Agreed - don't release them. It says something about us that the issue has even come up: nobody had to see photos of Hitler's body, did they? It was enough to know he was dead. Probably photos did circulate underground, where they should be.

I think it says something good about this administration, and about us as a country, that they won't release the images. The terrorists and their visual impacts of horror and violence have already coarsened us too much. We don't need to do it to ourselves. Eventually the live stream footage that everybody in situation room was allegedly watching in the famous photograph will make it to the Net and people who have a need to see it will find it. It doesn't need to be released officially.

That's a good point about a potential court case, too. As crazy as it is, such considerations have to be made; fortunately, though, in another case, the Spanish judge that was going to prosecute American soldiers based on an incident in Iraq got fired or something similar - maybe the world isn't totally completely crazy.

Let's start with an example. I'm working through Burns' "Baseball", and in the fourth episode, he mentions that the Yankees were the first to put numbers on their players' uniforms, so fans could recognize them better (apparently fans were too dumb to notice a difference between Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig on the field...not!). I waited for the explanation of how groundbreaking this was, that earlier players had refused to wear numbers on their uniforms, insisting that they were people, not numbers (the reason Ty Cobb's number wasn't retired is because he never had one, nor did he, or any ball player ever need one).

The significance of this numbering, for the first time in the long history of baseball, was never mentioned. It was just the story of where the uniform numbers came from...just an "of course" kind of thing.

And it occurred to me that Burns and many of his intended audience couldn't even see this concept that once was so strong in America; it's just outside their world view that we once refused to be numbered. And that's a problem when you're doing history. It's a problem of blindness.

And that is the problem with public funding of the arts: it makes blinders rather than opening up new vistas to artists. This is just the opposite of the point Burns makes in the article.

I don't care that Ken Burns is a liberal -- I care that he couldn't see something important about his topic because of the uniformity of the culture he is a part of, and that a masterpiece like "Baseball" therefore became less than it could have been (but it's still better than anything else I've ever seen about baseball, and would be even if Burns hadn't had public funding to rely on).

Public funding fosters uniformity in art as well as politics. Right now, only people who don't fit the profile can see that. We'll be well on our way back toward the high levels of our former greatness, in the arts as in other things, when NPR's demographic can once again see the truth in that, too. Liberals could, once upon a not too distant time. They can again, any time they really want to.

Yes, that picture surely is interesting -- it's the meanest one I've ever seen of Hope: the sharpness of the eyes, the teeth showing in what could be a snarl, the shadowing on the face to make it sinister. I suppose the "Filth" button is to show how judgmental he is or some such thing.

It only made sense to me when I compared it to the Obama "Hope" poster, which it parodies. Maybe this is way off base, but it seems both posters present facets of the Big Lie, or whatever today's left-wing propaganda is called now: Bob Hope=Mean. Barack Obama=Noble Intellectual.

It's an interesting study of propaganda techniques. There's just a wee bit of truth in each poster, enough to run with for the designer's own purposes (Hope came up, like most of his generation, in tough times, and his humor was so excellent precisely because it had *a little* bite to it; Obama is an intellectual, and also [dare I say it here?] an ordinary human being, with a touch of goodness to him, same as the rest of us).

Happened to watch him in "Northwest Passage" recently (thought it was only available on TCM reruns but it can be rented on iReel), and of all the performances I've seen Spencer Tracy give, his work in "Passage" is the best (and that's saying something). The bigger-than-life, blustery Major Rogers would have been a caricature in the hands of many actors (including some good ones), but Tracy turns him a complex human being. It's a performance well worth watching. Yes, back in the Golden Era, real men did cry...and then they got on with their job.

Also the human bridge across the river, including Tracy (first in and last out, a leadership point in different circumstances Mel Gibson emphasized in "We Were Soldiers"). Anyway, in "Passage," they actually did that stunt just as it was filmed! You wouldn't see many actors of any sort doing that today, let alone the star.

Pity that movie's sequel didn't pan out -- might have been pretty good.

Simon Pegg bowled me over with his performance as Scotty in "Star Trek" (2009). I'll watch this for that reason alone. The trailer is pretty interesting, too.

As for the question posted, @TyrannyHater, "if God created the most intelligent creature (man) in the universe in his own image, how do we explain Paul," that's easy: J. R. R. Tolkien explained it quite well in his "On Fairy-stories." Paul isn't real--he (it?) is a secondary creation of Man, who is acting like the primary Creator in whose image Man was formed, according to Christianity (am Theravadan Buddhist myself, just for reference).

That Paul himself poses the question, as well as the apparent inclusion of religion here, is interesting - wonder what the film's makers were doing with that (nothing much? addressing deep issues through a veneer of comedy?). Will watch for it in the movie.

That man could act, and I'm talking about "Suddenly" here: a riveting performance, one of the best I've ever seen from anyone. Also, he got Martin and Lewis talking to each other again. I understand he could also carry a tune and enjoyed parties....

My favorite tale about him may be apocryphal, but supposedly one night John Wayne was staying in the same hotel, on the floor above Sinatra. The noise got to him after a while, and he went downstairs. Sinatra was agreeable, but people being people, it got rowdy again and the Duke ended up downstairs again, not a happy camper. One of Sinatra's bodyguards stood up to him, and Wayne ended up breaking a non-breakaway chair over the man's head, not seriously injuring him, fortunately, but that was the end of the party for that night. Don't know if it's true or not, but you know, the world wasn't a bad place when it was big enough to hold the likes of Frank Sinatra, John Wayne and a few other men and women back in the day.

For such a tough business, there should be a special award for someone who can maintain a career like Michael Caine's, both for longevity and sturdiness. Not all the films he has been in have been major hits (think "Kidnapped," for example), but they've always been good films, worth the price of admission at least, and usually much more than that.

The man has worked a lot. Real life works a bit differently from Gotham, at least for him: "...you live long enough to become the classic film star."

In their prime, they were perfect...just perfect, especially in that incredible year for them, 1941. They made 36 films between 1940 and 1956 and raised lots of money in war bonds (Abbott had epilepsy and Costello, occasional bouts of rheumatic fever, so presumably that's why they weren't drafted). I think their brand of cerebral humor was even better than the Marx Brothers'.

But though they made us laugh, they should have paid their taxes. Then the memory wouldn't have that slight, and inescapable tarnish.

A postscript here, because no one else has mentioned this, but--seriously--"Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie." Just watched it tonight. It may not qualify among the greatest, considering the great movies out there, but I would include it as a great Christian film for kids today, and there are so few.

Other people's comments: I thought of "Gods and Generals," too, but decided against it even though that excellent and very underrated movie explores belief and faith of all sorts and in conflict, because the Christian part is explored really to illuminate the character of Thomas Jackson rather than Christianity. Now, "The Life of Brian" could be seriously considered, as it stays respectful of Jesus, but it is nowhere the top of the list of great Christian films.

Not in any order, except #1, which absolutely must be that version of "Ben-Hur." And a caveat: these aren't my selections of 25 favorites out of all the Christian movies I have watched--haven't seen some of them, and found it challenging to find 25 well-known Christian movies!! ** means it's going in the Netflix queue, if available.

1. Ben Hur (1959)

2. Ten Commandments (1956)

3. Jesus of Nazareth (1977)

4. Fireproof (2008)**

5. Elmer Gantry (1960) ?

6. Lilies of the Field (1963); for Homer's line "I'm a Baptist"--just so typically American, that.

7. Godspell (1973); actually, I'm basing this on the play, which was okay; didn't see the movie.

8. Jesus Christ Superstar (1973)

9. Song of Bernadette (1943)

10. The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)

11. The Bells of St. Mary's (1945)

12. The Passion of the Christ (2004)

13. The Cross and the Swtichblade (1970)

14. Rooster Cogburn (1975) - for Hepburn's performance, esp. when she stands up to Richard Jordan (and when she slips and takes a swig).

15. The Bible: In the Beginning (1966)

16. The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965)

17-??? A number of Christmas movies

18. The Visual Bible: The Gospel of John (2003)**

19. King of Kings (1961)

20. The Informer (1935): for the very last scene, in the church. Wow!

21. The Mission (1986)

22. Brother Sun, Sister Moon (1972)**

23. Letters to God (2010)**

24. Mary Mother of Jesus (1999)

25. Jonah: A VeggieTales Movie (2002)**