Over at his site, John Scalzi is spending December doing his own sort of Wind-down, though he isn’t calling it such. Specifically, he’s writing about a movie each day — a “comfort watch” that he goes back to time and again.
I like the idea. I could maybe pass a month that way myself.
Today, though, I’m instead going to tell you about a Comfort Non-Watch.
So, I’m a big fan of Bruce Campbell, have been ever since a friend of mine in middle school invited me over to his house, which was near a video store, which we went to, where his friend at the register totally ignored the fact that we were well under 18 and rented us Evil Dead.
If you don’t know Evil Dead, I’ll just go ahead and tell you it’s the best low-(almost no)-budget made-in-a-random-cabin-in-Tennessee-by-two-lifelong-friends-then-in-their-twenties-with-a-camera-and-a-dream horror film ever.
The next weekend, my friend and I watched Evil Dead 2, but, like the movie itself, that’s another story.
Anyway, since that fateful underage viewing of Evil Dead, I’ve made an effort to watch most everything Bruce Campbell has been in. It’s the rare case where I follow an actor rather than a writer or director. He’s just damned good, certainly the best B-movie actor of his generation.
There are a few things I’ve missed along the way, though.
I’ve seen most of his films, and most of the TV series he’s been in1, but the gaps, naturally, bug me.
One of those gaps is Running Time, a low-budget, black-and-white heist film from 1997 with a running time of 70 minutes.
I mention the running time because the entire film, in keeping with its title, is presented in real-time and as one continuous take.
Now, I’d heard of this, of course, and it was on my “get to it eventually” list — where it had so much company it would never want for conversation — but I hadn’t gone to the trouble of tracking down a copy of the DVD, which is rare and also the only way to watch the film. (I scoured every streaming service. Nobody has it.)
Then I found out that the role Campbell plays — Carl, the just-released-from-prison thief who gets pulled in for a job — is one of his top five2 favorite roles from his entire career.3
Well, then.
Off to eBay I went, and after some searching and waiting I scored a still-in-the-shrink-wrap copy for less than the cost of a good bottle of whisky.
And it’s been sitting on the shelf since, waiting for its moment, my Comfort Non-Watch, that movie which I am excited to see but hold in reserve for a day when I really need it.
Here’s what I’m drinking today: J.P. Wiser’s 18-Year-Old Canadian Whisky.
What a minute!
Yes, that’s what I was drinking yesterday.
But why?
Well, a few reasons, starting with the fact that I didn’t really feel like cracking into something else this evening and ending with the fact that if I don’t get ahead of The Empress of Whisky I might not get another pour off this bottle.
Will you have something new tomorrow?
Probably not. I’ve got some family holiday shenanigans to get through, which, while they may very well involve whisky, might not leave me with time to write about it.
I’ve decided not to push myself the way I used to when it comes to writing these. I’d like to have one each day, now that I’ve started, but I’m not going to eat that pressure this year.
If I do have whisky this weekend, I’ll take pictures and catch you up later.
Check out yesterday’s post for a story about my dating anniversary, as well as my tasting notes on J.P. Wiser’s 18-Year-Old Canadian Whisky. Or skip ahead to a tale of rum.
- I’ve been making my way through Burn Notice off and on this year — it’s not bad, if formulaic; Campbell is excellent as Sam Axe — and I’ll eventually force myself to watch the episodes of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess in which he guest-starred as Autolycus, King of Thieves. ↩︎
- Carl Matushka in Running Time; Brisco County, Jr. in The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.; Sam Axe in Burn Notice; Ash Williams in the Evil Dead films and the TV show Ash vs Evil Dead; and Elvis in Bubba Ho-Tep, a criminally underrated film featuring an aged Elvis and a black man who claims to be John F. Kennedy facing off against an ancient — is there any other kind? — Egyptian mummy in an east Texas nursing home. ↩︎
- I know this because I heard the words from Bruce Campbell’s own mouth when I saw him at Bruce-O-Rama at The Caverns this summer. He did Q&A, ran a quiz show, and introduced a screening of Evil Dead 2. It was awesome. ↩︎
lastgreypoet 