This goes back much earlier in the month but William Ahearn
captures quite well in this post some of my own feelings
about Woolrich. For that reason I want to surface it again as
we end the month. I hope a little later to do a final post
drawing from Michael Avallone's first- hand account of
Woolrich's funeral as published in the Mystery Writers of
America's The Third Degree.
Richard Moore
--- In
rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, William Ahearn
<williamahearn@...> wrote:
>
>
> --- Channing <filmtroll@...> wrote:
>
> > Of course many of these endings fly in the face
of
> > logic or
> > believability, but usually the ending is so
clever
> > you don't care.
> >
> Being a Cornell Woolrich fan is like having a
friend
> who comes to the party, gets drunk, eats
spaghetti
> with his fingers, hits on every warm body and breaks
a
> lamp before collapsing into a coma on the sofa on
top
> of everybody's coats.
>
> Yet, there's a deep and undeniable connection and
you
> know your life would be less without the guy.
Woolrich
> does things in his writing that would be a
wall-banger
> in any other writer's hands. When the guy is
paying
> attention, he produces some brilliant and
ambitious
> work (Waltz into Darkness, for one) and that's
what
> makes wandering through his faulty work
worthwhile.
>
> My favorite "Woolrich was there first" moment came
at
> the end of Jean Luc Godard's Detective. An
off-hand
> explanation at the end of a long and rambling
film.
> The explanation came from a Woolrich story --
although
> as you point out, he may not have been the
originator
> -- and while it was a revelation in the story, it
was
> almost a disappointment to the character in the
film.
> Nice trick to play on an old trick.
>
> William
>
> Essays and Ramblings
> <http://www.williamahearn.com>
>
>
>
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 29 Feb 2008 EST