Tornado (Sorta) Hits NYC!

 

The Fall of COVID-19 in NYC

... And may it be the first ... and the last ...

Review: "Nighthawks" (1981)

If you're looking for a gritty, pulpy piece of NYC action noir, you can't do better than Nighthawks from 1981. It falls into the same genre of NYC crime movie like The French Connection and The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3 -- smart cops, haunted by demons, trying to stop vicious criminals intent on destroying the city.  

It stars Sylvester Stallone and Billy Dee Williams -- at the height of their Rocky and Star Wars fame -- as two NYC cops hunting a terrorist who, after bombings and murder in London and Paris, escapes to NYC to continue his rampage. The plot is fairly standard -- the cops do lots of hard detective work, deal with annoying superiors and personal issues, catch a few lucky breaks, and it leads to lots of shooting, chasing, and action.

You don't watch a movie like this for the plot so much as for characters, the action, and ambiance -- and Nighthawks has plenty. 

This is also a great NYC movie. It shows a cross-section of life in the city circa 1981. The action moves all over the city -- from the subways to the backstreets to the roofs of buildings, from apartments to brownstones, from the Bronx to Manhattan to Queens to Brooklyn, from high-end department stores to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to the Roosevelt Island tram (and Roosevelt Island itself), even literally into the East River.  

Stalline is at his grizzled best, Williams is both intense and charasmatic, and the movie includes a great supporting cast with the late Joe Spinell (from The Godfather Part II), the late Persis Khambatta (Star Trek: The Motion Picture) and the gorgeous Lindsay Wagner right after the Bionic Woman. There's even a cameo by adult star Jamie Gillis! Most importantly, it stars Rutger Hauer in his American film debut as the scary villan.  

This movie is as pulpy NYC as it gets, and a fascinating look back at another city at another time.

The Making of the Mayor 2021

I know, I know, an exhausting presidential election just ended -- and, for some, it's still not over --  but NYC is already looking ahead to the mayor's race next year.

Oh yeah, it's gonne be gnarly. 

Not only will this race occur in the middle of the pandemic (how bad it will be next year, vaccine or no, obviously can't be predicted) but, for the first time, the party primaries will happen in June, not September. This means that in by the time summer begins the two main general election candidates will be chosen and it'll be game on -- for the next five months until November.

Also, Mayor De Blasio is term-limited out so this election will result in a new mayor, a new era. 

I'm exhausted already just thinking about it. 

What Biden Means for NYC

In most countries, the biggest city is the country's pride and joy. But in America, eh ... not really. Like so much of our schizophrenic national psyche, the biggest city is loathed as much as it is loved by the rest of the country (think when "New  York values" was used as a pejorative some years back). 

Many of our presidents, particularly Republican ones, have often held NYC in contempt. They rarely come here and, when they do, don't stay long. The Obama years was a brief exception (he was here all the time, usually to raise money) but even though the currently defeated President is from NYC, his Republican bone fides has made him hate NYC as much as it hates him.

But he's on his way out, and now President-elect Biden is putting together his plans and administration. Like the soon-to-be ex-President, Biden is also a Northeasterner (in fact, not long ago, the idea of a Northeast liberal Democrat as POTUS would have been unimaginable -- how times have changed). And Biden is also a big fan of public transportation -- he became known as Amtrak Joe since he traveled home to Delaware each night during his decades in the Senate. And Biden is very close to Governor Cuomo -- they're personal friends, and Cuomo was one of Biden's early endorses.

So good things may be on the way to NYC from a President Biden -- namely, money. Money for a new Hudson River tunnel. Money for public housing. Money for the city's government budget shortfalls, the pandemic having wrecked havoc on its finances. Money for a variety of infrastructure projects.

New York City, the nation's biggest city, gives so much, financially and otherwise, to the rest of the country -- and the city is lucky enough finally to have a president who recognizes this.

The Battle is over ... WE HAVE WON!

Memo from NYC

We are in the Dark Ages.

The 21st century version of the Dark Ages. The last 20 years has been a non-stop series of body blows -- botched elections, terrorism, endless wars, economic collapse, massive natural disasters, the rise of fascism, and a pandemic (if I'm leaving anything out, please let me know).

And it seems that half of the United States is just fine with it! 

When will it end? Well ...

... some history: the original Dark Ages lasted roughly 1,000 years, from around 500 A.D. (the collapse of the Roman Empire) until around 1500 A.D. (the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, the discovery of the New World, the invention of the printing press, etc.). 

Oh well, it was a great 500 years between 1500 A.D. to 2000 A.D. Had to end sometime. Now that we're in the second Dark Ages, we have about 980 years of this crap. 

If you want to learn more about the Dark Ages, 

How to Survive Election Day in NYC

... breath ...

... breath again ...

... vote (if you haven't already) ...

... breath and breath again ...

... breath some more ...

Remember this will always be the greatest city in the world.

"You're da' man now dawg!" -- Sean Connery (RIP) in the Bronx

 From the 2000 movie Finding Forrester:

Classic Mr NYC

Last year I blogged about a Broadway show that failed -- in fact, it never debuted in the first place. It was a musical about the early years of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates that was weeks away from premiering until the money vanished and the show was cancelled. It made me think about "the delusion of art", about how artists are people who have odd, purely inspirational, delusional ideas to create something (a painting, a statue, an instillation, a movie, a book, a musical, a play, anything) and are also delusional enough to think that anyone will care about it or want to work on it or finance it or finally go to see it when it's completed and put on display.

Works of art can enshrine their creators into history, give them legacies that long outlast their lives, become part of the public consciousness and culture -- or they can fail, disapear, their creators efforts all for nought, sometimes even leading them to ruin.

I just read another story about a show that had been in the works for many years and almost made it to Broadway -- until its star created all sorts of trouble, leading to its closure off-Broadway, any hopes of big money and Tonys shot. It's a depressing story, reminding you of the perils, but how people pursue it because they love it, delusional, for better or worse, forever.