Too Good to Check

There are certain stories that are like the killer in a slasher movie - they just won't lie down and die, however often they are refuted (and I mean refuted, not rebutted). Mama Cass died choking on a ham sandwich, Walt Disney was cryogenically frozen. Not true and not true. Only a few days ago I told some people at dinner about how a drunk Clark Gable once drove into and killed a pedestrian in his car and how MGM got an employee to confess to the crime. (There's a particularly interesting article on snopes.com demonstrating the falsity of that particular myth.)

Back when I was a teenager, we used to whisper to each other: 'You know that sex scene in Don't Look Now, the really good one? It was actually real. Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland really did it.' It was so exciting. It was also, needless to say, untrue. Even back then Donald Sutherland was denying it in interviews. And now today, there is a report that the ex-editor of Variety, Peter Bart has written a book in which claims to have been present on set and witnessed them 'really doing it'. And poor Sutherland, 38 years after the event, is denying it again. It won't do any good.

Incidentally, in the report Simon Reynolds describes it as the 'infamous' scene. As I understand it, that means famous in a bad way. I think 'celebrated' or 'fondly recalled' or 'much enjoyed' would be more appropriate.