Led Zeppelin - In Through the Out Door (1979)

I was alwasys fascinated with the last Led Zeppelin album,  In Through the Out Door (1979), see I was not contemponary with them so, as much as I was exposed to all I, II, III, IV, and in the eighties Houses of the Holy was was faved, this album stuck with me because it was their most eclectic, weird and it seems everyone hated it. Why? cos' they would not like them to play like that? or just philistines ;)....

from In the Evening to All of My Love through the greatest weirdola of 'em all, Carouselramba....with the keys that would define the 80's...maaan, I'm Gonna Crawl....

Anyhu, recently I got on on youtube a podcast of a Spanish guy, JCM (Jose Calvo Monturiol),  obsessed with this album, hid fave Zep LP, who wants to make justice to the album, and way more...He is a lifelong fan of Zep and a player in his own right. 

*****

There are seven episodes of In Through the Out Door (from 1974 to 1980, complete with the whole year events, up to the death of Bonham  (September 25th 1980) 

and also a new podcast of Post Zeppelin now, 1981-1989).  even more fasinating and still going on..loved the Michael Winner story ;).

The whole gig takes you to many hours of watching and listening and it's for the most super interrested freaks & geeks of LZ, It's super well documented and presented in such a nice way -personal and subjective-you gotta love it...or surely don't :)  I did. And I was talking about ot to all the guys I met and thought they can relate. So I thought this is a better way to present it and share it here. Just for the sake of music...

Thank you Jose for your passion, dedication and hard work, it was a pleasure (and a pain:) and a blast to watch and re-remember all and learn more....The song Remains the Same !!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-g8Dq45nZOI&list=PLqsprcaJ7OIdEXU46JJjSFE2EP6t_ufPS

RIP Dan McCafferty (Nazareth)

 I saw Dan McCafferty twice with Nazareth. In Bucharest.

Then I saw them once more without him (2018). It sucked. 

Though Dan was so frail, his throat singing was so great. Hair of the Dog if it bit 1000 times...He was 76, Retired (or?) from Nazareth in 2013. Too much Razmatazzz :()

they played Sala Sporturilor in Brasov in the early nineties (the first ofem all coming). a buddy of mine tried to give them palinca upfront....wild...

This is the pic I took in February 2012 at Hard Rock Cafe in Bucharest.. I think he was on coke but hey. he did a great gig. 

hre's my account of that evening...and it was a very emotional one...

Where's my white bycicle? :(((

Amsterdam (2022)

Amsterdam is a really bad movie. One that does no mov(i)e, its overlong (2h14min), bloated and unfunny. Like a comedy made by people with no sense of humor. Oh but it's not a comedy. It's a conspiracy crime thriller as well. And an expensive period piece. And a true story apparently. (that should've been told differently for us to care). And so a flop. A sign about all that was that it didn't make it first in any festival as a film like this should've do and build up from there. 

Margot Robbie looks superb asa brunette but she is not part of a Jules and Jim, or Bande a part triangle. And Amsterdam should have stayed in... Amsterdam. Also it could've been called Timbuktu or any other city for that matter. Cos it's like a Proust Madelaine that Amsterdam here, cos' Paris was probably too much of a cliche (`we'll always have Paris` ya know).

I am just sorry I didn't write about it earlier (saw it two weeks ago already) so I could save some friends money as they went into the cinema and were flabbergasted. Sorry, my bad...

A wasted De Niro (he looks really old), over-the-top Christian Bale and not funny (again with a glass eye!) grotesque Rami Malek, John David Washington leaves me totally cold... a potential great cast totally wasted... Chris Rock has nothing to do but some poor comic relief, Mike Myers shows up right from his Inglorious Basterds cameo and Michael Shannon is wasted, oh did I wrote that three times already? 

David O Russell is not Wes Anderson, nor the Coen bros, neither Woody Allen which he tries to emulate in this loud pastiche, with ambitious and gorgeous cinematography by Emanuel Lubezki. Best asset of the film except Robbie's smile..

I am now fully convinced the director (also writer and producer) is totally overrated and not on my cup of Joe list. The only film of his i liked was Three Kings (1999), which is not really his film, as it was tinkerd by the stars (cllooney absolutely hated him and vice versa) in it and the studio (WB).  And screnwriter John Ridley who was betrayed and sued for his credit. Oh, and it seems also The Fighter (2010), cos' I just saw I wrote a very possitive review back then (in Romanian here), and I expressed then my opinion about him on Silver Linings Playbook in 2012 (also in Romanian :) Both these movies get lower grades now from me, I always tend to be more generous then and back in time (or maybe was just younger;).  For ex. American Hustle I tried to rewatch recently on prime streaming and gave up after 10 minutes. Oh, and there is Joy...did I really went and see that? In a cinema theatre no less...I'll be Amster-damned...

4 stars out of ten, 2 out of five. 

it'll show up on disney+ soon, so save the effort...

The Eagle Has Landed (1976)

¬This never happened.It dit not occur¬

TEHL/ The Eagle Has Landed (1976) is the last film directed by the Magificent Seven's John Sturges, as a fare to get more fishing money. That's what I've read now and I am sad about this-he didn't care about the post production at all, but the film still stands up, and it's a joyride!

The plot to kidnap Winston Churchill by a band of condamned German paratroopers in England in 1943...wow! Solid script by Tom Mankiewicz, based on a novel by Brtish writer Jack Higgins. 

It is one of my guilty pleasures:  faved ww tales of what if (Where Eagles Dare, Eye of the Needle,  Kelly's Heroes)  and the multi million studio bound all star cast  A Bridge too Far was made at the same time)

Rober Duvall pulls a lookalike heavy Stauftenberg, how the F*** the got him?, grand accent), reddish Donald Sutherland as Devlin, an Irish IRA member seems to have much fuun,

It stars also Donlad Pleasence as Himmler, and Anthony Quayle has a cameo as adimral Canaris, we dont get the fuhrer but we get his signature :)

and Jenny Agutter, yes:)

Michael Caine as colonel  Karl Steiner, the same Steiner that shows up in The Iron Cross and Steiner Iron Cross Part 2, played by James Coburn (great in Peckinph's only war movie), and Richard Burton in a gimme gin gig, how the heck the only German name is Steiner for all these?

and Larry Hagman, well J.r. as a commaning American officer with a moustache...

I bet Tarantino loves this...

Sir Micharel Caine said it and I was shattered..BS

In his autobiography, Sir Michael Caine confessed to being somewhat disappointed with the end product: "The picture was being directed by the Hollywood old-timer John Sturges, and we were all very pleased that this illustrious veteran had agreed to direct our film. That is, until one day when I was talking to him between set-ups and he informed me that, now that he was older, he only ever worked to get the money to go fishing, which was his passion. Deep-sea fishing off Baja, California, he added, which was very expensive. The moment the picture finished, he took the money and went. Producer Jack S. Wiener later told me that he never came back for the editing nor for any of the other post-production sessions that are where a director does some of his most important work. The picture wasn't bad, but I still get angry when I think of what it could have been with the right director. We had committed the old European sin of being impressed by someone, just because he came from Hollywood."

I was too, to find out this in 2022 :(

so Anne Coates (the editor) did the movie...

I also love the Lalo Schifrin score and

this gets better every time i revisit it.

It's now on you tube , you can watch it here -until it vanishes :)

Why the plot failed? 

¬I thought my plot failed cos' one of my man died saving the little girl over there¬

Steiner

I still think it's a great fun film and they don't do them like that anymore :( Caine, Duvall,Sutherland, Lalo, Sturges all in one, you gotta treasure that, it was 44 years ago...The Eagle had landed all right (remember the Saxon live album cover as well).

7 out ot 10, 3 1/2 out of five (would be a six but, hey :)