I’ve always been a fan of the movie City Slickers. It always seemed like a good attitude adjustment flick. After rewatching it recently after many years, I identified with it a lot less. Jack Palance plays the tough trail boss Curly who seems as if he’s chiseled from the sandstone canyons through which he drives his cattle. He tells Billy Crystal’s troubled yuppy Mitch that the secret to life is just “one thing” but you have to figure out what that one thing is for yourself. That’s not advice. That’s something a comedy writer ginned up to complete a character’s story arc. Why do I think the “one thing” gimmick is unhelpful? Because there are too gosh darn many things to pick from. At least that’s how I feel when it comes to my creative endeavors.
Hi, my name is Jim and I’m a generalist.
I’m fascinated by watching expert craftspeople do what they do. They are usually someone who has literally taken Curly’s advice and applied it to their work, honing their skills in one chosen area to razor sharpness. (Of course there are those few who manage to achieve greatness in many different endeavors, but I don’t want to talk about those people. Because I hate them.)
My problem is that when I see someone doing fascinating work, I want to try what they’re doing and there’s just not enough time to dabble in everything. When you wake up in the morning with ideas for several different sculptures, a few short stories, and a couple of screenplays you can do what a normal person would do: pick one and work on it; or you could do what the unorganized, neurotic creative does and make a tentative effort at one thing while feeling guilty for neglecting another, or become completely paralyzed altogether, ultimately exploding like the artificially intelligent bomb in John Carpenter’s movie Dark Star. (Pro-tip: don’t try to defuse an AI bomb by making it question its own existence.)
Anyway I am often jealous of specialists who seem not to be plagued by the distraction of whatever they’re NOT doing at any given time.
The complete version of the familiar saying tells us:
“A jack of all trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.”
On the other hand, Ron Swanson tells us:
“Never half ass two things. Whole ass one thing.”
Which is correct?
What I’m Watching
I recently watch a couple of horror flicks you may have missed. Both are good stories that give a different take on some familiar ground. Both are also flawed, one by a main character who is very hard to sympathize with and the other by an unnecessary and distracting use of CGI. I’ll let you decide which is which. Both are still worth a watch. The Night House (2020) is on HBOMax. The Russian film Stray (also known as Evil Boy) (2019) is on Amazon Prime.
The Turner Classics library at HBOMax has the 1959 biopic John Paul Jones with Robert Stack—with an appearance by Bette Davis as Catherine the Great. I for one didn’t know that she requested Jones’ help in straightening out the Russian navy. Also on HBOMax is The Long Voyage Home (1940) adapted for the screen from Eugene O’Neill’s Sea Plays, and featuring a young John Wayne and an ensemble cast as merchant seamen traversing the U-Boat infested Atlantic with a hold full of ammunition for the allies.