Preston Sturges Knew a Scam When He Saw One

There's a new DVD boxed set of my favorite Hollywood (when it was still Hollywoodland) directors. You can read all about it, and about him, in Slate Magazine's article here .

Sturges was probably the most subversive and satirically adventurous director of his time, and time after time was able to slide amazingly subtle, but unmistakable, digs at a variety of cultural targets - including the film industry itself - past the dreaded Hays Office, the official government censors of the time.

I must admit that I've only seen four of the eight films from his most productive period, most recently The Lady Eve. Sometimes it can almost make me cry to see the high level of linguistic sophistication that was present in the best Hollywood films of the 30's and 40's.

So, Preston Sturges, scammed the Hays Office mightily, but most definitely not a scam for the viewer.

Why Scam World?

Why Scam World? Because, increasingly, everything is a scam. It's actually a rarity to find a person or business who'll just attempt to give you a fair deal anymore.

I won't only be writing about the various scams I find in my day-to-day life, but about other ways that we're being scammed.

The worst problem about the whole "culture of scamming," from Carl Rove to X-Box Live (or at least many of its members) is that the idea of cheating is becoming more and more accepted. It's almost as though it's not really cheating anymore, just a kind of accepted and expected behavior. Everybody spins, nobody lies. Everybody's playing Survivor, except the other participants haven't been informed and the island, or desert, or wherever, is a whole lot bigger.

As we go along I'll write about some specific scam-like behaviors and situations that piss me off, but today I'm just settting up the idea. I'll try not to be too curmudgeonly, geezerish, misanthropic, or to make too many lists like this one, ok?

So, welcome to Scam World, and I apologize in advance to and for my fellow humans.

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