{"id":20493,"date":"2013-11-13T13:02:15","date_gmt":"2013-11-13T18:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/?p=20493"},"modified":"2013-11-13T13:02:15","modified_gmt":"2013-11-13T18:02:15","slug":"millers-crossing-vs-a-matter-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/millers-crossing-vs-a-matter-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"<em>RTH Glossary<\/em>: Miller&#8217;s Crossing vs A Matter of Life and Death Albums"},"content":{"rendered":"<iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/e9PpDvG5aSM?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe>\n<p>I had been a fan of all the <strong>Coen Brothers<\/strong> movies leading up to <em>Miller&#8217;s Crossing<\/em>, the brothers&#8217; Irish mob genre-bender. The first time I watched that movie I sat there for over an hour thinking, &#8220;When the fuck is this thing going to go anywhere?!?!&#8221; Suddenly, one thing happened, then all hell broke lose. In the final 20 to 30 minutes I was dazzled. I walked away saying, &#8220;That movie was excellent!&#8221; My close, personal friend <strong>E. Pluribus Gergely<\/strong>, who I believe was sitting alongside me that night, couldn&#8217;t believe I was able to change my mind so quickly, so definitively. He still teases me about my ability to &#8220;do a Miller&#8217;s Crossing.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>I had a similar experience with the movie <em>Lost in Translation<\/em>. It was a total waste of my time until the party scene, with <strong>Bill Murray<\/strong> singing along to &#8220;More Than This.&#8221; From that point on the movie clicked, and I did a Miller&#8217;s Crossing. Patience has its virtues.<\/p>\n<p>Sometimes the opposite occurs for me: I&#8217;ll be enraptured by a movie only to have it crash and burn in the final 20 to 30 minutes. The other night I found myself in this enraptured state as I watched the first hour-plus of a 1946 ghost-love story, <em><a title=\"A Matter of Life and Death\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/A_Matter_of_Life_and_Death_(film)\" target=\"_blank\">A Matter of Life and Death<\/a><\/em> (originally released in the US as <em>Stairway to Heaven<\/em>). I&#8217;d long heard about one of the co-directors, <strong>Michael Powell<\/strong>, who is name-checked by my favorite director, <strong>Martin Scorsese<\/strong>, at every opportunity, but I&#8217;d never actually seen any of his movies. This movie got off to a fantastic start! It simply looked amazing, like <em>The Wizard of Oz<\/em>&#8216;s reverse twin sister, with earth scenes in color and heaven scenes in a pearly B&amp;W\/sepia tone. I&#8217;m a sucker for sepia tone. Plus it&#8217;s a ghost-love story, a genre I am a huge sucker for: all variations on <em>Here Comes Mr. Jordan<\/em>\/<em>Heaven Can Wait<\/em>, <em>The Ghost and Mrs. Muir<\/em>, even <em>Ghost<\/em> itself&#8230; (I know, hard to believe considering how damn manly I am.) Anyhow, the movie was fantastic until the final act, which I don&#8217;t want to spoil but which worried me as soon as it got underway, introducing a device I&#8217;m highly skeptical of in movie storytelling. The movie crashed and burned over the final 25 minutes. It went from being one of the most spectacular pieces of futuristic film-making I&#8217;d ever seen to merely a brilliantly executed concept that ultimately fell apart and left me highly disappointed.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/BuN8F2w5Tl0?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe>\n<p>Don&#8217;t get me wrong, <em>A Matter of Life and Death<\/em> still left me feeling enlightened about a major piece of film-making that I&#8217;d never been exposed to in 50 years, but the ending put me into a <strong>Reverse Miller&#8217;s Crossing<\/strong>. Being way more of a music guy than a movie guy, I got to wondering whether there are any albums that have put me through the emotional roller-coaster of either a Miller&#8217;s Crossing or an A Matter of Life and Death. I&#8217;ll have to think about it: albums that didn&#8217;t move me at all until they were two thirds through vs albums that made me think I&#8217;d found the holy grail before completely fizzling out over the last few tracks. How about you?<\/p>\n<p>For Matters of Life and Death, I&#8217;m talking about experiences a little more intense than the &#8220;great side 1\/<em>eh<\/em>&#8230; side 2&#8243; of Television&#8217;s <em>Marquee Moon<\/em>. There&#8217;s no doubt about it that side 2 won&#8217;t live up to side 1 as soon as you drop the needle; there&#8217;s little tease that the majesty will continue. For Miller&#8217;s Crossings, the experience would have to be a little more intense and dynamic than your typical &#8220;slow-burner&#8221; album. There needs to be a late-game &#8220;ah-ha!&#8221; moment that signifies an unexpected turnaround.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I had been a fan of all the Coen Brothers movies leading up to Miller&#8217;s Crossing, the brothers&#8217; Irish mob genre-bender. The first time I watched that movie I sat there for over an hour thinking, &#8220;When the fuck is this thing going to go anywhere?!?!&#8221; Suddenly, one thing happened, then all hell broke lose. <a href='https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/millers-crossing-vs-a-matter-of-life\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[342,17],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20493"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20493"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20493\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}