Esteemed film critic and bon vivant Walter Chaw invited me on his Denver Public Library show to talk about Jackie Chan and Drunken Master 2 (1994). Walter says it and Once Upon A Time In China (1991) are the two best kung-fu movies ever made. He and I chop it up about The Great Chan, Hong Kong and kung-fu movies, Bruce Lee, Wong Fei-hung, Bollywood a little bit — and how to review a movie. My idea is that pleasure comes first when you’re watching a movie, and that your pleasure depends almost entirely on the stars. As a viewer, you either want to know some actor, be some actor, or sleep with some actor. Walter picks the idea up and runs with it. The show’s hilarious, if I say so myself, and ends on a music video. Jackie sings!
May 2012. At Vroman’s in Pasadena, a great question from the audience prompted my riff about how fossil fuels — from coal to oil — are essential for that staple of crime stories, the high-speed chase.
Just a small, friendly dogpile, at Vroman’s. James Ellroy thinks Chandler can’t plot and I talk about his stint with the Dabney Oil Syndicate in L.A. between 1922 and 1932.
It’s still May of 2012. James Ellroy and I did two gigs on the subject of Noir and our history with it. Here this is Vroman’s bookstore and I’m explaining what I learned about Darkness and why I don’t play around with it anymore.
WritingRaw.com asked seven questions on subjects that are impossible to talk about without being pretentious—Tell the truth and the way you feel about it—or merely practical: write what sells.
