Charlton Heston...RIP

[Bluedawg]

Thanks for some great movies and great times...

Charlton Heston, who won the 1959 best actor Oscar as the chariot-racing "Ben-Hur" and portrayed Moses, Michelangelo, El Cid and other heroic figures in movie epics of the '50s and '60s, has died. He was 84.

The actor died Saturday night at his home in Beverly Hills with his wife Lydia at his side, family spokesman Bill Powers said.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,346965,00.html

[hc5duke]

Why do I feel like this thread will be moved to PPB before it reaches page 2?

[hurleyfor3]

SPOILER ALERT: Soylent Green is people.

[billybreen]

SPOILER ALERT: Soylent Green is people.

Spoiler alert:
Oh my god, I was wrong.
It was Earth all along.

You've finally made a monkey
(Yes we've finally made a monkey).
Yes, you've finally made a monkey out of me.

[hc5duke]

Spoiler alert:
Oh my god, I was wrong.
It was Earth all along.

You've finally made a monkey
(Yes we've finally made a monkey).
Yes, you've finally made a monkey out of me.

Excuse me, I ordered a Zima, not emphysema...

[JasonEvans]

Raise your hand if before reading/hearing his obits you know that he was a huge anti-segregation campaigner who marched alongside MLK.

--Jason "he wasn't nominated for an Academy Award for Ten Commandments... stunning" Evans

[HaveFunExpectToWin]

SPOILER ALERT: Soylent Green is people.

"Soylent Green is still made out of people! They didn't change the recipe like they said they were going to! It's still people!"

Phil Hartman did a great Charlton Heston.

[Bluedawg]

Raise your hand if before reading/hearing his obits you know that he was a huge anti-segregation campaigner who marched alongside MLK.

--Jason "he wasn't nominated for an Academy Award for Ten Commandments... stunning" Evans

A lot of people don't really know who he was...from Mick LaSalle, Movie Critic for the S.F. Chronicle:

My Heston story, which I've repeated many times, is that I kept him waiting for an interview 13 years ago. I left too late and took the highway when I should have taken streets, and stranded him right outside The Chronicle's third-floor elevator. You could not hide Charlton Heston. The man was 6 feet 3 and as recognizable as George Washington, which means that everybody getting off the elevator that morning did a double take.

But when I finally showed up, he was fine about it. Not only were there no remarks or cold looks, but he didn't do the usual celebrity thing of being nice by showing you, "Here I am being nice." Heston could be gracious and move on, because he had absolutely no ego investment in anybody else's courtesy. He didn't care if other people were respecting him, because he respected himself.

Heston's purity of essence was his strength. He was this kind of actor: You stand him up, put a camera on him, and he meant something. He meant heroism - not anti-heroism, and not even American-style heroism, like, say, John Wayne. Rather Heston represented some mythic conception of heroism, of struggling, teeth-gritting, muscle-popping humanity going into head-to-head combat with ignorance and oppression. He was classical, archetypal. Plop him down in any century over the past 2,500 years, and he'd have made it as an actor.

In fact, the real thing to marvel at is how much, thanks to Heston wasn't funny - stuff that should have been, and would have been, with any other actor. The purity of his heroic essence allowed for moments of intensity that, with anyone else, would have seemed absurd - or would have required scaling down. Are Pacino, De Niro, Hackman and Hoffman better actors than Heston? Fine. Then put them on the beach at the end of "Planet of the Apes," or show them riding away at the end of "El Cid," or working as a galley slave in "Ben-Hur."

Could they do it? Of course, they'd figure out a way, but it would be a small, ironic or personal way. Al Pacino, for example, railing on the beach at the end of "Planet of the Apes," would simply register as Al Pacino very upset. It would most certainly not register as humanity encountering the tragic folly of its ways, but that's exactly what you get from Heston.

[juise]

SPOILER ALERT: Soylent Green is people.

That reminds me of this shirt. (Many spoilers!)



RIP, Mr. Heston.

[Bluedog]

And he graduated from my high school!!! As well as Christie Hefner, Donald Rumsfeld, Ann-Margret, Ann Compton, Rock Hudson, Hal Sparks, Adam Baldwin, John Stossel, Rainn Wilson, Bobbi Brown, Edward Zwick, Pete Wentz, etc. (shameless high school plug ends here).

[JasonEvans]

That reminds me of this shirt. (Many spoilers!)

I know I am going to feel like an idiot, but can you explain these two:

"The villagers sacrifice the policeman"

and

"The protagonists are the others"

--Jason "is that 2nd one from Lost?" Evans

[billybreen]

I know I am going to feel like an idiot, but can you explain these two:

"The villagers sacrifice the policeman"

and

"The protagonists are the others"

--Jason "is that 2nd one from Lost?" Evans

I thought the first one was from that stupid M. Night 'Village' movie.

[Lavabe]

And he graduated from my high school!!! As well as Christie Hefner, Donald Rumsfeld, Ann-Margret, Ann Compton, Rock Hudson, Hal Sparks, Adam Baldwin, John Stossel, Rainn Wilson, Bobbi Brown, Edward Zwick, Pete Wentz, etc. (shameless high school plug ends here).

Bobbi or Bobby Brown?

"Some apes, it seems, are more equal than others."
"Take your stinking paws off me, you damned dirty ape!"
"You Maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!"
Still some of the best lines he ever delivered. Thanks for the cinema history Charlton!

Primatological Cheers for George Taylor,
Lavabe

[JasonEvans]

I thought the first one was from that stupid M. Night 'Village' movie.

But thre is no "sacrifice" in that movie and the spoiler on that TShirt that says "the Village is part of a modern nature preserve" is from M. Night's "The Village."

I did a tiny bit of reasearch and found that "The villagers sacrifice the policeman" is from The Wicker Man and that "the protagonists are The Others" is from the Nolcie Kidman movie The Others.

Frankly, neither of these are good inclusions on this "spoiler" t-shirt as they were neither very popular movies nor were they pop-culture/cult films like perhaps Donnie Darko (which is also on the shirt).

That t-shirt is more fun if all the spoilers are from movies/TV shows that are so huge as to make all the spoilers already known.

--Jason "what others could we add? What is a good one-line spoiler for the awesome twist at the end of Memento?" Evans

[dkbaseball]

And he graduated from my high school!!! As well as Christie Hefner, Donald Rumsfeld, Ann-Margret, Ann Compton, Rock Hudson, Hal Sparks, Adam Baldwin, John Stossel, Rainn Wilson, Bobbi Brown, Edward Zwick, Pete Wentz, etc. (shameless high school plug ends here).

Along with the best all-round athlete I've ever known (in Ann Margaret's class). I've always thought that New Trier High was the quintessence of the post-WWII suburban experience.

[Bluedog]

Bobbi or Bobby Brown?

Bobbi Brown, the makeup artist and CEO of Bobbi Brown Cosmetics (she's female). Yeah, clearly she's not as famous as Bobby Brown, the R&B singer and ex-husband of Whitney Houston, but it's all we got.

Along with the best all-round athlete I've ever known (in Ann Margaret's class). I've always thought that New Trier High was the quintessence of the post-WWII suburban experience.

Yes, it is quite a suburban experience...not sure what athlete you're referring to. This guy (Charles Linster) was pretty ridiculous, but he's younger. 6,006 pushups non-stop (over 3 hrs) is pretty impressive. "Once the front leaning rest position is no longer maintained, the exercise is over." He was about to go for more, but a mere 69 days after breaking the record, he snapped his neck and was paralyzed. Very sad...Held the world record for 11 years...

Sorry for being so off topic, but it is the off topic board, so I figure it isn't that big of a deal.

[dkbaseball]

Bobbi

Yes, it is quite a suburban experience...not sure what athlete you're referring to. This guy (Charles Linster) was pretty ridiculous, but he's younger. 6,006 pushups non-stop (over 3 hrs) is pretty impressive. "Once the front leaning rest position is no longer maintained, the exercise is over." He was about to go for more, but a mere 69 days after breaking the record, he snapped his neck and was paralyzed. Very sad...Held the world record for 11 years.

Nobody anyone would know. Just a friend of mine who played basketball and baseball for Xavier, Ohio, and then became one of the top ten handball players in the country. In phenomenal shape in his day, but another sad story as he now has Parkinson's.

Harrison Ford didn't go to New Trier also, or did he? I think of the school as sort of a fountainhead of classic American ambition for stardom. My friend was also the most driven athlete I've ever known, just demonically possessed on the court.