Note to Self: Be Less Dumb

Last night was devoted to Rest & Recuperation, and accordingly I watched DVDs on the laptop with the cat. First I finished Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Then I watched The Maltese Falcon. And today I slapped my head and said, you know what? Ferris is certainly an expression of the folkloric Trickster archetype, and Sam Spade is too, to a slightly lesser extent. Both understand what has to happen and they make it happen through guile. They upset the established order, but the results are ultimately beneficial.

Also funny. The Maltese Falcon in particular is wonderful, one of those films that are a) near-perfect as films and b) better than the book. It's a rare thing, and when it's done it's usually done by John Huston. I love the part where Elisha Cook Jr. as the psychopathic young gunsel Wilmer believes that he has gotten the best of Bogie's Sam Spade by threatening to shoot him with one of the two .45s he carries. As Wilmer conducts Spade to his boss's hotel room, Spade hangs back a little, yanks Wilmer's coat down over his arms, and reaches into the struggling young man's pockets and extracts the pistols. They enter the apartment, and Spade gives the pistols to the hapless Wilmer's boss, Sydney Greenstreet. "Here," he says. "A crippled newsie took 'em off him, but I made him give 'em back."