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>From: Francis Gavin <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Ten Worst Films of 1942
>Date: Mon, Apr 21, 2003, 9:00 PM
>

> T H E   T E N   W O R S T   F I L M S
> O F   1 9 4 2 ;
> A S   R E V I E W E D   B Y
> E Z R A   P O U N D
> O V E R   I T A L I A N   R A D I O .
> BY GREG PURCELL
>
> (as it appeared in McSweeney's)
> - - - -
>
> BAMBI
>
> Filth.
    (Few people have realized why Thumper was shaking his foot. But he
had stepped in it.)
>
> CASABLANCA
>
> This movie is filth.
    (Few have noticed the conspicuous stain on the back of Bogie's
trousers.)
>
> CAT PEOPLE
>
> A race may civilize itself BY LANGUAGE, not film. Cat People is filth.
    (No one sought fit to change the litter box during the filming.)
>
> GENTLEMAN JIM
>
> To the Animals who made this usurious film: god damn you.
    (Ez forgot to mention the filth here.)
>
> THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS
>
> This movie is indistinguishable from the filth-rustlings of swine in a sty.
    (The Ambersons were thought to have descended from Hampshires.)
>
> THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER
>
> May you choke on it, bacilli.
    ("bacilli" plural of filth.)
>
> YANKEE DOODLE DANDY
>
> I sort of liked James Cagney's filthy Irish energy in this one.
    (What appears to be the sort of stiff dancing style of Sheamus is due
to the fact he is using his woody as a third leg. This is why the Irish
have never been able to understand why the British prefer a "stiff upper
lip". But "it's the same old shileighly...)
>
> THE PALM BEACH STORY
>
> Bless: The Italian Dolcestilnovisti, the "sweet new style" current in the
> time of the papish Ghelfs and the imperial Ghibellines. One will
> particularly take heed of its foremost practitioner, Guido Cavalcanti.
> Blast: Preston Sturges and the Jewish moneylenders who helped him to make
> this film.
    (Oh, come now Ez you wouldn't expect some folks to break tradition and
make a living out of reality, would you?)
>
> NOW, VOYAGER
>
> Two boils for the director's infected liver.
    (Can you get boils from an infected liver? Vitamin A deficiency maybe.
Mawson found out it was bad to eat Husky livers.)
>
> THIS GUN FOR HIRE
>
> This film reeks of syphilis. Filth.
    (Ez should have had H.L.M help him with some of these, but all told
filth was probably not the right word for a condition of American character
recently described by Joseph Stromberg
(http:www.lewrockwell.com/stromberg/stromberg53.html)
as "mawkish sentimentality, corrosive innocence, intellectual
insularity, and technical-scientific know-it-all-hood combined with a
striking ethical, historical, and sociological empty-headedness." This
describes pretty well most of American cinema then and now.