Metroland

King of the B's

Tonight (Friday) at 7:30 PM at Page Hall, the New York State Writers Institute is screening an Edgar G. Ulmer double feature: Detour and Bluebeard.

Detour follows a piano-player turned hitchhiker (Tom Neal) and the cruel tricks fate plays on him--or the stupid shit he does that leads him to doom, depending on your point of view.

You're not likely to forget Ann Savage as the drifter who comes into his life--fierce (hellish?) doesn't quite cover it.

Savage recently died. There's a fine appreciation of her here.

The second film stars John Carradine as a puppeteer-artist-serial killer. He's brilliant.

UPDATE (1/31): If you were at the screening last night, and one of the MANY who left during BLUEBEARD because the dialogue was often unintelligible on the crappy DVD that was used, I wish I could help you out. But the best DVD version of this atmospheric gem is out of print.

Rabbit at Rest

At age 76, John Updike has died today. Click here for the NY Times story.

5 Trailers

It's cold as the frost on a champagne glass outside (or is it as cold as the hair on a polar bear's ass? I can't remember). Here are five cheerful movie trailers to cheer you up.

1. The Young Girls of Rochefort (1967, Jacques Demy)
Original French release trailer.

2. Point Blank (1967, John Boorman)

3. Duck Soup (1933, Leo McCarey)

4. Local Hero (1982, Bill Forsyth)

5. Irma Vep (1996, Olivier Assayas)

Four Walls and Adobe Slabs

I'm shaky, sweaty--can't sleep. Could it be that I've got so much Animal Collective coursing through my veins? Click here for a peek in the microscope.

Somebody Tell Jerry

Here's the NY Times story on our new Senator. It includes this helpful info:

Ms. Gillibrand (pronounced JILL-uh-brand)

Somebody let Mayor Jennings in on this. On Paul Vandenburgh's show this AM, he kept saying her name with a hard "G"--you know, like Gilligan.

Gillibrand

I am, right now, listening to the wailing and gnashing of teeth by a couple of liberals calling in to WAMC's Roundtable about the (soon-to-be) appointment of Congresswoman Kirsten Gillibrand to fill Hillary Clinton's Senate seat.

Please.

The first two issues being held against her are gun control (she's pro gun rightd rights) and gay marriage. (UPDATE: The DN's Elizabeth Benjamin has more on the latter issue.) In case they haven't been paying attention, the chances of a Federal marriage rights law or any expansion of gun control being enacted during the first (or even second) term of an Obama administration are ZERO. If we're lucky, we'll get a marriage rights act on the state level. If we're lucky. As for gun control, that issue is a loser for Democrats. Anyone hear Obama talk much about gun control last year?

What Gillibrand is, is a smart, hardworking politician with a proven record as a vote getter and fund raiser. Her chances for success are good.

In contrast, Caroline Kennedy has never been elected dog catcher. She avoided questions in one of her first encounters with the upstate press, in Syracuse. The idea that her thin resume could be ignored because of her family was an insult to New Yorkers.

Political Brawl Continues Over Troy Libraries

Laying the Blame

“They are lazy,” said Troy Councilman Mark McGrath (R-District 2). “All they do is stand in front of the city and rattle that empty tin can, and then if you speak out, you are immediately labeled as though you are against the library and books. That you are against kids.”

McGrath said that he will introduce legislation at the council’s Finance Committee meeting on Thursday to bar the city from allowing the library to close the two branches. McGrath’s move is intended to keep the Lansingburgh branch open.

ACORN Presses for Moratorium in Schenectady

Home Security

Gordon Bollard, the undersheriff in charge of evictions, came out to meet the handful of activists with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, filling the sheriff’s receiving area. He spoke privately with Williams and Chris Franklin, an ACORN organizer, and said that he would be willing to meet with them to discuss their proposals, as long as the county attorney signed off on the meeting. Franklin said that he wanted a meeting with Bollard and the county attorney, and later secured a tentative agreement from both offices that a meeting would take place this month.

At the meeting, ACORN intends to request that the county stop all evictions and sheriff’s sales in the county, said Harold Miller, upstate regional director, “until a one-year moratorium is in place statewide.” ACORN is lobbying statewide for this one-year moratorium, hoping to build on the success of last year’s 90-day moratorium.

Ghost Tickets in the Machine

The Easy Route?

Albany Common Councilman Corey Ellis (Ward 3) said that he has no plans to back down from his call for an investigation into the Albany Police Department’s ghost-ticket scandal, regardless of a letter that has been signed by an overwhelming majority of his fellow council people. The letter, authored by Albany Common Council Pro Tem Richard Conti (Ward 6), is a request for the state comptroller to audit the records of the parking enforcement procedures of the Albany police. Conti said that a state audit would give the city a clearer vision of what actually led to the widespread, years-long abuse that saw more than 14,000 of these ghost tickets issued in one year alone.

Is it Gillibrand?

With Princess Caroline out, the inside line is that Gov. David Paterson is about to name Kirsten Gillibrand to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by Hillary Clinton. We don't have confirmation, but we do know this: The media have been swarming around Gillibrand's Washington and Greenport residences this morning (she is in Washington), and her aides have been swamped with phone calls . . . And the other female front-runner for the seat, Carolyn Maloney, is not getting the same kind of attention . . . Possible announcement at noon . . .

--Stephen Leon