Then There’s the Dane…

Miller's Crossing | Cinema 1544: The As-Official-As-It-Gets Site

last God help me, I’m considering a Great Dane.

I’ve never owned one, and only met them at dog parks. I met one so handsome and Paul-Newman-blue-eyed I told the owner it may have been the most beautiful animal I’d ever met. He said thanks, but that he was just the walker. He said the dog had its own agent, it was booked for so many commercials and magazine shoots.

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I don’t give a shit about magazine covers, but I gotta admit: I’ve always loved horsedogs. In truth, my Walter Mitty existence involves owning a horse. But let’s be real; I’m no cowboy.

I am, however, a dogboy. And the bigger the better. Teddy tipped the scales at 75 pounds, Larry 80. Now I’m flirting with the idea of a single dog that outweighs them both.

I’m not sure why I’m drawn to such an enterprise, because every column and YouTube video I’ve watched warns: Be prepared to do the work. There’s no short-changing training or attention with a Dane.

Perhaps that’s the appeal. I once knew a 120-pound Detroit Rottweiler, a frightening site to behold. She looked like she’s have you for an appetizer, but she was all softie. And when a 120-pounder splays on you, it’s a lovegasm, plain and simple.

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I think I want that again. I’m not one with the natural world; I don’t commune or meditate or chant a mantra. Your cosmic unity will always sound like a horoscope to me.

But maybe I find the world through dogs. I know this is parental dementia, but a dog’s breath to me must smell like what baby’s breath smells like to a mother. I don’t engage in dog speak, but that’s only because I think it demeans both parties. But if I could get through, I’d bark over talking.

I know this instinct would cost, literally and figuratively. I would want insurance. Dog food would cost some people’s rent. Shit would drop like a Trump rally.

And still…

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I’ve never had a parenting urge. But this desire to bring a wolf to guard my campfire is primal.

If a dog is my entree to the universe, maybe it should be soul that blows the goddamn doors off.

The Genius of ‘Chicago 7,’ Despite Its Genius

The Trial of the Chicago 7' Review: They Fought the Law - The New York Times

Like David Mamet, Aaron Sorkin is less a screenwriter than a songwriter. Sure, Goo goo j’goob doesn’t make a lick of sense, but its got a great beat.

So, too, does The Trial of the Chicago 7, Netflix’s latest pandemic entrée. Granted, our time in isolation has made us more welcoming than ever to visitors. And Sorkin, the mind behind The West Wing, has yet to see a trope he won’t hit on.

But the movie connects despite some sizable flaws, perhaps because of its underpinning message and unmistakable parallels between the politics of a half-century ago and today.

The film is based on the 1969 federal trial of seven men accused of inciting a riot at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

The film has taken its lumps for making the trial too theatrical. Rolling Stone railed, “The Trial of the Chicago 7 feels outright outlandish at times.”

Note to Rolling Stone: Look up the real trial. Defendant Bobby Seale really was bound and gagged at the trial. And unlike the film, which showed Seale as literal hostage once, the order stood for several days. A defense attorney stated, for the record, “This is no longer a court of order, Your Honor, this is a medieval torture chamber.”

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The real Bobby Seale, left, in a courtroom sketch.

No, the flaws of Chicago 7 are about storytelling. The trial was such a circus, the film needs less dramatic flare, more documentarian finesse. In a throwaway scene apparently meant to peacock, one defendant asks another if he knows what’s going on as lawyers huddle. “I haven’t known what’s been going on for years,” the other replies with a poignant sigh.

In another, a defendant says he is keeping a list of soldiers who died in Vietnam during the case, noting that “with the trial starting, it might get easy to forget who this is about.” He later hands the list to Tom Hayden (a terrific Eddie Redmayne), whose final words to the court are to read the casualty list.

Too bad the speech — and list — are pure fiction.

And while chameleon star Sacha Baron Cohen bears a strong resemblance to Abbie Hoffman, the Brit simply can’t get beyond a “pahk the cah” Northeastern accent, and it weaves like a drunk driver on a two-lane highway.

Abbie Hoffman and Sacha Baron Cohen
Abbie Hoffman, left, and Sacha Baron Cohen

But it’s still worth the cost of admission, if only because it will nudge the occasional viewer to Wikipedia or YouTube for a remote-learning history lesson.

The film duly notes what became of the protesters, from Tom Hayden’s 5-term Senate run to Hoffman’s in 1989.

More importantly, Chicago 7 puts the upcoming presidential election into some much-needed context. As Sorkin does get spot on, the 60’s make these times look downright simple.

Back then, liberal voices got shot in the head for demanding to be heard.

In that sense, the election — like the sentiment of the Chicago 7, is already settled.