Of all the places on the Internet where one can while away the hours, none captures WWP's fancy more than the Internet Movie Database, the artgoer's complete online guide to cinema that boasts nearly a half million titles and nearly 2 million registered users. IMDb traces is roots as far back as 1989 [practically the Stone Age for the Internet], when it began as a Usenet group devoted to "actresses with sexy eyes." IMDb changed skins a few times and expanded by bounds in the mid-90s; since 1999, it has been a part of the Amazon.com empire.
Hardly a day goes by when we're not checking a fact at IMDb's unrivaled collection of information, well-known and obscure, about movies, television shows and the artists who create them. [In fact, at times we drop in at IMDb more frequently than we do on blogs, but we digress...]
After taking in the film "Capote" on Monday last, a perusal of the database revealed a few factoids WWP hadn't learned or subtly forgot. Did you remember, for example, that the titular Truman Capote died at the home of Johnny Carson's ex-wife? Or that the 1967 version of "In Cold Blood" [creepily featuring actor Robert Blake as one of the murderers -- ponder that for a moment] was filmed partly at the original scene in western rural Kansas? Or that author Harper Lee -- whose lone literary output, "To Kill a Mockingbird," won the Pulitzer Prize, and who figures prominently in the making of Capote's seminal "nonfiction novel" -- is still alive at age 80, taking turns between homes in New York and Alabama? [She hasn't done an interview since the Merv Griffin Show in 1963.]
This is pretty intriguing stuff for those like WWP who are fans of the stage and screen. You might even say it's one of WWP's favorite things. And now comes word that there's a companion gay/metrosexual-minded website.
Oh, the Memories.
It's drier than IMDB in that it just reports numbers, but I've been having a good time lately at Box Office Mojo dot com, where there are stories hidden in the numbers. Brokeback Mountain was the most popular movie in the country last Tuesday-Wednesday-Thursday (the three days after the Golden Globes), and both Brokeback and Capote have already earned more in ticket sales than they cost to produce.
Thanks for the tidbit on Ms. Lee.
Posted by: Gary | Monday, January 23, 2006 at 09:08 AM
Here's hoping the success of both films means more of the same caliber to follow.
Posted by: Worldwide Pablo | Tuesday, January 24, 2006 at 07:07 PM