#robert harling

[zanephillips]

SCOTT WOLF The Evening Star (1996) dir. Robert Harling

[fizzintine]

Steel Magnolias

directed by Herbert Ross

story by Robert Harling

starring Sally Field, Julia Roberts, Dolly Parton, Daryl Hannah, Shirley MacLaine, & Olympia Dukakis

[moratoirenoir]

[theoscarsproject]

Steel Magnolias (1989). A young beautician, newly arrived in a small Louisiana town, finds work at the local salon, where a small group of women share a close bond of friendship, and welcome her into the fold.

I feel like this is so woven into the pop culture lexicon, but weirdly I didn't actually really know what it was about? Anyway, I loved this weird movie. Sure, it's unfocused, sprawling, and picks and chooses which characters to add real depth to, but it just works for me. A lot of that is probably based on the strength of the cast (Sally Field and Shirley MaclLine in particular, the actresses you are!), but there's also just this throughline of big, messy, beating heart that gets me. 8/10.

[uwmspeccoll]

Milestone Monday, Part 1

On this day, October 18 in 1009, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem was completely destroyed by the Fatimid caliph Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, who leveled the Church's foundations to the bedrock. It would not be completely rebuilt until 1048.

The church had been built over the purported tomb of Jesus. The story is that the recently-converted Roman Emperor Constantine dispatched his Christian mother Helena (who was later proclaimed a saint) to Jerusalem to work with Bishop of Caesarea Eusebius and Bishop of Jerusalem Macarius to locate the tomb of Jesus. They discovered a tomb with three crosses, one of them presumed to be the True Cross of Jesus, and believed they had found what they were looking for. A shrine was built over the site ca, 326, and a church was later built and consecrated in 335.

To mark the date of the church’s destruction, we present illustrations by the noted English wood engraver Reynolds Stone for an edition of Evelyn Waugh’s meditation on the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, The Holy Places, published in London by the Queen Anne Press in an edition of 950 copies in 1952. Of the church’s 1009 destruction, Waugh writes:

In 1009 the Caliph Hakim, an Egyptian, tried to extirpate Christianity in his dominions. He was probably insane. He reversed his policy later but not before the Church of Modestus [the rebuilt Sepulchre church after a fire destroyed it in 614] had been demolished and the Sepulchre itself, which until then had preserved its original rock-hewn form, had lost roof and walls so that nothing now remains except the floor and the slab upon which Our Lord’s body lay.

The Holy Places was designed by Robert Harling with titling set in Eric Gill’s Perpetua and the text set in 14 pt Pilgrim, also by Eric Gill, and printed on Spicer mould-made Cream Wove paper.

View our other Milestone Monday posts.

[80smovies]

[anotherliteraryamericandream]

Miss Ouiser,

You’re just full of surprises! I’m so glad you let down that harsh exterior and have let yourself calm down. I’m glad Owen us by your side, for your tomatoes, and flowers, and Rhett’s sake’s too.

Miss Ouiser, I am proud that you have brought attention to your faith and no longer feel like you have to hide. I don’t know if that’s because of Owen or Shelby’s passing or just because God decided it to be so, but in any way--I’m still so happy. 

I would ask you to consider going to Camp Crossroads, but I’ll just pray that you keep praying. 

I know you can’t bear to hear Jack Jr. or Shelby cry and that might be because of who they remind you of, but Shelby wouldn’t want us to get mired down. And they’re babies--they do that.

I know you carry a lot of regret--maybe even shame--but there is no shame in praying to God because you don’t know what else to do.

                     I love you, Miss Ouiser!

                                         Love,

                                                Annelle

[mgmpluto]

Steel Magnolias (1989)