There's Gonna Be Some Heartache Tonight... R.I.P. Glenn Frey 1948-2016

If you can say that you wrote Desperado or Hotel California, well, you can pretty much do a mic drop when it comes to musical accomplishments in life.

That's where Glenn Frey and The Eagles belong, game-changers in the music industry.

If you've listened to just about any radio station since the 1970s, odds are good that you've heard their music. Pop music. Classic Rock. Even Country.

Eagles songs, or covers by other artists, are played on those stations every day.

And that's a nice comforting thing to hear on the radio.

Once upon a time I was asked who my favorite band of all-time was, and I answered The Eagles.

There were some snickering as typical answers are supposed to be The Beatles, The Stones, Led Zeppelin, The Who, blah blah blah

Apparently if you didn't start in the 60s, you aren't eligible to be a greatest of all-time.

Well, I disagree with that assessment. The Eagles were an amazing band, and after they broke up, they all went on to varying degrees of solo success.

I'm sure if we counted the hits from some of those bands to those of The Eagles, the tally would be closer than you might think at first glance.

Which brings us to the 80s, and I began listening to Top 40 music and was hearing classic Eagles songs while Don Henley and Glenn Frey were bringing their solo efforts to the airwaves.

With hits in Beverly Hills Cop and Miami Vice, Frey proved he was more than just the Garfunkel of the Don Henley/Glenn Frey collaboration.

Imagine the surprise when the Eagles reunited nearly 15 years later and buried their creative hatchets. Embarking on worldwide farewell tours that seemingly never ended, the guys sounded just as good decades removed from the 70s as they did in their prime.

And while they could have easily just played their greatest hits, Frey and Henley sat down and continued to write new Eagles songs.

Their last radio hit, Hole In The World, was their response to the terrorist attacks of 9/11.

It is as moving and beautiful of a song as the songs they had penned together decades earlier. 

And now with the passing of Glenn Frey, the music industry has lost another musical genius.

For the fans, we are left with a "hole in the world tonight..."

Farewell and Rest in Peace, Glenn. Thank you for all the musical memories.

I'm Glad Somebody Loved It..."Romancing The Stone"

Romancing The Stone (1984)

Rated PG-13 for language

Starring Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, Danny DeVito

Directed by Robert Zemeckis

The Story:

Joan Wilder (Turner) is a world-renowned romance novelist.  Her adventures thrill and delight audiences around the globe, and if the book can make Wilder cry, she knows she's got a hit on her hands.  When a mysterious map arrives, and her sister is kidnapped, Joan is thrust into living one of her own novels as she goes to Colombia to try and get her sister back.  It's there she runs into Jack Colton (Douglas), who embodies everything in a man that she writes about.  The duo decide to pursue the treasure on the map in the hopes of leverage to get her sister back alive.  Will her real-life adventure play out like her novels?

Another 80s classic for many, watched for the first time by yours truly.

Yep, true story!

Everything I needed to know about this film, I saw back in the day in Eddy Grant's "Romancing The Stone" music video.  So I never bothered to watch it.

So 30 years later,  Netflix offers it up for streaming, so I gave it a shot.

Meh.

:)

Again, especially with many of these 80s "classics", I find myself underwhelmed normally when I see them.  Now, plug in another fantastic movie from 1984, like Beverly Hills Cop or Ghostbusters, that I've seen over and over through the years...

Different story.

So I'm always caught in the conundrum:
Are these films not as good because I didn't see them at the time so I have fond memories?

Conversely, are my favorites from this time period only that great BECAUSE of the fond memories I have with them?

Philosophical dilemmas like this would give Socrates and Plato pause.

Now, what did Romancing the Stone bring to the table?

Robert Zemeckis directing his first feature since 1980's underrated Used Cars.  From the documentaries I've watched over the years, this seemed to be his sink or swim feature, and it led to him getting Back to the Future, so that's a plus.

Speaking of Back to the Future, when the movie opens, there is a bit of music that plays, and I swear it's from Back to the Future!  No surprise then to find Alan Silvestri the composer for this film.  Looking at his credits, this was his first real feature film break, and apparently like Spielberg and John Williams, Zemeckis and Silvestri are a dynamic duo in their own right.

As for Kathleen Turner, it kept her star rising, but it brought Michael Douglas back to cinema's forefront.  He had been floundering in a few flops previously, but this one put him back on the map, and he would go on to make some noteworthy films during the next decade.

So I'll give them credit, everything in the film was okay...

I wonder what my grade would be had this not been my first viewing?

Final Grade: C+

Rewatchability/Purchase Factor: I've gone 30 years between viewings, I think I can hold out that long again. ;)