Music Review: Roberto Carlos: Grandes Exitos. (Greatest Hits) (2007)

I was not familiar with Roberto Carlos but looking him up in Wikipedia I learned he is the King of Brazilian Music.  Portuguese is his native language but this C.D. is in Spanish.  He is likely the biggest star of all time in Latin America.  None of his songs are familiar to me but I especially like the beat and the sound of "Mi Cacharrito" (Road Hog).  He got a loaner from the car repair shop and talks about how the girls loved his car which he drove around town at 10 miles and hour.  It is a very funny song and he adds sound effects like beep beep.  His C.D. is mostly love songs and this is a nice change.  This song is actually one of his earlier songs.  

Roberto Carlos if known for popularizing pop rock in Brazil.  His influence extends beyond Brazil's borders.  Other songs I liked on the C.D. are "Lady Laura," "El Gato Que Está Triste y Azul". (The Cat that is Sad and Blue), and "Amada Amante" (beloved lover). I enjoyed this set of songs.  

Movie Review: ***Hotel Rwanda (2004)

 This movie is very intense.  I am glad I saw it once, but there is too much killing and cadavers all over the place to watch it more than once.  This is about the genocide of the Tutsi population by the Hutu.  The Hutu controlled the government fighting the rebels.  The rebels succeeded in killing the president which triggered the killing.  Paul Resesabagina (Don Cheadle) manages a hotel where many Tutsi come to avoid the war.  His wife, Tatiana (Sophie Okonedo) takes up supporting the orphans who show up.  The U.N. Colonel Oliver (Nick Nolte) provides all the support he can, and in the end helps them get away to the U.N. reception area.  They keep searching for Sophie's brother and her wife who have gone missing.  They never are able to find them, but they do find their daughters at the reception center.  Joaquin Phoenix plays a t.v. reporter.

Harrison Ford Movie: **** Firewall (2006)

Jack Stanfield (Harrison Ford) works in security in a large bank.  He and his family, his wife Beth (Virginia Madsen) and kids, Sarah and Andy (Carly Schroeder and Jimmy Bennett) are held hostage by a group of thieves intent on stealing $10,000 from 10,000 richest customers.  The thieves have studied the family for some time, opening a gambling account in Jack's name and a bill of $85,000.  The thieves are very treacherous.  They are lead by Bill Cox (Paul Bettany).  Jack's coworker, Harry Romano (Robert Forster) introduced Jack and Cox.  His boss is Arlin Fiorester (Alan Arkin). His assistant is Janet Stone (Mary Lynn Rajskub). They control Jack by threatening his family.  They try to get away but fail.  Stanfield is forced to help them get the money, erase tapes and allow cox into sensitive areas.  They also set him up as a jealous husband, making his wife record that he is leaving for Romano.  Cox visits Romano and murders him using Stanfield's gun.  

However Stanfield is able to do a double cross, having taken a picture of the account numbers where the money went.  He recruits Stone to help him.  The family after the operation was being taken to a rural area for their murder.  Stanfield overwhelmed the man sent to kill him and iill hi instead.  He lets Cox know his money is gone and won't come back until he gets his family.  The family is still alive, and the dog with a gps tracking device is with them.  Consequently they are able to track them.  

This movie is very good.  The fighting at the end had me really riled up.  Very exciting.  They bad guys are easily hated.  None of them would help the family as they were all committed.  When asked why you hate us the answer is, we don't, we just don't care about you. 

Alfred Hitchcock, John Steinbeck Movie: **** Life Boat (1944)

 This is a very good movie about a group of people that make it to a life boat after a German U-boat sunk their ship.  It includes both passengers and crew, and a member of the crew that sunk them.  Connie Porter (Tallulah Bankhead) was the first on the boat, having ben put there by a crew member.  She is taking pictures for publication.  The boat is then caught by a crew member, John Kovac (John Hodiak) from the engine room who was on break when the ship was hit.  He asserts himself as captain.  Gus Smith (William Bendix) another crew member who has been shot in the leg.  Stanley "Sparks" Garrett (Hume Cronyn) is a radio operator.  Alice McKenzie (Mary Anderson) is and army nurse.  She takes to fixing Smith's leg as best she can.  Charles J. Rittenhouse (Henry Hull) arrives next.  H is a wealthy industrialist.  Joe Spencer (Canada Lee) African American steward arrives with a woman, Mrs. Higley (Heather Angel) who is clutching her baby.  Spencer explains he had to drag her along as she has tried to drown the baby and herself.  The baby dies.  She is in shell shock and very distraught.  Lastly Willi (Walter Slezak) arrives and the quickly he is German and from the U-boat which was sunk.  

There is a feeling to throw the German back, but calmer voices prevail and they keep him for now.  He is the only one with a compass which he keeps hid, but he influences them to go towards German resupply ships instead of Bermuda where they want to go.  Mrs Higley is shell shocked and after missing her baby wants to join her.  They have to tie her up, but when they are all asleep she manages to slip over the side.  

During the course of being marooned, Porter loses everything, first her camera, then her fur coat which she gives to Mrs. Higley before she goes over the side, her typewriter gets knocked over the side.  Even her bracelet which she uses to attract fish but then it gets away.  Those on the boat facer storms, thirst, hunger, nerves, the boat filling with water, not knowing which way to go, treachery and people from different backgrounds.  

Smith, really Schmidt, gets gangrene in his leg.  The German, (they discover he is the captain) indicates he has a history of being a doctor and cuts off the leg to save his life.  However over time Smith is so thirsty he starts drinking sea water.  He becomes delusional.  With the German captain encouraging him, he goes overboard to join his girl.  The others are distraught with him when they discover this, and that he has water.  That was why he got Smith to go over the edge as he had discovered this.  They finally throw the German overboard,  just before they are found by a German resupply ship.  However the ship is under attack and they are in the middle of the fight.  When the resupply ship is sunk they are set to be rescued.  Based on the book by John Steinbeck.  This is a very good Hitchcock, and is a very good study of persons under pressure as are John Steinbeck's books.

Alfred Hitchcock Movie Review: **** Suspicion (1941)

 Johnny Aysgarth (Cary Grant) is a down on his luck lady's man and gambler.  He meets Lina McLaidlaw (Joan Fontaine) on the train.  They have a nonconventional romance.  He crashes a family balls and meets her parents, General McLaidlaw (Cedric Hardwicke) and Mrs. McLaidlaw (May Whitty).  The father does not approve of Aysgarth, who is known as a womanizer.  They marry.  Getting home from their honeymoon he starts to reveal his true self.  He has bought a nice home and hired maids, with no means of support.  He expects his wife's income to pay for everything.  He is disappointed when father-in-law sends a couple chairs for a wedding present.  He sells them to get money for the race track.  He hits big at the races and buys them back. His good friend, Beaky (Nigel Bruce) visits and tells the Mrs what kind of person Aysgarth is.  He faces the necessity of getting a job.  Which he does but embezzles money.  Father-in-laws dies, but nothing except the continued income goes to the daughter, and a portrait of the general.  Aysgarth is in dire straits.  She starts a real estate business with Beaky, but decides he isn't going to work due to bad soil so backs out.  Beaky is to go to Paris to get out of the deal, but he dies while he is there.  He had a chronic reaction to brandy and someone gave him a full glass.  Lina worries this may have been her husband.  Now she is worrying her husband may do her in next.  Her husband has been asking questions about poisons.  She makes arrangements to go to her mother's.  Johnny drives her and the door flings open.  Johnny reaches over to close the door, but she thinks he is tryig to push her out.  Johnny gets the car stopped and wonders what is wrong.  She discovers her husband was in Liverpool trying to resolve his debt without success.  He was not in Paris.  Consequently he thought of taking his own life was the next best option, not murdering his wife.  They reconcile and head home together to face the music.

Music Review: Andy Williams: 16 Most Requested Songs

Andy Williams: 16 Most Requested Songs, CDS Columbia Records, 1986.

Andy Williams has a distinctive voice, and had his own TV varity show for many years.  He also regularly hosted a TV Christmas Special.  The mosgt distinctive songs in this C.D. are covers of movie themes, "Moon River," "Born Free," "Love Theme" from Romeo and Juliet, "Maria" from West Side Story amd "The Impossible Dream" from "Man of la Mancha."  Also included is "Danny Boy" and the "Hawaiian Wedding Song."

Alfred Hitchcock and James Stewart Movie: ****^ Rear Window (1955)

 L.B. Jefferies (James Stewart) is a photographic reporter but is down with a broken leg he received while working.  He has plenty of time to look at his back window at the neighbors.  His nurse Stella (Thelma Ritter) chastises him as being a window peeper.  His girlfriend, Lisa Fremont (Grace Kelly) visits and he pays more attention to the neighbors than to her.  He doesn't want the relationship to go further as he feels they are from different worlds, however she loves him.  Things get interesting when he observes a neighbor going out late night on a stormy night, and his wife disappearing after that.  He is convinced the neighbor, Lars Thorwald (Raymond Burr) has killed his wife. However he cannot convince anyone else of this.  He talks to his friend in the police, Tom Doyle (Wendell Corey) but nothing he can do without some type of evidence.  The police enquire and he tells them his wife went to France.  He is later observed going through his wife's purse, which has her rings, including the wedding ring.  But how to get anything to show the police.  Lisa decides to intervene directly.  First they get him out of the house, and then she goes in and finds the ring.  However Thorwald comes home too early and finds her.  She puts on the ring.  Jefferies calls the police saving her life, but she is taken to the police station.  

They now have some proof, but Thorwald is onto Jefferies and shows up at his apartment.  Very exciting and very tense.