from Hitchcock's Notorious (1946). Filmsite.org notes:

The film is known for having at the time of its production 'the longest kiss in film history.' [Director Alfred Hitchcock circumvented the Hollywood code limiting a kiss to three seconds by interrupting the kiss every three seconds, but they never once break their embrace.]

Open thread below...

Welcome, ladies and germs, to the legendary C&L Blog Roundup and Comedy Club. Your emcee is Steven of The Opinion Mill, and he'll be here until Saturday -- or until Mike figures out how to block his e-mails. (Ba-dum, bish!) Be sure to send love and submissions his way at steve[dot]theopinionmill[at]gmail[dot]com, and don't forget to tip your waiter.

Whatever you do, don't talk to a Muslim on Ramadan or the Republicans will call you a traitor. Actually, they'll conduct a push-poll that suggests you're a traitor, then pretend the whole thing was a misunderstanding, but you know what I mean.

So far, Bush's War On Terror (he gets an auteur credit over the title) has been a rollercoaster of suspense -- kind of like an Alfred Hitchcock movie scored to the rumblings of Mike Chertoff's gut. We've had the arrests of the Shoeless Schmoes of Miami, the Jersey Pizza Jihadis and the JFK Jokers who were plotting to blow up an airport with a Bic lighter, but can your heart stand the knuckle-gnawing tension of the Salt Shakin' Seven? Cue shower music from Psycho!

Winger, can you spare a dime? They're scuffling for spare change at National Review Online.

Meanwhile, it's high time we stopped usijg the word "comedian" to describe the Pilonidal Cyst Poster Child. Whackity schmackity doo!

On a cultural note, here's another preview of Redacted, the movie about a 2006 atrocity in Iraq that will have the warwhores screeching and pulling their hair.

BOOK NOOK: David "Babbling" Brooks pretends to have read Jack Kerouac's novel On the Road on the occasion of its 50th anniversary; in response, David "Fafblog" Ehrenstein waxes nostalgic for the days when Brooks was sequestered behind the Times Select firewall. Stop the presses! The reviews are in! My Grandfather's Son, the new memoir by Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas, is a twisted mass of lies and distortions that demonstrate the winger justice has a can of worms for a mind and wouldn't know the truth if it left a pubic hair on his can of Coke. Other than that, though, it might be a fun read.

Don't forget to try the veal!

"Casablanca" named greatest movie script

Casablanca is one of my favorite movies of all time. If you have the DVD, they have a "making of" documentary included and what's amazing is that they were writing the script as they were filming. The cast was just as brilliant.(here's some cool facts about the film) I really don't have a problem with any of the top ten that "The Writers Guild of America" came up with. I do have issues with some of the other selections. I'm a big Hitchcock fan and although I like "North By Northwest," I'd take "Rear Window" or "Psycho" over it any day of the week.

Here's the full list.

I just watched "The Birds" again for the first time in a long while. It may not be his best, but still riveting. There was no actual music soundtrack. They used electronic effects to simulate the birds. Incredible cast that included a young Veronica Cartwright and Jessica Tandy. He does more with less dialogue than any director ever did. Donald Spoto wrote an excellent book called The Art of Alfred Hitchcock : Fifty Years of His Motion Pictures. For a cool approach to understand Hitch; view one of his films and then read the chapter that analyzes it.