Althouse: "It takes a hussy to know a hussy."

March 23, 2008

"It takes a hussy to know a hussy."

Why is Althouse getting so excited about this movie — this 1-star movie! — on TV?

ADDED: You know if you were really deeply into the Althouse blog, you'd've known.

52 comments:

rcocean said...: First movie in a theater, "Batman" and I took it very seriously.; 3/23/08, 6:38 PM
reader_iam said...: Does a drive-in theatre count? And that you were taken along more than to?; 3/23/08, 6:49 PM
Ann Althouse said...: Fortunately, I don't have the drive-in ambiguity to figure out. I don't think my parents ever did that drive-in thing. When they went out, they went out, and we had a babysitter. This was a movie that I went to with my older sister and some other girls. I saw very few movies as a child and was never taken to a movie with my parents. In fact, I don't think my parents ever went to the movies in the 50s and 60s. My mother loved movies, but my father didn't care about them at all.; 3/23/08, 6:58 PM
Pastafarian said...: You know, I have absolutely no idea what the first movie was that I ever saw at a theater.

I wish that I had more memories from my childhood, but pretty much everything from before ten or so is gone, other than a few isolated moments.; 3/23/08, 7:16 PM
Alan said...: The first movie I remember seeing was Darby O'Gill and the Little People. The banshee gave me nightmares. That's unremarkable though. Practically anything back then would give me nightmares. I was even afraid of the jolly green giant. That most likely because my father would say, "Fee, fi, fo, fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be he alive, or be he dead, I'll grind his bones to make my bread" as he'd come into the bedroom to tuck us in.; 3/23/08, 7:18 PM
George M. Spencer said...: "Lady and the Tramp."

"He'll never settle down—just keep breaking hearts."

Girl I was with got shaken up by that wagon wreck scene. Had to put my arm around her to calm her down.

Then it was time for milk and cookies and a good long nap.; 3/23/08, 7:25 PM
DADvocate said...: I'm the same age as you but never got to see this masterpiece.

I didn't understand the people were really actors either. I thought they really killed people. I believed they took convicted criminals and used them as the people to kill in the movies and TV shows.; 3/23/08, 7:28 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: Ah, when movies were movies. Unlike that poofery like A Man For All Seasons.; 3/23/08, 7:31 PM
Anonymous said...: Card playing, movies, and dancing were highways to Hell in my childhood. When I was eleven, I visited my big sis in college and she took me to see "A Touch of Class," starring George Segal and Glenda Jackson. I easily shrugged off the fear of God's wrath and thoroughly enjoyed the movie. Of course, we didn't tell my parents that she had corrupted my morals by exposing me to pop culture.; 3/23/08, 7:43 PM
Anonymous said...: "...my father would say, "Fee, fi, fo, fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be he alive, or be he dead, I'll grind his bones to make my bread" as he'd come into the bedroom to tuck us in."

That's kind of weird. I really don't remember your being there when Dad did that. Was there another bed in the closet that I've forgotten?; 3/23/08, 7:47 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: I do remember the first movie I saw in a theater. My dad took me to see the Alamo with John Wayne. I was about six or seven. It is the old Oriental Theater in downtown Chicago. Because we went downtown, I had to dress up, shirt, tie, and overcoat.; 3/23/08, 7:48 PM
Bob said...: Ann Althouse: You know if you were really deeply into the Althouse blog, you'd've known.

I doubt I'll ever be sucked that far into the vortex.

I don't remember what the first movie I ever saw was, but I do remember seeing Song of the South in the theater one time. That's the one that the hypocritical Disney will show and sell overseas, but not here in the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave.; 3/23/08, 8:05 PM
JackDRipper said...: Rose Dalton: Oh, honey, don't think about him. They tell me he plays women just like he plays poker. Riffle, shuffle, fast cut, big deal, the sky's the limit; and then all of a sudden you're lying there in the discard.

"........they're nothing but dirty, trigger happy little tramps."

Genius.; 3/23/08, 8:28 PM
Elliott A said...: I know I saw several movies, 2001 being one of them, but the first I really remember was Cold Turkey in 1971. The first date with my wife. Sat in the balcony of the old Forum Theater in Metuchen, NJ. I didn't have my license yet and she being older had to pick me up and drive me. Long time ago.; 3/23/08, 8:29 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: The first movie I saw alone- I was nine- was the 1962 version of the Phantom of the Opera. Gave me nightmares.; 3/23/08, 8:55 PM
Susan said...: It would have been one of the Disney movies that my mother took me to in the early 50s: Dumbo, Bambi, Snow White, or Pinocchio. I thought they were first runs, but I see from IMDb that they were made in the early 40s and Snow White in 1937. Wow, over 70 years ago. Holds up pretty well.; 3/23/08, 9:03 PM
Moon Rattled said...: "Maybe you think I'm related to these people..."

Maybe I think you're drinking too much too early in the day again. Btw, next time, get your head out of the way so the viewer can see what you insist on having them watch.; 3/23/08, 9:06 PM
Synova said...: Dirty, trigger happy little tramps.

LOL!; 3/23/08, 9:09 PM
Ron said...: hmmm....Faster Pussycat, Kill, Kill! crossed with what, Stagecoach? Is it Rio Bimbo, directed by Howard, er, ah, Helen Hawks?

But then, I just made that up.; 3/23/08, 9:09 PM
Roost on the Moon said...: (That troll isn't me, for the record.); 3/23/08, 9:11 PM
Synova said...: I took my little sister to Raiders of the Lost Ark. "It's a family adventure thing, Mom." I was eighteen, she was eight.

We got to the melting Nazis and I'm all, "Don't tell Mom, don't tell Mom, whatever you do, don't tell Mom!"; 3/23/08, 9:13 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: dirty, trigger happy little tramps.

Seventies and early eighties era female Chicago Police Officers. And I ought to know.

BTW, that was complimentary not derogatory.; 3/23/08, 9:24 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: "I mean to kill you or see you hanged at Judge Parker's convenience. Which will it be?"

"Bold talk for a one-eyed fat broad," their leader sneers.

Then the Dyke cries, "Fill your hand, you son of a bitch!"
(Jane Wayne True Clit)

"There's right and there's wrong," Jane Wayne said in The Alamo.
"You gotta do one or the other. You do the one and you're living. You do the other and you may be walking around but in reality you're dead."

When Jane Wayne died, a Tokyo newspaper ran the headline,
"Miss America passes on."; 3/23/08, 9:31 PM
Christy said...: Disney films. Then when I was a tweener, Granny took me to all the Elvis movies. I was just her beard; she was the one who wanted to see them.; 3/23/08, 10:08 PM
Rich Beckman said...: My memory is that the first movie I ever saw in a theater was 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. But I see that it was released in 1954 and I was born in '55.

20,000 Leagues is a Disney flick, so it may have been re-released.

I have a very clear memory of going to see The Crawling Hand. It was released in '63, so I was 8. Hard to believe that flick was ever re-released.

I didn't make it all the way through Hand because a couple of older kids from my block were in the theater and saw me. They quietly moved behind me (the theater being sparsely populated) and then grabbed the back of my neck!!!

So I moved.

They did it again!!!

So I left.

I didn't understand that I could've complained to an usher. Apparently , I also didn't understand I could've sat in the back row.

Hey, I was 8!; 3/23/08, 10:10 PM
Peter Hoh said...: That was fun seeing you that excited about a cheesy old western/ Loved the dialogue snippets. Sorry that I can't contribute the name of the first movie I saw in a theater. I have a vague memory of seeing "The Sound of Music" at the local movie house. I would have been 3 when it was first released. I'm guessing I must have seen it during a re-release.; 3/23/08, 10:25 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: peter hoh said...
That was fun seeing you that excited about a cheesy old western

There is no such thing as a "cheesy old Western". That is Un-American. We have to keep an eye on you buddy!; 3/23/08, 10:32 PM
reader_iam said...: If you only count in a theatre, then "Sound of Music" is the first real movie. My parents took me when it came out. And that's probably what my parents would answer for me.

But I think I would count the drive-in movie as the first. I don't remember what the kids' feature was that night, funnily enough, but the one for the adults--the one I remember--was "The Pink Panther." This was not when it first came out, but a couple of years later, and the reason I remember it so well, I think, is that I still had to wear a residual small bandage on my head as a result of some plastic surgery and my father kept saying, "[first name] [middle name] [last name], stop scratching and go to sleep right now!" between cracking up.; 3/23/08, 10:56 PM
reader_iam said...: For myself, I consider it lucky that I got to see loads of movies as a kid, either at a local theatre, which offered cartoons plus a feature or a double feature to kids almost every Saturday of the year (I think it was subsidized collectively by local merchants in some way, so parents could shop, or something), or many a late night, when my mom would bring the little portable b/w into my room because my dad couldn't stand the TV on and my mom loved to watched old movies late at night.

***

Sheesh. Could that sentence BE any longer? Eh, whatever.; 3/23/08, 11:05 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 3/23/08, 11:19 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: "I don't know whether I fired five or six shots. This is a .44 magnum. The most powerful hand gun in the world. It will blow your head clean off. Do you feel lucky? Well do you, punk?"
(Dirty Mary); 3/23/08, 11:20 PM
Peter V. Bella said...: I knew a hussy. You are no hussy!
Lloyd Benson; 3/23/08, 11:21 PM
Rick Lee said...: I saw a lot of second run movies at the drive in as a kid. We lived practically next to one. I have no idea what the first movie was I ever saw. One thing I do remember was being in 7th grade and going to see 2001. I think we thought it was going to be some silly sci-fi flick and it just blew my mind.; 3/23/08, 11:40 PM
blake said...: Wow. I can typically recall any movie I've ever seen, where I saw it and who I was with.

But the very first? A drive-in. I fell asleep during "Peter Pan".

I can't recall the first movie I saw in a theater, or more accurately which of the many movies I saw was the first. The Disney practice of re-releasing can muck up a timeline....

Hey...look...The Dalton Girls is on!

Oh, crap, but so is the director's cut of Grand Hotel. Talk about an Althouse-based dilemma.; 3/24/08, 2:49 AM
michael farris said...: The town I grew up in didn't have a movie theater until I was 10 or so, before that we had to take a 25 mile drive to see a movie.
I have dim, partial memories of Babes in Toyland in a theater and First men in the moon at a drive in but I think I fell asleep for a lot of those.

Probably the first movie I remember clearly was King Kong vs Godzilla (at a drive in), which I remember thinking was the greatest thing ever.

Also Mary Poppins in a theater but I'm fairly sure that was later. (And it didn't have the catastrophic brain deforming effect that KK v G did.)

And yeah, I was another kid who thought death scenes were real and that they must be using condemned convicts.; 3/24/08, 3:49 AM
save_the_rustbelt said...: My first "grown up " movie happened one night when I drove 15 miles for a date and my girlfriend was ill (now married 35 years).

I went to the local theatre and saw Clint Eastwood in "Coogan's Bluff," a bad movie with lots of violence and hints of lots of sex. Yes!

When there were no girls available the guys would go to the drive-in, I seem to remember the women in prison genre as being quite popular. Movies were always better with enough beer.

(And of course we saw all the Disney movies with the family.)

The last time we went to the drive-in with our parents, we were seeing a Ma and Pa Kettle movie in our 1953 Chevy, when a rather large and nasty tornado hit about 10 miles west of us. After 10 minutes of laying on the floor in the back seat, everyone we told to scoot. Missed the ending.; 3/24/08, 6:37 AM
KCFleming said...: 101 Dalmatians, Christmas Day, 1969.

It must have made very little impression on me, except that movies were fun (who knew?), as I never saw it again, nor desired to, even when my own kids were little.

We didn't have the money to be going to movies as a family, so it was weird and wonderful to be going that day, though. I remember hearing about and discussing movies at school many times. Papillon was the big movie to see in 1973, at least for 7th grade boys. I never saw it until I was out of college.

Being out of step with such cultural events likely helped shape my persistent cultural out-of-stepness.; 3/24/08, 7:09 AM
Richard Fagin said...: Prof. I can completely understand your excitement. My wife made me buy her satellite radio for her truck, and I have a similar experience almost every time I ride in it with Sirius Gold on: "Gawd, I haven't heard THAT on the radio in 45 years!"

I have to confess that my first reaction to you was immediate and maybe quite unfair. It was the same reaction I had to reading a column by Linda Ellerbee a long time ago. She lamented that when she was a kid, among other things lost over time was that people rode in "convertibles" not sports cars. I thought, "YOU? who spent her entire life trying to destroy that culture? Now you miss converbiels?? [expletive deleted]!!!"

I'm sure I was right about Linda. I hope that's all. Yeah there were lots of things that needed to be fixed. We threw the baby out with the bathwater, though.; 3/24/08, 7:18 AM
AllenS said...: My first movie was at the drivein theater in Roseville, MN. My parents in the front seat and myself and my sister in the back. It was a Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis movie, the name of which I can't remember. It was in the early 50's, and we didn't have a tv yet.

Damnit, I'm old.; 3/24/08, 7:40 AM
Modern Otter said...: I'm pretty sure it was "Fantasia," when it was re-released with an updated soundtrack ca. 1956-57. I was three or four, but still remember Mickey and those brooms. Movies, as a family event, were pretty much reserved for Christmas in our 4-kid household. (My gosh, that must have been $15 outing back then.) The only grade school friends I remember who went to the movies with their parents on a frequent basis were only-children.

Funny you should bring this up. Just yesterday I re-watched, for the first time, the first movie I ever saw in a theater without my parents, "Swiss Family Robinson." There was much I remembered well from the original viewing, and now I understand why it was important for Janet Munro's character "Berti" (Roberta) to conceal her gender from the pirates.; 3/24/08, 8:27 AM
George M. Spencer said...: 20 years from now the question will be, "Do you remember the first web site you played on?"

40 years from now the question will be, "What did you name your first robot?"

60 years from now: "Who was your first human?"

80 years from now: "What was your first body?"; 3/24/08, 8:30 AM
MadisonMan said...: First Movie: Mary Poppins. The first movie I saw twice in the theater was The Sound of Music.

The last movie I recall my entire family seeing at the same time: Oliver!; 3/24/08, 8:40 AM
Chip Ahoy said...: I recall the first thing I consciously sat there and watched on T.V., as opposed to running around while it was on. It must have been annoying for my parents. I didn't understand anything. "Why are the wheels going backwards?" "Who would ever want to be an actor when they shoot you?" "Do people stay dead?" "What if they don't like the food, do they have to eat it anyway?" "What happened to the dog?" "Where do they go to the bathroom?" "Where do they get all the old clothes?" "How comes Tarzan always has a perfect vine?" Parenting me was chiefly a matter of explaining things. Most very thing else was merely handed down.

The first movie I saw outside the house was on an isolated Air Force radar site at the top of a Pennsylvania mountain. The theater was intended for enlisted personnel stationed there but accessible to the spattering of dependents present. My older brother took me to the tiny theater. We saw some old movie having to do with European royalty where all the women wore conical hats with fabric draped from the points. Ridiculous. One guy murdered horribly everybody else in succession until he attained the throne. One guy had a cage placed over his entire head and a hungry rat dropped inside. Eventually the ghosts of his victims haunted him mercilessly. Scared the living shit out me. Nightmares for months. Put me off the genre permanently. I stayed a perfect shivering chicken until graduating college when I saw an interview of viewers younger than myself who laughed hysterically at the Elm Street series, then it finally occurred to me they're actually funny and I managed to recover.; 3/24/08, 11:34 AM
reader_iam said...: Speaking of kids and their reactions to imagery:

My husband and son were in the Philly airport a little bit ago, squashed in a crowd of people hoping to get onto an overbooked flight. Son was getting squirrely, and husband was getting fed up, so son was put on the phone with me while my husband was dealing with the situation.

In the course of the conversation, during which my son was just rattling on (the apple doesn't fall far from THIS tree, ahem), I happened to use the expression "like a chicken with its head cut off." This stopped the child cold (which was not my intention).

He said; "What? What do you mean? Wouldn't the chicken be dead right away? How could it be 'with' its head if it was cut off, anyway?" And so on and so on. I tried to explain, and even added a family story about my-mother-the-farmer's-daughter's early childhood experiences of her dad cutting off the heads of chickens. (Yeah, what in HELL was I THINKING!?!) More and more specific questions, just because I'd used what used to be a common expression in casual conversation. Mercifully, the loudspeaker came on again in the airport, forcing the termination of the call. I was in way over my head and drowning.

That's "my little literalist" ... .; 3/24/08, 12:46 PM
essaybee said...: My first movie: Mary Poppins. I was 5.

I used to work with foster kids and there was a 17 year old girl who had barely been out of her house in her entire life. It was my task to get her used to the outside world. She wanted to go to a movie, but was afraid of sitting in the dark with a bunch of strangers. I explained that it wasn't completely dark, and she got up the courage to go. She chose "You've Got Mail" for her first movie and we went.; 3/24/08, 2:02 PM
essaybee said...: reader_iam, that's a good story. My son has that literalist streak too.

Me: I told you to go to bed.
Kid: But you didn't specify when.; 3/24/08, 2:05 PM
Triangle Man said...: Did you parents of literalists read them Amelia Bedelia books?; 3/24/08, 3:45 PM
Dr. Caligari said...: I was told by my mother, many years after the fact, that the first movie I ever saw in a theater was Fantasia, when I was three. Fantasia was originally released long before I was born, so it must have been brought back for a revival.

The first movie I remember seeing in a theater was The Return of the Fly, which my somewhat off-beat uncle took me to see when I was 5. I remember being both terrified and delighted, thus beginning a decades-long love of monster movies.; 3/24/08, 4:26 PM
Trooper York said...: The Horse Soldiers with the Duke and William Holden. I have never trusted a doctor since.; 3/24/08, 5:06 PM
An Edjamikated Redneck said...: First movie in a theater was "Gone with the Wind", probably in 1967 (30th Anniversy and all that; it was an art house theater that showed old films- the bill for the following week was 'A Night at the Opera' & 'Horse Feathers" & we went to see them too).

First one without the folks was 'The Posiden Adventure' in what? 1970?

I don't remember the first movie I saw at the Drive-In, but the last was just a few years ago & I am looking forward to going again this summer; we still have a couple around here.

And Trooper- One of the best lines in a John Wayne movie is in 'The Horse Soldiers", when the Plantation Belle leans over & displays her ample cleavage directly over a plate of fried chicken and asks Wayne: 'Breast or Thigh?' The Duke's reaction is classic.; 3/24/08, 6:05 PM
Trooper York said...: "And Trooper- One of the best lines in a John Wayne movie is in 'The Horse Soldiers", when the Plantation Belle leans over & displays her ample cleavage directly over a plate of fried chicken and asks Wayne: 'Breast or Thigh?' The Duke's reaction is classic."

I trace my fascination with breasts to that very moment.; 3/24/08, 6:32 PM
Trooper York said...: That and Goldfinger with Pussy Galore. Ohhhh baby.; 3/24/08, 6:33 PM