Spaghetti Western Feast

Who likes Spaghetti Westerns?  I love Spaghetti Westerns.  And the more pasta, the better.  “What’s he talking about?” some of you are thinking.  “What does John Wayne have to do with marinara sauce??”  Well, this essay will explain.  I’ll also give a short list of my top five “Spags” – in case anyone would like to sample the cuisine.

Here’s the Spaghetti Western Database definition of a Spaghetti Western (this assumes most of you already know what a “Western” is):

The spaghetti western was born in the first half of the sixties and lasted until the second half of the seventies. It got its name from the fact that most of them were directed and produced by Italians, often in collaboration with other European countries, especially Spain and Germany. The name ‘spaghetti western’ originally was a depreciative term, given by foreign critics to these films because they thought they were inferior to American westerns. Most of the films were made with low budgets, but several still managed to be innovative and artistic, although at the time they didn’t get much recognition, even in Europe. In the eighties the reputation of the genre grew and today the term is no longer used disparagingly, although some Italians still prefer to call the films western all’italiana (westerns Italian style). In Japan they are called Macaroni westerns, in Germany Italowestern.

I’ll add that most casual Western fans in America associate Spags with four films produced and directed by Sergio Leone, three of which starred a young Clint Eastwood (before he started talking to empty chairs): A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS, FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE, and THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY (the fourth is Leone’s epic ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST).  Although these are the most well-made and popular, there are hundreds of lesser-known Spags, some of them quite interesting.  Many have outrageous titles like GOD FORGIVES, I DON’T and LIGHT THE FUSE…SARTANA IS COMING!  Many also feature the alternately weird and majestic musical scores of Ennio Morricone.  Stylistic trademarks include sparse, dubbed-in dialogue, lingering close-ups, desolate landscapes – and often the lack of coherent plot (forget substance, Spags are all about atmosphere).

Spaghetti Westerns are also very violent.  Quentin Tarantino’s recent DJANGO UNCHAINED is a modern-day nod to Spags.  I’ve been critical of overt violence in cinema, but I do think there’s a difference between the almost cartoonish violence in movies about the Old West and the more realistic violence of today.  Anyway, that’s my lame excuse.

So here are my Top 5 Spaghetti Westerns:

THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY: The most popular Spag, it’s also one of the greatest Westerns ever made.  Eastwood perfected his cool “Man with No Name” persona here.  He gets great support in bad Lee Van Cleef, a mainstay of the Spag genre, as Col. Douglas Mortimer (aka “Angel Eyes”); and ugly Eli Wallach, who provided a crude but lovable character as Mexican bandit Tuco and lifted this film to another level.  This is a long trail-ride of a movie about a search for buried gold, and it has dozens of great moments.  My favorite is a scene with a drunken Union general (a parody of U.S. Grant). Also the climactic three-way cemetery shootout.  And Morricone’s sweeping music is instantly recognizable even to those unfamiliar with Spaghetti Westerns.

ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST: Another Leone flick, this movie is a bittersweet depiction of what happened when civilization intruded upon the Wild West, changing it forever.  Henry Fonda, usually a good guy, played the blue-eyed killer, Frank, one of the coldest villains in film history.  The hanging scene at the end is a classic.  Also stars Jason Robards, Claudia Cardinale, and Charles Bronson as…wait for it…“Harmonica.”

THE GREAT SILENCE: This Spag is unusual because the entire movie takes place in the snow.  The cinematography is gorgeous, and it showcases creepy, maniacal actor Klaus Kinski as a soulless bounty hunter.  It also has a highly erotic, interracial love scene.  Director Sergio Corbucci loved downbeat endings, and this movie is no exception (though the DVD adds an alternate, more upbeat ending).

COMPAÑEROS: Starring charismatic Franco Nero, a big star in Europe, along with the entertaining Tomas Milian.  The movie has plot holes large enough to drive a wagon train through, but it’s a rollicking good time and, like a lot of Spags, it centers on an unstable partnership between two antiheroes.  It also has great comic elements, plus the added attraction of beautiful German actress Iris Berben. 

THEY CALL ME TRINITY: In the early ‘70s, a series of lighthearted Spaghetti Western parodies came out starring Terence Hill.  Many Spag fans don’t like the Trinity films, but I say “Hey, it’s all in good fun.”  Some prefer MY NAME IS NOBODY, with Fonda as an aging gunfighter worshipped by Hill, but I prefer this one, the first in the series, because it’s less goofy than the others.  Watch this one after you’ve seen a few of the more “straight” Spags.

I hope you’ve enjoyed my tribute to Spaghetti Westerns.  If you do choose to sample this pasta – gringo – may I recommend complementing your meal with our house tequila, followed by a skinny cigar?  No?  Maybe some sarsaparilla and refried beans?

Kon-Tiki Sails into the Movies

Thor Heyerdahl had a theory.  He believed that the Polynesians of the South Pacific did not originally come from Asia, as most experts believed.  He speculated they actually migrated 1,500 years ago from South America.  He based his theory in part on resemblance between the cryptic monuments on Easter Island and pre-Columbian designs in Peru.  But in order to reach the distant South Pacific islands, Peruvians would be forced to cross the mighty Pacific in nothing sturdier than small rafts made of balsa wood.  Impossible, Heyerdahl’s critics argued.  So the Norwegian set out to prove it possible by sailing from Peru to the islands on a raft, which he called Kon-Tiki after the name of the Incan sun god.

His epic 3,770-mile (6,067 km) voyage, accompanied by five other courageous Scandinavians, is the subject of the recent movie KON-TIKI.  The movie is based on Heyerdahl’s 1947 sailing excursion, which was detailed in his subsequent book and award-winning documentary.  So far the film has received a lot of praise (despite taking a few creative liberties for excitement purposes).  It was produced by Brit Jeremy Thomas (THE LAST EMPEROR) and directed by two young Norwegians, Joachim Roenning and Espen Sandberg.  They grew up in a small village outside Oslo and idolized Heyerdahl. 

“’He was ambitious and not afraid to admit it, which is not very Norwegian,’” says Roenning in the April 2013 issue of Smithsonian Magazine. “’We wanted to be a part of Heyerdahl’s adventure.’”

That adventure included not only Heyerdahl’s crossing the Pacific, but raising money for the expedition, hiring a crew idealistic and brave enough to join him, chopping down balsa trees in Peru to assemble the raft, and publicizing the adventure.  Heyerdahl succeeded magnificently.  Post-war America, Europe, and Australia were hungry for an inspirational diversion, and the world was riveted by tall, handsome Heyerdahl and his crazy scheme.  To make things even more interesting, Heyerdahl was afraid of water and never learned how to swim.

“’Heyerdahl was a great storyteller, but his true genius was PR,’” says Roenning, who refers to the voyage as the world’s “first reality show.”

The critics who groused that Heyerdahl was on a suicide mission ended up eating their words.  Rather than splitting the Manila rope lashings, or being ripped apart by 25-foot ocean waves, the balsa logs became “spongy” and comfortably melded with the rope.  Water flowed through the logs “as if passing through the prongs of a fork.”  Although there were perils (the usual storms and sharks, and even a phenomenal water spout), the crew made it to the islands unscathed.

But Heyerdahl never was able to convert those who mocked his anthropological theories.  Most scientists and historians today believe that, based on “linguistic and cultural” evidence, the Pacific islanders did originate in Asia (though recent genetic evidence does reveal a tenuous link to Native Americans).

Apparently, getting the movie made was more of a problem than the Kon-Tiki’s actual voyage.  Backers for the film were difficult to procure “because no one had died.”  So the filmmakers decided to sacrifice the raft’s mascot, a parrot named Lorita!  Finding acceptable scriptwriters was also troublesome.  One of the early candidates had helped write the script for ET: THE EXTRATERRESTRIAL, but she made the mistake of inviting the aging Heyerdahl to see the movie RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, which she hoped to use as a model for her script.  Heyerdahl was disdainful of Indiana Jones’s “approach to archaeology.”  She wasn’t hired.

2013 Boston Marathon

At this stage they don’t know who is responsible.  Some are pointing to anti-U.S. fundamentalists, and some suggest domestic terrorists.  A suspect believed to be a foreign national who was carrying a mysterious backpack was implicated.  But the fact that the bombings took place in Boston on Patriots Day, and on the day Americans’ taxes are due, has some people blaming U.S. right-wing extremists.  There’s just not enough evidence yet, so it could be none of the above.

The Boston Marathon brings citizens together from across the globe in a non-competitive athletic pursuit (“non-competitive” in the sense that the runners are testing themselves more than trying to outdo their opponents).  Even though world-class runners are involved, the 26.2 is special because it’s open to everyone.  You don’t have to be exceptionally skilled or selected to an elite team, as in most other sports.  You just need to be reasonably healthy and put in the work.  The Boston Marathon is the oldest and most prestigious race, and extremely popular worldwide, so qualifying times are needed to limit the field.  For those who reach the starting line – never mind finish line – it is a special moment.

I did the race back in 1999.  Truthfully, it wasn’t one of my favorite marathons.  Thousands of us were corralled in a large field in nearby Hopkinton for several hours before the start, and the long wait was frustrating.  After the gun went off, I was hoping to run a certain time, but I surrendered this idea when I realized my pace was compromised by the huge pack.  Although the crowd support was phenomenal, the mass of spectators and narrow streets created a claustrophobic sensation.  Forget infamous Heartbreak Hill; I felt like peanut butter smeared between two slices of bread the whole race!  My finish time is still a personal best.  But I couldn’t wait to grab my banana and bagel and get over to Walden Pond.

But maybe I missed the point.  The Boston Marathon, and in fact all distance races, are about feeling good about yourself, celebrating your health and life, and making contact with others: runners, volunteers, spectators…being human together in a community.  The runners all have separate stories, and live in vastly different places and under different circumstances, but we all have a similar, small achievement to be proud of.  The barriers are broken down.  The university kid from Ukraine is on equal terms with the fruit stand clerk from Brooklyn.  It’s  a democracy.   In the “corral,” I met a guy from Germany who shared his background with me.  And I shared mine with him.  I didn’t see him after the race, but I later saw his name in the results brochure and circled it.  He may have done the same with me.

The finish on Boylston Street was extraordinary.  Here, the road widened out.  On either side were hundreds of spectators and family members, seemingly ten feet deep.  The cheering was tremendous.  I knew my wife was there somewhere, but didn’t know the exact spot.  She saw me and took a couple pictures of an exhausted old man (at least that’s how I looked when I later saw the photos).  She’d also made the acquaintance of a couple from Holland, who were there to cheer on their loved one.  I remember stopping to stretch my calves about a hundred yards from the finish line.  I wasn’t pooping out, just wanted to stretch.  But these two big guys came up from behind, lifted me up under my arms, and literally carried me to the finish.  I tried to tell them “It’s ok fellas, I just want to stretch,” but they didn’t hear me due to the eruption from the spectators, who were affected by the scene.

I’ll never understand how humans can be so hateful as to want to take innocent lives.

How NOT to Repair a Lawn Mower

Spring has finally arrived.  With it comes a lot of yard and garden refurbishing.  Something I usually enjoy.  Unless there’s a mechanical problem.

This year it was the lawn mower.  Those of you who have grass lawns know that the first cutting can be an ugly experience.  The fescue grows faster than the ryegrass, and some patches of lawn were fertilized heavier than others.  So it’s like a sea of dark and light green, mounds and valleys, with scattered leaves and twigs everywhere.  I couldn’t wait to attack the mess with some sharp blades.

I did all the necessary preparation.  Last fall I emptied the oil and burned up the old gas for the mower’s winter hibernation.  Then last week I sharpened the blades and replaced the spark plug.  After filling up with fresh oil and gas, I was all ready.  But after a dozen yanks on the cord, I realized I had a problem on my hands.

Unlike a lot of guys, I’m not “mechanically inclined.”  I’d rather crack open a Tolstoy novel than the lid of a toolbox.  My wife constantly reminds me that her father “could fix anything.”  So why did she marry me?!

I knew enough not to keep yanking, or I would flood the engine (whatever that means).  So I let the engine rest, and returned later.  Still no luck.  Suddenly, the prospect loomed of paying for an expensive repair or buying an expensive new mower.  As always, my wife chimed in.  “That mower’s older than the hills anyway, we need a new one.”  This has been a mantra throughout our marriage.  Any time something doesn’t work, it’s time to buy a new one.  But this time I held firm and insisted I would fix it.

A friend recommended buying some ether to spray on the carburetor.  This sounded great!  It only cost a few bucks, and if it worked, I might actually be able to kiss the shoes of my father-in-law.  The only problem was, I didn’t know how to find the carburetor.  What does it look like?  What does a carburetor actually do, anyway?  But I’d better do something, because the sea of grass was at high tide.

The guy at the auto parts store said, “Yeah, just spray a little on the carb and air cleaner.  It’s really flammable, though, so whatever you do, don’t light any matches.”  This scared me a little.  Even though I don’t smoke, what if I created a spark?  Even scarier… where was the “air cleaner”?

Well, I summoned the courage to lift my toolbox lid, and went to work.  Took the plastic cover off the engine.  Removed the spark plug.  Unbolted the thing-a-ma-bobber.  Unscrewed the doo-hickey.  Sprayed inside the holes.  Sprayed the air filter.  Then re-bolted and re-screwed everything (except the gasket thing, which kept slipping out).  Inserted the spark plug.  Primed the engine.  Then yanked.

Nothing.  In fact, it sounded worse than before.  There was a kind of grinding sound.  Was this from the ether?  Or did I really need that gasket thing?

Then help arrived.  It was in the form of my next-door neighbor, who was mechanically inclined, and from the patio guy, who felt sorry for me and was also hoping for our business.     

It turned out I actually did need that gasket thing (something about air and dirt getting in).  I also shouldn’t have sprayed the air filter.  Instead, I should’ve sprayed into the hole behind the air filter (I guess this was the “air cleaner”?).  I also needed a new air filter, since the other one was not only a grimy black, but I’d probably ruined it by spraying it.  Fortunately, the guy at the parts store who sold me the ether was busy with someone else, so he didn’t see me when I returned to buy a new filter.

The joy I felt when I heard that engine roar cannot be expressed in words.  My neighbor gave me a big thumbs up.  My wife smiled at me from the kitchen window (“older than the hills,” huh?).  Best of all, I calmed the roiling sea of grass.

I’m not so dumb after all.  I know a lot more about lawn mower engines than I did last week.  And if anybody out there needs some guidance on prepping his or her mower for spring, just let me know.  I’ll be happy to provide my neighbor’s email.

“Puff, the Magic Dragon”

Next month will be 50 years since the Peter, Paul and Mary song “Puff, the Magic Dragon” reached number two on the Billboard Hot 100 charts.  What a  neat little song!  It was maybe the first “pop” record I ever owned.  I have a fuzzy memory of it being a 45 rpm yellow vinyl copy.  It wouldn’t be long before music would be all-things Beatles.  But in the spring of 1963, folk music was still very popular, and along with the Kingston Trio, New Christy Minstrels and others, PPM was one of the most popular folk acts.

The song has an interesting history.  According to Wikipedia, it had its start with an Ogden Nash poem, “Custard the Dragon,” about a “realio, trulio little pet dragon.”  A Cornell University student named Leonard Lipton borrowed Nash’s idea.  He penned his own poem in 1959 about a boy named Jackie Paper and his dragon friend Puff, who lived by the sea near a land called Honalee.  Jackie grows up and leaves behind the phantasmagoric world of childhood, leaving Puff alone and sad. 

Lipton had a friend who happened to be Peter Yarrow’s housemate at Cornell.  He supposedly used Yarrow’s typewriter to write the poem, then forgot about retrieving the paper when he left the room!  Yarrow found the paper, provided music for the poem, recorded it with Paul and Mary in 1962, and a year later the song became a hit.  It’s just a simple homage to childhood, but it struck a chord in a lot of people (including yours truly, who hadn’t yet left Honalee!).  In a gesture you don’t often see anymore, Yarrow gave Lipton half the songwriting credit, and Lipton gets royalty payments even today.

Discussion of “Puff the Magic Dragon” isn’t complete without bringing the infamous marijuana controversy into the mix, however.  Marijuana??  Talk about leaving the land of Honalee!  Yes, even as early as a 1964 Newsweek article, this simple, uplifting tune was accused of having veiled drug references.  The name “Puff” was said to imply a puff on a marijuana cigarette.  “Dragon” was a reference to taking a “drag” on a joint.  Jackie Paper’s surname was supposed to imply rolling papers.  And so on.  I’m not sure if anyone ever suggested playing the song backwards.  Maybe that came later with the “Paul is dead” rumor.

Yarrow, Paul Stookey, and the late Mary Travers strongly denied the allegations.  And I believe them.  (Not sure I believe John Lennon’s defense of his “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.”  If that song isn’t about dropping LSD, then I need to catch a slow boat to Honalee).  As PPM’s concert audience got older, the threesome made sure to do “Puff” at the beginning of their shows.  This way, the kids and grandkids could hear it before falling asleep!

Only a few months after “Puff,” Peter, Paul and Mary scored a number two hit with Bob Dylan’s protest anthem “Blowin’ in the Wind.”   They also performed the Pete Seeger-Lee Hays song “If I Had a Hammer” alongside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at the March on Washington for civil rights.  So 1963 was a very significant year for the group.

I’d love to verify if that little piece of vinyl I once owned was actually yellow.  My mom saved a lot of things, but unfortunately she didn’t hang on to“Puff.”  Maybe she threw him out when she got rid of my Beatles lunchbox.

Remembering Biff

I left the small town where I grew up several decades ago.  But last week I visited my mom, who lives in a retirement village there, and I decided to have an early Sunday morning jog through one of our old neighborhoods.  If you’ve ever re-visited a place from your childhood after a long absence, especially if little has changed, you know what a strange and exhilarating experience it can be.  Memories trickle in like dappled sunlight: the park where my dad taught me how to ice skate; the hill where my bike skidded on gravel and sent me tumbling to the pavement.  And you wonder if the houses might contain familiar faces.

As I approached our old house, I passed by a modest, single-level, yellow clapboard house with two gabled front doors.  This was where Biff had lived.  Biff was one of my childhood friends.  He was the only kid who was in all my classes from kindergarten through 4^th grade (when we moved out of the neighborhood).  I’d passed by his house maybe a half-dozen times since we left in the late ‘60s, with only a glancing thought about him.  This time, I whispered to myself “I wonder whatever happened to old Biff.”  He was really bright, so I figured he was probably a successful doctor, attorney, or bank president.  Thanks to the miracle of cyberspace (and to Biff’s unique name), I made a mental note to find out.

When I later plugged his name in the search engine, I discovered a few things.  One was that a very successful novelist had used Biff’s name for the main character in one of his books.  He knew Biff from the same grammar school, as did I, but neither of us knew the other (yes, it’s a small world).

The other thing I learned was Biff wasn’t a doctor, lawyer, or president.  In fact, he’d apparently shunned the standard American Dream to pursue his own dream.  He’d become a classic back-to-nature hippie troubadour.  He’d moved to the mountains of Montana to ski, hike, write music, and perform his songs in local bars and chalets.  In the process he made a lot of friends, and became sort of a local legend.  It didn’t surprise me.  My biggest memories of Biff are his sparkling eyes, impish smile, and soft-spoken manner.

What I didn’t expect to learn was that Biff sadly died, unexpectedly, at a young age.  Looking into the past can have its sorrows.

I wish I’d have hooked up with Biff long ago.  I think we’d have hit it off even beyond childhood.  After college, I made my own trip out west, to go backpacking, and I drove right past where Biff may have been strumming guitar.  If I’d have turned left at Bozeman – the “road not taken” – who knows?  I didn’t have his musical talent or self-confidence.  But if not pulling up a stool with him onstage, maybe I could’ve tuned his guitars or offered a lyric or two.

Two memories stand out about Biff, and if he were around now, I’d share them with him.  The first occurred in kindergarten.  Biff was Jewish, and I remember him talking about his faith during Show-and-Tell.  He brought in matzo crackers to share with the class.  Even though they were unsalted nor like our regular diet of sugared cookies, we all liked them.  More importantly, Biff’s presentation was my first awareness that people could have differences beyond the physical.  And that this was a good thing.  It’s a lesson I’ve had to relearn time and again.

The other memory was when we were nine and attended summer camp together.  Our moms signed us up to go as buddies for two one-week stints.  It was the first time either of us had been away from home for longer than a night.  I was pretty homesick, but Biff, being the magnetic person he was, hit it off with another kid in our cabin.  This kid (I’ll call him Eddie) was maybe a year older, from the rougher side of town, and he had a swagger.  I didn’t like Eddie, but he liked Biff, and they kind of teamed up.  Of course, my homesickness was even worse after this!  But I remember distinctly Biff approaching me later in the week and saying “Pete, I don’t think Eddie likes me anymore, he hasn’t talked to me in a while.”  Maybe it’s rose-colored glasses.  But this may have been his way of trying to make me feel better.

I didn’t return for that second week of camp, although Biff did.  I’ve always wondered how he fared.  Our family moved only a few months later, so I never found out.  Maybe those wooded hills of north-central Ohio helped inspire his later migration to Big Sky country.

Here’s to you, Biff.

Steve Allen to Jerry Springer

Dysfunctional excess

Is all it took for my success.

(Peter Gabriel, from his song “The Barry Williams Show”)

Last week Jerry Springer made a return visit to Cincinnati for a question and answer forum.  Before hosting a nationally syndicated “trash” talk show, Springer was a TV anchorman/commentator in Cincinnati, and before that, he was mayor (until he was caught writing a check to a prostitute).  I guess there’s a segment of society that’s attracted to “dysfunctional excess.”  One of the folks at work went to the forum and referred to Springer as being “smart” (how smart can you be if you pay off a prostitute with a personal check?!).  It got me to thinking about another smart guy who was a talk show host: Steve Allen.

For those who may not know, Steve Allen was the very first host of “The Tonight Show,” long before Jay Leno, and even before Johnny Carson.  He was largely responsible for developing the format of the TV talk show.  He didn’t look it, but he was actually pretty hip, being one of the first to book a young Elvis Presley, and helping to promote writer Jack Kerouac, author of the beat-generation bible “On the Road.”  And a teenaged Frank Zappa appeared on Allen’s show, playing an upside-down bicycle as a musical instrument!  In addition, Allen was an accomplished jazz musician and song composer, a talented comic, and he wrote a staggering 50 books during his lifetime.

Toward the end of his life (he died in 2000 at age 78), Allen became increasingly concerned about the amount of gratuitous sex, violence, crudity, and stupidity that the entertainment media was dishing out.  His last book was called “Vulgarians at the Gate: Trash TV and Raunch Radio: Raising Standards of Popular Culture.”  In the book he castigates TV producers, personalities like Springer and shock-jock Howard Stern, the film industry, and the music and video gaming industries for helping to facilitate a breakdown of mores in society through their product.   In my opinion, his voice carries weight.  Allen was there at the very beginning of TV, and he witnessed a number of changes over a 50-year period.  That combined with the fact that Allen was a voracious reader and researcher and he was constantly trying to improve himself.

Politically, Allen was a Democrat.  And as far as religion, he considered himself a secular humanist (he wrote several books that critiqued the Bible, but only after doing a lot of research on Christianity).  He didn’t believe in censorship.  But he did feel that Hollywood and the entertainment industry needed to do a much better job of policing themselves, and citizens needed to become more engaged and speak out against the crassness.  Parents are the best police for their kids, but they’re powerless once the kids leave the house. Allen felt so strongly about these things that at the end he was taking out ads in city newspapers and he became honorary chairman, with actress Shirley Jones (Mrs. Partridge!!!), of the conservative Parents Television Council.  The group is still active today, though unfortunately few of the board members have the acuity or worldliness of Allen.  Most recently, it started a petition to ban Seth McFarlane from ever hosting the Academy Awards again.

In another post on “latitudes,” I rebuked the NRA and gun lobby for their incomprehensible use of the Second Amendment to bludgeon attempts at sensible gun legislation.  But I also pointed a finger at the entertainment industry for shoveling out whatever garbage they could get away with under the First Amendment.  Until Second Amendment conservatives and First Amendment liberals stop blaming each other for gun violence, and decide that the problem is multifold, I’m afraid our society will continue its ineluctable slide into the muck of violence and vulgarity.  And we need more Steve Allens to hold accountable the Jerry Springers.