A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

© 2009 Windstar Productions and Eagle Rock Entertainment.  Cover photo © 1981, 2009 Stars and Stripes On October 13, 2009, Eagle Rock Entertainment (through its Eagle Vision distribution arm) released John Denver: Rocky Mountain High - Live in Japan, a DVD that presents a performance by singer-songwriter-actor John Denver recorded live at Tokyo's NHK Hall in May of 1981. Featuring a set of 18 songs that were, at the time, among Denver's "greatest hits," this 72-minutes-long presentation captures one of America's greatest performers at the apex of his musical career. It also gives viewers who were born after Denver's all-too-soon passing in 1997 a time machine into the past to see the then-37-year-old superstar charm his mostly-Japanese audience with his natural wit and gentle demeanor as well as with his musical gifts. (Note: The above video is from another Eagle Rock Entertainment concert DVD.) Filmed in 1981, this concert captures John Denver at t...

I took this photo of the man-made East Wind Lake during one of my daily walks around my former neighborhood in June of 2014. (Photo Credit: Alex Diaz-Granados - own work) Hello, Constant Reader, and welcome once again to Bloggin' On, the no-reviews, no-politics zone of A Certain Point of View where I talk about what I am up to and things that are on my mind. Think of it, if you will, as a blog-within-a-blog that lets you get to know me a little better. Right now it's past noon in my corner of Florida; the temperature outside is 75℉ (24℃) under partly sunny skies, which is comfortably nice for the season. The high temperature for the area is expected to reach 76℉ (24℃); the low tonight will be 56℉ (14℃), and no rain is expected to fall in our area, either. I had planned to write a review of John Denver: Rocky Mountain High - Live in Japan, but even though the DVD arrived yesterday afternoon, I have not watched it. When I went to bed last night, I promised myself tha...

Portrait of the Screenwriter As a Young Man, circa 1986. (Photo Credit: Peter C. Townsend) Hello, there, Constant Reader, and welcome once again to Bloggin' On, the blog-within-a-blog section of A Certain Point of View where I don't "do" reviews or the occasional bit of political commentary. It's Wednesday, January 22, 2020, although because it was a three-day weekend due to the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday, it feels oddly like it's Tuesday...and a spectacularly cold Tuesday at that. Right now (it's mid-morning as I write this) the temperature outside is 36℉ (3℃) under sunny skies, although the wind chill lowers the feels-like temperature to the freezing point. The temperature will rise a bit as the hours pass; the forecast calls for a high of 60℉ (16℃) and some cloudiness, but overall, by Florida standards, it's going to be  c-c-c-cold out there. Yesterday I got (via text) an update on our comedy film project from actor-director Juan Car...

© 2004 BMG Heritage/RCA Great songs never leave us, on a jet plane or otherwise. – David Wild, in "A Fan's Notes," John Denver: Definitive All-Time Greatest Hits On October 4, 2004, BMG Heritage and RCA released John Denver: Definitive All-Time Greatest Hits, a two-disc compilation that presents most of the late singer-songwriter John Denver's best-known and most popular hits (the sole exception being Grandma's Feather Bed ). Produced by Rob Santos and assembled by Gary Pacheco, Definitive All-Time Greatest Hits is a 24-track retrospective of Denver's storied career, including hits from his days as a star in the 1970s and the "twilight" years of the early to mid-1980s. Released to coincide with the 35th anniversary of Denver's first album for RCA Records ( Rhymes & Reasons, 1969), Definitive All-Time Greatest Hits presents 20 songs that were recorded between May of 1969 and April/May of 1983 on one disc, and four previously unreleased...

Great Voices Sing John Denver  (2013) Written and Directed by: Kenneth R. Shapiro Produced by: Elisa Justice, Milton Okun, Rosemary Okun, Peter Primont, Kenneth R. Shapiro, Mark Shimmel Music Arranged and Directed by: Lee Holdridge   Music and Lyrics: John Denver Starring: Danielle de Niesse, Placido Domingo, Placido Domingo Jr., Rodney Gilfry, Denyce Graves, Nathan Gunn, Thomas Hampson, Daniel Montenegro, Barbara Padilla, René Pape,  Matthew Polenzani, Patricia Racette, Shenyang, Stuart Skelton, Dolora Zajick On October 18, 2013, writer-director Kenneth Shapiro's Great Voices Sing John Denver, a 90-minute documentary about the making of the eponymous tribute album produced by Elisa Justice Holdridge, Milton Okun, and Rosemary Okun, which had been released in June of that year, was first screened. Featuring interviews with the Okuns, Justice Holdridge and her husband Lee Holdridge (who was the arranger and conductor for the musical performances),  Gre...

© 1975, 2001 Sony Legacy In February of 1975, RCA Records released An Evening with John Denver, a 2-LP "live and in concert" album recorded during several performances by the now-legendary singer/songwriter from Roswell, New Mexico, Henry John Deutschendorf, Jr., known professionally as John Denver. Recorded in the late summer and early fall of 1974 at the Universal Amphitheater in Los Angeles, this album was produced by the legendary Milt Okun, and featured backup by various gig musicians and an orchestra led by Lee Holdridge. Originally released on vinyl LP and cassette and in various countries (including Netherlands, Japan, and Spain) as well as in the United States, An Evening with John Denver was a significant recording for Denver, who was not quite 31 years old at the time yet was as popular as Frank Sinatra had been in the 1940s and 1950s. He'd started his studio recording career only a few years before under Okun's tutelage, and this was his first live r...

Screenshot from Movie Magic Screenwriter 6 with a page from A Simple Ad. (Photo Credit: Alex Diaz-Granados. ©2019 Alex Diaz-Granados) Hello and welcome once again to another edition of Bloggin' On , the blog-within-a-blog where I post stuff that doesn't fall under the reviews-or-political commentary content categories of A Certain Point of View. I'm glad to see that you're reading and I hope that you are enjoying my blog. Right now it's early evening in my corner of Florida; right now it's 66℉ (19℃) under cloudy skies. A line of thunderstorms and strong rain showers passed through the area earlier, so our outing to rewatch Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker was canceled and we stayed home instead. My Significant Other has been busy doing household chores while I - at her suggestion - took most of today off to, as she says, "sloth." Rainy days almost always sap the energy out of me, so I didn't argue and sat on the couch in the common room and...

"As I suspected, you're a rank sentimentalist." - Capt. Louis Renault to Rick Blaine, Casablanca Hello there, Constant Reader! Welcome to another edition of Odds and Ends, an occasional feature here in A Certain Point of View where I write about other things that aren't necessarily my usual Review of the Day fare. I was hoping I'd have that review of John Carpenter's 1983 adaptation of Stephen King's Christine, but I haven't gotten around to it this week. I received the Blu-ray via Amazon Prime and I've watched it once, but I think I'll have to watch it again at least one more time. I liked the movie well enough, even though 36 years have passed since I saw it in theaters back in Miami, Florida, but if I'm going to review it, I need to see it again, this time paying attention to the acting of the cast and the differences between the original novel by King and Bill Phillips' screenplay. Anyway, I've been feeling a bit senti...

Oh, God! (1977) Directed by: Carl Reiner Written by: Larry Gelbart, based on the novel by Avery Corman Starring: George Burns, John Denver, Teri Garr, Donald Pleasence, Paul Sorvino, David Ogden Stiers, Dinah Shore, Carl Reiner, Mario Machado, William Daniels, Titos Vandis, Barnard Hughes God: The last miracle I did was the 1969 Mets. Before that, I think you have to go back to the Red Sea. On October 7, 1977, Warner Bros. Pictures released director Carl Reiner's Oh, God!, a delightful and unexpectedly touching comedy starring George Burns as God and singer John Denver as a befuddled assistant supermarket manager chosen by the Almighty to deliver His message to a troubled, even skeptical humanity. Adapted by Larry Gelbart from Avery Corman's eponymous 1971 novel, Oh, God! is, as the late Roger Ebert wrote in his contemporary review, a " sly, civilized, quietly funny speculation on what might happen if God endeavored to present himself in the flesh yet once ...

On June 18, 1995, two years before his untimely death in a plane crash off the California coast, John Denver made a rare concert appearance on what was then cable's Arts & Entertainment channel (now A&E). Supported by both a string quartet and a group of backup vocalists and musicians, Denver performed over 25 of his best-loved songs and ballads, as well as a cover of Steve Gillette and Tom Campbell's Darcy Farrow, which Denver often performed at his live concerts and recorded at least three times during his recording career. This concert and the companion two-CD album released by Sony Legacy on June 13, 1995 were titled John Denver: The Wildlife Concert because they were intended to raise awareness of one of Denver's many causes: wildlife and natural habitat preservation. Profits from sales of the album went to the Wildlife Conservation Society, a New York City-based organization that seeks to preserve over two million square miles of wild places around the glo...

© 2007 Sony BMG/Legacy Records On February 27, 2007, Sony BMG's imprint Legacy released The Essential John Denver, a two-CD compilation album that rounds up 36 of the late singer/actor/songwriter John Denver's best-known songs. Like all of the albums in Sony's Essentials series, it contains all of Denver's "greatest hits," including Take Me Home, Country Roads (which is now one of West Virginia's four official state songs); Leaving on a Jet Plane; Sunshine on My Shoulders; Annie's Song; Rhymes and Reasons; Rocky Mountain High (Colorado's state song); Calypso; Thank God I'm a Country Boy; Goodbye Again; and Is it Love?  The Artist  John Denver (real name, Henry John Deustchendorf Jr.) was an "Air Force brat" who started his musical career in 1963 after dropping out of the Texas School of Engineering and entering the folk music scene in Los Angeles. He had learned how to sing in the Tucson (Arizona) Boys' Chorus while h...