The Thin Blue Line

“Because I’m the one that knows…”

Sometimes movies have the amazing power to do a whole lot more than make you laugh or cry or just keep you entertained. Sometimes a movie can save a man’s life.

In 1985, documentary filmmakers Errol Morris started working on a movie about Dr. James Grigson (“Dr. Death”), a Texas psychiatrist who was often called on to give expert testimony during criminal trials. During his research, Morris heard about the case of Randall Dale Adams, a drifter who had been convicted and sentenced to death for shooting a Dallas police office in 1976. Adams vehemently maintained his innocence, and just like that, Morris was hooked. He switched his subject from Dr. Death to the Adams case.

When The Thin Blue Line hit theaters in August 1988, the entire story was laid out in vivid color, and all of a sudden, people were second-guessing Adams’ guilt, petitioning for his release from jail, and wondering what kind of shenanigans were going on in Dallas–– that a man who was so obviously innocent could be convicted.

The movie is completely captivating; you may well be picking your jaw up from off the floor after hearing many of the interviewees. But beyond the subject matter, The Thin Blue Line is one of the top documentaries ever made. Morris’ stylistic approach, combined with the haunting score by Philip Glass, will make you think, give you nightmares, and thrill you… all at once.

We love that it saved a man’s life. We love that Morris got the real killer to confess on tape. We love that the 80s spawned one of the most amazing movies of all time.

We ♥ The Thin Blue Line.

It

“The terror, which would not end for another twenty-eight years ––if it ever did end–– began, so far as I know or can tell, with a boat made from a sheet of newspaper floating down a gutter swollen with rain.”

Think clowns are fun and happy? That they’re a joy to have around? That they can turn anyone’s frown upside-down? Well, it’s obvious to us that you’ve never had the pleasure (make that… TERROR!) of reading Stephen King’s classic 1986 novel It.

Pennywise.

If you know the name, you’re probably a little creeped out right now. Maybe you can’t shake this feeling that a clown is standing right behind you, fangs bared, getting ready to–– BOO!

Heh heh…

It first arrived in the fall of 1986 and remains, to this day, one of King’s best-loved, scariest books. The story of a group of loser kids (hey, that’s what they called themselves) who first encounter ‘It’ in the late 50s and then come back together to try to defeat It (again) in the 80s.

But how do you defeat something that is so completely evil and manifests itself in dozens of ways (not only a clown, but a spider, Frankenstein, leeches, a bird, the moon, and our favorite, ol’ Jaws himself)?

It, it turns out, was the sum of all our fears. You scared of something? It would take that form and dispatch you with alarming speed (and TERROR!)

(And in 1990, it was turned into a TV movie with Tim Curry as Pennywise.)

Sure… rabid dogs, cars that come to life, and telekinetic prom queens are all scary, but It remains among the scariest of any of King’s creations, because, well… we all have something we’re afraid of. And even if you say you don’t, you will when you read It. Because it’s full of… TERROR!

“Oh, they float, Georgie! They FLOAT!”

We ♥ It.

Question of the Day 3.22.12

Name the music video!

Answer to yesterday’s QOTD: Cheers. Congrats to Kailyn, Jeffrey, @Laura915, @RobLamarr, @AutoReverseFilm, and @Buttercup081474 for guessing correctly.

The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley

“Oh, it’s very exciting, I must say…”

We’re not exactly sure how a character from a Saturday Night Live sketch (via SCTV) lands his own Saturday morning cartoon, but it was the 80s, you know… and apparently anything goes in the 80s. (Look at Pee Wee Herman, after all.)

Martin Short’s loveable hyper-manic weirdo Ed Grimley made his first appearance on SCTV in 1982, but it was in 1988 when he finally made the transition from real person to animation. NBC began airing Hanna-Barbera’s The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley in September.

Featuring a band of nutty supporting characters, including Ed’s landlord Leo Freebus (Jonathan Winters) and his neighbor Ms. Malone (Catherine O’Hara), TCMMOED was a goofy (dare we say ‘madcap’?) bit of Saturday morning fun.

Plus it also included the original (real life) Count Floyd, who would always share a ‘scary story’ with us. (No, it wasn’t really scary, but the wolfman howling in the background and the creaking doors certainly helped.)

If you don’t remember the joy that was The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley, you’re not alone–– it only lasted 13 measly episodes. But that’s why we’re here… to remind you of all those, like, fun things from your childhood that you may have forgotten, we must say.

We ♥ The Completely Mental Misadventures of Ed Grimley.

Question of the Day 3.21.12

Name the TV show!

Answer to yesterday’s QOTD: Blame It on Rio. Congrats to Todd for guessing correctly.

Broken Wings

“Baby, don’t understand, why we can’t just hold on to each other’s hands? This time, might be the last, I fear…”

There have been plenty of ridiculous band names throughout history (‘The Band’ and ‘The The’ among them), but in our humble opinion ‘Mr. Mister’ might just take the cake. Or at least they did until ‘Limp Bizkit’ arrived on the scene.

But no matter–– because Richard Page and the boys knew how to make some pretty good music. Their first album may have gone largely ignored, but in November 1985 we got their sophomore effort Welcome to the Real World. And the Mr. Mister revolution was on… beginning with “Broken Wings”.

Written by Page and his cousin John Lang, “Broken Wings” was inspired by an early 20th century Arabic novel called (aptly enough) Broken Wings. And the video was one of those great 80s black-and-white artsy deals (see Don Henley’s “Boys of Summer”, Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game”, and Rhythm Nation 1814), featuring Page driving through the desert in a Thunderbird (when he wasn’t lounging in a window playing bass in a long white trenchcoat, that is):

“Broken Wings” got Mr. Mister off to a good start. It spent 22 weeks on the charts, including two at #1 in December 1985, and it paved the way for two more hits to follow (more on those later).

Plus, it got a big ol’ shout-out in Tupac’s “Until the End of Time”–– and a little street cred never hurts, right?

We ♥ Broken Wings.

Question of the Day 3.20.12

Name the movie!

Answer to yesterday’s QOTD: Tracey Ullman’s “They Don’t Know”. Congrats to @Scrapsity and @DJGarybaldy for guessing correctly.

Roller Racer

“Just swing the handlebars from side to side for a wild new ride!”

When we were kids we never really thought about why things worked. Atari games were just there… they plugged into the console, and all of a sudden a game appeared on your TV screen. And who really knew how Madonna’s voice went through a microphone and onto a thin strip of brown tape inside that cassette?

But perhaps the most head-scratchingly awesome toy from our youth was that crazy, physics-defying Roller Racer that first arrived on the scene in the mid 80s, thanks to Wham-O.

You sat on a seat, you wiggled the handlebars back and forth, and… you moved! Try the same thing on your Huffy, and you’d just look like an idiot standing in your driveway wondering why your bike wouldn’t go anywhere without pedaling it.

The only explanation we could possibly come up with was, of course, that it was magic. Pure and simple.

Or (more likely) it was just:

The front wheels of the machine are connected to the handlebars by a lever, in such a way that they are located behind the axis of rotation of the steering column. This means that a torque applied to the handlebars will cause a lateral friction force by the wheels on the ground, a force parallel to the axle and perpendicular to the direction the wheels are rolling. If a component of this force points to the back of the car, the reaction force of the ground on the car (by Newtons’s “action/reaction” law) points partly forward and accelerates the car.

Sure it all makes sense now (assuming you have a Ph.D. in physics), but back then, well… the Roller Racer was just damn cool.

Turns out the Roller Racer is still cool… a hot-seller on Amazon even today, and a staple in pretty much every middle school gym in the country.

Just don’t ask us how it works.

We ♥ the Roller Racer.

As for that Annie trivia from yesterday? We asked if you knew who the two girls were (each of whom went on to make quite name for themselves in our favorite decade) at :15-:19 of this clip. If you guessed Amanda (Can’t Buy Me Love) Peterson and pop star Martika, you’re right!

Question of the Day 3.19.12

Name the music video!

Answer to Friday’s QOTD: The Clash’s “Should I Stay or Should I Go?”. Congrats to Todd, Emma, and @buttercop081474 for guessing correctly.

Annie

“Maybe in a house, all hidden by a hill, she’s sittin’ playing piano, he’s sittin’ paying a bill…”

Since every single one of us had already learned “Tomorrow” by heart in elementary school, and since Annie had already spent 5 years as a super-hit on Broadway, it only made sense that a movie would follow. And that’s just what we got in May 1982.

Starring Aileen Quinn, Albert Finney, and Ann Reinking as the good guys, and Tim Curry, Bernadette Peters, and Carol Burnett as the bad guys, the film version of Annie was an all-star bit-o’-fun all on its own. Sure, purists may have flinched at the ‘liberties’ the producers took in adapting the musical from the stage (gone were songs like “We’d like to Thank You, Herbert Hoover”, “Something Was Missing” and “N.Y.C”, and added were things like Punjab and that hairy climax on the drawbridge), but all the charm, heart, and humor were still there.

And, of course, we’ll always have “Tomorrow” and “It’s a Hard Knock Life”, and Sandy, and that cute little red dress.

Plus, Annie also went on to become the source of a pretty nice bit of mind-boggling 80s trivia. Check out :15-:19 of this clip and tell us if you recognize those two girls, each of whom went on to make quite name for themselves in our favorite decade.

(We’ll give you the answer tomorrow… Get it? “Tomorrow”? Ha!)

We ♥ Annie.