Martin's shorts

I've been spending a lot of time with another man lately. He's mature, debonair and very Italian. He's an artist, passionate and yet he has a very dark streak which is revealed in his art. I want to run my fingers through his silver hair and tweak his beak of a nose under his pop-bottle glasses...

Actually, I've never met the guy, but I am a huge fan of the works of Martin Scorsese, and I recently enjoyed the lastest addition to his dossier, "The Departed." And when I say "enjoyed," what I really mean is that I was freaking crazy about it and had to discuss it, ad nauseum, for hours after we watched it.

It was so freaking good -- violent, Oh LORDY -- that I stopped it about half-way through to annouce to the hubby that THIS was a good movie!

I had a similar reaction the first time I saw "Goodfellas," which still ranks as one of my all-time favorites.

I also watched "Raging Bull" from start to finish this weekend as well. Not as good for me, but still memorable. It was during that film that it struck my why I like Scorsese so much, it's his view of relationships -- specifically how they eviscerate you.

Years ago I wrote a short story about a woman who has an affair, kills her lover and is sent to an insane assylum where she remains catatonic (yet narrates) through most of the story. The whole point of the story was that men that we love are one of the few things that can truly ruin a woman. There's something about that person -- the way they seep into your skin, how you can close your eyes and recall exactly how they taste -- that makes them lethal.

It's a concept I tried to convey, but I believe Martin has perfected time and time again, and that's what makes his movies so unbelievably compelling for me.

That and his mastery of the f-word. My lord, does that man know how to cuss!