Have you read Ironweed, David? I have the sense that people who read the book first had a different reaction to the film than you did, and most of the people who lined up to watch the film were people who read the novel, which is why it fell flat on its release.

No, Tom, I haven't read it.

I know the movie flopped. I think it also suffered in comparison to Barfly which also came out that year to greater acclaim.

It probably helped to see it without the burden of expectations.

Here's a lovely, contemporaneous review of The Dead.

Here's the last paragraph of "The Dead":

A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, on the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely churchyard on the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.

I can almost recite the last sentence, but he loses me at "his soul swooned slowly." No, sorry.

I can almost recite the last sentence, but he loses me at "his soul swooned slowly." No, sorry.

It's definitely a chancy sentence that errs on the side of cheese. But I can forgive it as he was quite rapt in the rhythm there.

But it caught me short reading it too.

Purple prose alert! Purple prose alert! (Isn't there a whole thing about purple prose in Portrait of the Artist? "Madam, I never eat muscadel grapes" ?)

Oh, that's gorgeous.

I think I had to read both Ironweed and "The Dead" in high school. I barely remember them; I may not have made it very far in "The Dead," but I'd like to give it another try now.

Fantastic supporting cast too including a very young Nathan Lane, Margaret Whitton (best known as the evil team owner in Major League and the cheated on wife in Secret of My Success) and especially the actress who played Annie, the abandoned wife of Nicholson's character.

Don't forget Fred Gwynne!

Don't forget Fred Gwynne!

Who became good friends with Tom Waits, and one day said to him, "Tom, I've got a good title for a song but I can't do anything with it. See if you can write something for it. It's called 'Yesterday is Here.'"

Also Diane Venora and Michael O'Keefe.

RIP Blake Edwards. Condolences to Julie Andrews.