Summer Reading!

Every year around this time the ailes at the video store would be full with frantic parents and their children looking for the last copy of The Scarlet Letter to rent. Or maybe someone would rent that old VHS copy of John Steinbeck's The Pearl we had. No, these weren't eager students of classic literature looking to view Hollywood's take on the classics, but rather an angry mob of parents and their kids hoping to find movie versions of all the books they were supposed to read over the summer. When I first started to work in video retail in 1986, their were a handful of parents renting the movie versions of books for their kids. They would always claim that their child had read the book but now wanted to see the movie. But by the time we closed in 2004, the parents just came out and admitted that their kids didn't even bother to read the books that they were assigned. The new excuse was that they didn't understand what they were reading. Well, if that's the case then perhaps there is a bigger problem then just not wanting to read. Maybe the child doesn't know how to read, and if so why aren't the parents concerned? What would amaze me was when the parents would get on waiting lists for a movie that we only had one copy of, like The Invisible Man. The Invisible Man was one of my favorite books to read when I was a kid. I am also a fan of the 1933 Universal Studios film version starring, Claude Rains. And it is that version that parents would rent for their children. That film is almost nothing like the book. And secondly, the book is so short and such a quick read, that in the time the parent waits for the only film to become available, their child could have read it twice over. While parents are partly responsible for this lack of interest in the written word by their children, some teachers are to be blamed as well. In my time behind the counter I saw many teachers who would rent films to show in their classrooms, and not all were part of the lesson plan. Teachers would flat out tell me that one day a week would be set aside to show movies in class. These were not films related to certain lessons that were being taught, but just a movie or two that the teachers felt would keep them occupied. That kind of laziness is really absurd. Have teachers adopted a defeatist attitude? "If you can't beat them, join them!" Is that what they think! No wonder the educational system is in such disrepair in this country. But at the same time I must admit that the sudden surge in popular children's books like the Harry Potter series brings me hope. Maybe things will start to turn around and future generations raised on Potter and Narnia will actually want to read first and then go see the movie.

Glenn Ford 1916 - 2006

Glenn Ford began his acting career in 1937. After a few bit parts and some leading man roles he emerged a star in 1946 along with Rita Hayworth in the film noir classic, Gilda. As Hayworth's ex-lover in the film, their on-screen chemistry was so popular that they went on to star together in several other films including The Loves of Carmen and Affair in Trinidad. But Ford found his place in dozens of Hollywood westerns including The Desperadoes, The Man from Colorado, Jubal, The Americano, 3:10 to Yuma and Cimarron. They called him the fastest gun in Hollywood. He could draw his weapon in .04 seconds - faster than John Wayne. In 1958, he was voted Hollywood's number one box office star. Yet in between his time in the saddle, Ford gave some truly stand-out performances in films like Blackboard Jungle, playing a middle-aged high school teacher up against inner city kids opposite a young Sidney Poitier. As a tough cop willing to take on a politically powerful crime syndicate in The Big Heat, Ford worked for legendary director Fritz Lang. Ford only stumbled once or twice on screen, he was miscast as Damon Runyon's gangster in Frank Capra's Pocketful of Miracles. For me, I first encountered Glenn Ford in 1978 as Jonathan Kent in Richard Donner's Superman: The Movie . Ford brought a sense of humanity to the small role of Superman's Earth father, and his naturalistic style of acting made his on-screen heart attack one of the most realistic I've ever seen portrayed on film. Ford retired from the screen in 1991 and then suffered a series of strokes that left him in poor health. TCM is planning an all-day tribute to Glenn Ford on Sunday, September 10th. I'm sure the TV monitors in our store would have been playing our own tribute right along with them.

Glenn Ford Movies

Sound the Freak Alarm!

In our store we had all sorts of props lying around. There were old promotional materials, unused video boxes, books, magazines and an assortment of discarded holiday decorations. One such ornament was a pair of plastic rats left-over from Halloween. These rats can be found every year at most holiday specialty stores like Halloween Adventure. The rats had a device inside that made a high-pitched squeak sound when squeezed. At our store the pair of rodents became an unofficial alarm to be sounded whenever a new or resident freak customer entered the store. Our store attracted many freaks in all shapes and sizes. There were the usual time-bandits, we had many of those. Time-bandits in our store usually came in bearing long lists of movies, all of which had never been or never will be available on home video. Then there were the truly freakish customers with actual physical or mental defects. Don't get me wrong, we were tolerant at our store and treated everyone with respect, but some of our freaks were truly unique. There was "Decaying Woman", an elderly lady who was literally decaying before our eyes. Each week she would leave not only old yellowed newspaper articles on the counter, but she would also leave bits of dead skin. Honestly! You had to see it to believe! Technically she was also a time-bandit as well, due to the large amounts of movie reviews (those discarded newspaper articles) she would go through looking for a movie to rent. Then there were the freakish customers who wanted physical contact of some kind. An obese unkempt man once asked me to help pull his pants up after his suspenders had become unattached. That was truly memorable! Elvis fans almost always lead to the sounding of the rat alarm. I have nothing against the "King", but his fans can be peculiar to say the least. Body odor and proud porn customers always justified a hardy squeeze of the rat. (Proud porn customers were those who showed no shame when announcing their adult title selections very loudly.) Luckily, the customers in question never caught on to the sound of a squeal or two emanating from behind the counter. But to us the staff, it was a reassuring way to offer solidarity to each other in times of great peril!