Awww, Dentist for Tuna, juvat!*

 Yes, Folks, it is decidedly "Pick on Tuna" day here in the Lone Star State.  Why you ask?  Well, I found a video which I believe will serve him in good stead as he advances into the ranks of the "Elderly".  Now, using my artistic license, I define elderly as a moving variable (E).  The formula for that variable's value is thus:

E>1 + JA** (in years)

Now, there is a second formula which also defines Elderly.  That one is 

E=JA (in years)-1 

One can only be in one grouping or the others. This will be apparent shortly as this week's lesson to be learned is aimed at the second grouping.

So, on with the show. 

Mrs. J and I were in the truck headed eastword.  While we were not going TO Austin, we were headed to Dripping Springs which 20 years ago was a very small town well away from Austin.  Now, it's a suburb for the Austin Borg.  We were going to visit our friend from Texas Hills Winery.  I don't know if I'd mentioned her husband had passed away last year (it was a pretty rotten year all round).  She has just completed selling the winery and has bought a house in Dripping (the locals drop the "Spring" part).  Mrs J. needed to discuss with her the Wine River cruise coming up in November that our friend's going to be the MC for.  I wanted to drink a little wine.  

Win/Win!

Dinner was excellent, as was the wine.  As we're heading home, Mrs J is surfing videos on her phone.  She's laughing quite hard and I ask what's going on.  She replied that she had found a video that I "HAD" to post on this morning's blog.

So it is written, So it shall be!

The video is the 12 commandments for Senior Citizens. I think they're funny, along with a modicum of truth contained within.

So, Tuna, take them to heart, learn them and feel free to start applying them because you're rapidly approaching the age at which they become truthful.

BTW, #5 is particularly accurate at least as as far as I'm concerned.

Enjoy and...Peace Out Y'all!

* Actually it's "Audentes fortuna juvat". Or, Fortune favors the Bold.   This was the "Motto" of the 80TFS "The Juvats" of which I was a member.  Youngest guy in the squadron.  Learned a lot from the "older generation" the 30YO Captains and the 40YO Majors. The attached title is just a thought I had on the way home from Dripping and it stuck with me for some reason.  Besides, Tuna doesn't get enough grief around here.  Thought I'd fix that a bit.  Sue me!

**You'll have to think about that one.  I'm not going to define it.

Weird Dreams and a Few Film Reviews ...

Source

Bizarre dream, or was it a nightmare?

Sunday was the "stripping of the bed," it's not like we make a big deal out of doing this, but every time we do this, The Missus Herself comments on just how horrible my pillow looks. She often speaks of discarding it, but on Sunday last, she did more than just speak of it.

So now I have a new pillow, same make and model (if you will) as the old pillow, but it has yet to become "my pillow," carefully kneaded, drooled on, and crushed over time so that it is almost a part of me whilst I slumber. Nope, not yet.

I'm not saying that the pillow change had anything to do with the rather bizarre dreams (nightmares?) I had in the course of Sunday night to Monday morning. Could have been the two slices of cold pizza I consumed earlier. Who knows? Nevertheless the dream (nightmare?) was unsettling, to say the least.

The scene was rather like that in the opening photo (from the latest version of Dune). People were in formations, they were very gray, the day was gray and dark, might have been raining as well. I felt like I was somewhere in the future. A rather dismal future, that I can tell you.

I awakened, rather breathless as if I had just been running. I sat up in bed and said "What the hell was that?" I'm guessing it's my dismay as to the possibility of a completely unqualified, anti-American, corrupt asshole becoming the President of the United States. Again.

But having been awakened and left somewhat dazed, my brain went in different directions, I do that in order to try and get back to sleep. What I tend to do, when in the midst of one of my fictional bouts of writing, is try to think up new plot lines, twists and turns, ya know, that sort of thing.

For some reason though, early early on a Monday morning, my thoughts went to retirement, which is just a bit under three months away. It struck me that I would no longer be interacting with fellow adults in the pursuit of a common goal, ensuring that the Navy's weapon systems actually perform well, at least in a simulated environment.

In my half asleep, bad dream awakening state, I kinda panicked at that thought. I will indeed miss that. What I won't miss is management with no clue directing the show. We don't have a lot of that at the middle level, we have an awful lot of that at the higher middle levels. To them it's all about throwing the right tool and the right process at the job.

While the right tools and a good process can help, they're not a panacea, though many view it as such. So when a ew tool comes out, they rush to get it as long as someone in "industry" endorses it. Doesn't matter if they actually use the Gorram thing, if it's new, they want it. Kinda like those transformationalists a few years back.

That I will not miss at all.

Now that school is back in session and as apparently all of the "work from home" types are gradually filtering back to their actual brick and mortar company locations, traffic on my wee commute has become a PITA.

Mind you, it's nothing like big city commutes where you might sit in traffic for an hour or more, but if you're used to a 15-minute commute which now takes 30 minutes, well, let's just say, I ain't gonna miss that either.

Finally had the chance to watch that much-maligned film Civil War. You know, the one where Texas and California gang up on the rest of the United States and secede. The one where the "Western Forces" (sporting Old Glory with 13 stripes and 2 stars) manage to capture DC? As entertainment it wasn't bad. Lots of shootie stuff and things going boom, I like that in a film, even if the plot makes no damned sense at all.

And it didn't make any sense. No back story as to how California and Texas found common cause (I mean come on, Texas and Florida makes much more sense). No details on how it all started.

But yeah, lots of shootie stuff and things going boom.

Second film review, (okay, I watched a couple of movies on Saturday as it was raining like a sumbitch) this one was Red State. I had seen some clips of it, and John Goodman was in it (I like him), and when I was looking for something else to watch, there it was.

It's tagged as a "horror film" which I didn't think it was, sure some teenagers got slaughtered, so I guess to Hollyweird that's a "horror film," it wasn't, not really. Lots of shootie stuff and some really cool "trumpets of Revelation" stuff near the end. (Sounded like some of the same sound effects used in the Tom Cruise version of War of the Worlds when the tripods showed up. They were cool in both films.) You can read the synopsis at the link above.

It was weird, but oddly entertaining.

Maybe I need therapy ...

I managed to squeeze in another film on Sunday night, The League of Ungentlemanly Warfare, which, while entertaining, was rather a disappointment. I was expecting so much more.

U-Boats controlling the coast of Africa from Senegal to Gabon, the Germans occupying various coastal areas, the Royal Navy controlling the waters to the west of that, it was all so very contrived.

Now I'm not a huge fan of Sir Dudley Pound (PQ-17 and all that) but the movie made him look like a right berk, didn't like that at all. The premise of the movie was flawed, and the characters portrayed are based on real people! Come on, take a bit of history and put it in there Hollyweird, I know, it might require picking up a book, but damn, what a bloody disappointment.

It did have the benefit of being mildly entertaining, I will give it that, but I'm awfully glad that I didn't spend money at the theater to see it!

Speaking of weirdness, I love this scene from Dune ...

Maybe I really do need therapy ...

Anyhoo, how was your weekend?

This is How you Austerlitz!

Exploits of the Cavalry Regiment at the Battle of Austerlitz in 1805¹
Bogdan Pavlovich Willewalde (PD)

Why yes, I am still ranting about the movie.

I was driven to look up who was the military consultant for Ridley Scott's Napoleon. Who to blame for this abject departure from history? Turns out he had a British military consultant and a French historical advisor. I read this about his military consultant, the title of this article ...

Critics of Napoleon epic have fallen for emperor’s fibs, says film’s military expert

... pretty much told me all I needed to know, but I read the article anyway. One word, poppycock. (Though in The Guardian's defense, they do look at both sides of the argument, the last line in the article struck a chord with me.)

Want to know how to do warfare in the Napoleonic era? Hire a British ex-paratrooper? I'm sure the guy knows modern warfare, but he sucks at history. He's the kind of guy I would hire to teach actors and extras how to act like soldiers. From what I saw, he did okay at that. He's done some excellent work on other films, check out his demo reel from his LinkedIn page.

So he knows the small bits, but if he was responsible for setting up the battle scenes (particularly Austerlitz and Waterloo) then Sir Ridley should have hired someone else. Which is where I assume the French historian was relied upon. I'm not seeing any expertise on his LinkedIn page to support hiring him as a consultant on the wars of Napoléon.

Sir Ridley could probably have hired the guys who do the Austerlitz and Waterloo reenactments and gotten a lot more bang for his buck (literally).

The reenactment of these battles are held periodically, Austerlitz is reenacted once a year and from what I have read is always on the anniversary of the battle, the 2nd of December and takes place on the ground where the battle was actually fought. Waterloo is reenacted every five years on the actual ground but is on a weekend near the anniversary of the battle. (I had the extreme fortune to have attended the reenactment on the 18th of June 1995, a Sunday, the 180th anniversary of that battle. Same day of the year, same day of the week, and, wonder of wonders, the weather was damned near identical to what it was like in 1815!)

The Waterloo reenactment is a much larger affair (after all it's within spitting distance of Brussels and its international airport) whereas the Austerlitz reenactment is smaller but seems to be growing every year. (I suppose when your reenactment is in the wilds of Czechia, sixty plus miles from Vienna, you have to be happy that you get as many reenactors as you do. I will say this, the guys who do Austerlitz do it very well.)

So why do I keep going on and on about this? Other than my obsession with the Napoleonic period, well, I hate seeing Hollywood make a hash of history. If they do it, at least make it entertaining (and here I'll cite Sir Ridley's Kingdom of Heaven and The Last Duel for being ripping good yarns and well-made films, in terms of history, meh, not real accurate). I have friends who found Napoleon very entertaining, perhaps I make too much of the film's mistakes. But I also found it to be a very boring movie, it wasn't edited well and it seemed to drift from one scene to the next without a lot of context.

I know, I know, "You want history, read a book!" That I have read so many books on this era is probably why I dislike the film as much as I do.

Now the title of the post "This is How you Austerlitz!" is because I wanted to expose you to a few short videos. The first is by a guy who toured the area of Austerlitz. (It's not called that anymore, now it's Slavkov u Brna, Austerlitz is the name of the place in German. Remember, back in the day this was part of the Austrian Empire, and what language do Austrians speak?) I show you this to illustrate how far off the location Sir Ridley chose for the film was.

The following clip is from this year's (2023) reenactment of Austerlitz. Note that Sir Ridley's film is mentioned as well.

The rest of the clips are all of the reenactments at Austerlitz. Take my word for it, the reenactments gave me a far better flavor for this sort of thing than Sir Ridley's film.

Also from the 2023 reenactment. (There wasn't nearly as much snow there in 1805, if you believe the paintings of the battle. Yeah take those with a grain of salt as well.)

This is from an earlier reenactment, though the text accompanying the video didn't make it all that clear (note the lack of snow!)

And last (and perhaps least, though the cinematography is better, the historical accuracy isn't) here's the scene from Ridley Scott's Napoleon:

For anyone looking to make a film about Napoléon, call me, I'm available.

I'm still a fan of Ridley Scott's films but ...

Now I'll get down off my soapbox.

For now ...

¹ I rather wish I could have found the original title of this painting. It's in the Artillery Museum in St. Petersburg, no, not the one in Florida. The painting depicts the capture of the Eagle of the 4ème Régiment d'Infanterie de Ligne by the cavalry of the Russian guard at Austerlitz. The French lost only one eagle at the battle of Austerlitz.

Was I Too Harsh?

Napoleon at Fontainebleau, 31 March 1814
Paul Delaroche (PD, OAFS modified it)

Okay, so I offered my opinion on Ridley Scott's Napoleon the other day, and it wasn't pretty. As you may gather from the title, I've been reflecting on my verdict of the film being a bit of a stinker. Well, there actually were some good bits in the film which regardless of the lack of historical accuracy in some aspects were, shall we say, "entertaining," for some definitions of that word.

For instance, the first 30 minutes or so of the film, as I think back on it, were actually quite good. And no, not because Marie Antoinette received a "republican shave¹." The only real quibble I have with that first 30 minutes is that Napoléon was there, in reality he was not. You could say that Sir Ridley was demonstrating that Napoléon Bonaparte was a "child of the Revolution," which he was. So I can live with that, symbolism and dramatic license, if you will. I can live with that, had there been some narration, some mention of that for the less historically-cognizant, it would have been better, but hey, it's entertainment, not a documentary.

My first reaction was, "The critics must be wrong, this scene is incredible." The atmosphere, the camera work, and the music.

"Oh, you mean the sound track."

Um, no.

This ...

Now the version in the film is being sung by the great Édith Piaf (something I had to look up), I'm pretty sure the version above matches the film). It sounds very 1789-ish, if you get my drift. It added immensely to the tension of the moment as the French queen is led to her death. (Ironically, Marie Antoinette was the great aunt of Napoléon's second wife, Marie Louise - whose appearance in the movie lasted less than five minutes - a thing which an historian would get, but certainly not your average movie-goer.)

So the opening bit was quite good, then we move on to Toulon, the great French port then in the hands of the English. I was good with this until the point where the French were melting down cannon to make mortars. Which in the movies were nothing more than a short cannon propped up at a steep angle (we get to see that again later in the movie when "Cossacks" are attacking a French column with "mortars.")

Mortars in the movie -

Siege of Toulon "Mortars"
Screenshot from Ridley Scott's Napoleon
(Source)

Invasion of Russia "Mortar"
Screenshot from Ridley Scott's Napoleon
(Source)

Mortar in the late 18th Century -

10 inch Gribeauval Mortar
(Source)

I could have let that pass, but the film made such a big deal about it. In reality, Captain Bonaparte did do a great deal of organizing in the lead up to the siege of Toulon. Perhaps Sir Ridley was over-simplifying the real events to make a point? I don't know, but it irked me, the first thing in the film to really irk me.

Then when Bonaparte's horse is killed under him (didn't happen at Toulon) and then later on he pulls a cannon shot from the horse's chest and gives it to a man saying something along the lines of "Give this to my mother," I began to get super-critical of everything I saw on screen. You might say the Toulon scenes really sent me off down that path.

I can see doing certain things to convey an idea in an abstract way, to avoid going into great historical detail (which might turn many audiences off) but this stuff seemed like the writers and the director couldn't be bothered to make an effort at accuracy.

After the Siege of Toulon we see Bonaparte's quelling of the Paris mob with cannon fire -

(Source)

An excellent scene showing the effect of canister shot on a crowd of people. Unfortunately, there was little in the way of context to tie things in with the rest of the film. I think we can see that Bonaparte is playing a larger part in the politics of governing France, but if you knew nothing of the history, you might walk away confused.

When we meet Joséphine, I like the way she was dressed and the way she was wearing her hair. Her hair had a hurried, chopped off look, what was called a "guillotine haircut." Also, the red ribbon around her neck, you can well imagine what that symbolized. A very nice touch. (Remember, her husband had been sent to the guillotine.)

So there were a lot of nice little details in the film which I thought were well done, but there were also too many other things that were not. All in all, the film makers tried to cover too much material in a very short time. I also think they mischaracterized the Emperor and his wife. But as Napoléon's character has been smeared by the English for over two hundred years, why would they change now?

So yes, my first review of the film was a bit harsh. But don't spend money on it going to the theater, wait until it's available to stream, which is when I might watch it again. Maybe.

So was it bad? Well, in some respects, yes. But in some respects it was all right, not quite good, but not entirely bad.

Bataille d'Iéna. 14 octobre 1806
(Modified by OAFS)
Horace Vernet

Before I forget, in addition to using the song Ça Ira, the film makers did have other selections of period music playing in the background at times, not enough to please me, but enough so that I noticed.

I guess my bottom line is that it wasn't a complete waste of time, I did get a couple of blog posts out of it, didn't I?

¹ Not sure where I first heard this term, might have been in John Elting's Swords Around a Throne. I might be misremembering that as well. The guillotine was referred to as the "republican razor," that much I know.

Okay, It Was Bad

Bataille d'Iéna. 14 octobre 1806
Horace Vernet

So I finally went to the theater to watch Ridley Scott's Napoleon, I was prepared to be underwhelmed, yet I still had some hopes of the film at least being entertaining.

It was not.

Some scenes were well done, the setting, the atmosphere of the Revolution seemed accurate. Ridley Scott, in my mind, has always been very good at setting the scene. The Last Duel felt like medieval times, The Duellists, also set in the Napoleonic Era (and a far better film than Napoleon), felt right in depicting that time.

The history in this film is terrible, absolutely terrible. Trenches at Waterloo? The rain stopping just before the attack? Napoléon on horseback in hand to hand combat with infantry? Preposterous.

Even though the terrain in Sergei Bondarchuk's Waterloo was exaggerated way out of scale, it appears the folks who chose the setting for Waterloo in this film paid absolutely no attention to what the battlefield actually looked like.

Messengers having two horses, one they're riding and the other they're leading was shown in the film, but only at Waterloo. Really? I get the idea, having a spare mount, but it didn't work that way. Messengers rode hard and fast, leading an extra horse would make that hard to do. At any rate, that's the first I've ever heard of such a thing.

Sending multiple messengers along different routes, that's how it was done. Poor subalterns weren't expected to lead another horse while they galloped about.

One more thing, the Prussians finally show up in the film, about nine years too late, and they come in on Wellington's right flank, not his left. Couldn't even be bothered to get that right. (And again, bloody trenches!)

Oh yes, apologies should be offered to Spain as well, they had a major hand in Napoléon's downfall, they aren't even mentioned in the film

If the Waterloo depicted in the film was bad, the battle of Austerlitz was worse. Napoléon's achievement in driving his troops from the Channel coast to the northeast of Vienna, in winter, convincing the Austrians and Russians that his army was strung out and tired was a brilliant strategic achievement.

In the movie, Napoléon draws the enemy onto a frozen lake, then bombards it, destroying the enemy. (The Satschan pond was real, legend has it that the French did breakup the ice as the Russians and Austrians retreated across it causing many of the enemy to drown. Some historians question whether or not it happened to that extent.)

And who in the film crew though that armies used so many effing tents? There's a whole bloody village of tents at Austerlitz and a regular campground at Waterloo.

The French and Variety got it right. An awful, awful movie.

Dear me, they even got Napoléon's birthday wrong!

I wouldn't give the bloody thing half a star out of five. Definitely not worth your time.

Movie Review

(Source)

So back in 2010 the film Trollhunter came out, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I watched it in the original Norwegian, with subtitles as I just don't speak Norsk, kinda wish I did though as it's a neat language. It's got a lilting, rhythm vibe to it. Pleasant to listen to.

I have to say that I got pretty excited when I saw this trailer a few weeks back ...

After resolving to watch it, I promptly forgot about it. As Friday was a day off, I was casting about for something to watch, a little voice in my head whispered "Netflix," so I went there.

After seeing that trailer some time back, I guess I actually went to Netflix and added that upcoming film to my watch list. Lo and behold, there it was, so I watched it.

Great fun, some really good characters, including a guy I count as my favorite Norwegian actor. He's been in a few films I've seen, always seems to play a guy who ain't as honest as he should be. He's a really good actor. He plays the characters you love to hate!

Fridtjov Såheim¹
(Source)

Here's the trailer for Trollhunter ...

(I post it so you don't have to go hunting, but you will have to click over to YouTube to watch it, beklager.²)

A couple of fun movies to watch on a cold winter night.

Enjoy!

And yes, I'm still in my creativity drought, ah weel, this too shall pass.

¹ Google Translate says this is pronounced "Freet-yoff So-highm." And yes, that's an approximation.

² Sorry. (Norwegian)