Movies and television featuring canoes

Purely fictional/oldie: River of no Return
Starring Marilyn Monroe, Robert Mitchum, and Rory Calhoun.
Bad guy runs off and leave Monroe, Michum, and his young son stranded on river in the middle of nowhere; Alaska if I remember correctly. Mitchum builds log raft to get downstream to civilization.
They encounter travails aplenty.

Enclosed photo was taken of Marilyn on a day off from filming the movie. Some fair action sequences of rafting, but certainly NOT a “barn burner” by any means…except for Marilyn!. I wouldn’t have kicked her out of my canoe(or anywhere else), for eating crackers.

Marilyn canoeist .

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That is a great picture!

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Going Off On Tangent Threads Midst the Knitted Curves

Those beaver tails push on through swells
before the platinum peaks.
And Norma Jean keeps memories keen
for us old coots’ canoeing freak.

But, being a canoe aficionado, the real (workable) question that comes to mind is, What’s up with that extra outwale gunnel strip? Looked through some wood canvas canoe images on Googs and I did not see one in the many images of Chestnuts, etc. Extra stiffener? Splash rail? The image’s lighter tonal variation on the underwale makes me think it was a later add-on to the upperwale.

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The Frank Church “River of No Return” is the Salmon River in Idaho and that is actually the location of the story line in the movie. Some filming was done on the Salmon but much was done in Alberta, Canada around Banff.

I noticed Marilyn is demonstrating very good torso rotation in that photo.

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And the thumb on top position of her control hand demonstrates that she is proudly displaying the “American stroke”, though she may be in Canada.

And may not she be chided
for no p-f-d,
for it helps keep afloat
these tossed thoughts in me,
that well-rounded hulls
though perhaps tad tippy,
can take on top-heavy loads
and still be a pleasure at see…er, at sea.

Okay, I’m an incorrigible ole coot, ladies. Someone’s gotta carry the candle for Jsaults and Fat Elmo (and Elton’s winded Marilyn) round here. Perhaps Bob’s gotta a pic of a shirtless Clark Gable, James Dean, Kirk Douglas, or even Adolphe Menjou, in a Chestnut Pal for the gals?

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In spite of her smile Marilyn has a death grip on that paddle.

The best and the inspiration for our Pukaskwa to Michipicoten trip.

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I regret to inform you, I can’t help you with guy’s photos. The only exception I can think of are vintage photos of Civil War soldiers, their weapons, uniforms, and accoutrements

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I think I was about 12 when my interest in women began. 3 of my first favorites were Natalie Wood, Bridget Bardot, and Marilyn Monroe. That interest has never wavered.

I still “love the ladies”; I’m too old to change.
BOB

From canoes instantly to rafts, to log rafts, to the Civil War and then …pin up girls.
I am starting to think that the internet has shrunk the average attention span of Americans to around 5-10 seconds.

A brand new human being, razor sharp, all firm and tan
All clean, all pure, with a 30 second attention span
As the clock strikes 12 and we’re ready for parlor games
You play blind man’s bluff, and I’ll play charades…

A man walks down the street
He says, “Why am I short of attention”?
Got a short little attention span…
And, why are my nights so long?
Where is my wife and family?
What if I die here?
Who’ll be my role model?
Now that my role model is gone,gone?

5 to 10 seconds, 5 to 10 minutes, 5 to10 hours, 5 to 10 months, 5-10 years, 5 to 10 decades, 5 to 10 centuries.
In the grand scheme of things; it don’t matter…
Nothing of major significance is happening here.
Move along, nothing to see here; stay on task.
The computers, and the cameras are on; the thought police are monitoring your behavior prole.
Buy products; that’s your function.
Not paying attention…

BOB

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Thanks to gitchellbob.

Well, you know what they occasionally say,
though I’m not sure what’s left is right?
If you paddle the stream of consciouness,
you’ll never paddle the same come its night.

Besides, if “they” were ever to capture my canoeing (real or fictional) onto some film (real or fictional), then I suppose Okkervil River would have it summed up best:

It’s just a bad movie where there’s no crying
Handing the keys to me in this Red Lion

Where the lock that you locked in the suite
Says there’s no prying
When the breath that you breathed in the street
Screams there’s no science
When you look how you looked then to me
Then I cease lying and fall into silence

It’s just a life story, so there’s no climax
No more new territory, so pull away the IMAX

In the slot that you sliced through the scene
There was no shyness
In the plot that you passed through your teeth
There was no pity

No fade in, film begins on a kid in the big city
And no cut to a costly parade, that’s for him only
No dissolve to a sliver of gray, that’s his new lady
Where she glows just like grain on the flickering pane
Of some great movie
Hey, I didn’t watch it

It’s just a house burning, but it’s not haunted
It was your heart hurting but not for too long, kid

In the socket you spin from with ease
There is no sticking
From the speakers your fake masterpiece
Comes serenely dribbling

And when the air 'round your chair fills with heat
That’s the flames licking
Beneath the clock on the clean mantelpiece
It’s got a calm clicking
Like a pro at his editing suite takes two weeks stitching
Up some bad movie

Or Life Is Not a Movie Or Maybe
Okkervil River

Oh, and thanks Bob for Natalie’s eyes dark,
Brigette’s like a doe,
it’s where eyes affixed might lock,
and memories fantastic go.
(Got any Rita’s or Ava’s?)
Nah, I was, in light of some previous posts wherein a few of the lady-posters commented about male-bastion threads, trying to give them some equal “poster” time. This ole coot’s still a ladies man, too, although my lady says it’s more of an innocuous incorrigible, in fact (or fiction).

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mucho thanks to canoeswithduckheads.
We have managed to bring out the bright and creative people on an otherwise dull thread.
I have been reciting Robert Service poems around campfires for almost 50 years. I have tried writing some poetry but it is usually bad. I have been attending the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering in Elko, NV since 1988.

Thanks and kudos to our local poets. I have enjoyed the vernacular canoeing poems of the North from people like Sig Olsen. My grandfather was from Ontario. He recited poetry in English from Quebec. “The snow she four feet wide, huh.”

In the same way that hijackers bring creativity to a commercial airliner’s flight path. Sorry to bring you down among the dullards.

I admire poets. I have nothing but the greatest respect for them although, like Ppine, it seems to be beyond me to write it. Thanks to CWDH.
Brings to mind a quote I stumbled on recently…
“English is weird. It can be understood through tough, thorough, thought, though.”
And I will never call TheBob Al.

Although the term “canoe” is used loosely here, the film “Cockleshell Heroes” had a sub-headline of “They called them canoe commandoes!”

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Alaska with Thora Birch had a good canoe scene and Horsefeathers with the Marx Brothers had a good canoe scene as well

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I was unaware of that film (“Cockleshell Heroes”) – will have to try to track it down. They used folding kayaks, wood frames with canvas hulls!

The one surviving Cockle Mark II tandem boat from the Operation Frankton raid (which was damaged in transit in the submarine and never deployed) was restored and is in the Combined Military Services Museum in Maldon, UK, northeast of London on the English Channel sea coast.

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Jeremiah Johnson had some good winter scenes and some running water.

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