Top 10 Comics Washington Post: WuMo Gets Political (well, sort of....)

Greetings to our readers in Azerbaijan, Qatar and Chile....

Happy 70th birthday to Turkan Soray, the queen of Turkish cinema..........

The highlights include "WuMo" making fun of DC lobbyists as fat cats, a perfect strip for the Post (Image #1 is of politician turned lobbyist Trent Lott, a Republican who still spends more time on Capitol Hill than in Biloxi), "Lio" illustrating how a big spider gets everyone's attention (image #2 is a tarantula) and 3) a frustrating phone call with a cable company rep in "Candorville" (Image #3 of the 1996 Jim Carrey black comedy).....

Here are our top ten comic strips from today's Washington Post:

1. WuMo

2. Lio

3. Rhymes with Orange

4. Brewster Rockit

5. Pearls Before Swine

6. Candorville

7. Speed Bump

8. Sherman's Lagoon

9. Knight Life

10. Prickly City

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

http://www.gocomics.com

http://www.denverpost.com/comics

Chuck Norris vs. Cuneyt Arkin (3 of 6)_ The Romatik Cuneyt

It is midnight here in New York (not really where I am at), 8:00 a.m. in Dubai, high noon in Hong Kong and 2:00 p.m. in Sydney, where ever you are you are with the Daily Vampire.

Today, we continue our series with a look at the careers of two vintage action film actors, Cuneyt Arkin of Turkey and his lesser-know counterpart (yeah, we are being sarcastic) Chuck Norris.

Arkin, now age 75, who is three years older than Norris, was also known as Cuneyt Baba (Father Cuneyt) in Tukey. He also made a lot of romantic films with Turkish screen goddess Turkan Soray, now age 67. In 1970 alone, they made many films together. One of my personal favorites is "Hayatim Sana Feda/My Life Belongs to You, Feda."

The film is patterned after Douglas Sirk melodramas from the 1950s, such as "Magnificent Obsession" and "Written in the Wind," which usually starred the late Rock Hudson.

In "Feda," Arkin plays Harun whose reckless driving causes him to hit the car driven by Soray's Zeynep, a character who is a lounge singer. She goes blind from the accident, and a guilty Harun tries to make it up to her. They fall in love. Interestingly enough, this film, came out the year I was born, which was also when "Love Story" became a huge box-office hits and one of the most questionable Best Picture nominees.

So, as we always do with these entries, we are asking which actor won the Best Oscar in 1970, the year of the 'romatik Cuneyt' (in Turkish, romantic is spelled with a 'k'). Is the answer:

A) Ryan O'Neal

B) John Wayne

C) George C. Scott

D) Jack Nicholson

E) Robert Redford

Incidentally, it is now 7:00 a.m. in Istanbul, Turkey.


The answer to last week's entry was B) F. Murray Abraham; he won the Best Actor Oscar for "Amadeus" in 1984, when Norris made "Missing in Action."

http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com

http://www.cuneytarkin.com.tr

http://www.chucknorris.com

No Turkish Bride_It Was an April Fool's Joke

It is time to come clean and admit that I am NOT marrying a woman I met on the Internet named Sibel Turkan Atasoy who lives in Afyon, Turkey. She is a fictional name, and if any woman, living in Afyon, Turkey, or elsewhere actually has that name we will be floored.

I took the middle name from the great Turkish actress Turkan Soray.

I must also profess that I was April Fooled myself as University of Utah Utes gymnastics coach proclaimed that his team had landed the top gymnast in the world on collegegymnasts.com.

Interestingly enough, we asked Bing who was the top-ranke gymnast in the world and they said Sharaya Musser. She happens to be a highly-accomplished gymnast at Penn State, but we are 99-percent sure that she is not actually the 'best in the world.'

I guess this means so much for the power of search engines!

Last Ten Films I've Seen....'Malcolm' in the Middle

Contrary to this image of Malcolm McDowell, Stanley Kubrick's surreal masterpiece "A Clockwork Orange" (1971) is NOT among the last ten films I've seen. But, I did see the three-hour against-the-grain musical comedy/political satire "O Lucky Man!"
(1973, dir-Lindsay Anderson) which McDowell actually consders his favorite film.

Here is the rest of the list:

1. "Suzanne's Career"* (France. 1963. dir-Eric Rohmer)
2. "Zulum/Cruelty" **(Turkey. 1972. w/Turkan Soray. dir-Atif Yilmaz)
3. "O Lucky Man!" (UK. 1973. w/Malcolm McDowell. dir-Lindsay Anderson)
4. "Punishment Park" (1971. dir-Peter Watkins).
5. "Wanda" (1970. dir-Barbara Loden)
6. "A Man for All Seasons" (1966. w/Paul Schroder and Robert Shaw. dir-Fred Zinneman)
7. "Lifespan" (Holland. 1976. w/Klaus Kinski. dir-Sandy Whitelaw)
8. "Prince of Persia" (2010. dir-Mike Newell)
9. "Yazgi/Fate)"** (Turkey. 2001. dir-Zeki Demirkubuz"
10. "The Fugitive Kind" (1959. w/Marlon Brando. dir-Sidney Lumet).

*-Not a full-feature length film
**-Not distributed in the United States

Here are some notes on the other films in the list:

"Suzanne's Career" is the second film in Rohmer's "Moral Tales" series, which includes what many consider to be his best film- "Claire's Knee" (1971).

"Zulum/Cruelty" is a vintage Turkish melodrama with a very young Turkan Soray who is known as the 'Queen of Turkish cinema.' It makes for an excellent guilty pleasure, but needless to say it was not a challenger to Luis Bunuel's French film "The Discrete Charm of the Bourgeoisie" which deservedly won the Best Foreign-Language film Oscar in 1972.

"Punishment Park" is a docudrama based on the 'siege mentality' concept. Along with the documentary "FTA" with Jane Fonda, it is one of several Vietnam War-era films which were effectively banned in America for political reasons. In the film, anti-war protestors choose to go to Punishment Park where they must capture an American flag on top of a mountain as opposed to federal prison. But, they soon find out that with armed law enforcement officers trailing them that they made the wrong choice.

"Lifespan" is vintage kitsch, and Kinski's appearance in the film makes it even more so. The plot is bascially this: "A doctor trying to develop a serum to strengthen his life tries his formula on nursing home residents.' Pardon the cliche, but this is definitely NOT for all tastes. In fact, I'm wondering if the film even offended me!

"Yazgi/Fate" is based on the novel "The Stranger" by the late French writer Albert Camus. The film by Zeki Demirkubuz, one of Turkey's most acclaimed directors, deal with the ramifications of nilihism as the title character is presumed guilty of a crime he did not commit because of his emotional detachment to the victims.

Lastly, "The Fugitive Kind," which is based on the Tennessee Williams play "Orphesus Descending" features four Oscar-winners. In addition, to Brando, the erotic for its time film has Anna Magnani, Joanne Woodward and Maureen Stapleton in its cast--all of whom won Oscars during their carreers. Woodward is the only one of the four who is still alive. Magnani, who became famous for her performance in the Italian classic "Open City" reportedly lusted after Brando, but he was not romantically interested in her.