Talk:The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

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Eh... anyone else thing this article needs re-writing? If nothing else, that second paragraph seems to come out of the left field of an agenda. It's been ages since I've seen this movie though. Also, as a side note, I've heard that Thurber didn't like the movie, felt it made a mockery of his story. -Fuzzy 19:33, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)


Contents

[edit] Rewrite May 23, 2006

I realize some of the changes towards succintness and readability may be subjective, but I think these changes provide a much more coherant structure for the future edits of one of my favorite movies.

[edit] Notable Changes & Deletions

  1. synopis had a few things out of order (e.g. Walter leaving his fiacee) and injected POV (e.g. "Walter predictably ditches his fiancee")
  2. took out ta-pocketa-ta-pocketa-ta-pocketa. i agree the running gag should be mentioned, but it is not one of Kaye's patter-songs
  3. removed Antoine de Paris facts. these stray from the point of the article and belong in a dedicated article about Antoine himself
  4. the mention of lyrics having something to do with ridiculing gays doesn't make sense, especially the way it was written. of course, if you can find a source for it- be my guest to put it back in.
  5. the sentence, "The studio was more interested in making a financial success for Kaye's singing and comedic abilities, rather than what Thurber had intended." may be true but such an accusation needs a source!
  6. sectioned synopsis off from paragraph about Thurber's reaction and Anatole of Paris trivia

-User:Bantosh 16:45, 22 May 2006

[edit] Color versus B&W

moved discussion to Talk:The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1947 film)

[edit] Rather absurd reference to British crime fiction

Please see Talk:Anthony Berkeley Cox for a discussion. <KF> 17:03, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Film

This page most definitely needs to be split into a film page and a short story page. The Film portion takes up more space than the original story does RSido 02:55, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Considering the stature of this short story, the current article is extremely unbalanced - the story is barely mentioned except in connection with this unsourced Anthony Cox theory. As it stands now, the 1947 film gets most of the copy, followed by the remake, followed by the unsourced theory, with the short story, which should be the article's primary focus, running a distant fourth. I'm going to go ahead and spin off the 1947 film so that we can start fresh on covering the story itself. Okay? Okay! Karen | Talk | contribs 05:15, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] InfoBox

Hello. 1. Should we hyperlink James Thurber in the infobox within Wikipedia? 2. Should we make a 'See Also' section with one of the hyperlinks linking to Walter Mitty en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Mitty? Thanks. --Mayfare 00:22, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes, and yes. Done. Thanks for the suggestions! -- Karen | Talk | contribs 07:01, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Why omit a root ????

Obviously, the title of the story refers to an (if you allow) erotic novel by some "Walter" (supposed to be Hery Specer Ashbee, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Secret_Life) titled "My secret life" in which this "Walter", a victorian age gentleman, describes how he seduced numerous (1200?) young ladies. Maybe someone can add a clue how Thurber got to "Mitty". (Awaler (talk) 21:06, 26 April 2008 (UTC))

Considering that the construction "Secret Life of..." is extremely common (possibly inspired by this story), I think it's a bit of a stretch to make the claim that My Secret Life is the definite source of the Thurber title. I'm not saying you're wrong, but we would need a reliable source to make that connection, not just the confluence of the words Secret, Life and Walter.--Karen | Talk | contribs 07:45, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
Unfortunately, I am unable to give you a "reliable source" on this. The thing is not my invention, a (deceased) teacher mentioned it in my English class 40 years ago. On the other hand, we are talking about the author of "Is Sex Necessary ?". I see a parallel there. The title alludes to sex, but the text frustrates any pertinent expectations. --Awaler (talk) 23:45, 8 May 2008 (UTC)