Thursday, July 16, 2009

Thursday's Ways Not To Die

.

That poor dumb dog. Digging up where he shouldn't be. His fate is sealed! You shouldn't be looking on this so happily, Jimmy Stewart; if you had an inkling of the evil that lay in the heart of that quiet-seeming salesman across the way you'd be calling the ASCPA right about now.


Lady-About-Town Lisa Carol Fremont is
showing off a delicate number with a twirl when...


"Which one of you did it?
Which one of you killed my dog?
You don't know the meaning of the word "neighbours'.
Neighbours like each other,
Speak to each other, care if anybody lives or dies!
But none of you do!
But I couldn't imagine any of you being so low
That you'd kill a helpless, friendly dog.
The only thing in this whole neighbourhood who liked anybody!
Did you kill him because he liked you? Just because he liked you?"


That's a boner killer, eh? That speech... that speech knocks me senseless every time. It captures so much of the unspoken guilt you carry around living in a big city... you move to a big town like New York in part for the anonymity of a crowd, the ability to not just blend in but blend everybody else out. But I think we all feel some guilt about it too. I do. I have this couple that lives downstairs from me that I pass on the stairs almost every day with their little boys, I always say hello, but that's it. I don't know any of their names. I could, but I wonder if it's not just fine for all of us the way it is. We don't need to be friends. But it's a push-pull feeling and this speech here, well it cuts to the heart of that.

I think that's why it's so important that Hitch knew this was the moment to take the camera out of the apartment and give us our first close-ups of the characters that we've been gawking at through the window all this time:


But let it be known that the poor doggy died for a cause!
His demise was not for naught!


Because that ol' bastard Thorwald was the only person who didn't come to the window for that speech, which is what cements the truth in Jimmy Stewart's mind for the final time. And from there nothing will hinder him from finding out the truth! Well except for a broken leg, of course.

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Previous Ways Not To Die: Don't Die Over Spilled Milk -- Inviting the Wrath of Aguirre -- An Inconceivable Outwitting -- The Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique -- Nipple Injected Blue Junk -- Your Pick Of The Deadly Six -- Thing Hungry -- Don't Fuck With The Serial Killer's Daughter -- DO Forget To Add The Fabric Softener -- Any Of The Ways Depicted In This Masterpiece Of Lost Cinema -- Rode Down In The Friscalating Dusklight -- Good Morning, Sunshine! -- Mornin' Cuppa Drano -- The Cylon-Engineered Apocalypse -- Tender-Eye-zed -- Martian Atmospheric Asphyxiation -- Maimed By A Mystical Person-Cat -- The Sheets Are Not To Be Trusted -- Handicapable Face-Hacked -- I Did It For You, Faramir -- Summertime In The Park... Of A Pedophile's Mind -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 3 -- Strung Up With Festive Holiday Bulbs By Santa Claus Himself -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 2 -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 1 -- Decapitated Plucked Broiled & Sliced -- Head On A Stick! -- A Trip To The Ol' Wood-Chipper -- Pointed By The T-1000 -- Sucking Face With Freddy Krueger -- A Pen-Full Of Home-Brewed Speed to The Eye -- Motivational Speech, Interrupted -- A Freak Ephemera Storm -- When Ya Gotta Go... Ya Gotta Go -- Hoisted By Your Own Hand Grenade -- Having The Years Suction-Cupped Away -- Criss-Cross -- Turned Into A Person-Cocoon By The Touch Of A Little Girl's Mirror Doppleganger -- Satisfying Society's "Pop Princess" Blood-Lust -- Done In By The Doggie Door -- Tuned Out -- Taking the 107th Step -- Rescuing Gretchen -- Incinerated By Lousy Dialogue -- Starred & Striped Forever -- Vivisection Via Vaginally-Minded Barbed-Wire -- Chompers (Down There) -- Run Down By M. Night Shyamalan -- Everything Up To And Including The Kitchen Toaster -- Sacrificed To Kali -- Via The Gargantuan Venom Of The Black Mamba Snake -- Turned Into An Evil Robot -- The Out-Of-Nowhere Careening Vehicle Splat -- "Oh My God... It's Dip!!!" -- Critter Balled -- Stuff'd -- A Hot-Air Balloon Ride... Straight To Hell!!! -- Puppy Betrayal -- High-Heeled By A Girlfriend Impersonator -- Flip-Top Beheaded -- Because I'm Too Goddamned Beautiful To Live -- By Choosing... Poorly... -- Fried Alive Due To Baby Ingenuity -- A Good Old-Fashioned Tentacle Smothering -- Eepa! Eepa! -- Gremlins Ate My Stairlift -- An Icicle Thru The Eye -- Face Carved Off By Ghost Doctor After Lesbian Tryst With Zombie Women -- Electrocuted By Fallen Power-Lines -- A Mouthful Of Flare -- Taken By The TV Lady -- Bitten By A Zombie -- Eaten By Your Mattress -- Stuffed To Splitting -- Face Stuck In Liquid Nitrogen -- Crushed By Crumbling Church Debris -- Bitten By The Jaws Of Life -- A Machete To The Crotch -- Showering With A Chain-Saw -- In A Room Filled With Razor Wire -- Pod People'd With Your Dog -- Force-Fed Art -- Skinned By A Witch -- Beaten With An Oar -- Curbed -- Cape Malfunction -- In The Corner -- Cooked In A Tanning Bed -- Diced -- Punched Through The Head -- Bugs Sucking On Your Head
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5 comments:

J.D. said...

God, how I fucking love that movie.

Stacie Ponder said...

This is the best Ways Not To Die yet! I haven't watched this movie in a long time...I need to rectify that.

movie scary said...

wow, i haven't seen this film in ages. need to check it out again.

Pax Romano said...

My partner is addicted to this film, he can recite most, if not all of the dialogue. Can't wait to show him this. Excellent posting, JA. One of your finest.

Jon said...

"Rear Window" is my favorite movie of all time. Danke, JA, danke.