I am currently watching television programmes

[justdrew]

anyone seen Wilfred?

It's amazingly good. Adapted from an Australian series of the same name, the US version is fairly different though. 2nd season just started and it was incredible. See it. Very RI-related material!

Whatever preconceptions you start with, they will be overturned



and really, really... the show REALLY makes you think, I still can't decide if Wilfred is a good thing or a bad thing for Ryan.

---

oh, and I'm finally catching up with Dark Skies. Not the show I thought it was! (much better) thanks for the recommendation.

[sunny]

I watched several eps of Wilfred's first season and loved it but I didn't know the new season had started. Thanks Drew!

[justdrew]

I watched several eps of Wilfred's first season and loved it but I didn't know the new season had started. Thanks Drew!

finish the 1st first, this takes up right where it left off (more or less)

[MinM]

A couple more thoughts on Dark Skies:

The portrayal of the killing of Dorothy Kilgallen is spot-on as to the why, the where, and the how. Not so much the who.

Also as with Nowhere Man...

A Special Ops guy in silhouette has some interesting revelations in the Nowhere Man DVD.

1) He claims that if he had to do it over, he would not have let himself be used as a tool of the MIC, or Big Government as he puts it. Perhaps he had a Pat Tillman-like epiphany? I tend to doubt it since he's involved with the likes of Surnow.

2) Since 1967 "Big Government" has been using TV as a form of Visual Hypnosis. There was also an episode that explored this phenomenon.

3) "Big Government" could have staged a 9/11 False-Flag in order to further extract concessions from Americans, and expand government authority. Although he is careful to couch this with the admonition that he is 150% sure that OBL did it...

So if you happen to get Nowhere Man through Netflix, before Netflix goes under, check out Special Features on Disk 9. Then click on Fact or Fiction?:

Nowhere Man: Fact or Fiction? - True Stories of CIA Mind Control Techniques (Video 2005)

An anonymous ex-CIA operative reveals real world government conspiracies, mind control techniques and how fragile our identity really is...

Director:
Evan Geerlings
Writer:
Lawrence Hertzog
Stars:
Baz and Bruce Greenwood

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0491796/

viewtopic.php?p=426547#p426547

the commentary (Signal-To-Noise: Uncovering Dark Skies) is probably more interesting than the individual episodes.

Including a little nugget about shooting a scene in the pantry of the Ambassador Hotel (shot in a scene totally unrelated to the RFK assassination which they were going to cover in season two).

Mad Men.

Twice in a row this season--5.05, 'Signal 30', and 5.06, 'Far Away Places'-- a walk on actress has passed through a scene wearing a pink suit and pillbox hat. It's 1966 in MM universe, so I'm thinking the Jackie doppelgangers are foreshadowing some interesting discussions on Mark Lane's Rush to Judgement, published in '66. Should be very good, considering how well the show handled the assassination itself.

Dark Skies covered in one season about the same time period Mad Men has in it's run. Although in Dark Skies these historical events were used as plot devices central to the overall storyline. All of this set against a backdrop of an ongoing alien invasion stemming from the 1947 Roswell Crash.

This tidbit from the Educational Forum in a thread about Danny Casolaro of all things prompted me to check out the Dark Skies dvd...

St. Louis Magazine, August 2008

Stalking the Octopus

For 20 years Kenn Thomas of Steamshovel Press has been tracking the oily tentacles of world conspiracy — and shaking readers out of their reality tunnel

by Stefene Russell

Recent history is a vast record of a vast conspiracy to impose one level of mechanical consciousness on mankind. –Allen Ginsberg

...Thomas even wonders out loud if he and fellow conspiracy newsletter publishers Greg Bishop, editor of the now-defunct Excluded Middle, and Jim Martin of Flatland were perhaps the inspiration for The X-Files' Lone Gunmen; in fact, he saw smatterings of Steamshovel in Mel Gibson's Conspiracy Theory, too.

"Everything in there, everything this cab driver guy spots, is right out of Steamshovel Press," Thomas says. "There are two anthologies, basically back issues of Steamshovel. Brian Helgeland, the screenwriter, bought both of those books [Popular Alienation and Popular Paranoia] from Jim Martin at Flatland Press." Thomas says he's also seen material from the Steamshovel website show up on TV: "There was a show called Dark Skies on the SciFi channel that mixed in real historical figures with this whole alien story. I did some research one week on Dorothy Kilgallen; the next week, Dorothy Kilgallen was a character on the show. So I write a column about Carl Sagan—in the '60s Sagan presented a paper to all these rocket scientists on aliens—and the next week, Carl Sagan was a character on the show. So they're cribbing off the website." Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course. "I've been told many times that I need to go to Hollywood and exploit this," Thomas laughs. "The thing about living in St. Louis is, for $200 you can go to any city in this country, and L.A.-centered stuff, New York–centered stuff—that's part of the conspiracy. It's part of the homogenizing of the world. I don't want to be part of that. I want a bigger picture. And you have to work harder to live in L.A. I think I've stumbled upon the perfect place." ...

viewtopic.php?p=465448#p465448

Unfortunately, as with some other slightly subversive (by U.S. Network standards) shows of that time (Nowhere Man and VR.5) and more recent examples (Rubicon and Alcatraz)...

There are only two television shows we keep up with on broadcast TV: Modern Family and Fringe (and, starting in January, Alcatraz of course). I totally love JJ Abrams' stuff, propagandistic though it may be (and, sometimes, surely is).

But we've also been having lots of fun on Netflix lately, watching The Tudors. (If Henry Cavill is in something, all he really has to do is just stand there, okay? He doesn't even have to speak! — although movement is greatly appreciated, and he really is quite a fine actor — and there'd be a good chance I'd want to watch it. Hey, I admit to being frivolous and superficial — but, remember, my superficiality only goes so deep!)

But that's about it with us for television. For me, reading is really where it's at.

This week Alcatraz had a scene right out of the brainwashing montage in the Parallax View.

'Alcatraz': The Only Innocent Man On The Rock Isn't So Innocent Anymore (VIDEO)

rigorousintuition.ca :: "Pharmacologic Waterboarding" at Guantanamo

rigorousintuition.ca :: Mind Kontrol Themes on TeleVision

viewtopic.php?p=452920#p452920

the show only lasted one season.

[jingofever]

anyone seen Wilfred?

It's amazingly good.

I'm surprised it doesn't get the same praise that lesser shows get. For whatever reason I was reluctant to watch but it really is amazingly good. Also great is Delocated, starring the "git git git" guy from the Horse Apples episodes of Wonder Showzen.

[Joe Hillshoist]

[Joe Hillshoist]

This is from the Aussie version.





Wilfred is about the only show the American TV industry took from somewhere else and didn't fuck up. Its totally different, but it should be.

It really shits me the way America has its own version of Ab Fab, The Office and Life on Mars for example. Its an unhealthy and up itself worldview imo.

[MinM]

So while watching Perry Mason the other night the character Paul Drake (played by the son of right wing hack Hedda Hopper) reads from a column by fellow fascist columnist Walter Winchell. Adding to the synergy is that the show is followed by The Untouchables, narrated by J. Edgar's good buddy, Walter Winchell.

Still no takers for Krebs, Gilligan, Twain.

August, 1964...Jerry Lewis...discuss.





http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Patsy

The Patsy was filmed from January 6–February 28 1964. It was released on August 12 1964 by Paramount Pictures.
.....
It was re-released on a double bill with another Jerry Lewis film, The Nutty Professor, in 1967.
....
Its working title was Son of Bellboy, as it was originally intended to be a sequel to The Bellboy. In fact, Lewis' characters in both films are named Stanley.
.....
This film contained cameos from a variety of Hollyood personalities including George Raft, Hedda Hopper, Ed Sullivan, Ed Wynn, Mel Tormé, Rhonda Fleming, Scatman Crothers, Billy Beck, Hans Conried, Richard Deacon, Del Moore, Neil Hamilton, Buddy Lester, Nancy Kulp, Norman Alden, Jack Albertson, Richard Bakalyan, Jerry Dunphy, Kathleen Freeman, Norman Leavitt, Eddie Ryder, and Fritz Feld.

Still think Disney's 1976 'The Shaggy D.A.' had nothing to do with D.A. Jim Garrison?

on edit: I found a copy of 'The Patsy' and watched most of it.

I am positive that Lewis was asked to do it For the Country and he saluted and never told us the background.

But, typically, he was given a rationale that was benign without telling him that
the project was also useful a decoy for the idea 'Oswald was a patsy.'

'The Patsy' is a parable about 'gathering together in face of sadness and moving on' complete with a Jackie Kennedy romantic figure he has a crush on saying soothing things to Jerry Lewis like "sometimes the things that make us who we are are not all happy things."

I stopped 'The Patsy' half way through where there is a dream sequence of Jerry Lewis dancing with the Jackie Kennedy romantic figure in a school gymnasium. Lewis is in a suit and she is in a pink dress with pink head band-the image of Mr. and Mrs. President on 11/22/63, justweeks before filming was started on 'The Patsy.' The two dancers stop in the middle of the gym floor right on some basketball court lines that look exactly like a bullseye.

I stopped the video there for now. More soon.

1962 Gulf of Tonkin LIMPET op = 1964 'Incredible Mr. Limpet'

'Wild in the Streets' (1968) is a generation gap fantasy that is as 1968 as you can get, kind of 'Planet of the Apes' where the Woodstock Generation are the apes who take over America with massive demonstrations that overwhelm the authorities and LSD in the water to control Congress.




Barry Williams, the future Greg Brady, has a brief scene as the young rockstar-turned-political demagogue helping his father rip the plastic covers off of the furniture as rebellion against sex-averse and cleanliness-obsessed mom.

There's also a cameo by Jack Ruby's lawyer, Melvin Belli.

Richard Pryor is about 20 years old and plays 'Stanley X,' the drummer for the rock band that ate America.

Ed Begley plays an old fuddy-duddy political boss who ends up in the re-education concentration camp dosed on mandatory therapeutic LSD in a peace sign-adorned robe prison uniform dancing in circles with other seniors while chanting "No fundraising dinners are the best dinners..."



Ironically, Hal Holbrook as the young office-seeking politician allies with the rock star to get youth votes almost like a Robert Kennedy figure but later attempts to assassinate the rocker when he's taken over the country. This movie really is as 1968 as you can get.

From the VHS box-

"The idea of not trusting anyone over thirty is taken to a bizarre extreme in this film of American society that's set in the 1960s.

Christopher Jones stars as Max Frost, a malcontented teen and nationally famous rock star who's so popular he helps elect a U.S. senator (Hal Holbrook). Next, Max gets the voting age lowered to 14 and goes on to become President! His first act is to have everyone over 30 carted off to internment camps, as the kids take over the entire country.

Featuring Shelley Winters as Max's mother and Richard Pryor as a militant rock drummer."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_in_the_Streets

Trivia

* The movie features cameos from several media personalities, including Melvin Belli, Dick Clark, Pamela Mason, Army Archerd, and Walter Winchell. Millie Perkins and Ed Begley have supporting roles, and Bobby Sherman interviews Max as President. In a pre-Brady Bunch role, Barry Williams plays the teenaged Max Frost at the beginning of the movie. Peter Tork of Monkees fame also makes a cameo appearance as a ticket buyer.

* The storyline was a reductio ad absurdum projection of contemporary issues of the time, taken to extremes, and played poignantly during 1968—an election year with many controversies (the Vietnam War, the Draft, Civil Rights, the population explosion, rioting and assassinations, and the baby boomer generation coming of age).

* The original magazine short story, titled "The Day it All Happened, Baby!" was expanded by its author to book length, and was published as a paperback novel by Pyramid Books.

* A soundtrack album was also successful, and the song "The Shape Of Things To Come" (written by songwriters Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil) and performed by Max Frost and the Troopers, featured in the movie, became a #22 hit on the US Billboard charts.

* The "Shape Of Things To Come" contained a line There's a new sun, risin' up angry in the sky. As a Rising Up Angry became the name of a real-life Chicago radical group active from 1969-1976.

* According to Max Julien on the DVD commentary for The Mack, in which Richard Pryor co-starred, Pryor reportedly urinated on Shelley Winters's head while filming a scene[citation needed]. Pryor did not star in another film until Lady Sings the Blues in 1972.

* The movie was released on VHS home video in the late 1980s, and has recently (2005) appeared on DVD, on a twofer disc with another AIP movie, 1971's Gas-s-s-s.

* Garland Jeffreys wrote an unrelated song called "Wild in the Streets", which both he and Chris Spedding recorded in the 1970s. It became the title song of a 1982 album by The Circle Jerks.

* Bon Jovi also released an unrelated song titled "Wild in the Streets".

Overlooked Films
***
Andrew Morton's Tom Cruise bio 'shocking claims'

Dorothy Kilgallen Movie?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Winchell

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedda_Hopper

[jingofever]

So while watching Perry Mason the other night the character Paul Drake (played by the son of right wing hack Hedda Hopper) reads from a column by fellow fascist columnist Walter Winchell. Adding to the synergy is that the show is followed by The Untouchables, narrated by J. Edgar's good buddy, Walter Winchell.

Watching some MeTV are you? If you get up early enough you can catch The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis with Maynard G. Krebs. Like, wow! After reading Michael Ventura's praise of Route 66 I've watched a couple episodes. Good stuff.

[barracuda]

Dobie Gillis, huh? It's no exaggeration to say that show constitutes a central core within one of the crusted kernels of my formative Weltanschauung.

[sunny]

On True Blood last Sunday, 'Willie Pete' over Al Anbar, Iraq. Happy 4th of July.



US Military--the ultimate Vampyr.

[MinM]

So while watching Perry Mason the other night the character Paul Drake (played by the son of right wing hack Hedda Hopper) reads from a column by fellow fascist columnist Walter Winchell. Adding to the synergy is that the show is followed by The Untouchables, narrated by J. Edgar's good buddy, Walter Winchell.

Watching some MeTV are you? If you get up early enough you can catch The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis with Maynard G. Krebs. Like, wow! After reading Michael Ventura's praise of Route 66 I've watched a couple episodes. Good stuff.

Guilty as charged.

Dropped the Dish and cable.

So now it's Me or ION TV

[Stephen Morgan]

[Hammer of Los]

...

The Tomorrow People;








...

[Hammer of Los]

...

Hey!

Tomorrow People!

Don't let the fu**ers burn you at the stake.

...