WCBE 90.5 FM: "The History Boys," "We Are Marshall," "Rocky Balboa," "Fur"

WCBE 90.5 FM
It's Movie Time: "The History Boys," "We Are Marshall," "Rocky Balboa," "Fur"
Co-hosts, writers & producers: John DeSando & Clay Lowe
Recorded: Wednesday, 1:30 pm, December 20, 2006
Air Time: Friday, 3:01 pm and 8:01 pm, December 22, 2006
Streaming live on the web at http://www.wcbe.org .

John

"The History Boys" had a successful HISTORY in London and New York and NOW on your screen . . .

Clay

"We Are Marshall" is as much about tenacity as it is about football . .

John

"Rocky Balboa" is a little film about a big guy . . .

Clay

"Fur" is a little film about little people and the woman who took their
pictures . . .

HIT MUSIC, THEN UP THEN UNDER FOR:

Richelle"

"It's Movie Time" in Columbus with John DeSando and Clay Lowe. . .

MUSIC BRIEFLY UP THEN SLOWLY DOWN AND OUT

John

I'm John DeSando . . .

Clay

I'm Clay Lowe . . .

John ("The History Boys" 128 words)

“History is just one f’n thing after another.”

Clay

John, that’s the only stale line in the movie.

John

This quote from The History Boys is the ANTITHESIS of the high-minded quotes and philosophies spouted by teachers and aspiring “Oxbridge” scholars at a public grammar school in Yorkshire.

Clay

Now, THAT'S true.

John

How nice of you.

That quote epitomizes the sub-textual disdain for intellectual snobbery and solipsism that hangs about academic institutions anywhere, anytime.

It’s 1983 in a boys’ public grammar in Yorkshire as the gifted “history boys” prepare for entrance to Oxford or Cambridge. Learning French by acting out a scene in a brothel is the preferred mode of preparation.

Clay

That's what I do.

John

The latent and sometimes overt homosexuality is just another learning experience for the boys. If you love to hear English as it was meant to be spoken, albeit highly stylized, see The History Boys.

Clay ("We Are Marshall" 131 words)

Folks, if you want to hear English spoken the way it is back in the hollars of West Virginia, then “We Are Marshall” is a far better pick.

Sure the ruddy Brit boys heading for Oxford or Cambridge are wittier and classier than their rowdy homespun college counterparts from small town America. But the sons of farmers and factory workers in “We Are Marshall” make up for in spirit and determination what they lack in manners and intellectual shine.

Set in the year following a tragic plane crash that killed most of
their football team, “We Are Marshall” is the story of one of the team's survivors, a newly hired coach, and their old college president who finally catches on to what it means to go for broke.

John ("Rocky Balboa" 129 words)

Here’s another one of those unaassuming films that contribute to a merry Christmas.

Just as Citizen Kane was as much about the rise and fall of Orson Welles, Rocky Balboa is as much about Sylvester Stallone's going one more round with a movie industry unsympathetic to aging. It is a small, underplayed drama about an older man, like you, who still has life and more importantly--spirit.

But Stallone's script and direction emphasize the rightness of Rocky's
trying himself again, having some confidence in his physical ability to stay in the ring with the young man. Actor/director Stallone gives a
sweetness and almost Zen-like wisdom to the boxer's decision.

Stallone has succeeded in giving dignity to his boxer and aging in general, with an attendant life lesson to act always with a charity that helps outside the ring and maybe even inside.

Clay ("Fur" 133 words)

Folks, it’s too bad that the movie “Fur” doesn’t tell you more about the movie’s heroine, the late photographer Diane Arbus. But then it’d be just another bio.

Nicole Kidman, thankfully, rises above this and is able to
capture the sensuality of Arbus while at the same time she is able to expose Arbus’s vulnerabilities as mother, daughter, and wife.

“Fur” is a mythopoetic tale that explores the inner recesses of the mind of the Diane Arbus, who though growing up in the midst of privilege, ended up becoming fixated upon the grotesqueries of lives that existed outside the confines of her own narrow realities.

Part Alice in Wonderland, part a retelling of “Beauty and the Beast,” “Fur” is a great film to kick-off a discussion about what it is that motivates artists to create.

But enough of those cheeky boys, grunting jocks, and furry, erotic,
monsters, John, because it’s grading time.

HIT DRUMS, THEN UNDER FOR

John

Holy HAPPY HISTORY, Hooray

"The History Boys" earns an “A” because the ACADEMY hasn’t been ACES like this since Dead Poet’s Society . . .

Clay

"We Are Marshall" gets a “B” because it’s a B Movie delight . . .

John

"Rocky Balboa" earns a “B” because BOXING is not BORING. . .

Clay

"Fur" gets an “A” because it ALLUDES to realities that ARE beyond the senses . . .

John

Clay, all this talk of aging and history makes me wonder how you have defied the actuaries and the fur-loving women you have left behind . . .

I'm outta here.

Clay

John, never take on the odds, go with the flow, and when things get too furry, go for the clippers and razor . . .

I'm outta here, too.

See you at the movies, folks and have a happy holiday.

HIT CLOSING THEME THEN UNDER FOR

Richelle:

The Award-Winning "It's Movie Time" with John DeSando and Clay Lowe is written produced by John DeSando and Clay Lowe in conjunction with 90.5 FM,WCBE in Columbus, Ohio.

MUSIC UP, THEN DOWN AND OUT