Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for December 20, 2014

I got it. But, I’m old and a movie fan. Alex Guiness was great.

me too!!!!

Googling: The next best thing to actually knowing things.

Pierre Boulle wrote Bridge on the River Kwai based on his own experiences as a forced laborer for the Japanese.

Boulle is most famous for another of his books, Planet of the Apes.

Who the heck is Alex Guiness? Some obscure actor in summer stock? Certainly not Sir Alec Guinness, academy award winning British star of the silver screen. Shame on all of you.

Madness.

One of those films that’s worth watching again periodically.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRHVMi3LxZE

That was one great movie.

Alec Guinness, dammit, NOT “Alex”!

Thank you June Moffatt; my thoughts exactly. But I don’t remember him in it either! Mind you, I haven’t seen it for 40 years.

What no pun,just a goggle ?

I actually got it without google. That’s it – I’m officially an old guy.

Sheesh! It appears only us old farts read comics :-)

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.That was a fun bridge scene also.

Can’t hear that tune without singing these words:

Comet – it makes your teeth turn green!;Comet – it tastes like Gasoline!;Comet – it makes you vomit;So buy some Comet, and vomit, today!

I got but I havevseen the movie,great reference for a change.

Yeah…I’ll admit to loving the movie as a kid, not having watched it for well over forty years, and even remembering the whistling tune before clicking on the link above. Robert Pope might be right, maybe it is only us old farts that read GoComics!

DAMN!!!!

Now I’ve got the Colonel Bogey March earworming me (and not the ‘clean’ version either….“Hitler has only got one ….”)

I got it.

I saw the movie AND read the book. And I can play Col. Bogey’s March on my accordion.

Got it, and loved the comment stream on this one. I will be whistling the tune all day again.

Kwai is ok, but I prefer the Big Island.

I get it, of course; it’s the newer pop culture references that I don’t get.And I get that when Pastis can’t think how to end a strip, he has one of the animals talking with him in the last panel.

Joining the old fart parade…

Like the Wild Bunch just crossed into Mexico. Like Tucco and Blondie want across the river. Like Bain took over Gotham. Like Arnold got hold of air to ground missiles again. Like the bomb within a bomb in The Lone Ranger.

I got it too. Alec Guinness well before he was Obi Wan Kenobi. Great reference Stehan.

Great! now that whistling tune is running through my head….

How old do you think the readers are Rat???

I am ‘old’. :( sigh. Peace.

I didn’t see the movie, but I read the book, so I didn’t get Rat’s joke, because in the book the bridge doesn’t get destroyed.

I read the comic and instantly heard the whistling!

Thanks a bunch, Mr.P. just when I thought that I finally got that whistling tune out of my head.

Oh come on, I got it, and I’m under 40! It’s called “having parents who don’t want to cook on weekends and prefer Chinese take-out and a video from BLockbuster.”

Alec Guinness? Oh, you mean Obi Wan Kenobi. LOLI remember the movie, just not the particulars.

Google this, MORE CROCS MORE CROCS MORE CROCS!

I got it,

In my senior year in high school. My English teacher would show movies if nothing was need to be done. Once he played the movie.

Does he know the hero dies blowing up the bridge?

Way to go Pastis, now I had to go and buy the song. (The Surf Dawgs’ version is groovy, but you can’t march to it.) Now I’ll be whistling the stoopid ear worm all day – not to mention marching to. Any other subliminal messages you’re trying to get across. (Oh, I guess if you told us they wouldn’t be subliminal, now would they.) — Kansas City photo.

I got it. Never saw it, tho. I don’t watch movies about wars.

I got it!! (but then, I’m older than dirt lol)

I got it!

Another old guy here. I saw the movie when it was new. But I haven’t thought about in (probably) decades. Nonetheless, I got it, without the help of Google [or, as it would be in my case, Startpage]. So, bite me, Cartoon-Boy!

No need for Google here either so goat hasn’t got a clue

nice reference to a classic!! I think I will watch that this weekend now!!

Hitler, has only got one ball,Goering, has two but very small,Himmler has something simmler,But poor old Goebbels has no balls at all.

Whistle Chorus:

Frankfurt has only one beer hall,Stuttgart, die München all on call,Munich, vee lift our tunich,To show vee ‘Cherman’ have no balls at all.

Whistle Chorus:

Hans Otto is very short, not tall,And blotto, for drinking Singhai and Skol.A ‘Cherman’, unlike Bruce Erwin,Because Hans Otto has no balls at all.

Whistle Chorus:

Hitler has only got one ball,The other is in the Albert Hall.His mother, the dirty bugger,Cut it off when Hitler was small.

Whistle Chorus:

[yes, there are variations:]

Sauron, he’s only got nine ringsThree are with the Elven Kings,Seven, in dwarvish heaven,And poor old Frodo’s got hold o’ The One.

Truly one of the great movie moments when Col Nicholson falls mortally wounded on to the detonator and the bridge collapses just as the train is crossing it. It was the original and archetypical “Oh My God, what have I done?” moment. Back in 1957, with memories of WW2 and Japanese POW atrocities still fresh in their minds, people jumped up and cheered out loud as the train fell into the river below.

I got it.

Very good movie, great finale.

This is not a particularly obscure reference.

Lol, I got it…does that mean I’m old?

Interesting story, MK. It could make a good movie script.

yes i dont get it

Looks like time for a remake. Every time reference to a great film brings a blank stare from a new generation, it’s time to remake it whether it needs it or not. Who from a newer generation is going to watch an “old” film? How could that be any good? So let’s put Brad and George in it to make it palatable, and do it again.

I got it!

Yup! It appears that only us old guys read comics. Far different then reading it in the daily newspaper. (the what?!?) At least we can now pick and choose which comics to read. Oh yeah, didn’t have to google it either.

You can always rely on Google!

Well, I can anyway.

xxx

It’s ALEC with a “c” and he’s great in everything he’s ever done.

“We call it the Dennis Miller factor.”

They don’t make movies that good any more.

I walked across the bridge on the river Kwai, only a few years ago.

whistling softly to myself -do do, do do do do do dodo do, do do do do do do etc.

Col. Bogey March is used to introduce the grand finale (“GARGANTUA”) at Thunder Over Louisville (fireworks) every year. Very fitting, actually.

I got it and I’m 21.

I got the reference but, then again, I’m 49. Still, it’s not like the comic referenced some lesser-known or cult favorite 50s war movie like “Attack!” or “Paths of Glory”. The movie won Best Picture and was one of the highest grossing films of the decade. It also still pops up fairly regularly on TCM and other cable channels.

Also, while Pierre Boulle wrote the book the film was based on and won an Oscar for the screenplay, the actual screenplay was by Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson. They had to give Boulle credit because Foreman and Wilson were blacklisted at the time.

I not only remembered the movie, I remembered how to spell “Alec Guinness!”

I didn’t see it until 2001-2002 when I was in college (again), but I did see it. Eventually.

what yah talkin bout Willis? You calling me old?!

The REAL Bridge on the River Kwai:

http://www.seat61.com/Bridge-on-the-River-Kwai.htm#.VJcg9l4AHA

All praise the Google!

I am not old yet but I know it from being in VFA-192 “SSHWFGD” Golden Dragons. Love the movie too.

I love the idea of an obscure punchline that the reader is expected to research.

Ah, I did… I understood that reference.

˙ʇnoqɐ ƃuıʞןɐʇ sı ǝɥ ʇɐɥʍ ǝnןɔ ou ǝʌɐɥ ı

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050212/

Suddenly I’m hearing the Colonel Bogey March.

Good one … I believe that was Bertrand Russel. Might isn’t always right

I Googled it, baby

Come on! I got that. I watched that movie at the age of what? 12? 13?Admittedly that was some 30 plus years ago, but let’s not get bogged down by pointless details…