Word: noir
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American films in the late 40s and early 50s were dominated by a style called film noir, as the optimistic excitement of wartime Hollywood gave way to a bleak mood of disillusionment and introspection. Directors turned away from the mythology of the American Dream to examine the darker sides of the American psyche: corruption, jealousy, greed, obsessive hate, and murder became crucial themes. Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity, showing in the Orson Welles's film noir festival is in many ways a perfect example of the genre. Written by Raymond Chandler, it stars Barbara Stanwyck as the sexy but neglected...
...swiftly. They soon are dumped back into the realities of Detroit and New York. But the memories mingle and linger: supreme of pheasant smitane, Rockefeller, Harriman, Dillon, chestnut mousse, Bob Stack, Nanette Fabray, De La Renta, Alsop, filet of salmon in aspic, Cronkite, Swearingen, Humphrey, Schramsberg blanc de noir, Auchincloss. Watching from the dim corners of the old Decatur House on Lafayette Square, where the ladies went for tea, or inside the stately Anderson House, where Sadat the next day returned the White House favors with a dinner, one could see that a lot of the people had seen each...
Grape prices have dropped by 25% this year, and even more for finer-quality grapes. Vintners who paid the growers $862 per ton for high-quality Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and White Riesling grapes last year are now paying only about $500. Retail price reductions for wine will be less dramatic than that because of swelling production costs. But there should be modest price cuts in the best California wines by next summer, when 1974 whites will begin to hit those overcrowded retail shelves. The reds, aged longer, should drop somewhat by the 1975 holiday season. A 15% price...
There are a couple of well-known names among the credits. One of the scriptwriters is Millard Kaufman, who wrote Bad Day at Black Rock. His partner is Samuel Fuller, a sort of American-primitive film maker (The Steel Helmet, The Naked Kiss) beloved of film noir aficionados. Director Terence Young has a few James Bond movies like From Russia with Love and Thunderball to his credit. Maybe these names were all rented for the occasion, as camouflage. The evidence on-screen strongly suggests that The Klansman was made pseudonymously by the Snopes family, trying to cash...
...million gal. of California table wine consumed annually by Americans is made from plebeian grapes grown in California's hot San Joaquin Valley, blended and sold mostly by the jug. The highly cherished European wines, on the other hand-such aristocrats as Cabernet Sauvignon, Pinot Noir, Chenin Blanc, Sauvignon Blanc-are made only from selected clones whose territory and yield are as strictly regulated as a royal household and sell in general for $8 a bottle or more. In fact, vagaries of the European climate make the great vintages as costly as a Patou perfume...