The late-night/early-morning spot for Cubs fans asks what your favorite part of All-Star Week is
It’s All-Star Week here at BCB After Dark: the grooviest gathering of night owls, early risers, new parents and Cubs fans abroad. Come on in and take the night off with us. There’s no cover charge. There are still a few tables available. Tell us if we can do anything for you. Bring your own beverage.
BCB After Dark is the place for you to talk baseball, music, movies, or anything else you need to get off your chest, as long as it is within the rules of the site. The late-nighters are encouraged to get the party started, but everyone else is invited to join in as you wake up the next morning and into the afternoon.
Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh won the Home Run Derby.
Last week, I proposed a trade for Marlins starter Edward Cabrera. It had the Cubs giving up a lot, but it was for a young pitcher who appears to be emerging as a star and has three years of control after this one. Fifty percent of you thought the Cubs should make the trade I proposed and 27 percent of you think that Cabrera won’t be worth what the Marlins want for him. Seven percent of you think my offer was too light and 16 percent thought the Cubs could get the deal done with less.
Since then, Cabrera left his last start with elbow discomfort. The MRI on his elbow came up negative and with the All-Star Break, the Marlins currently think he’ll avoid going on the injured list. But the Cubs or any other team would certainly want to see Cabrera pitching healthy and effectively before making a big deal.
Here’s the part with the music and the movies. You’re free to skip that if you want. You won’t hurt my feelings.
Tonight we’re featuring vocalist Lisa Fischer and the SFJAZZ Collective doing the Rolling Stones classic song “Wild Horses.”
Terence Blanchard is on trumpet, Bill Frisell on guitar, Warren Wolf on vibraphone, Edward Simon on piano, Matt Brewer on bass and Kendrick Scott plays the drums.
I managed to watch my new Criterion Collection UHD 4K Blu-Ray of David Lynch’s 2001 masterpiece Mulholland Drive this weekend. The legend of Mulholland Drive continues to grow in recent years. The New York Times poll of last month named it the second-best film of the 21st Century and the BFI Sight and Sound poll from 2022 named it as the eighth-greatest film of all time. It was named the best film of the decade (2000 to 2009) in several polls back in 2010.
I’m not going to do a full commentary on Mulholland Drive. For one, I’m not qualified to comment on it. Second, I’m not sure anyone is qualified to comment on it. Roger Ebert held a symposium shortly before he died with cinephiles as they examined Mulholland Drive. He reported on the event thusly:
We have finally met defeat. A film has resisted our efforts to pound it into submission . . .In short: “Mulholland Drive” resists, defies and finally defeats logical explanation. It is impossible to produce a consistent precis of the film that accounts for everything. And there is an admirable reason for this: Like a dream, it does not have to make sense.
Mulholland Drive is about two women in Los Angeles. Betty (Naomi Watts) is an idealistic young actress. Rita (Laura Elena Harring) is an amnesiac who can’t remember her past (or her name) but has a big purse stuffed full of money. Or maybe it is about Diane Selwyn and Camilla Rhodes, two lovers, one successful and the other not. Maybe it’s about all four. Or maybe all four women are just one woman. Maybe that person is dead.
Not many directors get turned into an adjective. Hitchcockian, Capraesque, David Lynch’s films are all “Lynchian.” And Mulholland Drive embodies that better than any other film. The only logic of the film is the logic of dreams and nightmares. Both the real stuff we experience at night and the dreams and nightmares that we speak of when we talk about the movies and Hollywood.
Lynch’s films, at their best, can’t be explained because there is no explanation. Lynch has been known to ask why does everything have to mean something? Why can’t things simply exist? He never objected to people giving their explanation to his movies. He only objected when people tried to give the explanation. And he never offered his explanation, thinking it to be no more worthy than yours.
But before I embarrass myself by going any further, let me talk about the 4K UHD copy that I watched. I have a good TV and a solid sound system at home, but it’s not the kind that cinephiles chase for the highest home theater quality. I do have a 4K Blu-Ray player and while I watch a ton of films through streaming, like any home cinephile I prefer physical media for pictures that I love when I can afford it. The picture and sound quality is just better with physical media.
The Criterion Collection edition comes with both a UHD 4K Blu-Ray and a normal Blu-Ray. Even on my “slightly above-average” home system, I could tell the difference between the two discs. The colors were sharper and the shapes were more defined. It became more obvious when Lynch shot Watts or Harring through a filter, for example. I’m not enough of a home theater nerd to go into things like film grain and pixels and whatever, but I found watching the 4K disc to be a treat. The regular Blu-Ray is good and if that’s what you have at home, you’ll still get the full experience of the film. But the UHD 4K is like looking at a painting up close instead of from the back of the room.
There are a few extras in the collection, but I haven’t had the chance to go through them all yet. There are some interviews with Lynch and the stars and one deleted scene. It comes with a booklet. But there’s no “commentary track,” as if Lynch would have ever allowed someone to explain the movie to you, even himself.
Here’s a trailer for the restoration of Mulholland Drive.
Oh, and I’ve had Rebekah Del Rio’s Spanish-language version of Roy Orbison’s “Crying” going through my head since I re-watched the movie. You’ll never hear the song the same way again.
Welcome back to everyone who skips the music and movies.
Major League Baseball wants to turn All-Star Week into a “thing” with a lot of events that are a celebration of baseball. Personally, I think some of these are good ideas and some of them, well, aren’t good ideas. But instead of inflicting my views upon you, I thought I’d let you tell us what your favorite part of All-Star Week is.
There’s the All-Star Game, of course. There’s the Home Run Derby, which took place tonight. Those are the big two. But there are other events, including the Futures Game, the MLB Draft, the Celebrity Softball Game and the All-Star Red Carpet Show.
Then there is also four days off from the regular season. I’ll let you vote for that.
Thanks for stopping by. We hope you had a good time. Tell your friends about us. Get home safely. Recycle any cans and bottles. Tip your waitstaff. And join us again tomorrow night for more BCB After Dark.