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December 31, 2008
Ten Best Movies of 2008, Part I
Seraphic Secret is taking a short break from blogging the Gaza War to look back at the ten best movies I screened in 2008. I have to admit that I did not see one contemporary release that comes close to the quality and passion of these older films. And keep in mind that most of these classic movies were produced on modest budgets, never intended as studio blockbusters. These ten products of Hollywood's golden age are what Hollywood used to do best: solid, unpretentious entertainment.
Charles Laughton, the finest actor
of his time.
10. The Man From Down Under (1943) starring Charles Laughton and Donna Reed. Billy Wilder once stated that Charles Laughton was the greatest living actor. Who am I to argue with the legendary director? Laughton was certainly methodical in his research. Tapped to star as Captain Bligh in MGM's blockbuster Mutiny on the Bounty, (1935) Laughton went to the original London tailor shop that made the real Bligh's uniforms and had them copied to wear as his wardrobe. Anything for a true performance. Here, Laughton brilliantly portrays a rough and alcohol sodden Australian soldier who adopts two Belgium orphans, rescuing them from the ruins of World War I. This could have been a dreadful exercise in melodrama, but Laughton's acute commitment to the crude but sensitive Aussie character raises the movie to an unexpected emotional pitch. Robert Z.Leonard real name Robert Zigler Leonard, directed this little gem. Leonard is one of those great studio directors who are sniffed at by film cultists because he didn't have a "personal signature.” But Leonard's signature, like the great Clarence Brown, was rock solid professionalism and the highest levels of craftsmanship.
Marion Davies in Peg O' My Heart
9. Peg O’ My Heart (1933) starring Marion Davies as poor Irish girl who is forced to abandon her beloved father and live with snooty, wealthy relatives in the manor—and learn to be a lady. Davies is poignant and charming. She was a hugely gifted comedienne. Unfortunately, as William Randolph Hearst's mistress she was never taken seriously. It didn't help that Hearst financed her movies and insisted that she star in stiff dramatic period pieces that were unsuited to her natural comedic talents. Davies, a former Ziegfeld Girl, also sings and dances in this movie with magnetic energy. Once again, Robert Z. Leonard provides rock solid direction. Before he died, Orson Welles confessed that he had “done a dirty” to Marion Davies with his portrayal of the shrill and talentless Susan Alexander in Citizen Kane. It's impossible to know if Welles was truly contrite—he was always acting—but he spoke the truth. Citizen Kane destroyed a talented woman's reputation for several generations. Only now is a new generation of movie-lovers beginning to appreciate Marion Davies incandescent screen persona.
8. Five Star Final (1931) starring Edward G. Robinson, and Marian Marsh, Screenplay by Byron Morgan, directed by Mervyn Leroy. This amazing film delves into the squalid world of yellow journalism. Edward G. Robinson, real name Emanuel Goldenberg, plays a city editor who agrees to pursue a story, actually a family with a terrible secret, in order to increase circulation. Lives are shattered and spilled ink results in spilled blood. There's great use of split screen to build tension during a telephone sequence, so next time you watch 24, remember that this is an old and reliable device. Robinson, one of the great American film actors of all time, turns in a powerful and moving performance as a professional who sacrifices his soul and ethics for a story that should not be told. Mervyn LeRoy, real name probably Mervyn Levine, who got his start as a gag writer for silent star Colleen Moore, stays out of the way and allows his cast to work together and dramatize the moral vacuum that has been opened. The great Marian Marsh real name, Violet Ethelred Krauth, is simply riveting. I saw this on TCM, and so far have not been able to find it on DVD or VHS. A buried treasure.
7. The Toll of the Sea (1922) From a script by Hollywood's greatest screenwriter, Frances Marion. Anna May Wong's first feature role. She was just 17-years old. This was the first Hollywood feature shot in the new two-color Technicolor process. Anna May, Lotus Flower, rescues and falls in love with a shipwrecked American sailor. He promises to take her home. But the sailor's friends discourage the love affair with a Chinese girl, and he takes off to America without Lotus Flower. Wong's performance is beautifully modulated and deeply moving, especially for one so young. Wong matured into a great actress—she steals scenes from the flashy Dietrich in Shanghai Express simply by her riveting zen-like stillness. Sadly, Wong was doomed to star in B programmers where the plot required her to die rather than end up in a clincher with her Caucasian co-star.
Constance Bennett
6. The Easiest Way, (1931) starring Constance Bennett, Anita Page, Adolphe Menjou, Robert Montgomery, and the very young Clark Gable has a small supporting role. This is a a smoldering, Pre-code moral fable. Constance Bennett, an impoverished beauty, discovers that the easiest way to support her struggling family is to become mistress to the oily, and always tuxedoed Adolphe Menjou. But Bennett falls in love with the poor but honest Robert Montgomery. Ultimately, she has to choose between love, money, and a moral code that will allow her to sleep at night. Bennett was a huge star for a few years, but her diva-like behavior made enemies of studio executives and film crews alike. When Bennett's star fell—sister Joan's star ascended as Constance crashed—there were few who shed any tears. Constance Bennett fans usually cite the superb Hollywood or Bust or the overrated Topper—a one-joke film with terminal second act problems—as their favorite Constance Bennett films. But for yours truly, The Easiest Way is her most surprising and multi-layered performance. For an insightful look into the entire Bennett clan—talk about a family with tzuris—Self-Styled Siren has been blogging about sisters Constance, Joan, a bit on tragic Barbara, and toxic daddy Richard Bennett.
5. Lorna Doone 1922, starring Madge Bellamy, John Bowers, Frank Keenan and Patrick McDonald, from the novel by Richard Doddridge Blackmore. Madge Bellamy, real name Margaret Derden Philpott, for a few brief moments in Hollywood time, was a massive star. You can also see her in John Ford's The Iron Horse. In the sound era, Madge's most famous role is as Madeleine Parker, in White Zombie, with Bela Lugosi (1932), a cult classic. But the young beauty seemed bent on self-destruction and gained a reputation for being difficult, the kiss of death in tinsel town. She sealed her fate when she walked out of L.B. Mayer's office because, as she explained, he didn't stand up to greet her like a gentleman. Her personal life was a mess. Bellamy was dominated by a grasping, overbearing mother, and Madge's only marriage lasted but four days. Her downfall came when she stalked a former lover and then shot him. Arrested and charged with attempted murder, Bellamy said: “I only winged him, which is what I meant to do. Believe me, I'm a crack shot.” Lorna Doone, one of the greatest love stories evuh, tells the tale of Lorna, a noble young girl who is kidnapped and reared by the Doone's, a clan of highland bandits. Years pass and one of the thieves tries to press Lorna into marriage, but Lorna is still in love with her childhood sweetheart. Director Maurice Tourneur, real name Maurice Thomas, was one of the great pioneers and poets of the silent cinema. Every composition is carefully balanced and source-lighting evokes layers of mood that recalls the Northern Renaissance. Bellamy is just lovely and her performance is a fine portrait of a young woman torn between the conflicting emotions of duty to Sir Ensor Doone, the clan leader, and her long lost love.
And do check out my buddy Dirty Harry's list of Ten Worst Films of 2008. Oy-vey, the things DH does for his audience. He should get a medal for hazardous duty.
In the meantime:
Mae West, the woman who famously boasted of turning
men into boys, celebrates.
The hard-working Jack has just published his Gaza Update 4.5. Seraphic Secret prides itself on transparency, so we'd like you to know that Jack asked us if we had any suggestions on how to improve his Gaza Updates. “A picture of Brigitte Bardot,” was our reasonably reply. I mean, BB would be a great moral booster during this difficult time, no?
Well, Jack didn't take our wise advice so here's one—for the troops.
The anti-Islamist BB
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 01:01 PM | Comments (17)
And the Oscar Goes To...
Here's the feel-good movie of the year: the IAF targeting and taking out a cell of Hamas terrorists as they load Grad missiles—manufactured by Iran, smuggled into Gaza via tunnels from Egypt—to the back of a truck. This compelling and suspenseful film—very Hitchcock—was up on the IDF's new You Tube account, but, naturally, a bunch of terrorists and their enablers protested and the politically correct idiots at You Tube removed it. Can't let the public see a bunch of Arab Muslim thugs preparing to launch missiles against innocent civilians in Israel. That would, y'know, give lie to their precious victim status.
Thankfully, Live Leak is happy to pick up the business. The IDF should immediately shift its account to Live Leak. Capitalism at work.
Update: We have just been informed by Seraphic friend Ezzie, that You Tube have reinstated the banned video. Just goes to show, with enough publicity and pressure the good guys can win in this PC environment.
Speaking of politically correct idiots, a group of Hollywood actresses have decided to enable the Jew-hating terrorists. Explain to these actresses that they are strengthening sharia-yearning transnational Islamists who routinely oppress, rape and murder women, and they will look at you as if you're crazy. For them, that only happens in the movies. And you wonder why it's been almost 50-years since Hollywood produced Exodus, the last big studio film in support of Israel.
And hey, want to know where the courageous Hamas leadership in Gaza is hiding? In maternity and cancer wards. Shocking, huh, they're cowering behind their most vulnerable civilians. As they well know, there is no chance the IAF will bomb a Gaza hospital. Because unlike Hamas and the Gazans who elected them, the Jewish State is civilized, even when threatened by a relentless and genocidal enemy.
Shin Bet Chief Yuval Diskin briefed the cabinet Wednesday on the progress of Operation Cast Lead.
According to Diskin, "Hamas has been attacked like never before. It has suffered significant damages and its rule over Gaza has been compromised."
Diskin also noted that large numbers of Hamas operatives are hiding in hospitals and that some are posing as medical staff. "Some are also hiding in mosques and some of those have been turned into headquarters, since they assumed Israel won't attack them there. Their weapons' labs have been completely destroyed and their tunnel system has been severely damaged.
For the full story, please click here.
Ah, Denmark, the little country that heroically rescued its Jewish citizens during World War II. Well, times have changed.
A group of Arab youths opened fire Wednesday evening on a number of Israelis working at a mall in the Danish city of Odenza, some 200 kilometers north of Copenhagen.
Full story here.
The next time someone claims that anti-Zionism is not pathological Jew-hatred, here's what Seraphic Secret recommends: Punch them in the face—really hard—and calmly explain to the, hopefully bleeding useful idiot, that the punch was merely an advanced rhetorical device, not violence. I'm certain he'll calm down and accept your nuanced—one of their gold-plated words—interpretation.
Jack has just published his Gaza Roundup 3.5. Invaluable.
My friends Jameel and Aussie Dave continue live-blogging the war. These guys should get a medal for excellence in journalism.
A Jewish soldier recites Shachareet, the morning prayer,
on the Israeli Gaza border.
Watch this 15-second video clip. Fifteen seconds is all you have from the start of a "Code Red" air raid siren—if you're in the 10-kilometer zone around Gaza—to reach the safety of a bomb shelter.
Ready, set, go!
Not a lot of time.
Here's the petition in support of the citizens of S'derot. H/T The Muqata.
Also from Aish, Missiles from Gaza, a sobering look at the current situation.
Oh joy! Further honest if unlettered Arab rhetoric. This from Iran, where Jew-hatred is a fine art. Notice the not-so-subtle atomic logo on the red balloon. This, no doubt, signals that Persia is developing atomic energy for peaceful purposes, not as we right-wing alarmists caution, to bomb the Jewish State into ashes.
Jack is a busy blogger, he's just posted his Gaza Roundup numero IV.
My good friend and one of the best bloggers in the known universe, David of Treppenwitz, is gladly—well, sorta—running in and out of a bomb shelter.
Attention! Did you know that Nazis are evil, that World War II offered moral absolutes? Did you know that sophisticated film reviewers consider this POV rather, um, unsophisticated? Well, check out the review of Valkyrie by Manolo Blahnik—I always call her that—at the, what a shock, NY Times.
It’s a war that offers moral absolutes (Nazis are evil) and narratives (Nazis are evil and should die) that seem easier to grasp than any current conflict. Truly, World War II has become the moviemaker’s gift that keeps on giving, whether you want it to or not.
Karen read this—I actually don't bother reading reviews—and went into a pretty dramatic melt down.
“Robert, you have to write about this.”
“Oy, it's just a dopey film review from a clueless tool.”
“Robert, this is horrifying. Can you imagine if you showed this to a Holocaust survivor?”
“Why draw attention to such idiocy?”
“Really, you have to write about this review, it's unconscienceable.”
“Okey-dokey.”
Thanks heavens nobody pays attention to film reviewers. In fact, the dinosaur media are wisely laying off their film reviewers, recognizing dead wood when they see it. New media is moving into the film world with the speed and power of Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman across Georgia. The blogosphere is brimming with stupendous and penetrating film sites, the good blogs so much better than the mainstream media that it's not even a close call.
A really powerful film producer once explained to me that if one of his blockbusters received a positive review from the NY Times the film was guaranteed to tank. A negative review was gold in the bank.
Anyhoo.
Yours truly needs a drink. Oh wait, I don't drink, liquor gives me migraines. Okay, somebody out there pour a stiff one for Seraphic Secret.
Liberals are going to need a drink—many drinks—once they get a look at this honest and hard-hitting report from FOX Business News: The Media and Gaza.
Seraphic Secret is going to take a moment to shep nachas, Yiddish: experience joy and pride, for the Exectuve Producer of the Fox Business News is long-time Seraphic friend, Jake. Hat Tip to faithful Seraphic reader Lance, who suggests that we give the Oscar to Jake.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 04:39 AM | Comments (12)
December 30, 2008
Honest if Unlettered Arab Rhetoric
A pro-terrorist, i.e. Palestinian supporter, displays his ideological convictions at a Jew-hating, er Juice-hating rally, in Manhattan yesterday.
Seraphic Secret is worried that Israel will suspend Operation Cast Lead in order to send “humanitarian aid” into Gaza. Israeli government spokesman claim that Hamas have hijacked the peaceful residents of Gaza.
This is nonsense. It's like drawing a distinction between the so-called innocent German citizens who actively supported the Nazis, or the Japanese who willingly died for their emperor.
The citizens of Gaza overwhelmingly elected Hamas, not because, as the chattering classes claim, because Fatah is corrupt—all Islamists are corrupt—but because the Hamas Covenant denies the historical and religious legitimacy of Israel, vows to eliminate Israel, and to murder all Jews everywhere. This genocidal program is a guaranteed winner with the citizens of Gaza, and has metastized throughout the Arab Muslim world.
Once Israel denies the rock solid civilian support that props up Hamas, she enters a realm of delusion that can only lead to military and political defeat.
My friend Treppenwitz points out that Israeli blood, for humanitarian transfusions, is shipped into Gaza via Jordan. Why? Because Jewish blood is considered filthy, and so as a fig leaf, Jewish blood sent to Jew-haters is transported into Gaza via an Arab state, thus maintaining the illusion that the blood is pure, i.e. Muslim.
This is Nazi doctrine writ large.
Can you make peace with such people?
The Israeli government, acting as a modern Judenrat, expelled every single Jew from Gaza, we're talking approximately 9,000 Jewish souls.The government promised that once Gaza was Judenrein, free of Jews, peace would break out.
It didn't quite work out that way.
The peaceful residents of Gaza took the following actions:
1. Burned ever abandoned synagogue.
2. Destroyed the lovely and profitable greenhouses that dopey liberal American Jews—Mortimer Zuckerman & friends—purchased for 14 million dollars—who said Jews are smart?—for the peace-loving residents of Gaza.
3. Immediately launched missiles into Israel, targeting civilians.
4. Kidnapped IDF soldiers. Goldwasser and Regev were probably dead when they were kidnapped. Gilad Shalit is still in cruel captivity—the only Jew in Gaza.
I have yet to hear one supporter of the Gaza expulsion admit that creating a defacto Palestinian state only strengthened Hamas, and proved to every transnational terrorist on the face of the earth that terror pays big dividends—especially when the victims are Jews.
Seraphic Secret has long maintained that all power should be shut off to Gaza—Israel controls the power grid. No fuel should be permitted into Gaza. And let the Egyptians provide humanitarian aid for they also share a border with their Arab brothers.
Every spark of electricity provides the Jew-haters in Gaza with power to kill Israelis. Every ounce of fuel is ammunition for the terrorists to launch their missiles.
War is a serious business. Hamas recognize this and proceed accordingly.
I fear that the current Israeli leadership has no stomach for waging war as it should be waged against the Reich in Gaza: with overwhelming force, until Hamas are turned to nothingness and Gaza surrenders unconditionally.
The world is obsessed with casualties—of terrorists—in Gaza, but what about the slaughter of innocents in Congo and the murder of Kurds in Iraq?
Baka Diary has an incredibly powerful post: Where Was the Outrage, that profiles the innocent civilians, women and children, murdered by Hamas missiles—weapons the world labels crude and ineffective.
More tragedy for the Holtzberg family:
The four-year-old son of Gavriel and Rivak Holtzberg, who were killed in the terror attack on the Chabad house in Mumbai, has died of a severe genetic disease overnight.
Dov-Ba'ar Holtzberg's funeral will be held at 10 am in Jerusalem.Jack has posted his invaluable Gaza Roundup, Part III.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:52 AM | Comments (13)
December 29, 2008
Why We Fight
Israel is unable or unwilling to expend much energy in the propaganda war against her Arab Muslim enemies and the mainstream media who enable the Jew-hating Muslim world.
But Arab television does the job for the Jewish State quite nicely. They produce and broadcast—round the clock—the most ghoulish, blood-thirsty, genocidal films since the Third Reich. In fact, the propaganda films of the Third Reich are positively subtle compared to the filth churned out by the Arab Muslim world.
These Jew-hating spots should convince most any fair-minded person—excluding the Hamas boosting dinosaur media—that Israel must fight and destroy her enemies. The charge of disproportionate response is just plain silly for there is no such thing as a disproportionate response in the face of relentless and solemn Muslim tribal calls for genocide.
Israel's current offensive against Gaza, Operation Cast Lead, has been a long time coming. Hamas, a proxy for Iran, has poured more than 6,000 missiles into Israel since 2005 when Israel expelled every Jew from Gaza—the Israeli government acting as a modern Judenrat—and created a de facto Palestinian state. Terrorist rhetoric has been full-throated and triumphal. Hamas have boasted that The Zionist Entity—they refuse to acknowledge Israel—has no way of dealing with their rocket attacks. But now that Israel has struck back, the bombastic rhetoric has abruptly ceased. Hamas gnashes its teeth and cries that they are helpless victims.
Odd how the terrorists shed one identity for another so rapidly. Reminds me of the school yard bullies who used to torment the small and weak kids in my grade school—until the weaker kid struck back in self-defense.
I have no idea how Operation Cast Lead will turn out. Israel says that its strategic goal is to halt the rain of rockets on Israel, not to topple Hamas.
But Hamas was formed for one purpose: to destroy Israel and to murder every Jew on the planet. This genocidal goal is neatly and proudly laid out in the Hamas Covenant.
And so the truth is that until Hamas is destroyed Israel will suffer unrelenting terror.
America utterly destroyed Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan during World War II. If Israel wants peace from Gaza, and from her hostile Arab neighbors, she must demonstrate the consequences of making war against the Jewish state.
And the consequences must be the destruction of Hamas and their unconditional surrender. Defeat must be accompanied by humiliation for in the Arab Muslim world—a culture defined by honor and shame—abject humiliation is the surest long term remedy.
If an international cease-fire is imposed, then Israel loses, because like cockroaches, terror organizations need only survive a conflagration to declare victory.
Jack has compiled an excellent Gaza Round-up Part II.
Seraphic Secret's buddy, Jameel at The Muqata continues to live-blog the war. Superb work.
My mate, (I speak the lingo) Aussie Dave, at Israellycool, between swigs of beer—he is an Aussie!—is also doing a great job of live-blogging the war.
Update:This is unconfirmed but Joshua Pundit reports that IDF troops have just entered Gaza. May Hashem protect and guide them to victory.
IAF footage of air strikes on Hamas tunnels, used to smuggle arms from Egypt into Gaza—with the aid of The Muslim Brotherhood—strikes on missile depots disguised as greenhouses, and a strike on the expensive high-rise headquarters of Hamas.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:39 AM | Comments (22)
December 28, 2008
Egypt: "Hamas is to Blame"
In the back-stabbing world of Arab politics where “death to Israel” is the only common cause, this official statement from the Egyptian Foreign Minister is a blazing neon sign that Hamas is perceived as a greater danger to the region than the evil Jooz.
Too bad the European Jew-haters can't come up with the same common-sense message. But the cultural and mental narcissism afflicting liberals trumps all.
And Haveil Havalim # 198 is up and live, this week hosted by Material Maidel—hey, is MM aware of Seraphic Secret's Friday Footwear?
In her quick-witted commentary—very Carole Lombard—MM wonders if Seraphic Secret's post about the Iranian Christmas Message is a bit angry.
Actually, we're furious.
Hey, guess what kids, Faux Photography from Gaza, AKA Pallywood, is already underway.
The well informed and always articulate Joshua Pundit, nicely summarizes Operation Cast Lead, and points out that the AP office in Gaza was also hit by Jewish shrapnel. In a screenplay we refer to this as a well-crafted resolution.
Jack has put together a nice round-up of posts about the war. Jack is pressed for time, but he says that there is more to come.
At some point, the useful idiots in the west and in Israel are going to insist that the so-called Palestinians should get more aid, more money. Joe Settler sanely points out that the more money you give these genocidal thugs, the more Jews get dead.
My buddy Jameel at The Muqata, is live-blogging the war—and yes, it is a war.
And let's not forget that my Aussie mate—I just love saying mate—at Israellycool, is also live-blogging the war.
Flashback: At the Nefesh B'Nefesh International Bloggers conference I met Israellycool for the first time. Aussie Dave is tall and trim and looks a bit like a Jewish version of Crocodile Dundee. Anyway, we're standing there talking about, what else, blogging, and he starts getting all tech on me. He goes on about RSS feeds and other stuff and I go:
“What's RSS?”
His jaw, I kid you not, just drops to the floor.
He's like: You're kidding, mate?”
I'm like: “Um, no.”
So he looks at me long and hard, at first totally bewildered at the ignorance displayed by yours truly, and then with real pity in his eyes because it hits him: Seraphic Secret is tragically backwards.
But he's a good bloke—another great Aussie word—and he starts lecturing me on RSS feeds and other stuff, and the tech talk is just mind-numbing, so naturally my so-called mind just drifts away and I wonder if Mae Murray, real name: Marie Adrienne Koenig, might be the most forgotten and overlooked star of the silent movie era—evuh?
Aussie Dave finishes his RSS lecture and asks if I understand, so of course I nod my head like a bobble and tell him:
“Oh, yeah, perfectly.”
And he knows I'm just lying through my teeth.
Anyhoo:
Still wondering about poor Mae Murray.
And still not a clue about RSS.
Mae Murray, known as
The Girl with the Bee Stung Lips.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a miraculous happy eighth and last night of Chanukah. And if you want the perfect Chanukah gift—also excellent for a late Christmas gift—here's a shameless plug for my novel. Another fine gift is my Emmy Award winning film.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:23 AM | Comments (24)
IDF Targets Hamas Military Targets
The IDF on Saturday night released aerial photos of Hamas facilities targeted by IAF fighter pilots on Saturday in Operation 'Cast Lead.'
The photos show the military training facilities Hamas has developed in Gaza, from where Israel forcibly evicted close to 10,000 of its Jewish citizens in August 2005 in hopes of establishing peace with its Palestinian Authority Arab neighbors.
Hamas embeds its military and training facilities in civilian areas, knowing that Israel is most careful about bombing such areas. Almost all the Gaza casualties are Hamas terrorists. The civilians who have been and will be killed, are, according to the Geneva Conventions, put at risk by Hamas, thus Hamas are responsible for their deaths, not Israel, who are defending themselves against terrorist aggression:
Article 28 of the Geneva Conventions: The presence of a protected person may not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations.
In short: Hamas are committing war crimes by using civilians as human shields.
As for the French who are accusing Israel of a disproportionate response, well, here's a news flash: disproportionate response is exactly how wars are won. But then that's not something the French would recognize since their military default is total surrender.
For the complete list of targets with photos, please click here.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 12:45 AM | Comments (12)
December 26, 2008
My Beautiful Neighborhood VIII
I went through this period were I photographed richly textured details of roofs, sides of buildings, steel grates, and other stuff in my neighborhood. I printed the photo twice, paired them as mirror images, rephotographed the assemblage to highlight compositional elements, and then, whew, printed them again.
I created hundreds of these compositions before switching to digital photography at Karen's wise suggestion. All the pictures were taken with a Contax G2 Rangefinder—a great camera, now sadly retired—usually mounted with a 50mm lens. With so many unlabeled photos—dopey me, I gave them numbers—it's kind of fun trying to see through the abstraction and puzzle out the actual space.
And no, I have not forgotten that today is Friday Footwear. And because today's theme is doubles here's a bonus snapshot of, ta-da, Offspring #2 and Offspring #3 in matching Ugs. Can anyone identify the location? Hint: it's not in California.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a miraculous Shabbat, a happy sixth night of Chanukah. And if you want the perfect Chanukah gift—also excellent for a late Christmas gift—here's a shameless plug for my novel. Another fine gift is my Emmy Award winning film.
Oh, yeah, thought you should all know that during this Christmas season, Hamas, enacting Sharia, legalized crucifixion.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:39 AM | Comments (11)
December 25, 2008
A (somewhat clumsy) Merry Christmas
Marceline Day waits for Santa.
Karen and I founded Seraphic Secret as a memorial for our son, Ariel Chaim ZT'L.
Inevitably, as time passed, we widened our topics to include politics, religion, Hollywood, family life, how I married Karen, and of course, the Arab Muslim terrorist threat to Israel and the West.
We always assumed that our readers would be overwhelmingly Jewish, supporters of Israel, and Orthodox in their beliefs and ritual.
But a funny thing happened on the way to Seraphic Secret, something totally unexpected and deeply moving.
Karen and I discovered that hundreds, if not thousands of our readers and commenters are Christian, deeply committed to their faith—in many forms—great supporters of Israel, and articulately focused on the struggle against Arab Muslim terror.
Quite a few of our Christian readers have become close cyber-buddies. We cherish these relationships and are grateful to our friends for taking the trouble to reach out to us.
I was brought up in a rather sheltered environment, in a a home and community still reeling from the Holocaust. On one side of the invisible divide were Jews, and on the other side a universe of hostile non-Jews, intent on our destruction.
What I never understood, until relatively recently, is that American Christians are a world away from European Christians, who were, and are marinated in cultural and religious Jew-hatred.
And so:
This is our clumsy way of thanking you for the kind words and prayers you have offered for Ariel Chaim, ZT'L.
This is our clumsy way of expressing gratitude for your invaluable support of Israel.
This is our clumsy way of letting you know that your presence in our lives has enriched us immeasurably.
Finally, this is our somewhat clumsy way of wishing all our Christian friends a very Merry Christmas.
And now, from the classic movie Holiday Inn, Bing Crosby sings a Christmas song written by Irving Berlin, real name: Israel Isidore Baline, an American Jew born in an impoverished Russian shtetl.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a happy fifth night of Chanukah. And if you want the perfect Chanukah gift—excellent for Christmas too—here's a shameless plug for my novel. And another great gift is my Emmy Award winning film.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 12:33 AM | Comments (33)
December 24, 2008
Christmas Message
The Persian Christmas message for suspected homosexuals.
This is what you get when the chattering classes, deeply steeped in Jew hatred, embrace multi-culturalism and moral relativity: an alternative Christmas message from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad , in, what a shock, Britain, where Jew-haters sing anti-Israeli Christmas Carols in Church.
But Dorothy Byrne, Channel 4's head of news and current affairs, defended the choice. "As the leader of one of the most powerful states in the Middle East, President Ahmadinejad’s views are enormously influential," she said. “As we approach a critical time in international relations, we are offering our viewers an insight into an alternative world view."
Okay, so what are some of the, ahem, alternative views of this influential world leader? Let's rewind:
3. Finance and equip Hizbullah, a proxy army, to achieve #2.
4. Hang suspected homosexuals, adulterers, and natch, Zionist spies, in the public square.
5. Sieze British sailors and hold them hostage and make sure to display them on TV as tools of Islamic propaganda.
6. Hang Christians.
7. Murder 240 American Marines.
8. Eliminate and persecute members of the Baha’is.
9. Declare war on America.
10. Gradually, but ruthlessly eliminate the Persian-Jewish community.
Seraphic Secret has long maintained that the Western attempt to “understand” the views of Islamic Jew-haters bent on genocide is to legitimize such totalitarian views.
It is not a virtue to be tolerant of the intolerant. It is, in fact, suicide.
The Islamists are fighting a total war against the West: multiple wars of terror across the globe—anchored by the war against Israel's existence—and in the West, a propaganda/media war—aided by useful idiots—to undermine democratic institutions and values. Most dangerous, the Islamists are enabled by a dinosaur media, careerist intellectuals and politicians.
Here's what you need to understand: evil exists and it must be eradicated.
America and her allies recognized the evil of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan and both countries were bombed into nothingness.
The West, sooner or later, must understand that in order to defeat those who claim that Islam is the solution, are, in effect saying: Islam is the Final Solution.
The West will then have no alternative but to reduce the radical Islamic world to ashes. Because sometimes war is the answer.
That is Seraphic Secret's message.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a happy fourth night of Chanukah. And if you want the perfect Chanukah gift—excellent for Christmas too—here's my shameless plug.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:49 AM | Comments (19)
December 23, 2008
Where is the Peace?
No on two-state.
There is already a Palestinian state and it is called Gaza, an Islamic terrorist state dedicated to the destruction of Israel and the elimination of Jews everywhere. It's in their official covenant, perhaps the most racist, genocidal, Jew-hating document of modern times.
Establishing another Palestinian reich in Judea and Samaria would be nothing short of national suicide for the Jewish state. In fact, Israel has only one Gaza option: a serious military operation against this Islamist entity.
Seraphic Secret is one with The 18.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a happy third night of Chanukah. And if you want the perfect Chanukah gift—excellent for Christmas too—here's my shameless plug.
And finally, this piece about the Conservative of the Year. Guaranteed to make Liberal heads explode.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 07:55 AM | Comments (13)
December 22, 2008
Islam = Terrorism? Duh
FBI Most Wanted Terrorists.
But, of course, according to an opinion piece in (where else) the New York Times, it's sinister to link Islam with terrorism.
Sigh.
Seraphic Secret is proudly sinister.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a happy second night of Chanuka. And if you want the perfect Chanukah gift—also excellent for Christmas—here's my shameless suggestion.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:28 AM | Comments (16)
December 21, 2008
Shiny Happy Dhimmi
Henry Fonda says: “After guard duty I'm
going to read Shiny Happy Dhimmi.”
Soccer Dad is up and live with Shiny Happy Dhimmi #6.
Tonight is the first night of Chanukah, a joyous holiday that celebrates the military and spiritual victories of loyal Jews against Jew-hating tyrants and their Hellenized Jewish collaborators.
Nothing much has changed in Jewish history. Pious Jews still fight for Judaism and Israel, whereas Hellenized Jews foolishly appease those who would destroy Torah, Judaism and Israel.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a happy and joyous Chanukah.
And oh yeah, here's the perfect Chanukah gift.
This is a fine Chanukah message from novelist Naomi Ragen:
Chanukah begins on the longest and darkest night of the year. We commemorate one of the darkest periods in our history, when the Greeks destroyed our Temple, raped Jewish brides on their wedding night, and forbid the practice of the Jewish religion or the learning of Torah. We mark our victory over this enemy by lighting up the dark night with a candle, which not only gives light, but is capable of spreading light by lighting a thousand other candles without itself being diminished.
The second miracle of Chanukah, after our amazing victory, came about because one bottle of undesecrated oil was found in the Temple, enough to last for one day and instead lasted for eight. But we don't celebrate this holiday by pouring oil into a container and watching it burn for eight days. Instead, we light one candle. And when that burns out, we come back the next night and light two candles. And when they burn out, we come back again and light three candles..and four.and five.and six... and so on. I want to wish every one of you who is suffering, who has experienced loss or pain or heartache or illness, that this year Chanukah will bring light back into your life. I bless you that when life knocks you down, you will get up the next morning twice as strong. When it knocks you down again, get up the next morning three times as strong! I wish this for you as individuals, and for the Jewish nation as a whole, wherever our people may be.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 12:19 PM | Comments (2)
December 19, 2008
My Beautiful Neighborhood VII
Great signage right off Pico Blvd. This is the store where I buy
all my American and Israeli flags and lapel pins.
As I've said, I love to roam the alleyways here in my neighborhood.
This row of garages has layers of texture topped by wonderfully muted colors.
Self-portrait in concrete.
They don't build hinges like they used to. From the Griffith Observatory.
Another self-portrait. This one in a superbly broken mirror in one of my
beautiful neighborhood's alleys.
Last week Karen and I visited Bensonhurst, our old Brooklyn neighborhood. It used to be a predominately Italian-Irish neighborhood with small, quivering pockets of Jews. Now Russian and Korean immigrants dominate. I'm a sucker for brilliantly colored walls with great signage. It also helps when it's raining and the streets are film noir slick.
The moment you've all been waiting for: Friday footwear. Offspring #2 is a busy wife and mother, but she still makes time to purchase new shoes. These classic flats with whispery ankle straps are the love child of Moira Shearer in The Red Shoes and Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday. “Carlo, you simply must take me dancing in the silvery moonlight. Pronto!”
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a restful and miraculous Shabbat.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 03:53 AM | Comments (11)
December 18, 2008
Gary Sinise: Great Star, Great American
President Bush awards Hollywood star Gary Sinise with the
Presidential Citizens Medal.
This war's Bob Hope is Gary Sinise.
Gary tirelessly supports our troops and children's educational programs in Iraq—without a retinue of PR people and reporters trailing his every move and calling attention to his good deeds.
Go to my buddy Dirty Harry for the complete story.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 01:25 PM | Comments (8)
December 16, 2008
20 Favorite Actresses
This MEME is ripping through the film blogosphere like a prairie fire. I have not been tagged, but it's too compelling a list to ignore, therefore I'm jumping in.
So: What is my criteria for a favorite actress?
After much thought, it comes down to this: If yours truly will sit down and screen a film—any film, even a lousy movie—just to watch a particular actress weave her magical spell, well, she definitely qualifies as a favorite actress.
Mind you, we're not talking best actresses. Hence Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Barbara Stanwyck, Myrna Loy, Ida Lupino, Norma Shearer and other towering figures do not make my list.
Some of the actresses on my list are great actresses. Others are deeply limited but possess that magical star quality that makes it impossible for Seraphic Secret not to watch.
Obviously, my list leans heavily towards players of the silent screen—Gish, Bow and Pickford were immensely gifted, hard-working trail-blazers—and actresses from Hollywood's Golden Age, the thirties through the mid-forties.
This was a hellish list to compile but after a while I tried not to over-think my choices and just went with my gut.
I believe this MEME originated from The Film Experience. Head on over and take a look at all the fascinating lists compiled by a diverse range of movie lovers.
Gong Li (yup, that's me, the grinning male on the left)
As always, I'm tagging all my reader-commenters and lurkers. I'm also tagging: Dirty Harry, Bookworm Room, Toronto Pearl, Jack, Michael Jennings, Batya.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 01:29 PM | Comments (31)
The Drowning Cell Phone (s)
Two weeks ago:
Offspring #3: “I, um, need a new cell phone.”
Me: What happened?
Offspring #3: “My phone got damaged. Water damage.”
Me: Water?
Offspring #3: “Yeah, I dropped it in the toilet.”
Me: “The toilet.”
Offspring #3: “Uh-huh.”
I desperately try not think about the unfortunate scenario; details, time sequences, etc.
Me: “Okay, what do we learn from this particular accident?”
Offspring #3: (big sigh) “Not to take my cell phone into the rest room.”
Me: “Excellent.”
Last Week:
Offspring #3 whips out her cell phone, a seriously complicated little block that has this snappy Star Trek swiveling device on top and enough flashing buttons on the tiny keyboard to satisfy NASA command.
Me: “So that's your new phone, huh?”
Offspring #3: ”Um, not exactly.”
Me: “I do not understand.”
Offspring #3: “This is actually my new, new phone.”
I just sit and wait because Offspring #3 is just so darned cute when she spills.
Offspring #3: “I dropped my new phone in the toilet. This is my friend's phone. She gave it to me because she didn't need it anymore and this way I didn't have to buy another. Saved money, see?”
Offspring #3 delivers above dialogue in a single, breathless burst. Pretty impressive. The content almost slips right past me. Almost, but not quite.
Me: “Wait. Wait. You're telling me that you dropped a second phone in the toilet?”
Offspring #3: “Uh-huh.”
Me: “This is not possible.”
Offspring #3 just gazes at me like, what's not to understand?
Me: “What about the lesson? You know, not taking a cell phone into the rest room.”
Offspring #3 lets loose with a massive Joan Crawford shrug. This kid should be a Hollywood agent. She's got a totally brilliant way of structuring conversations—the silences between sentences—guaranteed to make the other side feel like morons. You don't really know what's hit you until a few days later when you wake up in the middle of the night and go: “Wait a minute, did that really happen?”
Okay, I see an opportunity. I have the parental high ground for a few brief seconds. I can turn this cell-phone-in-the-toilet-plague to my advantage.
Me: “Can I write about this on Seraphic Secret?”
Offspring #3's eyes are round as saucers as she thinks this one over.
Offspring #3: “Sure, okay.”
Wise decision.
Stay tuned for the next exciting chapter regarding the fate of Offspring #3's new, new phone.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:37 AM | Comments (32)
December 15, 2008
Change We've Seen Again and Again and Again
Hey, kids, let's turn even more of the middle-east into a Judenrein,
totalitarian Islamic reich. As the map shows, Israel—the tiny red dot—already takes up way too much real estate.
President-elect Barack Hussein Obama's promise for change certainly seems to be taking root in his Middle Eastern appointments. He's heading back to the very worst interlocutors from the Clinton years. You know, the good ol' days when terrorist leader Yassir Arafat spent more time in the Lincoln Bedroom than any other foreign leader. Yeah, that bit of appeasement diplomacy worked out really well for Israel and the West.
Naturally, an overwhelming majority of American Jews voted for Barack Hussein Obama and this proves one of two things:
1) American Jews will follow the Democrats the way children followed the Pied-Piper. Basically, they are deeply uncritical lemmings.
2) American Jews do not care about Israel.
Or, both.
The short list: Martin Indyk, Dan Kurtzer, Colin Powell, and Dennis Ross. Or, as they're also known: the guy who just promised that Obama will ratchet up pressure on Israel, the guy who's been promising since March that Obama will ratchet up pressure on Israel, and the guy who was so biased for so long that Israel wrote him off because he was from the State Department and - really - what do you expect? Oh - and also shameless Obama shill Dennis Ross. So not that much of a surprise.
To read the complete article go to my friend Mere Rhetoric.
Meanwhile, the current Israeli government continues along a path of appeasement and stupidity which is simply mind boggling.
Because in return for these confidence building gestures, Israel gets this bit of Islamic barbarism.
Oh yeah, let's hand over Judea and Samaria and divide Jerusalem to these Islamo Nazis. What could possibly go wrong?
So let's review: In return for a bunch of blood-thirsty terrorists who will go back to killing Jews, what does Israel get out of this deal?
Um...
In Hollywood, this type of negotiation is delicately known as, “getting royally reamed.” Any agent who structures such a one-sided deal would be fired in in instant and never work in this town again.
By setting free a bunch of Arab Muslim terrorists Israel signals to the Islamists that the Jewish State no longer has any interest in fighting an offensive war against Israel's enemies. It's a feeble defensive act that is sure to fail. Proof positive that the current Israeli government has no strategy beyond appeasement and surrender for dealing with the ring of Islamists and Islamist states who surround Israel. No wonder Hamas is preparing to take over Judea and Samaria. Fatah and its Holocaust denying President Mahmoud Abbas, have authority over maybe two or three buildings. Only the IDF and committed Jewish pioneers stand in Hama's genocidal path.
The first rule of warfare is to know your enemy. The tragic truth is that many in Israel and most in the West have little idea about the truth of Arab Muslim intentions towards Israel, Jews, and yes, America.
But hey look at this, sometimes Israel gets something right.
And now, from the better-late-than-never file:
Karen and I were at 30,000 feet when the new Haveil Havalim #196, My Kids Wish it was Chanukah Already was published.
Ditto for Soccer Dad's Shiny Happy Dhimmi #5.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:33 AM | Comments (4)
December 12, 2008
“Now We Are All Lubavitch”
The other day, Seraphic Secret received a note from Chabad Headquarters in Crown Heights, N.Y. expressing appreciation for our coverage of the pogrom on the Jews of India. Chabad also thanked us for our “unabashed love for Klal Yisroel [World Jewry] and your clearheaded insight into matters of Israel’s well being and security.”
Chabad informed us that they have been working round the clock on a memorial tribute to Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, 29 and his pregnant wife Rivka Holtzberg, 28, along with 38-year-old Leibish Teitelbaum, 50-year-old Norma Shvarzblat Rabinovich, Yocheved Orpaz, 60, and Bentzion Chroman, 28, all martyred in the Mumbai pogrom, May Their Blood be Avenged.
The tribute is deeply moving and for those who have never heard the message of the Lubavitcher Rebbe ZT'L, this video will be a revelation. The Rebbe speaks eloquently and articulately of the Jewish imperative for sh'lichut, outreach and charity, in every corner of the world, no matter the personal sacrifice.
Part I
Part II
The mainstream media is determined to spin a false Mumbai narrative: that the Muslim terrorists killed without regard to ethnicity or religion. This is true—up to a point. But the chilling fact is that the Islamo Nazis diverted a full 20% of their manpower to select, torture and murder the Jews of Mumbai.
The mainstream media are unwilling to admit that Islamic terrorists, in fact, the entire islamic world is a sewer of Jew-hatred. The media, including Hollywood, prefer a false narrative of national liberation movements whose grievances and roots we must understand, i.e. poverty, lack of education, lack of jobs, yadda, yadda. It's a tediously pat narrative that feeds left-wing delusions of romantic third world revolutionaries. But it's a bit like claiming that the Crips and the Bloods are selfless neighborhood Robin Hoods.
The liberal media do not comprehend that in the Islamic world Jew-hatred masquerades under the guise of so-called national-religious liberation movements. Divisions of land, international treaties, billions in foreign aid, and noble speeches from gullible western politicians cannot and will not solve the genocidal Jew-hatred that is the bedrock of Islamic terrorism. More precisely, Westerners cannot solve this fundamental and ancient bigotry. Only the Muslim world can fix what is so terribly broken in their religion, their tribes, and their societies.
The world must choose between Jew-haters and Jews.
And the world should be acutely aware that once Jews become politically acceptable targets of hatred and murder, well then everyone becomes fair game, for Jews are the canary in the coal mine of civilization.
Neither Karen nor I are Lubavitch Hasidim, but as Seraphic Secret has been saying since the Mumbai pogrom: “Now, we are all Lubavitch.” This goes for Jew and non-Jew alike, those who recognize that fighting the evil of transnational Islamic terrorism is the civilized world's highest priority.
Ma'ayan Ariel say: “Gee willikers, I'm only eight-months old and they already have me editing and contributing to Seraphic Secret. I can't wait to start yeshiva, which has to be easier than this. Anyhoo, my Saba and Savta, grandfather and grandmother, along with Offspring #2, my Ima, mommy, and the wonderful son-in-law, that's Abba, my daddy, and Offspring #3, my doting aunt, wish all our friends and relatives a lovely and meaningful Shabbat.”
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 05:49 AM | Comments (15)
December 10, 2008
Silence = Acceptance
Seraphic Secret is one of the 18. H/T Treppenwitz
The Mumbai terror massacres and the selection of Mumbai's Jews for murder should alert the free world to the Jew-hatred that is at the core of Islamo Nazism. Not territorial disputes, the demarcation of national boundaries or refugees. These are just fig-leafs for a genocidal transnational Islamist movement intent on eliminating Israel and all Jews from the face of the earth. If you doubt this, just read the Hamas Covenant, a proudly Jew-hating and genocidal document.
But true to its liberal agenda, appeasement at all costs—especially when it involves Jewish blood—the mainstream media did all it could to play down the slaughter in the Mumbai Chabad House, making believe that the Islamo Nazis were equal opportunity murderers—when nothing could be further from the truth.
And of course the mainstream media doesn't have the brains or the guts to write about the strong connection between Lashkar-e-Taiba and American Islamo terrorists.
Mark Steyn comments on the pathologies of the west.
In a well-planned attack on iconic Bombay landmarks symbolizing great power and wealth, the “militants” nevertheless found time to divert 20 percent of their manpower to torturing and killing a handful of obscure Jews helping the city’s poor in a nondescript building. If they were just “teenage gunmen” or “militants” in the cause of Kashmir, engaged in a more or less conventional territorial dispute with India, why kill the only rabbi in Bombay? Dennis Prager got to the absurdity of it when he invited his readers to imagine Basque separatists attacking Madrid: “Would the terrorists take time out to murder all those in the Madrid Chabad House? The idea is ludicrous.”
And yet we take it for granted that Pakistani “militants” in a long-running border dispute with India would take time out of their hectic schedule to kill Jews. In going to ever more baroque lengths to avoid saying “Islamic” or “Muslim” or “terrorist,” we have somehow managed to internalize the pathologies of these men.
To read Mark Steyn's complete article, please click here.
Karen and I are flying to NY today to visit with our girlses, our wonderful son-in-law, and to shep nachas, Yiddish: bask in pride, over our beloved granddaughter Ma'ayan Ariel. We might not be able to blog for the next few days, so accept our apologies, and know that we'll be back at the top of next week.
To keep our readers entertained and well nourished, here's Seraphic Secret's long running and most popular series: How I Married Karen.
As Orson Welles used to say at the end of his Mercury Theater Broadcasts: “I am your humble servant.”
Karen, my kallah, my bride, June 19, 1977
Introduction: Seraphic School Days or The Sadist of Yeshiva Flatbush
Chapter 1: The Rabbi's Seraphic Daughter
Chapter 3: Karen's POV on the Seraphic (Pity) Dance
Chapter 6: Seraphic Street Festival Bonus footage: Karen's Side of the Street.
Chapter 7: Karen Meets the Parents—Way Too Early
Chapter 8: Karen's View From Robert's Couch
Chapter 9: Sunday Afternoon Around the Corner From the Park With Robert
Chapter 10: Seraphic First Date
Chapter 11: Seraphic Shakesperian Urges
Chapter 13: Not So Seraphic Sweden
Chapter 14: Karen Meets The Seven Samurai—Sorta
Chapter 15: Karen and Robert Debate About—Get This—Art
Chapter 16: Seraphic Obsession Meets De Palma's Obsession
Chapter 17: How To Lose (Not So) Seraphic Friends
Chapter 18: Karrrrrrrrrren! Bonus Footage: Seraphic Loyalty.
Chapter 19: Robert Enters the Closet—Literally
Chapter 20: Seraphic Psycho—Plus Hitchcock's Great Crane Shot
Chapter 21: Flushing in Brooklyn
Chapter 22: Plan 9 From Bensonhurst
Chapter 23: Not Popping The Question
Chapter 25: Permission to Marry Karen
Chapter 26: My (Very Long) List of Sins
Chapter 27: Stanley Kubrick Plans Our Wedding, Bonus Wedding Pictures
Chapter 28: Negative on the Negatives
Chapter 29: Karen's at City Hall, Where's Robert?
Chapter 31: Beauty and Me, Bonus Photos of Robert & Karen in School
Chapter 33: The Seam, The Sword & Belle
Chapter 34: Karen Out of Context
Chapter 35: High School Confidential
Chapter 36: Be Good to My Daughter
Chapter 37: Seraphic Duel via Rashomon
Chapter 39: Two Tales of the Past
Chapter 40: Script
How Karen Feels About How I Married Karen
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:42 AM | Comments (10)
December 09, 2008
Tagged: Five Things
Zahava tags Seraphic Secret.
Homework. I mean, tagged by Zahava AKA Mrs. Treppenwitz.
5 things I was doing 10 years ago:
1) Karen and I were dealing with Ariel's ZT'L cancer.
2) Trying to keep life as normal as possible for the girlses.
3) Writing and producing in Hollywood.
4) Spending way too much time creating elaborate photo-montage scrapbooks.
5) Creating a financial portfolio that would allow us to build wealth.
5 things on my to-do list today:
1) Drink my morning cup of coffee. Karen prepares a cold water brew that goes with us even when we travel. All other coffee tastes like acid-drenched mud, including wretched Starbucks, yuck!
2) Work on my script.
3) Publish this blog post.
4) Speak to my agent about stuff.
5) Try not to annoy Karen with too many phone calls because I really miss her during the day and maybe I should just sign up as a patient and she can be my therapist.
5 snacks I love:
1) Dark chocolate.
2) Power bars. Karen has this uncanny ability to locate and purchase really exotic brands.
3) Coffee yogurt.
4) Ice Coffee.
5) Coffee beans.
5 things I'd do if I were a millionaire:
1) Donate $ in Ariel's memory to all the yeshivas he attended.
2) Arrange it so Karen and I lived near our girlses.
3) Build an excellent screening room and purchase lots of movies for my film library.
4) Buy Karen anything she wants. A safe offer because Karen's not one of these girlishly unhinged women who lusts after jewelry, clothing, or sleek cars.
5) Invest wisely for a million dollars is not really all that much money.
5 places I have lived:
1) Brooklyn, N.Y.
2) Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y.
3) Israel.
4) Manhattan.
5) Los Angeles.
5 jobs I have had:
1) Stock room schlepper for bookstore.
3) Busboy in the Catskills.
3) Hebrew tutor.
4) Editor-in-Chief of a film magazine.
5) Hollywood screenwriter and producer.
I'm tagging all my readers and every blogger I know.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:03 AM | Comments (20)
December 08, 2008
Big Hollywood
It's no secret that the Hollywood community is overwhelmingly liberal, deeply left leaning. Many of the films that Hollywood chooses to bankroll are often thinly disguised propaganda pieces flogging the year's most fashionable "progressive" causes.
It's also no secret that there are plenty of Hollywood conservatives who are forced to fly below the radar because there is an unofficial black-list against those who do not mindlessly spew the party line.
A few years ago I wrote about my experiences in Hollywood as it became clear to me that Islamo Nazism was being ignored or excused by liberal Hollywood. It was also chillingly obvious that Hollywood consciously abandoned Israel. No big shock for the left is a comfortable home for Jew-hatred disguised as “mere anti-Zionism.”
I've been in too many meetings where studio and TV execs shy away from stories that feature Arab Muslim terrorists for fear of being accused of that non-existent prejudice, Islamophobia. The only place this condition exists as a terrifying fact—not as some new and novel victim liberal fantasy intended to excuse terrorism—is in Muslim societies where Sunni slaughter Shia and Shia slaughter Sunni.
Hollywood, more and more, is revealed as a gullible group of appeasers and anti-American hysterics—one miserable film after another about Iraq is nauseating proof. And so, it has become necessary for conservatives, those who share common Judeo Christian values and a love of Israel, to band together and expand the narrow political and aesthetic discourse that dominates Hollywood and those who write about Hollywood.
To this end, Andrew Breitbart founded Big Hollywood, an informative, entertaining and articulate all-things Hollywood website. My good friend Dirty Harry was tapped by Andrew to be Editor-in-Chief.
I've been asked to be a regular contributor, a great honor, for the list of contributors is long and impressive.
My first article is "The Real Battle of Algiers," a two part essay that illuminates the skillful jihadist propaganda that is Gillo Pontecorvo's film, The Battle of Algiers. I examine the true historical record, the inconvenient facts excluded from the film, including the horrifying Muslim Jew-hatred that helped fuel the battle of Algiers, and the eventual expulsion of Algeria's entire and ancient Jewish community by the Algerian terrorists after the French surrendered.
As I've said many times, movies are a moral landscape.
The Battle of Algiers is a movie that inhabits a deeply immoral and dishonest landscape. It's a beautifully crafted film, but at the core it is a stealth piece of Jihadist propaganda. Like Leni Riefenstahl's work for the Nazis and Sergei Eisenstein's films for the Soviet Communists, Pontecorvo's movie is in service to a totalitarian and genocidal ideology.
Big Hollywood makes its debut on Tuesday January 6, 2009.
To get regular Big Hollywood updates, sign up here.
Clara Bow salutes Big Hollywood.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:53 AM | Comments (10)
December 07, 2008
Best of the Jewish Blogosphere #194
Louise Brooks says: “I also read
Haveil Havalim and Shiny Happy Dhimmi.
That's why I'm so smart.”
Haveil Havalim #194 is up and this week hosted by the amazing, multi-tasking Shiloh Musings.
Soccer Dad, founder of Haveil Havalim, is powerless in the face of potential Jewish Blog Carnivals, hence he's started another blogfest: Shiny Happy Dhimmi. This one is #4. It's a keeper.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 11:29 AM | Comments (8)
December 05, 2008
My Beautiful Neighborhood VI
Sometimes I don't have to stray very far from my front door to discover dazzling compositions. This blue dot on the field of gray and green is on the sidewalk right in front of Casa Avrech.
This week Karen and I replaced our old furnace—when I say old I'm talking 1930's—with a spanking new unit plus central AC. There were workmen and tools all over the place. Needless to say, I was in heaven. No idea what these rubber tubes are used for.
Insulated heating ducts for the new unit. They look like great silver worms from a sc-fi movie.
A section of our old furnace. Actually, it's not old, it's ancient. But such great texture. Anyway, the workmen were examining the old furnace and talking excitedly among themselves in Spanish. I asked: “What's up?” A guy said: “This is the oldest furnace we have ever removed from a house.” I'm like: ”Have you done a lot of furnaces? The guys crack up and go: “Thousands!”
X marks the spot. When I snapped this photo one of the workmen asked me why I was taking the picture. I told him that the letter X is very hard to find. He was like: Huh?
Saw this sign in a parking lot nearby. Okay, so correct me if I'm stupid but isn't this an invitation to a pile-up? Whatever.
What would Friday be without the obligatory footwear shot. Seraphic friend Bill Brandt writes: “I submit my shoe photo from 1973 — when I was at Ft Bliss, TX (El Paso) for a few months. Our Puerto Rican Drill Sgt. told us that he wanted our shoes "speeet-shined" and that's what I did for some hours.” Thank you Bill, glad to have you on our side.
Karen and I wish all our friends and relatives a lovely and restful Shabbat.
Seraphic Secret's Jew-Hunting in Mumbai has been published in a slightly edited form in this week's Jewish Press.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 09:33 AM | Comments (14)
December 04, 2008
Terrorism, Terrorism, Terrorism...
Pop Quiz. Identify the three masked figures. They are:
a) Gun Men
b) Militants
c) Practitioners of Islamic Theology
d) Professors of Middle Eastern Studies at Columbia University
e) Palestinian Terrorists
*Correct answer at end of article.
If you cannot name the enemy, how can you fight the war they have declared against you, much less triumph in such a conflict?
Great Britain is a tragic example of a nation that has, at governmental levels, willingly adopted Orwellian speak regarding the Islamic terrorists who are successfully chewing away at the fabric of British society. The BBC and the chattering classes, who form and disseminate public policy, have decided that Islamic terror does not exist. All in the name of multi-culturalism.
Psychologists refer to this mechanism of denial as magical thinking. As in: “There's a monster who's going to kill and eat me but I'm going to close my eyes—shut them really, really, really tight—and then the monster will disappear!”
As a consequence of this willing denial of reality and the existential nature of the conflict with transnational Muslim terrorists, I figure that in about two generations, maybe less, with current demographic and immigration patterns, Great Britain will be reduced to an English speaking Caliphite—Judenrein, naturally—operating under Sharia, coolly administered by a Quisling Parliament and a dhimmi Church.
Unless... unless loyal British citizens rise—cue the ghost of Winston Churchill—and forcefully take back their country from the all-devouring Islamic imperialists. To accomplish this the British will have to recognize two facts:
1. The British—okay, I'm throwing in Ireland, Wales, Scotland, Australia, whatever— those who are not Muslim are just filthy Jews, pigs and monkeys, to the Caliphite Islamists, a genocidal and transnational religious movement intent on colonizing Great Britain as D'ar as Islam, a Holy Muslim land. Once this imperial grab is completed, under Sharia, no Muslim land can ever revert back to the hands of the infidels. Thus, perpetual jihad, perpetual terror. This is not a byproduct of Islam. It is Islam.
2. To fight these Islamo Nazis the British will have to get serious about their existence. There is no compromise. There is no appeasement.
It's us or them.
And so, the first step for Britain and for all of Europe, is for the labels: Islamic terrorists, Caliphite Muslims, or my favorite, Islamo Nazis, to become commonplace—for these labels are accurate and necessary.
As it says in Sefer Mishlei, Book of Proverbs, 18:21: Death and life lie in the power of the tongue.
This brings us to a fine article from the Wall Street Journal by Tom Gross in which he asks: If This Isn't Terrorism, What Is?
So why are so many prominent Western media reluctant to call the perpetrators terrorists? Why did Jon Snow, one of Britain’s most respected TV journalists, use the word “practitioners” when referring to the Mumbai terrorists? Was he perhaps confusing them with doctors?
Why did Britain’s highly regarded Channel 4 News state that the “militants” showed a “wanton disregard for race or creed” when exactly the opposite was true: Targets and victims were very carefully selected. Why did the “experts” invited to discuss the Mumbai attacks in one show on the state-funded Radio France Internationale, the voice of France around the world, harp on about Baruch Goldstein (who carried out the Hebron shootings in 1994), virtually the sole case of a Jewish terrorist in living memory?
Unfortunately in recent years we have become used to leftist media burying their heads in the sand about the threat that Islamic fundamentalism poses, in much the same way as they once refused to report accurately on communist atrocities. But now even conservative media may be doing it too.
For the complete article, please click here.
*Answer to Quiz is f)CAIR's Hollywood Office. These Hollywood insiders are responsible for vetting every feature & TV Script in town and they have been doing a bang-up job. There are no Muslim terrorists in Hollywood films. Instead the public has been fed a steady diet of savage American soldiers who murder, rape and chew tobacco. There are also legions of heartless CIA agents who do all sorts of scary covert stuff in the poor Arab Muslim world so naturally the wretches have no choice but to strap on homicide bombs and murder men women and children. Makes perfect sense. And of course, there's Guantanamo and secret prisons which, in the Hollywood imagination, bear a striking resemblance to Dachau. Okay, so I cheated, there wasn't an f) offered in the multiple choices but I'm hoping you can forgive a little levity from yours truly.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 10:54 AM | Comments (21)
December 03, 2008
Two Funerals and a Wedding: Remembering Gavriel & Rivka Holtzberg ZT'L
Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg. Photo: Chabad.org
Introduction
Batya Rotter, the daughter of our friends Dr. Arnie and Leah Rotter, spent a good deal of time in Mumbai. Naturally, as a young Othodox Jewish woman in a land where Jews are as rare as the Dodo Bird, Batya was drawn to the Chabad House where she, an extraordinary young woman in her own right, developed a profound and nurturing relationship with Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg ZT'L.
Here, Batya reflects on the shining values and personalities of the martyred couple. And Batya marvels at the personal sacrifice of lives joyously given in service to HaShem and to the Indian Jewish community.
In an irony that one might only imagine from the pen of a screenwriter, Batya grapples with warring emotions as she internalizes the atrocity and suffers spiritual whiplash as Yael, her beloved sister, stands under the chuppah, the wedding canopy, at almost the exact same moment as the details of the atrocity become known. RJA
Dreaming of Beit Chabad in Mumbai
I couldn't sleep tonight, in pain from the events of this past week. I wanted to write to remember Rabbi Gabi and Rivki Holzberg Z''L, who were murdered in Mumbai; they were two of the finest people I know.
Tonight I dreamed I went to the Beit Chabad in Mumbai. Passing the vendors on the street, and the sounds of the flour mill across the alleyway, I walked into the main floor and smelled the aromas of freshly made chumus and matbucha. The Chabad house in Mumbai was a Jewish oasis where there was always air conditioning, a smile, and a freshly cooked meal. It was a beautiful Chabad house, and it was run by the most beautiful people. I start to think of Rivki—and then, I start to cry.
I see Rivki's face, and even her thick glasses can't hide the glowing happiness in her eyes. From the bump on her stomach you can see that she is expecting, and after losing one child to illness and another to severe congenital defects, you see her stomach and want to smile too. She is the embodiment of hope and faith. When you sit on the couch in the main room, she brings you some chocolate cake and wants to know how you are doing. And while you vent about your trials from the week, she has somehow managed to take you away from the streets of Mumbai to another place entirely. I remember at first being surprised to learn that Rivki was only three years older than me. She had a clarity of purpose and a purity of faith that you do not find often. While there are times when I think of her as a friend, there are also times when that title seems too commonplace. She is more than a friend—she is a role model, a vision of fortitude and courage, and a soul too precious for this world. Building a Home for Others I honestly don't know how Gabi and Rivki built the Chabad house from nothing, and how they brought the taste of a Jewish traditional home to the crazy streets of Mumbai, putting their own personal pain aside to build a home for others. They managed to make a wedding for a traveling couple who suddenly learned they were expecting a child, and court visits for Israelis stuck in jail for drug trafficking. Every week, there was a beautiful Shabbat meal for anyone and everyone to join, and every night at 8pm, there was a free kosher dinner for anyone traveling and in need of soul food. I remember the excitement Rivki exhibited when she showed me the board on the wall that mapped the plans and financial progress of their new Chabad house. They had been operating out of two floors in the building, but had a dream to furnish and use the other five floors as a guest house, Jewish library, and child care center. You see, Gabi and Rivki had dreams—not to live in a quiet house near their families, but to build where Jews could be Jewish in India. The Wedding and The Murders I found out that Mumbai was burning on Thursday morning—Thanksgiving morning—the same morning that I woke up in Israel to go with my sister to the Kotel, the Western Wall, on her wedding day. I read the headlines, and then I read about the Chabad House. My sister, the bride, not knowing that any of this had taken place, had a glowing happiness in her eyes, while I was feeling something akin to an out-of- body experience. We made it to the Kotel, where I went off to the side to call Antony, my boss from India, who confirmed that the situation did not look good. The home where I was a frequent visitor, where I got my chickens to make chicken soup, and where I would eat chocolate cake and talk with Rivki, was being held by terrorists. TERRORISTS! I thought about Gabi, and I thought about Rivki—and that is when I lost it. Brides and Grooms in The Courtyards of Jerusalem How does one deal with a wedding and a terrorist attack on the same day—both so close to home? I'm looking back at the last couple of days, and I still don't believe that any of this is not a dream. While my sister and her husband began a journey of love and commitment, the couple who knew a love and a commitment to a calling beyond themselves were under attack. And while Yael Rotter and Jon Mosery stood under the Chuppah overlooking the hills of Jerusalem, Rabbi Gavriel Hotlzberg looked at carnage as he covered his beloved Rivka in a tallit, a prayer shawl, before joining her in, what I must force myself to believe is, a better place. I only hope that just as in the heart of their wedding joy, Yael and John broke a glass to remember destruction and suffering, that somehow, amidst the pain of shattered dreams, Gabi and Rivki found a way to feel some joy that their healthy Moishe survived. To all my Mumbai family, all of whom felt the surrogate parenting of Gabi and Rivki, I am sending hugs and love, even though my heart is a little broken. And to all of you reading this email, I ask that you do something good—something so kind, so good, and so loving, that it can, in some way, make the world hurt less. Because little Moishe should not know the hate-filled world in which his parents were murdered. And because our broken hearts and the courtyards of Jerusalem should only be filled with voices of joy and happiness, voices of brides and grooms. Baruch Dayan Haemet. May their memory be blessed
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 04:25 AM
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Seraphic Secret is deeply sorry to add more anguish to this already horrific story, but it is now public knowledge that Rivka Holtzberg ZT'L, May Her Blood Be Avenged, was six months pregnant when she was tortured and murdered by the Islamo Nazis. Moshe Tzvi calls out: “Imma, Imma,” Mommy Mommy. I believe that the man reciting Kaddish is Rivka Holtzberg's ZT'L father. Contribute to a fund for the Holtzberg children—an older child is in the hospital with Tay-Sachs disease—and to rebuild the Chabad House In Mumbai by going here. H/T Seraphic Friend: Ralphie
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“Hey, did you look out your window this morning and see all the moderate Muslims protesting the Mumbai massacre?” Rabbi Hier chuckled and said: “Robert, lemme tell you a story. There's a Sheikh who actually issued a fatwa against homicide bombers. Finally! This made us very happy. But recently he withdrew the fatwa and gave his seal of approval to homicide missions.” “What happened?” “Wait, I'm telling you. So we investigate. What's going on, why did Sheikh change his ruling? And soon enough we discover that the terrorists have threatened to kill the Sheikh's entire family if he doesn't withdraw the fatwa.” Rabbi Hier and I gazed at each other and we just smiled, kind of knowingly, kind of helplessly, because we both know that when you are dealing with a genocidal Caliphite Islamic culture, unless you are willing to take off the gloves and get serious about fighting transnational terrorism, well, the terrorists are going to gain critical mass. Meanwhile, the West keeps itself busy self-righteously handing them habeas corpus, closing Gitmo, giving legitimacy to the Jew-hating U.N., treating Islamo Nazis like common criminals, and planning how to win the next elections. Sure-fire strategies for national suicide. Anyway, Rabbi Hier went straight from the bris—the baby was named Daniel, Mazal Tov!—to the memorial service at the L.A. Chabad House for the victims of the Mumbai massacre. Rabbi Hier spoke powerfully and eloquently about the urgent need to confront Islamic terrorism. Rabbi Hier ends his hesped, eulogy, noting that Judaism has survived Inquisitions, pogroms, the Holocaust, and we will also survive the Islamic threat because we are like that one cruse of oil that burned miraculously for eight days, and which we celebrate during the upcoming holiday of Chanukah. No matter what happens the Jewish people live—forever. And the Islamo Nazis will end on the ash heap of history.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:53 AM
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Our friend Dr. Sherwin Isenberg, a member of Young Israel of Century City, spent Shabbat in Mumbai with Gavriel and Rivkah Holtzberg ZT'L, four days before the massacre. Sherwin is a internationally renowned Pediatric Ophthalmologist who does research to prevent childhood blindness in the far corners of the world. In this video, he speaks at the memorial held at the Chabad Center in Los Angeles recalling his Shabbat in Mumbai with the Holtzberg's, and the special community of Jews who gathered around their Shabbat table. He ends his memorial with: May Their Blood be Avenged.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:44 PM
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Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 02:25 PM
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So, let's recap: the Islamo Nazis who committed the atrocities in Mumbai were angry about Kashmir—any grievance will do—so naturally they dispatch their Islamic stormtroopers to torture and murder Jews. I'm sure this will make sense to the useful idiots who enable the Islamo Nazis in their genocidal program.
Rivka Holtzberg cuts the ribbon for the new mikvah,
ritual bath, in Mumbai. Photo: Chabad.org.
The floor of the Mumbai Chabad Study Hall is washed in
Jewish blood. Israel news photo: Gur Ari, Zaka.
Moishe Tzvi Holtzberg in the arms of Sandra Samuel, the courageous nanny who rescued Gavriel and Rivka's son from the death dealing Islamo Nazis. Together with grandparents Yehudit and Shimon Rosenberg they are pictured waiting at the Mumbai airport for a flight to Israel.
Batya Rotter
In Israel, the levaya, funeral procession, for the martyrs Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg, May Their Blood be Avenged.December 02, 2008
The Horror Continues: Rivka Holtzberg ZT'L, Six Months Pregnant
Two-year old Moshe Tzvi Holtzberg, son of Rabbi Gavriel and
Rivka Holtzberg, May Their Blood be Avenged.
Photo: ReutersHer father broke the news during an emotional funeral service in Israel attended by thousands.
Rivka Holtzberg's pregnancy added to the intense sense of anguish felt across Israel at her death along with five other Jewish victims.
They died when the Chabad community house in Mumbai was targeted by armed gunmen.
Mourners walied as eulogies were delivered over the bodies of Mrs Holtzberg, 28, and her husband, Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg, 29, in the small village of Kfar Chabad near Tel Aviv.
The two bodies, wrapped in blue and white prayer shawls, were laid out on benches set on a podium while members of the orthodox Chabad community prayed and listened to eulogies.
Rabbi Dov Goldberg said during the service that Rivka Holtzberg told him "a month ago that she was five months pregnant."
That One Cruse of Oil
Last Sunday morning I attended a bris, a circumcision, at my shul The Young Israel of Century City . Sitting next to me during Shachris, morning prayers, was my friend Rabbi Marvin Hier, Founder and Dean of The Simon Wiesenthal Center, here in Los Angeles. After davening, prayers, I said to Rabbi Hier:
Do read The Lessons of Mumbai—Too Long for a Bumper Sticker by the always eloquent Breath of the Beast.December 01, 2008
Shabbat with Gavriel & Rivkah Holtzberg ZT'L
The Nanny of Mumbai: A Hero of our Time
Moshe Tzvi Holtzberg with Sandra Samuel, the courageous Indian nanny who
saved Moshe's life when she spirited Rabbi Gavriel and Rivkah Holtzberg's ZT'L son
away when the Mumbai Chabad House came under attack by the Islamo Nazis.
The family is trying to arrange for Ms. Samuel to continue as Moshe's nanny in Israel. Because They Were Jews
Rabbi Gavriel and Rivkah Holtzberg ZT'L. May Ha-Shem avenge their blood.
Doctors working in a hospital where all the bodies, including that of the terrorists, were taken said they had not seen anything like this in their lives."Bombay has a long history of terror. I have seen bodies of riot victims, gang war and previous terror attacks like bomb blasts. But this was entirely different. It was shocking and disturbing," a doctor said.
Asked what was different about the victims of the incident, another doctor said: "It was very strange. I have seen so many dead bodies in my life, and was yet traumatised. A bomb blast victim's body might have been torn apart and could be a very disturbing sight. But the bodies of the victims in this attack bore such signs about the kind of violence of urban warfare that I am still unable to put my thoughts to words," he said.
Asked specifically if he was talking of torture marks, he said: "It was apparent that most of the dead were tortured. What shocked me were the telltale signs showing clearly how the hostages were executed in cold blood," one doctor said.
The other doctor, who had also conducted the post-mortem of the victims, said: "Of all the bodies, the Israeli victims bore the maximum torture marks. It was clear that they were killed on the 26th itself. It was obvious that they were tied up and tortured before they were killed. It was so bad that I do not want to go over the details even in my head again," he said.
Corroborating the doctors' claims about torture was the information that the Intelligence Bureau had about the terror plan. "During his interrogation, Ajmal Kamal said they were specifically asked to target the foreigners, especially the Israelis," an IB source said.
Phillips comments:
The atrocities demonstrated with crystal clarity what the Islamist war is all about — and the western commentaries didn't understand because it simply refuses to acknowledge, even now, what that war actually is. It does not arise from particular grievances. It is not rooted in "despair" over Palestine. It is not a reaction to the war in Iraq. It is a war waged in the name of Islam against America, Britain, Hindus, Jews and all who refuse to submit to Islamic conquest.
What of the terrorists' treatment of their Jewish targets? Phillips writes:
They went to some lengths in addition to single out a centre for observant Jews. Rabbi Holtzberg and his wife Rivka were murdered not because of Palestine but simply because they were Jews. That is because hatred of Jews as Jews is fundamental to the Islamists' hatred of the west — and of Israel.
H/T Powerline, via Soccer Dad.
Posted by Robert J. Avrech at 08:47 AM | Comments (23)