Ramblin' with Roger

Movie Review: Made in Dagenham

Here, Sally Hawkins was matter-of-fact plunky without sinking to cliche. Indeed, once knows the basic outline, it is difficult to avoid a bit of predictability. Fortunately, the story, and performances were strong enough.

Late last year, my wife and I saw the trailer for the movie Made in Dagenham, and liked it well enough that we decided to go see the film itself. But for whatever reason, we didn’t make it.

Then we noticed that it was playing for three days at Proctors Theatre in Schenectady last week. So I took off early from work, went home, and we dropped off the daughter at the home of a teenaged daughter of a church member. We were running late for the 5:15 p.m. showing because of rush hour traffic, so Carol parked the car while I bought the tickets and popcorn. Walking from the ticket counter to the entrance, the door closed, and it was LOCKED!

So I walked back to the counter to comment on this. At that very moment, my wife showed up AND someone opened the door, we ran in and got led into the darkest theater I’ve ever gone into. Thank goodness for the guide’s flashlight.

We walked in during the opening credits, and I don’t know if there was anything before that; evidently, there were few or no coming attractions.

From the IMDB: In 1968, the Ford auto factory in Dagenham was one of the largest single private employers in the United Kingdom. In addition to the thousands of male employees, there were also 187 underpaid women machinists who primarily assemble the car seat upholstery in poor working conditions. Dissatisfied, the women, represented by the shop steward and Rita O’Grady, work with union rep Albert Passingham for a better deal. However, Rita learns that there is a larger issue in this dispute considering that women are paid an appalling fraction of the men’s wages for the same work across the board on the sole basis of their sex. Refusing to tolerate this inequality any longer, O’Grady leads a strike by her fellow machinists for equal pay for equal work. What follows would test the patience of all involved in a grinding labour and political struggle…

Sally Hawkins, who played Rita, was someone I wanted to see in the well-regarded Happy-Go-Lucky (2008), but didn’t. Here, she was matter-of-fact plucky without sinking to cliche. Indeed, once one knows the basic outline, it is difficult to avoid a bit of predictability. Fortunately, the story, and performances by Hawkins, Geraldine James as Rita’s friend Connie (who had a more interesting story arc), Bob Hoskins as her ally Albert (whose character has his own motivation), Daniel Mays as Rita’s trying-to-be supportive husband Eddie, and in particular the amazing Miranda Richardson as Cabinet member Barbara Castle, a glass ceiling breaker in her own right, were compelling enough. Another strong performance was by Rosamund Pike, who, like Hawkins, had a smallish role in the movie An Education (2009), which we did see.

The one complaint is that especially early on, we both had real difficulty discerning what was being said because of their accents. At least one reviewer had the same issue. I don’t know if my ear acclimated or the dialogue became easier to understand, but it did get better.

The movie had period music as its soundtrack, most of which I recognized, and it neither enhanced nor detracted from the movie for me.

Definitely inspiring without being mawkish, and worth the trip.
***

The UK trailer, I believe.

White House Releases Long Form of President Obama’s Hawaii Birth Certificate

From the New York Times:

President Obama posted a copy of his “long form” birth certificate, hoping to finally end a long-simmering conspiracy theory among some conservatives that he was not born in the United States and was not a legitimate president.

The birth certificate, which is posted online at the White House website [PDF], shows conclusively that Mr. Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, and is signed by state officials and his mother.

Now may we PLEASE talk about something else?

5000 Questions, Part 1

I’m of the opinion that I am more aware than most other people, who seem to be oblivious to their surroundings.

Sad to read about the passing of Phoebe Snow. She had a hit single with Paul Simon called Gone At Last, but she was only 58 or 60, depending on which obit one reads.

Apparently, there really ARE 5000 questions, but this guy only did 100, at least here, so I’ll do the same. Moreover, only 25 at a time.

1. Who are you?

Not as mysterious as I think myself to be, yet not as much of an open book as others perceive me to be. And you thought I’d go with The Who reference, didn’t you?

2. What are the 3 most important things everyone should know about you?

I get bored easily if I’m doing the same thing, so I always need to change it up. I generally DO know where things are on my desk, so if I clean it, I’ll probably file away something important. I see and hear many things as music and numbers, even if you don’t.

3. When you aren’t filling out 5,000 question surveys like this one what are you doing?

Being a business librarian, blogging, doing the domestic thing with wife and daughter.

4. List your classes in school from the ones you like the most to the ones you like the least (or if you are out of school, think of the classes you did like and didn’t like at the time).

LOVED math through trig, history, American government, and politics. HATED calculus, statistics, anything that involved rote memorization.

5. What is your biggest goal for this year?

Get closer to retirement, monetarily.

6. Where do you want to be in 5 years?

I’m OK where I am. That said, I’ve never been that good at predicting the future, especially my own.

7. What stage of life are you in right now?

Eternally on the precipice.

8. Are you more child-like or childish?

Child-like, probably.

9. What is the last thing you said out loud?

Oh, crap. (About a news story.)

10. What song comes closest to how you feel about your life right now?

You’ve Got To Have Heart from Damn Yankees.

11. Have you ever taken martial arts classes?

No.

12. Does your life tend to get better or worse or does it just stay the same?

Rollercoaster.

13. Does time really heal all wounds?

No. Most, but not all.

14. How do you handle a rainy day?

Rainy days and Mondays seldom get me down. Doesn’t really affect much.

15. Which is worse…losing your luggage or having to sort out tangled holiday lights?

No contest -losing your luggage.

16. How is your relationship with your parents?

Both deceased. I was fine with each of them at the end.

Will you miss them when they are gone?

They are. I do.

17. Do you tend to be aware of what is going on around you?

I’m of the opinion that I am more so than most other people, who seem to be oblivious to their surroundings. I’ll give you a very recent example: there was a woman getting out of the back seat of a cab while holding a toddler. I thought she might need assistance getting out, though the cabbie was unaware. I asked, she said yes, and I let her pull herself up, using my arm as a support. She thanked me, but at the same time, she thought the driver should have picked up on this.

18. What is the truest thing that you know?

Life isn’t always fair.

19. What did you want to be when you grew up?

A lawyer or a minister. I am neither.

20. Have you ever been given a second chance?

A bunch of times.

21. Are you more of a giver or a taker?

I see myself as a giver, but that could be ego.

22. Do you make your decisions with an open heart/mind?

Generally yes.

23. What is the most physically painful thing that has ever happened to you?

It’s a tossup among root canal, my broken rib, and a toe infection that nearly killed me (literally).

24. What is the most emotionally painful thing that has ever happened to you?

It involved affairs of the heart.

25. Who have you hugged today?

My wife and daughter. And maybe you, if you were around.

The Lydster, Part 85: Peanut free

What’s odd is that, as a kid, I LOVED peanut butter. But I must have ODed on it, because the smell now makes me nauseous.

As some of you know, the daughter has a peanut allergy, discovered when she was given a peanut butter cookie shortly before she was three. Interestingly, she didn’t have the typical symptoms of swelling. Instead, she vomited – several times. And she has been tested about a year ago, and she is still allergic.

I’ve noted here in the past that there are basically two kinds of people when it comes to food allergy safety; people who have a family member with an allergy, and the pretty much oblivious. Because there’s so much cross-pollination with them, the daughter avoids tree nuts as well as peanuts, even though she is not specifically allergic to them.

I remember a couple of years ago that we were invited to the house of a friend for lunch. We gave the hostess the information beforehand. What did she serve? Nutella sandwiches with nut bread we couldn’t let her eat either.

Likewise, at a party Lydia attended just a couple of weeks ago, the cake had no peanuts or nuts but was processed in a plant with nuts. Fortunately, we always pack alternatives for such an occasion.

Fortunately, she’s not allergic to airborne peanuts, as some people are. The first time Lydia ever flew on a plane, a couple of years ago, the flight attendant, passing out peanuts and another snack, practically passed out when I mentioned my daughter’s allergy. I was appalled by this story about a restaurant chef lying about the fact that the foods were “gluten-free” when, in fact, they were not; highly irresponsible.

I am comforted by the fact that, at least at this point, she won’t take peanut butter deliberately. She was writing her homework, and she had to just WRITE the words “peanut butter” and she complained how awful it tasted, even though she hadn’t ingested it in over four years.

What’s odd is that, as a kid, I LOVED peanut butter. But I must have ODed on it because the smell now makes me nauseous. Meanwhile, my wife really rakes in the Halloween candy, just on the peanut butter products alone.

Pictures c 2009 by Alexandria Green-House

O is for Occupants of Outer Space

Golden phonograph record designed to “contain sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth, and are intended for any intelligent extraterrestrial life form, or for future humans, who may find them.”

“In March 1953 an organization known as the International Flying Saucer Bureau sent a bulletin to all its members urging them to participate in an experiment termed ‘World Contact Day’ whereby, on March 15 at a predetermined time, they would attempt to collectively send out a telepathic message to visitors from outer space. The message began with the words…’Calling occupants of interplanetary craft!'”

Apparently, no one replied.

But the old news story inspired a Canadian band to form with the peculiar name of Klaatu. The group name came from the science-fiction classic 1951 film “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” in which the immortal phrase “Klaatu Barada Nikto” is uttered to stop the robot Gort from destroying the earth after the humanoid Klaatu (Michael Rennie) is shot and (temporarily) killed. Obviously, Ringo Starr copped the imagery for his 1974 album, which helped fuel the rumor that Klaatu was really the Beatles.

In the mid-1970s, Klaatu wrote and recorded the song Calling Occupants Of Interplanetary Craft (The Recognized Anthem of World Contact Day), or Calling Occupants on the label. Here’s a verse:

Please come in peace we beseech you
Only a landing will teach them
Our earth may never survive
So do come we beg you
Please interstellar policemen
Won’t you give us a sign
Give us a sign that we’ve reached you

And here’s a link to the single.

The song was covered by the Carpenters(!), who took it to #32 in the US charts in 1977.

Coincidentally, two both Voyager spacecraft were launched in 1977, each with a golden phonograph record designed to “contain sounds and images selected to portray the diversity of life and culture on Earth, and are intended for any intelligent extraterrestrial life form, or for future humans, who may find them.”

There are, of course, plenty of movies of visitors from another planet; here’s somebody’s top 10 list. Conversely, the 50th anniversary of an Earth human actually going out into space is this month.

As we know more about the universe, it becomes increasingly doubtful, at least to me, that there isn’t intelligent life SOMEWHERE out there. Although I was a bit distressed by the fact that 1/3 of the Russians and 1/5 of the Americans on THIS planet believe the sun goes around the earth. Oy.

ABC Wednesday – Round 8