ST ch 19 French 75s, Greasy Thumb Guzik

[Laura Kelber]

I think you may be the author of that essay, Robin.

On Wed, May 13, 2026, 3:27 PM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:

> . The Long Goodbye is practically an essay about the source material, much
> as One Battle After Another is.
>
> Great remark/observation....
>
> Thanks
>
> On Wed, May 13, 2026 at 3:16 PM Robin Landseadel via Pynchon-l <
> pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:
>
> > Laura Kelber: I'm not at all sure that GR should be adapted. Some things
> > are better left as they are. There was a short film, Impolex (2009),
> which
> > I haven't seen. The late, great Dave Monroe saw it and thought it was
> > reasonable. The one thing on my wish list for any Pynchon adaptation is
> > that the adapter has a clear understanding of the book's meaning (to
> them)
> > and has a Kubrick-like intensity about mapping it all out in detail ahead
> > of time, and conveying that meaning on the screen (ah, if only Kubrick
> > could have taken it on!). Anything less is just riffing (inspired by).
> > That's how we ended up with Emerald Fennell's *"Wuthering Heights."* I
> > can't think of any great adaptations of any of my favorite novels. The
> best
> > adaptations (okay, just guessing here) take an underwhelming novel and
> make
> > it better: Kubrick and *The Shining*, for example. David Lean's *Bridge
> On
> > the River Kwai*. . . . "
> >
> > My vote for a fully successful film version of a classic novel is "The
> > Maltese Falcon", John Houston's 1941 version. Very little taken out. I
> > happen to think that Raymond Chandler's novels are great, have a sneaking
> > suspicion Pynchon does as well. The two best adaptions of Chandler I'm
> > aware of play havoc with the source material, that would be the 1946
> Howard
> > Hawks "The Big Sleep" and Robert Altman's "The Long Goodbye" from 1973.
> The
> > Long Goodbye is practically an essay about the source material, much as
> One
> > Battle After Another is. I found myself really liking Inherent Vice
> after a
> > couple-two/three viewings. I realized that stuff had to be cut in order
> to
> > make a movie of reasonable length.
> >
> > Speaking of adaptation of classic material to the screen:
> >
> > “ . . . Some kind of classical music coming from the TV room. Mozart. In
> > these desperate stretches of early-morning programming, she finds Ernie
> > tubeside, his face transfigured in the ancient Trinitron glow, watching
> an
> > obscure, in fact never-distributed Marx Brothers version of Don Giovanni,
> > with Groucho in the title role. She tiptoes in barefoot and sits next to
> > her father on the couch. There’s a big plastic bowl of popcorn, too big
> > even for two people, too big for even two people, which Ernie after a
> while
> > nudges in her direction. During a recitative he fills her in. “They cut
> the
> > Commendatore so there’s no Donna Anna, no Don Ottavio, this way, without
> > the murder, it’s a comedy.” Leoporello is being played by both Chico and
> > Harpo, one for lines and one for sight gags, Chico fast-talking his way
> > through the Catalog Aria for example while Harpo runs around after Donna
> > Elvira (Margaret Dumont, in the role she was born for), pinching,
> groping,
> > and honking his bicycle horn, as well as later picking harp accompaniment
> > for “Deh vieni all finestra.” Masetto is a studio baritone who is not
> > Nelson Eddy, Zerlina is very young, lip-synced and more-than-presentable
> > Beatrice Pearson, later to portray another ingenue with a fatality for
> > scoundrels opposite John Garfield in Force of Evil, (1948) . . . “
> >
> > Bleeding Edge pgs. 417/418
> >
> > There's that massive load 'o' popcorn again, or I suppose before, as that
> > thread gets picked up in Shadow Ticket.
> >
> >
> > --
> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
> >
> --
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>