Heston
A word or two: Religious movies have always turned me off so I could have cared less about most of Heston's movies, especially The Ten Commandments. However, several years ago I switched from the impossibly narcissistic Oscar Show to see if Ben Hur, then showing on HBO, was any good. I crapped. That is one of the best movies ever on every level one cares to apply. Heston did other good stuff but I never really believed his acting so I wasn't a fan of his. But the public did, and that's what counts. That's why he was a huge movie STAR and there are no real movie stars around any more. His death marks the end of what was once The Star System. Heston (along with Liz Taylor) was the last of the "studio creations," an era when hundreds of studio publicists blanketed the media with star building stories that a shrinking public, which became glued to the tube in ever increasing numbers, totally bought into. Time will tell if his starring vehicles have legs; Planet of the Apes and Ben Hur most certainly will (for different reasons) so we will see.
1 comment:
I was once lucky enough to hear Heston speak at a conservative gathering in LA, not long after the Rodney King riots. He mentioned 2nd Amendment right to keep and bear arms and illustrated with an anecdote about how Hollywood was quite alarmed--there was a lot of fear--TV showing anarchy. fires out of control, Koreans defending their shops with weapons, etc. He said he got many calls from Hollywood acquaintances (lefties) begging him for a gun for protection (he collected guns), but had to refuse because he could not in good conscience loan a gun to someone who didn't know the first thing about them! (I paraphrase.)
I remember wishing he would drop a few names but he had too much class for that. Wow, what a powerful and intelligent speaker, with that wonderful deep voice of his. All I remember now is that the conservative crowd loved him and I could see how much he cherished his wife, who was there beside him. What a gracious and classy man, speaking his mind bravely in the belly of the beast. Far better to have a firearm and not need it, than to need and not have one!
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