I think too much. Seriously. My mind never shuts off. One look at the competition and this might sound like a good thing. Certainly it does have its merits. What sometimes becomes an issue is that my thought process is far from that of the average person. This is not a pretentious boasting by any means. I just tend to wax over different shit than other people. Not better or worse and no more relevant. Just different.
I guess that it's safe to say that instances involving super-sized contemplation for most might include politics.... religion.... sports would probably figure somewhere big in there as I am fairly certain that much blood has been shed over who has the better football team. I have blogged repeatedly that none of this stuff interests me much. About the only valid point of interest that really does tend to take up more of my minds time than most other things would be that which revolves around the ever changing social climate. Particularly issues that involve the human condition and its variables. In cow goes moo terms.... people and shit. This is what interests me.
I don't like to read the news. I see it every time that I log in online. Headlines are thrown at me in efforts to get me clicking so that I might be forced to take part in some survey or maybe even if I am really lucky win a new pea pod. I like my pea pod by the way and I have no intentions of trade what so ever. Sorry. I got all excited at the mention of peas. What was I talking about again? Oh yeah. Reading the news. Eh, I don't read the news. I don't watch it. I don't think about it or dream about it while I'm spooling my lizard tail either. Still, I cruise the headlines several times a day because I am forced to and every now and then something grabs my attention and even gets me to thinking. Celebrity death figures high on the list for me. Well, unless it happens to be people that I already thought were dead. Since there is no story there, why bother clicking?
Did you know that Bill Mckinney just died?
Yep. Died of throat cancer in a Los Angeles hospice. Do you even care? Probably not since I am doubting that you even know who he is. Oops. Sorry. WAS. Some particulars..... he was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee..... this is an interesting side bar of information at my happy hour because my family tree grows real big there. Roots. Boots. The whole bit. This pop culture icon also leaves behind a son and "several ex-wives." How awesome is that for an epitaph? Several ex-wives. Southern pride, you know? I once had an aunt down there who was married for like an hour. True story. I just loved the "several ex-wives" foot note. It's like in the day and age of Elizabeth Taylor and her fickle ways this man didn't even deserve a proper head cheese count so the reports decided to go with "several."
Okay okay I have probably wasted enough of your time. Who was this guy and why does his death make me think long enough to write about it? Bill Mckinney was some actor that had been in several movies and yet his numerous thespian credentials probably wouldn't garner him a role even as important as being "that guy in that one movie." He was primarily a supporting actor and his presence in these films would come and go even before most audience members started to register or even care. But, make no mistake about it, Bill Mckinney did have one role that even though small in actual time clocked in onscreen this guy was a celluloid phenomenan and pop culture legend.
An otherwise forgettable career has been immortalized in more than just fun film facts. In a world filled with bubbles and bubbles of quotable film dialogue he delivered one of the all-time greats. Not just dialogue mind you. This dude gave us a film moment to cherish and recall for now and for always and joined such illustrious quote worthy luminaries as
Clark Gable "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn"....
Judy Garland "There's no place like home".....
and my personal favorite Roy Scheider "you're gonna need a bigger boat".....
when he pulled down Ned Beatty's drawers in the thrilling backwoods and backdoor adventure Deliverance and hammered him in the ass and let loose some of the most epically tinged gospel any actor has ever spewed forth. Something about making Big Ned squeal like the pig that he really is.
The lambs might have been silenced long ago. Elvis might have left the building and climbed up on a toilet and croaked like that old bullfrog, Jeremiah. But now the unthinkable has happened. The pigs have stopped squealing. I am brought nearly to tears as I write this. Hey, I told you my mind doesn't work like other people. My emotions either. Do note that I said nearly though, please and thank you. Why? Well you see, it's this thinking thing that I have. I do it far too much for my own good. So, as I was on the verge of tears for several reasons..... I'll even refresh for those who just joined this blog in progress..... a man who was born in the same garden where my own family tree rooted..... a father.... husband to too damn many women to even name drop.... the man who achieved worldwide acclaim for plowing into Ned Beatty's dough, all the while bringing to light in a cow goes moo world that pigs have feelings and squealings too. If this doesn't make you tear up then you are clearly heartless and soulless.
I don't want anybody reading this to feel bad for me though. I didn't wind up shedding tears in the end. Mostly because all of this got me to thinking about far more important things and before I knew it... I felt better. Not mooing like a cow better. Not barking like a dog better. Nope. I felt like doing a little squealing myself. Without the butt ramming of course, as that is just not my thang.
How would this mans death affect me so much that it made me think? What was I indeed thinking about? Lots of stuff. But top of the pops would be this.... there was a scene and snatch of dialogue that is not only known by nearly every member of the human race, but this very sentiment somehow helps to defines our culture. We sing for supper. Therefore.... well, you figure out the rest. This scene and its relevance in our memory banks says so much about us as a society. A scene of rape. Anal rape. Of Ned Beatty. Doesn't anybody else find that a little fucked up?
Movies are something that can bridge the gap between human relations. Think about that. How many people cried when they thought ET was never going to be able to phone home again because he contracted syphilis on the playground? Who laughed so hard they wound up crying when cute little Macaulay Culkin was busy torturing the shit out of those pesky house thieves because he hadn't discovered the joys of pajama twister in Michael Jackson's bedroom yet and just stayed home alone? Remember that scene in Brian's song when Gale Sayers gathered his teammates together and told them all that Brian Piccolo was dying of cancer? It was a moment in television and film history that not only emphasized men have feelings because we have nipples but.... well, we actually do have feelings, damnit.
The movies we love say so much about us. Even something as violent as Scarface is a perfect essay on the greediness that stains the human condition. Just goes to show what a bunch of savages there are in this town. The movie also went on to become a pop culture phenomenan of its own by inspiring such rap icons and business moguls as Jay-Z and P Piddy or Pee Doody or whatever he's calling himself this week. But as much as all of us savages love to be inspired by our violent art and then reap benefit or mock it somehow, I highly doubt that I'll ever hear a dj performing a comedy sketch that pokes fun at that girl being flayed on a rock and skewered by pork swords in I spit on your grave. Do you think you might ever be in a crowded bar and see a bunch of drunk dudes corner the waitress and start up a game of pin the tail on the pool table because their favorite movie is The Accused?
I hardly ever see rape being used as the butt of a joke. Not rape rape. I see Ned Beatty's butt poked at all the time. Well, I don't actually see it.... but.... okay, never mind. You know what I'm saying. But that scene has become even more beloved and universally lauded than the moment Harry peed all over Sally and marked his territory or JR Ewing got shot in the eye with a red stapler because he handed in his tps reports late. I guess the question my always light switched on mind has got to ask is....why? Is it because it's Ned Beatty? Do people have some personal vendetta against big man? Were all player haters once after Warren Beatty feeling like good old Ned was a much slower and easier target? Is it because it's a man being raped? Men have feelings too you know.... along with our nipples.
Even in terms of the legacy and appreciation of the film deliverance itself..... all of these years later does anybody remember the riveting performance delivered by Burt Reynolds? Reynolds was, after all, the epitome of early to mid 70's mucho macho. What about Jon Voight? The man who not only is an Academy Award winning actor but also has cool sperm to boot because he created Vagina Jolie?
Nope.
You ask anybody about Deliverance and all anybody will be able to remember was that it was the movie with one hell of a hootnanny complete with a hillbilly milkshake that not only brought Ned Beatty to his knees in the wooded feedyard but had him deliver the mating call heard all around the world. Even to this day I'll bet that guy can not hail a cab without having someone ask him if he would squeal for his ride. But squeal no more. For the man who made us all squeal with delight was laying in a hospice somewhere and emitted his final pig song.
On a completely un-related note, I should mention all the poor women whose names the entertainment industry and obituary columns are too damn lazy to remember and recognize. So, after all those years of telling people "yep, you know that squeal like a pig guy? I fucked him", in fact, one might even say these women made him squeal like a pig.... it is them I feel the most pain for. Not Ned Beatty. When he read that script and rehearsed that scene for the first time I'm way sure he knew what he was getting himself into. But these women? Their tiny bit of celebrity that could be milked for all its worth now has been squashed like a halo of flies all racing for the same piece of dung in a pigpen only to wind up crash landing into each other.
I don't know, I just can't help but wonder how something like Ned Beatty being sodomized by a shit-toothed moonshiner winds up becoming as epic as the shower scene in Psycho. It just seems weird to me that this whole "squeal like a pig" thing took on a mindset of its own and managed to find its relevance in the history books somewhere between Jimmie Walker lighting his farts and making doo doo dyn-o-mite and Ron Jeremy showing that old lady who fell down and couldn't get up where all the beef was really at. It makes me think. But it also makes me feel like something is wrong here. I can't help it though. I think too much. In addition, I have feelings too, damnit.
Sometimes, my head hurts from thinking too much. Sometimes, my nipples hurt from feeling too much. But, I guess all of this is better than having your butt hurt from being down on the farm.
*****Original post date 12/3/2011*****
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