Johnny Guitar (1954) Truffaut said of Johnny Guitar that the cowboys die like ballerinas. There's also a lot of animalistic action in the cinema of Ray--check out that v-flock behind Mercedes McCambridge. Sterling Hayden plays the title character, but Joan Crawford is the star. She never had this much sympathy in a performance again. To… Continue reading My favorite Films of the 50s
I'm set to edit my short story The Silent Steps of Murder. It will be removed from the website next week. If you still want to read it early and free you have until Saturday, August 24th to do so. I will tighten it up and remove all mentions of the strangler case. Ending the… Continue reading One more week to read The Silent Steps of Murder
I'm working, just a bit slower than before. Cut me some slack. Today I turned 48. I'm fucking old. I'm still working on Where There's Smoke, There's Pazuzu. It's taken longer than planned. I love what it's become. The problem is that it's approaching 16,000 words. I feel like that's dangerously close to novella territory.… Continue reading August Update
John Russell Fearn's The Five Matchboxes does a lot of things rather well, but what's missing from the book are the things that move me from admiration to adoration. You see, TFM is a procedural, a subgenre of mystery fiction that emphasizes the realistic depiction of law enforcement methods and processes in solving a crime.… Continue reading The Five Matchboxes
Naked Lunch (1991) Burroughs explained the title Naked Lunch as, "A frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every fork." The naked lunch served up in Naked Lunch is the moment a man realizes he is homosexual, but married to a woman he half-despises and both of them are hooked to… Continue reading My favorite films of the 90s
James Scott Byrnside 