Articles written by Louis Williams

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What is Helium

About me - Louis Williams

Retired (three years) professor of English, South Dakota State University.

BirthplaceBaytown, Texas

BA/MA, English, University of Texas, Austin, 1960, 1965

Ph. D., American Studies, University of Minnesota, 1976

Publications: Tropical Murder, Tower Books,

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Entertainment > Movie Genres Best western movies of all time: 2 of 11
FORT APACHE I saw it first when I was eleven or twelve and loved every minute; now, I have some reservations. In fact, I have almost nothing but. Not being in the mind of the director, of course, means that you may miss some things. Possibly Ford was trying to be Shakespearean - the Shakespeare of the history plays, at least... More..
Entertainment > TV Show Reviews TV show reviews: HBO, True Blood: 4 of 9
Down on Plasma Bayou: True Blood, or The Vampires Are Coming If you're Sookie Stackhouse, of Bon Temps, Louisiana, in HBO's True Blood, you're probably wired for weird. You live within a short day's drive of the North American voodoo capital, New Orleans, you are surrounded by whooping and hollering preachers, both Black and... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Rio Bravo (1959): 2 of 4
A Mutual Admiration Society with guns: Howard Hawk's RIO BRAVO This might be called the siege of the jailhouse since the jailhouse-the whole town-is besieged after Sheriff Chance throws Joe Burdette into the slam for murder and his brother Nathan objects. Nathan is the local cattle baron and can hire all the guns he wants; C... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Once Upon a Time in America: 1 of 2
Noodles the Dreamer: Leone's ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA This film, made in 1984, is essentially a Victorian novel covering over fifty years in the lives of a group of people who both age and grow before your eyes. Not all of them, of course, grow in the same direction. Some of them dwindle, while one - Noodles, played by Ro... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Once Upon a Time in The West: 1 of 1
The Epic of the Warriors: Leone's Once Upon A Time In The West Everything takes time in this movie. The pace is practically geological; men move slowly, think slowly, gather slowly. There, in a huge landscape, their movements seem microscopic. Only the train moves swiftly. The train is all important, too, because after the p... More..
Entertainment > Movie Genres The best war movies: 4 of 6
They Were Expendable A fictionalized recounting of events in the Philippines from just before Pearl Harbor till shortly after McArthur's departure by PT boat. The PT boats are heart and soul here, since the lead, Robert Montgomery, plays lieutenant Brinkley (read Bulkeley) and the other navy officers, with John Wayne playing... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Inglourious Basterds: 10 of 14
The Boomerang War: Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds In this picture the entire leadership of the Third Reich is destroyed by buring movie film. A lot of burning movie film, you understand. But, then, courtesy the work of Leni Riefenstahl, you could argue that the Third Reich - at least its public manifestations - was the pro... More..
Entertainment > Movie Analysis Movie analysis: The Searchers: 3 of 4
THE SEARCHERS The moment when John Wayne, as Ethan Edwards, sick cookie supreme, rides his Comanche captive niece (Natalie Wood) down and then swings her high before cradling her in his arms - this when every indication has been that he, racist and psychotic, is going to kill her as he has been promising for most of the movi... More..
Entertainment > Movie Analysis Movie analysis: The theme of imbalance in Hitchcock's Vertigo: 3 of 3
The Logic of Dreams: Hitchcock's Vertigo Are we seeing a fevered dream here, or a set of facts? If facts, the facts are incredible. How do you, the killer, Gavin Elster, played by the ever-dapper Tom Helmore, an old friend of the hero, the acrophobic John Scotty Ferguson, played by James Stewart, set things up so precisely a... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Apocalypse Now Redux: 2 of 2
Up The Lazy River: Coppola's Apocalypse Now Redux This tale is suspended between two colonels: Kilgore (Robert Duvall) at the river's mouth and Kurtz (Marlon Brando) up in Cambodia, where the river curves out of sight into the jungle, both of them - or is it just one? - vastly insane. In between you have Captain Willard's (M... More..