"Union Maids" (1976)

Met the people who made this movie shortly after it came out.  Interesting folks and the group they belonged to was not beloved by the college history professors in the Dayton area because of the previous movie they made about Patterson the guy who founded NCR.

The Vikings

Watched The Vikings last night. All I can say is do not unleash the watch dogs of my fury.

Oh yeah, don't piss off the guy with the hawk.

New Deal Economics 101 and a Movie

So how many movies have you all seen where the romantic male lead is a middle level federal bureaucrat? Huh, Huh? Well the only one that I can think of is The Wild River staring Montgomery Clift and Lee Remick. It's great.

Watch Montgomery Clift get beat up more than once. Watch him propose to Lee Remick after they both get knocked out by Albert Salami (the only one dimensional character in the film). What's even better is the proposal line: "I'll probably regret this and I know you will." I had forgotten that I'd taped it some time ago and we watched it again last night. What a great film. Having a hard time finding a DVD of it though.

The feeling for the time and the place are near perfect. The writers' and director's liberalism shines through all. Highly recommended.

And just for the wonks a little Krugman. Just in time for the new Depression the right rides forth to attack the New Deal and try to convince us that it is better to starve and freeze then to try to do once again what worked in the past. (No I'm not talking about the New Deal itself [which tried, but didn't go far enough], but rather the spending from the Second World War).

I sometimes wonder if that isn't what has gotten us here. The lesson learned from the period 1932 through 1940 isn't that we can spend on stuff to make our lives better to get out of depressions. Nope. It's that we can get out of and keep out of depressions if we put mass amounts of money into our military. 1984 anyone?