settima

comedy

Série noire (Alain Corneau, 1979)

Apr

9

canned pilchards

Série noire (1979)

Franck Poupart (Patrick Dewaere) about to dig into a can of pilchards. A pile of French women's magazine “marie claire” is next to him on an otherwise bare coffee table. DP: Pierre-William Glenn.

Io la conoscevo bene [I Knew Her Well] (Antonio Pietrangeli, 1965)

Apr

2

cocktails

Io la conoscevo bene (1965)

A lone Roberto (Enrico Maria Salerno) at a lively cocktail party in Rome's hypermodern EUR district. DP: Armando Nannuzzi.

“Trouble is, she likes everything. She's always happy. She desires nothing, envies no one, is curious about nothing. You can't surprise her. She doesn't notice the humiliations, though they happen to her every day. It all rolls off her back like some waterproof material. Zero ambition. No moral code. Not even a whore's love of money.”

– the writer

Привързаният балон [Privarzaniyat balon / The Tied-Up Balloon] (Binka Zhelyazkova, 1967)

Mar

17

bread

Привързаният балон (1967)

A boy and young woman (Janet Miteva) riding a donkey. The boy eats a handful while the woman faces downwards. There are several donkeys with riders behind them. DP: Emil Vagenshtain.

Mord und Totschlag [Degree of Murder] (Volker Schlöndorff, 1967)

Mar

4

juice

Mord und Totschlag (1967)

A pensive Marie (Anita Pallenberg) drinking something red with a green straw from a glass bottle. DP: Franz Rath..

The World's Greatest Sinner (Timothy Carey, 1962)

Mar

1

eggs

The World's Greatest Sinner (1962)

Clarence “God” Hilliard (Timothy Carey) sitting at a round dinner table talking to his wife who's leaning against a counter holding a carton of eggs and crockery. DPs: Frank Grande, Robert Shelfow, Ray Dennis Steckler & Edgar G. Ulmer.

“Let's be different. Let's not hate anyone.”

– Clarence “God” Hilliard

The Whole Shootin' Match (Eagle Pennell, 1978)

Feb

23

dinner with dad

The Whole Shootin' Match (1978)

Father and son at a small messy dinner table in a small kitchen. The dad, Frank (Sonny Carl Davis) is going on about something while the kid, T. Frank (David Weber), licks his finger. DP: Eagle Pennell.

The Kentucky Fried Movie (John Landis, 1977)

Feb

9

popcorn

The Kentucky Fried Movie (1977)

A white guy munches popcorn in a seemingly empty movie theatre while an usher, standing right behind him, lights a cigarette. DP: Stephen M. Katz.

“The popcorn you are eating has been pissed in. Film at eleven.”

– newscaster

A cavallo della tigre [On the Tiger's Back / Jail Break] (Luigi Comencini, 1961)

Jan

6

A cavallo della tigre (1961)

Two men in a doorway with a stunned look on their faces and their mouths stuffed with food. DP: Aldo Scavarda.

Angel, Angel, Down We Go [Cult of the Damned (Robert Thom, 1969)

Dec

22

Angel, Angel, Down We Go (1969)

A chubby, piggy pink-dressed debutante (Joan Calhoun) flanked by her uppity-class parents (Charles Aidman and Jennifer Jones) in a fancy restaurant. The kid gives her mother the side eye. Other eaters look on in shock. DP: John F. Warren.

“We say hip, hooray, Hip, hip hooray, For fat!”

– Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil, The Fat Song

Every Day's a Holiday (A. Edward Sutherland, 1937)

Nov

21

National Entrepreneurs Day

Every Day's a Holiday (1937)

Lobbycard. Peaches O'Day (Mae West, dressed by Schiaparelli) hands her business card to yet another sucker. They're on the Brooklyn Bridge, which can be seen in the background. DP: Karl Struss.

The main character is an entrepreneur: National Entrepreneur's Day (USA)

 

In my book, entrepreneur is just a fancy talk for conman. A famous one, the one who may've tried to sell you the Brooklyn Bridge, was George C. Parker. He'd peddle the famous landmark to any hapless rube, immigrant, or sucker who then would promptly erect a little tollbooth to make a fast buck from any hapless rube, immigrant, or sucker.

“Selling the Brooklyn Bridge again, huh?”

– Police captain Jim McCarey

Like Parker, Mae West's Peaches O'Day bamboozles it her way. And boy, does she have a bridge to sell you!