IVIV page 142

[Michael Bailey]

"The footage, almost too clearly, showed Glen Charlock getting shot
down by one of the
masked gunmen."
Doc and Farley are watching.

This is homemade video, not too far removed from the 24fps stuff in _Vineland_
and taken with a camera that some ex-GIs liberated from the, umm, camera pool?

sometimes you hit a passage and there's really nothing
you can say about it that isn't right in there.  That
never stops me, though.

A distinction is made between the light in the movies and
the light of the "indiscriminate LA sun" - this is a point made
in thousands of narratives, "hey, this isn't the movies, it's
the real thing"

this passage has the advantage of previous and later passages
in this book and the author's oeuvre which talk about lighting
in the movies.  Like the love between Elmina and Leo, which some
may regard as a parody or crime or parody of a crime but I
regard as an important touchstone, the simple but time-honored
"light of day" makes its appearance and a point that - for some
ineffable reason - not only militarists and their apologists but
also even moderate and pacific citizens find tiresome, simply
because it is so true that they think it goes without saying:
killing is ugly to watch, if you've got even half a heart.

I tend to think that literature is supposed to reaffirm stock
values, and I support that endeavor.  So I approve this scene.

There doesn't seem to be confusion on Doc's part, as he watches,
about the difference between reel life and real life.  Rather,
his watching it underscores the difference, but it doesn't
prevent him from also seeking the knowledge available
for his detecting trip:

after getting Farley to reassure him that the photo lab
isn't likely to give the footage to, say, Bigfoot, who as
we know is friendly with the perpetrators (this would
be probably a bad thing for Doc and Farley both),
Doc asks if he can get an enlargement to see who
is shooting...

and then he's back in his office giving me an excuse to
see what "sinverguenza" means.  I often see this
lettered on the windows or sides of vans driving around town.

Sinverguenza: basically, shameless

once again, Doc uses "Trick question" rather offhandedly
and outside a rigorous meaning structure



-- 
--- ...one of the "sounds of the sixties" evoked in IV
is that of the coffee percolator, which is simply a far, far groovier
sound than any drip coffeemaker has ever made