ST ch 19 French 75s, Greasy Thumb Guzik
Corbeau Castrum
filsducorbeau at pm.me
Wed May 13 15:50:26 UTC 2026
What would be the appropriate way to adapt Pynchon's work? More kazoo? Less improvisational filmmaking? Must the conditions of production between a novel and a film be parallel or similar in approach? And why? Another way of asking this question is, what would be examples of successful adaptations?
On Wednesday, May 13th, 2026 at 17:40, Laura Kelber <laurakelber at gmail.com> wrote:
> Here's the link to the article about how the ending of One Battle After
> Another was created.
>
> https://theplaylist.net/paul-thomas-anderson-says-one-battle-another-shut-down-production-for-2-months-for-benicio-del-toro-inpired-a-new-ending-20251211/
>
> Basically, PTA had no strong ideas about how to end the story so he halted
> production for 2 months until Del Toro could come on set and re-imagine the
> whole ending. He had a strong sense of who his character was (much stronger
> than DiCaprio seemed to have of his own character), which is why Benicio's
> character took charge of the story, with DiCaprio relegated to comical
> sidekick. Benicio also came up with the whole road trip/race idea,
> apparently. That's not how I think an adapter should approach Pynchon's
> work. And it's why he had to change the credit from "adapted from" to
> "inspired by" Pynchon's novel. Hard to understand why PTA won Best Adapted
> Screenplay under the circumstances.
>
> On Tue, May 12, 2026 at 10:14 AM Joseph Tracy via Pynchon-l <
> pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:
>
> > Just didn't seem right to me, since there is this dead body of a CC
> > member on the highway and the car from which Penn was shot ( hardly a
> > French 75 vehicle) which is gonna come to police attention,or Penn's,
> > since he is walking along the same road. The Penn character is supposed
> > to know how to find shit out and has the power to do so. Just seems
> > like a non credible loose end in order to do the scene with the Nazi
> > style gas chamber and Penn's smiling ripped face looking like a George
> > Grosz drawing.
> >
> > The driving scene was shot in southern California near Palm Springs
> > about 8-10 hours from Humboldt County. No terrain like that up there,
> > but one of the more stomach churning car chase scenes ever.
> >
> > On 5/12/26 4:34 AM, Mark Kohut wrote:
> > > O yeah....the Sean Penn character believed it was his Leftie enemies,
> > > the French 75s
> > > who tried to kill him.....staring at the barrel of a rifle for a
> > > bare second or tow before being shot in the face
> > > makes it hard to see who shot.....film cutting nice on that, imo....
> > >
> > > On Tue, May 12, 2026 at 12:05 AM Joseph Tracy via Pynchon-l
> > > <pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > I thought the movie was a kind of surrogate imaginary revenge against
> > > Trump for people who aren't going to do shit to work for change,
> > > or to
> > > stop the bipartisan genocide and scapegoating of refugees fleeing
> > > poverty and right wing narco states. No Zionists in the Christmas
> > > Club,
> > > no Rubio, No Condaleeza, no Clarence Thomas. Also there was no
> > > family
> > > in Humboldt County, which was quite central to the novel. The only
> > > 'education for the Prairie character was violence and terror
> > > resolved in
> > > classic hollywood fashion when she shoots her designated killer.
> > > Why did
> > > Sean Penn still join the weird club after they tried to kill him and
> > > left him disfigured? Vato and Blood telling the fascist prick he
> > > would
> > > have to leave his bones behind but he would get used to it was
> > > better.
> > > DiCaprio and Del Toro( substitute for family) and the young woman
> > > who
> > > plays the Prairie type role were excellent as were several other
> > > performances. The French 75 started out with an appealing action and
> > > then they are robbing banks and murdering the security guard. Did
> > > that
> > > make anyone want to join the revolution?
> > > One realistic aspect was the extreme difficulty of organizing a
> > > violent revolution in an age of pervasive digital surveillance.
> > >
> > >
> > > The scene with the letter worked for me only because I thought it was
> > > obvious DiCaprio wrote the letter and that his daughter knew it.
> > > Otherwise it would be like a manipulative Hollywood resolution where
> > > abandonment and murderous betrayal is healed by a profession of
> > > love. In
> > > Vineland Frenesi takes the risk of going north and showing up.
> > >
> > > I hate to be so negative. Was looking forward to the movie. Liked his
> > > version of IV. I found it slightly better watched on a TV in a
> > > second
> > > view with my visiting daughter, who was not too impressed.
> > >
> > >
> > > On 5/11/26 12:34 PM, Mark Kohut wrote:
> > > > us thSo, we differ and maybe I’m too accepting.
> > > >
> > > > Here’s to pluralism.
> > > >
> > > > On Mon, May 11, 2026 at 12:08 PM Laura Kelber
> > > <laurakelber at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >
> > > >> I'm just not a fan of PTA, other than Boogie Nights, and I find
> > > nothing in
> > > >> his movies that echos or resonates about America or the world
> > > the way
> > > >> Pynchon does, or even, for that matter, the old doc The World
> > > at War (which
> > > >> I'm currently rewatching) does. In an interview, he said that
> > > Benicio del
> > > >> Toro actually helped craft the plot of the latter part of the
> > > movie, which
> > > >> is "inspired by," not an adaptation of Vineland. So I don't see
> > > PTA as
> > > >> anything approaching the deliberate craftsmanship of Pynchon.
> > > >>
> > > >> On Mon, May 11, 2026 at 11:53 AM Mark Kohut
> > > <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >>
> > > >>> Anderson’s movies’ tones are not literally the decade they
> > > are set, imo.
> > > >>> Look at the Master, Magnolia, others. They are thematic
> > > thematic tones
> > > >>> resonating beyond their present.
> > > >>>
> > > >>> In OBAA it is the eternal present of America from the sixties
> > > to Tiffany,
> > > >>> imo.
> > > >>>
> > > >>> I think one reason Anderson is a fan and has had his artistic
> > > vision
> > > >>> shaped by TRP is to try to emulate that poised both
> > > sides/times now.
> > > >>>
> > > >>> See Lawrence and H Rap Brown among others on violence and
> > America.
> > > >>>
> > > >>> On Mon, May 11, 2026 at 11:37 AM Robin Landseadel via Pynchon-l <
> > > >>> pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:
> > > >>>
> > > >>>> I understand what you are saying about the initial setting of
> > > the movie
> > > >>>> in the Obama era. Of course, no names are named. However, the
> > > historical
> > > >>>> POV of most of the movie is in the present tense, or at least
> > > a present
> > > >>>> tense. Thank you for mentioning Assata Shakur and Fred
> > > Hampton. That would
> > > >>>> be more on-point, in that regard you are right as regards
> > > French 75. The
> > > >>>> point of 24fps was to document police actions against
> > > protesters, something
> > > >>>> that was happening a lot at Earth First and associated
> > > rallies in the
> > > >>>> Emerald Triangle in the late 1980s/early 1990s, lots of folks
> > > circling the
> > > >>>> scene with handheld videocams.
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>>> On 05/11/2026 8:17 AM PDT Laura Kelber
> > > <laurakelber at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > >>>>>
> > > >>>>>
> > > >>>>>
> > > >>>>> Saw One Battle After Another a couple of days ago. "French
> > > 75" appears
> > > >>>> to be a group modeled after the SDS or Black Panthers but set
> > > in the
> > > >>>> present tense rather than the late 1960s/early 1970s like 24fps.
> > > >>>>> French 75 appears to me to be modeled after more violent
> > > groups like
> > > >>>> The Weathermen and BLA, and Perfidia clearly referenced
> > > Assata Shakur, who
> > > >>>> died about a week (if I remember) before OBAA had its
> > > theatrical release.
> > > >>>> The violence of these groups was a response to the FBI's
> > > assassination of
> > > >>>> Fred Hampton and the excesses of the Nixon administration and
> > > COINTELPRO.
> > > >>>> To set a similar group ahistorically in the tepid years of
> > > the late Obama
> > > >>>> period seems politically tone deaf to me. It's not something
> > > that Pynchon
> > > >>>> would ever do, and certainly didn't do in Vineland. That's
> > > one of my many
> > > >>>> objections to the movie.
> > > >>>>> Laura
> > > >>>>>
> > > >>> --
> > > >>>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> > > >>>>
> > > > --
> > > > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> > > --
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> > >
> > --
> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >
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