YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE

"'It is impossible,' he said, 'that the wealth that maintains you in your dissolute way of life should have come to you lawfully.  You have acquired it dishonestly; it will be taken from you in the same way.  The most terrible punishment that God could inflict on you would be to leave you to enjoy it in peace.'... I listened amicably to his advice; and although I was not in the least disposed to follow it, was grateful for his zeal, for I knew the source from which it sprang"--Manon Lescaut

"The things I do for England!"--James Bond

This afternoon I saw Lewis Gilbert's You Only Live Twice with Dawna.  It's one of the more offbeat James Bond movies. (When Sean Connery was in Japanese disguise, he reminded me of Marlon Brando in Teahouse of the August Moon!) Major plot hole:  at the end they escaped through the tunnel where they couldn't enter earlier because it contained poison gas.

I'm enjoying my reading these days.  Manon Lescaut must have been ahead of its time:  there's something really modern about the contradictions in Des Grieux' character. (Remember when I said that the book and opera Carmen was the first film noir?  Now I think this was it!)

I'm also enjoying J.L. Granatstein's coffee-table book about Canada in World War II, especially the chapter about the home front.  In the broad terms of Canadian history, the wartime period seems like something of an aberration...

Lawyer Glenn Close on Damages is pretty scary, like Tina Brown on speed!  Talk about a poker face...