I've posted enough videos here of Jiminy Glick that I figure it's only proper to give some equal time to the fellow underneath.  This is from 2016 when Martin Short received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Canadian Screen Awards.  While he gives a very nice acceptance speech, and the video montage is a lot of fun, I think the best part may be the presentation speech by Short's close friend and fellow SCTV alum, Eugene Levy.

By the way, they refer to the award as the "Candy."  I tracked down the story behind that.  The host for the evening is Norm MacDonald, and he quipped at the evening that, being Canada, it only made sense to called the award the Candy, as much a tribute to John Candy as anything -- and throughout the night, other presenters (including Donald Sutherland) picked up on it, and it appears to have stuck.

For our part here, we celebrate National Train Day on these pages by posting a list of the greatest train movies.  These are films in which trains are absolutely central to the story.  Where a train is the driving force of the tale, without which you can’t properly describe the plot.

(Think of it like the classic and beloved Santa Claus song, "Santa Claus is Coming to Town."  Santa Claus isn't actually in the song at all.  He hasn't even shown up yet.  In most ways, it's about "you" and what you should do -- or better not do.  But even though there's not a hint of Santa Claus even appearing in the song, without Santa Claus...there's no song.)

We're strict about this.  A friend once recommended The Taking of Pelham-1-2-3, and it was strongly considered, but that was a subway train or light rail.  This list is for full-bore trains, the kind that either have sleeping cars and dining cars, or could if they were hitched on.  But I've added it to our Honorable Mention list this year.

I should also note that, since the list is fluid, we've added another new movie to the list of Great Train Films, last years movie, The Commuter, with Liam Neeson as a man on his daily trip to work who gets caught up in a conspiracy on board. 

There are two other categories:  Honorable Mention is for movies which you can tell their stories without using the word "train," but they have some connection to trains -- usually a great, standout train sequence -- that makes them memorable.  And last year I added a new category of Special Mention, for works that don't qualify as a train movie or perhaps even as a movie at all, but deserve a place of honor.  We include three new entries this year.  One is for the aforementioned The Taking of Pelham-1-2-3 -- not about trains but light rail, but deserving of inclusion.  The second is Great Railway Journeys of the World, a wonderful TV documentary by the intrepid traveler Michael Palin, And finally, we add The Railrodder, one of the last works that Buster Keaton made.  It's a tremendous one-man short about a befuddled fellow on a railroad track cart, traveling across the length of Canada. 

And as I noted in the past, though something I think is likely very obvious, I love train movies.  Here is the current list of Great Train Movies.

Around the World in 80 Days
Back to the Future 3
The Bridge on the River Kwai
The Darjeeling Limited
Emperor of the North
The General
The Great Locomotive Chase
The Great Train Robbery
The Lady Vanishes
Murder on the Orient Express
The Narrow Margin
North by Northwest
Northwest Frontier
Night Train to Munich
Polar Express
Runaway Train
Shanghai Express
Silver Streak
Source Code
Strangers on a Train
Tough Guys
The Train
Transsiberian
Twentieth Century
Union Pacific
Union Station
Unstoppable
Von Ryan’s Express
 
Honorable Mention
Throw Momma from the Train 
Planes, Trains and Automobiles
The Greatest Show on Earth
Go West
At the Circus 
Cat Ballou
Trading Places

Special Mention
Great Railway Journeys of the World (TV documentary)
Nothing Like It in the World by Stephen Ambrose (book)
The Railrodder (short)
The Taking of Pelham-1-2-3

I've also added another new feature last year -- a scene from one of the Great Train Movies, or another entry on the list.  And though I've posted it in the past, this year in honor of its Special Mention inclusion, here is Buster Keaton in the 1965 short, The Railrodder.

The other day, Disney announced its news streaming service Disney Plus which will launch November 12.  Pricing will be $7 a month or $70 for an annual subscription, which most news reports commented how it compares favorably to $13 a month for Netflix's most popular tier.  The company said that they may eventually bundle Disney Plus with other of their services like Hulu and ESPN Plus.  During the first year, they expect to release 25 new series and 10 movies, documentaries and specials.  Overall, the Disney Plus library will have over 7,500 TV episodes and 500 movies.

It seems like a fascinating venture, with some plus and minuses.  On the plus side, Disney has a huge vault they can draw from, and recently bought the film division of 20th Century Fox, and now have that library, too -- which include the Star Wars franchise, the Avenger franchise and all 30 years of The Simpsons.  And among the new productions for the service are a Star Wars spinoff series, The Mandalorian and prequel to Rogue One (for which Diego Luna will reprise his role of Cassian Andor).  There will be a series Marvel Studios series Loki, that stars Tom Hiddleston reprising his role,; and a Pixar series Monsters at Work, that takes off after the events of the  original Monsters Inc. movie.

On the negative side -- or at least left out of most news stories is that the $7 a month is an "initial" price, most likely to get interest and subscriptions, and it seems probably that that will rise, and the cost-difference with Netflix will narrow.  In addition, Netflix has $9 stream plan, as well, which is much closer to Disney's "initial" offering.  And a significantly larger catalog -- 1,569 TV shows and 4,010 movies. (Keep in mind that the "7,500" figure for Disney is episodes, not shows.  If each Netflix TV series only has two years of 22 episodes each -- and keep in mind that old shows often had around 35 episodes a years and most not only ran for more than just two years, with some like Gunsmoke and Bonanza running for decades -- that works out to 70,000 episodes.

But further, it only compares with Netflix and leaves out Amazon.  An Amazon Prime subscription averages out to $10 a month.  And that not only includes a very large catalog, including international TV shows -- but most importantly includes free 2-day shipping on Amazon (and free next-day delivery on orders over $35), along with music streaming, cloud photo storage, Prime Now with free grocery and restaurant delivery within range, and more.

And no one should expect immediately competition with Netflix.  Disney predicts between 60-90 million subscribers in five years -- while Netflix currently has 140 million subscribers. Disney also says it expect so spend $2 billion a year over most of the next five years, while Netflix spends around $12 billion on content a year.

This is not to say that the Disney Plus service isn't intriguing and won't be a success.  In fact, it's very fascinating and seems poised to do well.  But as a complimentary service to Netflix and Amazon Prime, rather than one that can knock them out of the box.  Mainly, it's to say that most coverage of Disney Plus was pretty sketchy in its description of the landscape.

Besides which, who know how that landscape may be drastically changed in five years.

Last year, Adobe help a contest to create a movie poster using its product Creative Cloud.  The payoff would be that Zach Braff would write and direct a short based on the winning the poster.  They released the 11-minute film on Wednesday, and here it is, In the Time It Takes to Get There.

Starring Florence Pugh and Alicia Silverstone, it looks at the life of a bored star "product influencer."  The twist is that this isn't about someone today on social media, but rather in the 18th century.  I like Zach Braff's work a lot -- not just acting, but I think the three films he's directed have shown a lot of talent, and Garden State was especially well-written (getting a Writers Guild nomination).  For my taste, I don't find this particular script especially funny, though it's wonderfully directed and is a rich production to watch.  And the details spoofing the fame and world of today's influencers are well done.  The user comments and online votes for the short are highly positive, so happily the audience who've seen it had an especially good time.

I've been seeing billboards and TV ads for a few weeks now promoting the remake of the movie based on Stephen King's novel Pet Sematary.  They've caught my attention more than most remakes since (during my early, dark days when I was a kid and didn't know better and did movie publicity) I was the unit publicist on the original film of Pet Sematary.  I'm not quite sure why they feel a remake is needed so soon after the first one -- it's not like it comes from another era, mind you, but 30 years ago in 1989 -- but they do, and so be it.

One notable difference between this new version and the original, which is why I'm glad I worked on that one, is that the original had a screenplay by Stephen King himself.  And since we shot the movie in Maine, not far from where he lived -- which was in his contract that we film in the state -- he visited the set periodically.  We didn't talk a great deal, but did on occasion.  And since I was always wearing my Cubs hat and he's a well-known Boston Red Sox fan, that always served as a good conversation opener.
​​

Our conversations, though not many, actually lead to probably my favorite story.  Of any story I've ever told.

My brother John was a bit of a curmudgeon.  He hated things that were popular.  (Once, when he came to Los Angeles for a visit, I asked if he wanted to go to Disneyland.  When he said no, I asked why not, and he said, "Because I'm afraid I might like like it.)  On the other hand, his wife loved reading books by Stephen King.  She would ask John to read them, but  no way in the world would he read a novel by Stephen King.  Even if he had the time in the middle of his medical practice, Stephen King wasn't just a popular novelist - he was probably THE most popular current novelist in the world.  Stephen King would not be read.

But she didn't let up.  And finally, John - the good husband - gave in.  Okay, one Stephen King book.  He read Firestarter.  And he loved it so much that he finished the book in two days.  Probably hating every moment that he liked it so much.

Well, as fate would have it, not long after that, I was hired to work on Pet Sematary.  As I said, when, Stephen King would visit the set we'd generally talk about baseball or (of course) the movie, since I was also interviewing him for the production noes I was writing on the making of the film.  One day, though, I said I had a funny story for him, that I thought he would appreciate.

I told him about my brother.  I said he hated anything popular.  I explained how my sister-in-law couldn't get my brother to read his books, specifically because they were popular.  I went into great detail about who John was, and why the last thing on earth he wanted to do was read a popular Stephen King novel.

And then I explained that John finally broke down, read Firestarter -- and absolutely loved it.  Loved it so much that he finished it in two days.

Now, you must understand, this is the Best Possible Reaction that any writer can ever have.  It's one thing to be praised by fans - but it's something else entirely to have someone who is so deeply predisposed to hate your books that he's fought off reading them for years finally read one and love it so much that it's devoured.

Stephen thought for a moment after being told all this, trying to figure what to say.  It was clear he felt wonderful by John's reaction - which is pretty impressive, considering all the acclaim that Stephen King has had in his renowned career.

And then he leaned over, looked at me and said - "Tell your brother, I apologize.  I don't set out to write popular books.  It's just that people buy them."

(Not long after, I was back home in the Midwest and visited my brother who lived in Wisconsin.  And I told John this story.  His face lit up.  One of the biggest smiles I've ever seen him make.  "Stephen King said that about me???!"  he asked.  Yes - Stephen King said that about you.  He laughed out loud, and said, with much pleasure, and an acknowledgement of his own inexplicable reaction to popularity - "You know, he's probably right."  And he kept smiling.)

I didn't take all that many photos of the production -- most of my pictures were of my trips around Maine on my days off, most notably to Arcadia National Park, Baxter State Park (which I particularly wanted to go to because L.L. Bean sells a 'Baxter State Park Parka'), Campabello Island, where FDR lived when he came down with polio, and had his recuperation there -- and was the subject of the classic play and subsequent movie Sunrise at Campabello (both starring Ralph Bellamy, who as whimsy has it went to my high school, New Trier.  But I digress...)  Interestingly, it's actually located in Canada, but has been made into an "International Park."

I did take a few photos, though.  This below is 'Jud Crandall's House,' where the taciturn character played by Fred Gwynne lived.  I've previously told the stories of working with him on the film, which you can read here if interested.  The short version is that I quite liked him.  He was a bit crusty, but personal and direct.  He'd done a great deal, was an accomplished artist, hit some highs and lows in his career, and didn't take kindly to fools, but if you were straight with him, he was good to be around.  And contrary to what he may have said later in public -- perhaps it was to be diplomatic, perhaps he came to accept things -- at that time, he didn't hold much appreciation for The Munsters.  He was grateful for the good it brought him, but it seriously mucked up his career after that, and he didn't want to talk about it.

And this is the house from behind.  It's only this rear that the production did additional work on -- the structure existed before we got there, but had to be filled out for the movie's needs.

We filmed in an area known as Hancock Point, which is a bit outside the town of Ellsworth, about 25 miles from Bangor.  The town leaders wanted to give the Key to the Town to the movie company, and since the breakfast "ceremony" for that took place at a local restaurant pretty early in the morning, none of the filmmakers wanted to get up that early.  And so I -- as unit publicist -- was given the honor.  I had to make a little speech, was very gracious (and meant it) and was presented with the key.  I figured that since none of the people on the movie cared enough to go themselves to get the key, and it was presented to me...I would keep it.  And still have it.  I'm not sure what it will open up for me if I ever go back to Ellsworth, but I'm ready, just in case.

I also recall that it was a big enough deal for us to film in the state that the governor showed up one day.  (Checking records, since, no, I didn't remember, it was John McKernan, Jr., a Republican.)  He told a wonderful story about Hancock Point that I included in the press kit.  The short version was --

Back in World War II, the Germans wanted to get spies infiltrated in the U.S. so, Hanock Point being one of the easternmost parts of the country, they got a U-boat close enough to land and dropped two men off.  They were dressed as locals and went walking through the point into town -- and almost immediately were spotted and arrested, but everyone knew everyone in that small, taciturn village that any stranger instantly stood out.
​

One last photo.  It has nothing to do with Pet Sematary, but it came during my time there and is one of my favorite pictures, although it's helped by the background.  On one of my day's off, I decided to drive through the countryside.  At one point, I passed a farm, and saw a large group of cows on the far side of the field.  I stopped the car, and got out to look at them.  What can I say, I like cows...

And then I soon noticed something unexpected.  It turned out that cows are incredibly curious.  Because one-by-one, a cow would turn, spot me, and sloooooowwwwllly walk across the field to check me out.  And then another.  And another.  And another.  And...  Well, I decided to wait to see what would happen.  And this was the result.
​

​We all communed there for a while -- it would have been so rude of me to leave right after they had made the notable effort to graciously stop by and visit -- but then eventually it was time for me to head on.  From their end, I'm guessing they returned back to the far side of the field.  Perhaps discussing the whippersnapper in a Cubs cap.

I have a lot of very good memories of working on the film, and some off-beat one, not just on the set, but traveling around the state.  This includes some wonderful country-dining, a lot of blueberries and blueberry pie (Machias in northeast part of the state is the wild blueberry capital of the U.S.), going to a Triple-A minor league baseball game in Old Orchard Beach for the Maine Phillies, ​several trips to Freeport, the flagship home of L.L. Bean that's open literally 24/7 every day with countless factory outlet stores from other companies built-up around it, eating at "lobster pots" -- seemingly almost as ubiquitous and inexpensive there as McDonalds -- most memorably Bob the Lobster, understanding from the eerieness of parts of the state where Stephen King's stories come from, dismal Mexican food and an absence of a lot of ethnic food, and seeing a concert in town by Noel Paul Stookey -- Paul, of Peter, Paul and Mary -- who lived down the road in Blue Hill.

I wish the remake well.  But I'm very glad I worked on the original.

From all the writing I've been doing about my friend Vicki Rskin's wonderful, just-published book A Hollywood Memoir about her parents, actress Fay Wray and Oscar-winning screenwriter Robert Riskin (It Happened One Nigh), I've come across a bunch of interesting videos that I thought I'd post, along with some stories.  And given how many articles I've written about it already, I decided not to drag it out further and just put them all together, in one big Fay Fest.

I don’t know what this first video is from, but it has to be within the last year because they mention the Broadway musical of King Kong.  It’s a piece on the original movie that uses a lot of an old interview with Fay.  I do recognize the announcer, Bill Kurtis who was a very popular TV news anchor in Chicago who then went on to do national work for CBS.  And later became a host on several documentary TV series.  (Fun note for perspective: I found out only a few years ago that he was close friends with my dad’s cousin -- and my second cousin -- Marion Elisberg Simon, who was sort of a doyenne of Arts, social programs, and Jewish community in Chicago, and he wrote an introduction to her autobiography a few years ago.  She only just passed away last year at 99.)

I also came across this fascinating video from 1998, when Fay was 91.  She had been invited to come to the Oscars, and host Billy Crystal goes down into the audience to talk to her.   What's interesting is that she seems surprised that he's there, which seems unlikely since you wouldn't invite a 91-year old legend to the Oscars, plan to talk to her live, and not tell her.  What's also possible, if not likely, is that they did indeed tell her, and at 91 she just got the stories conflated and thought they meant to only have her stand up and wave.  The point here, though, is that this is a recipe for something going very, very wrong, live on TV, with a massive worldwide audience -- and yet Fay (although a bit flustered) is sharp, bright and utterly charming.  And while every moment you think it's going to go kablooey, it never does.  What leaps out too are the looks of joy and awe on the faces of all these major stars in the audience, because that's Fay Wray there, at 91.  (By the way, that's her daughter Vicki sitting to her left, with short dark hair and wearing a sort of plaid jacket with black lapels.)
​

With the Oscars out of the way, I thought I would nonetheless stick with movies for another day.

​Turner Classic Movies is finishing up its annual, glorious "31 Days of Oscar," where each presentation over that period are either Oscar winners, or had a least one nomination.  It's always a joyous time of year for just great movie-watching.  Movie after movie.  And the channel itself does wonderful job throughout the year with presenting and promoting old and classic and even just ordinary movies as its commercial and cultural mission.  Which brings me to what I fully acknowledge is nothing more than a Point of Personal Privilege.  Which in this case takes its form as a rant.

Tiny details are not especially important in the grand scheme of far-larger landscapes, and much of this is just quibbles.  And admittedly, as I said, a personal rant.  Though I think in the end it has a larger point because TCM heralds itself as the guardian of movies and the source of record, so such things matter in that context.  And for a long while, other than when the late Robert Osborne wasn't on the air, the results at TCM for its commentary are fairly empty.  To be clear, Osborne wasn't just a "movie geek" as bios describe some of their new hosts, but an actual movie historian who studied and knew and understood the details.  I have no idea how much research TCM's other hosts do about movies, and how much of what they say is written by others.  But the holes are too often so massive you could drive the train from the end of Bridge on the River Kwai through it.

Ben Mankiewicz has great movie-family pedigree, but I never get a sense that he has all that much love or even appreciation for movies.  And if he does, it doesn't come through.  It's not that his bookend commentaries on movies are far too often surface, pointless and tend to miss what is actually important historically and cinematically, but regularly veer off into other movies that have almost zero connection to the movie at hand.

This is more about what has come since, when TCM has brought in some new hosts, though I've only seen their Sunday addition, Australian Alicia Malone -- one of their "movie geeks," who at least has written about movies  Again, though, i don't know if she does her own research and on-air commentary, or relies on a staff, or if it's a mix of both, but over the last couple of weeks, when I first saw, her there have been issues that are glaring regardless of who did the writing.

To be clear, what I'm about to mention are just a very few examples and as such will come across as petty.  But it's only three because there are only three, but rather because I haven't written down all the others over time -- from her, Mankiewicz and others.  I've just gnashed my teeth and moved on.  And so these three serve, not as the evidence of what I'm saying, but examples of the larger issue of how uninformative and surface the channel in its commentary has become.

Last week, the channel showed the musical Bye Bye Birdie.  In her description, Malone admirably said who wrote the screenplay -- and she gets big points for that, since most people leave out the screenwriter.  But she didn't mention Charles Strouse and Lee Adams, who wrote the songs!  How do you talk about a musical and not mention who wrote the songs??  Even if you didn't write the commentary yourself, you'd think a person reading it would notice that beforehand and ask for the information to be included.  And when talking about how Paul Lynde recreated his role from the stage production...she didn't mention that...oh, the movie's star, Dick Van Dyke, one of the most beloved actors in American TV and film history. not only was also recreating his Broadway stage role...but had won a Tony Award for it!!  Moreover, it was the Broadway role, in fact, that helped get him hired for his legendary TV series, The Dick Van Dyke Show.  Seriously, if you're going to mention Paul Lynde recreating his stage role, how does one leave all that out??  Something a movie geek should know, or that a researcher would easily find out.

The movie was followed on the schedule that day by Oliver!  Or as it's actually, officially known -- since he wrote the book, music and lyrics -- "Lionel Bart's Oliver!"  And in Ms. Malone's commentary on the movie, nowhere did she once ever even mention the name...Lionel Bart.  How on earth do you do a commentary on Oliver!  -- sorry, on "Lionel Bart's Oliver!" -- and not even mention Lionel Bart??!  Forget for a moment that it's Lionel Bart you're not mentioning in "Lionel Bart's Oliver!"...once again, how do you not mention who wrote the music and lyrics (whoever the person is) for a musical??!!  

I let all that slide until the next Sunday, yesterday, when they aired the movie musical High Society.  Ms. Malone began by talking about last week they had three movie musicals based on Broadway musicals, and this week they have three more.  Except High Society is not based on a Broadway musical, but was an original.  (Yes, it's based on a movie which is based on a Broadway play, but that's very different.)  She also kept referring to the film as a "remake" of film and stage play, The Philadelphia Story.  But it's not -- any more than My Fair Lady is a "remake" of Pygmalion, or West Side Story is a "remake" of Romeo and Juliet.  It's a totally different creature, a musical adaptation.  That's another animal entirely from a "remake."  More to the point was a story she told about the film's Oscar nominations --

She mentioned High Society's two nominations for Best Song and Best Music Scoring.  And then told the tale of how there was a mix-up with "Best Story," confusing High Society with a film of the same title the previous year, until the other writers noticed it on the list of eligible movies and informed the Academy.  And then she added that the Motion Picture Academy apparently let those earlier writers keep the plaque with their nomination, noting with a smile that "I don't know if that's true, but I hope it is."  The problem is that just moments earlier, she said that the movie only got two nominations -- neither of which you'll recall was for Best Story.  So, by her own words, just seconds earlier, there is zero possible way that the writers would have kept a "Best Story" nomination plaque.  Since, by her own words, it didn't get a Best Story nomination!  And it doesn't matter if she did the research about that anecdote or someone else did -- anyone reading the copy could have easily noticed that.

To be fair, the movie that followed High Society on the TCM schedule was The Music Man, and she did a respectable job introducing it.  There was much more she could have added, like that the film's director Morton DaCosa (who she mentions) also directed the Broadway production.  A small, but valuable item, as long as you're mentioning him.  And that several cast members of the movie other than Robert Preston recreated their Broadway roles.  Pert Kelton (as Mama Paroo), The Buffalo Bills barbershop quarter, and Harry Hickox (who played the adversarial traveling salesman).  But still, it was a solid introduction.

And she also did a reasonable job with the following movie, 1776.  Yet even at this it was largely surface.  For instance, she mentioned that Peter Hunt directed the film -- but not that he had also directed the stage version.  She mentioned, too, that the production used much of the original Broadway cast -- but not that for the other roles, almost everyone else in the movie had also appeared in either a touring production or subsequent Broadway cast of 1776.  And while she mentioned that the film only did moderately-well and got mediocre reviews, she importantly left out the reason why!  I mean, if you're going to criticize a movie (especially one you're about to present), while that's fair, though odd with no context, it would seem proper to point out the reason for the criticism:  that 40 minutes of the movie had been cut out!  And left unsaid is that it's only been in recent years after intense research tracking down lost material and meticulous restoration (including footage that very conservative producer Jack L. Warner had ordered destroyed for it being too liberal) that the finally-approved "Director's Cut" movie -- which is now what TCM shows, as the filmmaker intended -- has finally received its share of long-overdue acclaim. Bizarrely, and I personally think unnecessarily, she even doubled-down after the film by quoting from bad reviews, rather than noting that the stage version (which is what this final just shown far-more closely matches) had not only won the Tony Award as Best Musical, but also the Pulitzer Prize..

As I said, I know that this is all niggling.  And it's only just a small handful of observations.  To be clear, it's actually not meant as a specific singling-out of Alicia Malone -- who does seem to have a knowledge of and love of movies, far more than the channel's main host Ben Mankiewicz -- just that with the luck of the draw she's the person I've most recently seen and can comment on.  (And have generally gotten to the point where I skip past what Mankiewicz has to say.)  But I repeat.  It's the culmination of A LOT of errors and glaring, core omissions I've seen on TCM for quite a while now, none of which I've written down or can remember the details of, and these are only the small handful of examples from just two days the past week to serve as examples of the larger issue.  And -- importantly -- because TCM prides and markets itself as the depository of movies as an important part of American culture (something they do a great job of in their presentation and much else, including festivals, seminars and original featurettes), it's not nit-picking to notice when they slide so far off the track so often in their commentary of that history.

​There, I got that out of the way.  For now.

Last year, on the day of the Oscars, I wrote the following, about a quest I've been on.

A long while back, I was on a mini-mission to get the Motion Picture Academy to open their Oscar broadcast with a particularly wonderful song that, though it had a bit of shelf-life in country music (reaching #10 on the country charts), I figured they wouldn't know.  I actually came close -- not to accomplishing my task, but having access to making the suggestion -- when my former boss at Universal Studios, Bob Rehme, was made president of the Academy.  Alas, I didn't have the contact information that would have helped and didn't make the effort -- which probably wouldn't have been too difficult, even it was before Google searches -- to track it down (hence never getting beyond being just a "mini-mission").

The idea time has long-since passed, since the group who sang the song, the Statler Brothers, have retired, and also some of the references in the song -- while many are still classic -- aren't all likely as impactful on today's audience.  Still, it's a very fun song, and would make an enjoyable number in the middle of the broadcast, sung by a cobbled-together quartet of movie stars singing.  Or the Statlers themselves could come out of retirement.  They did briefly a couple years ago for an event when elected into a country music Hall of Fame.

But no, that's not going to happen.  But it doesn't stop me from at least presenting the song on the day of the Oscar broadcast.  So, here it is -- one of the most affectionate and clever songs I've heard about movies. And it fits perfectly into the portfolio of "list" songs that the Statlers were so well-known for.

Indeed, the name of the song is "The Movies."

There's one change from previous years.  When I've posted the song in the past, it was a video with Jimmy Fortune who had replaced Lew DeWitt who'd had to retire for health reasons.  But I've found a video with all four original Statlers, all the more notable since it was Lew DeWitt (on your far right, with the guitar) who wrote the song.

[Note: Since posting this article, the video below seems to have been removed.  However, here's a link to the version with Jimmy Fortune that I've posted in the past.]