I was late to the party on this TL threadlet about some great flicks on TCM.

But I did want to recommend checking out your local Cinémathèque to catch great classic films of all genres, documentaries and other off-the-beaten track fare that might not often get shown on TV (or be easily available on DVD/BR). Nice screens, comfortable spaces, beautiful clean prints.

Appropos of Veterans' Day, here's the history behind Cinémathèque Française, which became a worldwide, film preservation movement and archive:

The collection emerged from the efforts of Henri Langlois in the 1930s to collect and preserve films. Langlois had acquired one of the largest collections in the world by the beginning of World War II, only to have it nearly wiped out by the German authorities in occupied France, who ordered the destruction of all films made prior to 1937. He and his friends smuggled huge numbers of documents and films to unoccupied France to protect them until the end of the war.

You can get a membership, a series pass or a pay-go and it's a great value. You'll also be supporting the preservation of film as the artists intended, and that might otherwise be chopped and tweaked to suit the fashion of the times or be expedient to newer media (eg, formatted/edited for TV, stretched or shrunk for time, bleeped and "denuded" for the churchy set, yadda yadda.)

It's a nice weekly trek, too. I love their summertime series and walking/cycling over and then chatting afterwards with fellow film geeks.

When TV started, there were live dramas. Live newscasts. Live comedy shows. Live variety programs. No tape. No tape delay.

There was a connection between the performers and the audience.

I was watching some DVDS of some 50's programs, and there is a certain quality of electricity that is now gone.

In addition, there were local television stations. Now absolutely every station has the same format and same programs. No Ernie Kovacs. No Steve Allen.No John Daly. No Zacherley. No chances. No individuality. And no Edward R. Murrow - that's for sure.

I still remember the day I proposed to his picture.  I took its blank smile back at me as a yes.  

We were young.  I was 10.

Years went by and we still hadn't set a date.  Then I learned he married someone else.

THAT BASTID! Not even a breakup, or a kiss goodbye.  What a jerk. My heart broke.

Now every time I see him, the old hurt comes back.  

Sometimes it's so painful I have to laugh ;-).

How good? He nearly stole the movie out from under Alec Guinness.

After seeing some of his wild stuff on tape and DVD, I think Kovacs actually IS an evil genius!

She either has awesome PR coaches or she is actually a nice person.  I choose to think the latter is true.

If models are just clothes-hangers with legs, does that mean that slave/child-labor interned in designer sweatshops are mere sewing machines with baby teeth?

Cooper's hawks are bird hawks.  They take birds in my back yard from time to time, where I have two feeders set up.  I've never seen one take a rodent before.  I've thought about setting up a barn owl nesting box (huge box, hard to find a good place for one) because of our rodent population.  However, raptors, corvids and owls do not share territories willingly.  We already have both crows and hawks around, so the odds that we'd attract an owl family are slim.

In the comic biz, I always ask "Will this come out in trade paperback?".  Because if it will, I pass on buying each issue and wait for it all to come out in one handy volume.  Ditto with television.  I can always catch it on DVD - without paying for cable, TIVO, or DVR or g_d_d commercials.

We're fulla red-tails here, and they're beautiful, but what I long to see and attract are more kestrels. And crows, crows just make me happy.

I think it's a rule - if you want to be a country singer, you have to be very attractive