, is also a coulmnist for "The Roanoke Times" in Roanoke, Va. He was interviewed by that paper's reporter Ralph Berrier Jr. about how he got permission from George Lucas to use Yoda in his book. Angleberger replied that he actually dealt with the Star Wars licensing department instead. And, a woman who works for Lucas took the book home to her ten-year-old boy. He loved it, and thus the force was with Tom (we couldn't resist).

Ironically, Angleberger once interviewed me about a midnight screening of the famous/infamous film "Turkish Star Wars" (1982) with legendary cult action star Cuneyt Arkin, who is now 72 years old (a year younger than Warren Beatty!) that I was hosting at the Grandin Theatre in Roanoke, Va., in May of 2005 on the eve of my graduation from grad school.

Out of curiosity, I just looked the film's Wikipedia page, and I found that in addition to "Flash Gordon" and "Raiders of the Lost Ark," the science-fiction film had 'borrowed' music from the likes of "Moonraker," "Ben Hur" and "Planet of the Apes" (that's two Charlton Heston movies!).

Those who live in DC metro area can meet Angleberger at Hooray for Books in Alexandria, Va., on May 14.

The book has been published internationally though we aren't sure if one can buy it in Oslo or Istanbul, but it should be available at the Boulder Bookstore in Boulder, Colo., which happens to be our favorite indy bookstore on planet Earth!

The Last 10 Films I've Seen

I will be the first person to admit this is a very strange list!

"The Cardinal" is the nightmare opus I feared it would be. Unless you are Catholic or an Otto Preminger fan, you will probably not be interested in seeing the film though John Huston is solid in a supporting role.

Huston directed "Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison," with Robert Mitchum and Debroah Kerr. The film, which was quite good, marked the second time Kerr played a nun. "Black Narcicuss" was the first.

"Stoked-The Rise and Fall of Gator" is a tragic documentary about skateboarder Mark Rogowski SPOILER ALERT: He was imprisoned in California for murdering a female acquitance. A short time after his 31-year sentence, he was diagnosed with bi-polar disorder. According to Wikipedia, he is eligible for parole this year.

"Fish Tank" is an excellent, but highly depressing English film which has won well-deserved critical praise.

"Mahkum/Confinement" is an over-the-top '70s Turkish action yarn with the familiar father-and-son soap opera plot which stars former matinee idol Cuneyt Arkin (pictured here) who is now 72 years old!

"8 Million Ways to Die" with Jeff Bridges and Andy Garcia was the last film from the great Hal Ashby. Sadly, it does not stand up to his great films like "Harold and Maude" by any stretch, but it makes for a great '80s nostalgia trip. I saw the film, which is not available on dvd, on IFC.

"Jud Seuss" is the highly infamous anti-Semitic German film made when Hitler ruled Germany in 1940. I found it on Youtube. Even though it is a historic film studied by scholars, it is also popular among skinheads because of its themes. The film's director Veit Harlan (1899-1964) is the subject of a new documentary. He was interestingly enough the late Stanley Kubrick's father-in-law.

"Umut/Hope" is a highly-regarded Turkish film from Yilmaz Guney, a man who Turkish conservatives still despise even though he died more than 20 years ago because of his politics. Though I am hardly a Turkish nationalist, I also differ with many of his far-left views, including his desire to see a free Kurdistan within Turkey (Guney was of Kurdish heritage). But, Guney, who was also a matinee idol in the sixties, is also highly recognized for his artistic accomplishments as a film director. His earlier film "Seyit Han/Bride of the Earth" (1969) was recently screened at the on-going Boston Turkish Film Festival.

Here are the last ten films I've seen. I must profess this idea came from the on-going series in "Film Comment" in which the magazine asks various film directors what are the last ten films they have seen.

This reminds me of a tweet I saw last week from Pee Wee Herman (Paul Rubens) in which the character/character actor said he was watching "Pee Wee's Big Adventure," a film which is NOT on this list!:

1. The Cardinal (Otto Preminger, 1963)
2. Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (John Huston, 1957)
3. Stoked- The Rise and Fall of Gator (doc. Helen Stickler, 2002)
4. Venus (Roger Michell, 2006)
5. The French Connection (1971, William Friedkin)*
6. Fish Tank (2009, Andrea Arnold)
7. Mahkum/Confinement (1972, Turkey-Osman Seden/Cuneyt Arkin)
8. 8 Million Ways to Die (1986, Hal Ashby)
9. Jud Seuss (1940. Germany-Veit Harlan)
10. Umut/Hope (1970. Turkey-Yilmaz Guney/Serif Goren)