Sunday 27 February 2011

You shove in all your sausage and meatballs.....

.
"Heh, come over here, kid, learn something. You never know, you might have to cook for 20 guys someday. You see, you start out with a little bit of oil. Then you fry some garlic. Then you throw in some tomatoes, tomato paste, you fry it; ya make sure it doesn't stick. You get it to a boil; you shove in all your sausage and your meatballs; heh…? And a little bit o' wine. An' a little bit o' sugar, and that's my trick."

No of course it isn't Johner who cooks this meatball sauce, but Clemenza the trusted Corleoni caporegime in The Godfather. Johner is a man comfortable in his own skin, what's left of it. Sure he likes having Annalee or any one of a thousand other broads cook for him, but push come to shove, he can rustle up a mean spaghetti sauce. Just don't call him "meatball".

I learned to love Italian food courtesy of Mario Puzo and Francis Ford Coppola. Coppola legend has it, put this scene in the movie so that if the film bombed, the audience would at least come away with a good spaghetti sauce. LOL!

You can imagine that for Johner, Friday night is "Spaghetti night". If he did nothing else all week, and you can imagine him doing nothing else all week, he felt he earned it with this sauce. An ex-oppo of mine had wednesday night as "Curry night". Every wednesday, without fail he became Gordon Ramsey and entered this world where the chicken and the curry were all that existed. And we are talking about the days before ready sauces here. God help you if you didn't appreciate the meal out loud when it was finally slapped before you.

Alien Resurrection was on the box this week.  Flawed, but with some great characters, especially the crew of The Betty, who I felt deserved more. Elgyn, Christie, Johner, Sabra, Annalee Call & Vreiss really knock the crew of the Serenity into touch.


Now, don't get me wrong, I still love the Firefly series, Inara, Kaylee, River...was there anyone else? LOL However, in a gritty, blue-collar universe, with lot's of acid-for-blood nasties out there, I'd sign-up with The Betty. If nothing else, the meatball sauce is bound to be a killer......

Cheers
Mark
.

6 comments:

  1. Hmm. I dunno, Serenity sounds like a safer ship to sail with. Not to mention...Uhh. Yeah. Inara. Kaylee, River..Depending on when you fly with them, the preacher and Wash. (Wash Dying in the movie was the most absolute rubbish thing I've ever seen. Why Cthulu?! Why?! Wait...wrong god...Uh. KHORNE?! Wait, still the wrong god to ask.)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I always have to laugh when people talk about bringing Firefly back. As much as I would like to see it happen I have to ask, "who's going to be in it?"

    All the characters are either dead or broken emotionally.

    The Betty did have a cool crew and I wouldn't mind seeing more spacers like these in miniature.

    -Eli

    ReplyDelete
  3. Agree that the movie is flawed, but I think I feel more strongly on that as a matter of fact. Not at all a fan of A4, or the French director's self-consciously zany crew. Hate how he beats you over the head with how off-beat and quirky everything in his movies is. His cartoon of a movie ruined a great franchise, bringing it just one step away from the comic book gutter it's wallowing in now. Hopefully Ridley Scott will rescue it, fingers crossed....

    Someone was wondering how anyone can try to bring back Firefly, but ... it's ok to bring back the Betty's equally devastated crew? lol

    The bigger problem with bringing back Firefly is convincing a network to pay for a show that no one watched.

    Cheers
    RBS

    ReplyDelete
  4. Nobody is saying bring back the Betty's crew, just that we'd like them in miniature.

    The Alien franchise never was any good after Aliens. A3 and beyond just could get it right. Some of the best Aliens stories after the Aliens movie were done in the pages of Dark Hore comics where the writers seem to have a better idea of how to treat the material than anyone.

    As for Firefly, it had a loyal fanbase, but I think the show was a bit ahead of its time. If it were to come out now, it might have a better viewership.

    -Eli

    ReplyDelete
  5. I like both but for different reasons... my problem has always been with any film that knocks its characters out in quick succesion as they progress from one set of circumstances to the next...i'm not saying that everyone should live far from it. I just object to that "new scence next death,moving on" type approach.... it devalues the sacrifice while limiting the dialogue and there's no expectations other then the twist which was he ain't really dead atleast not till he heoically pushes the button then dies...pathos pants!! Still it's fun to watch the first time before you over analyse it afterwards.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hmm. I agree on seeing some minis modeled after the Betty's crew. And Firefly...well, bringing it back may be cool, but as everyone stated...what would be in it? It's been brought to a decent conclusion, but at the same time, part of the further character development could accepting the loss of two of the main characters and then replacing one or both of them on either a permanent or at least temporary basis, which meeting or obtaining the new crew/passengers on itself could provide a good episode or two (Or three or four) of adventures to work through. There's part of a season right there. Dedicate another episode or two to figuring our more about what the government did to River's brain and if there's ways of quelling or reversing it and whether or not she even wants anything done about it other than keeping it under control, maybe another to dealing with some leftover problems from the war and bam, there's between 5-7 episodes. Anyone else got more ideas? :P

    And as someone else mentioned....Yeah. A3 and A4 were TERRIBLE. After Aliens, the franchise is dead to me. That includes AVP and AVP Requiem.

    ReplyDelete