The return of the summer of the middle-aged action hero

Movie stars are, for the most part, handsome men. Sometimes they're quirky handsome, sometimes they're offbeat handsome, sometimes their appeal is a strange alehemical mix of talent and personality, but all of them have IT. And IT does not fade with age.  Never mind that Shakespeare wrote:

And as with age his body uglier grows,
So his mind cankers.
The Tempest (4.1.213-4)

This summer we'll get Denzel Washington in an updated version of The Equalizer, Bruce Willis (almost unrecognizable in The Prince, where he plays a bad guy in the Ben Kingsley mode), Liam Neeson in the provocatively titled A Walk Among the Tombstones, and in the fall we'll get Peirce Brosnan in a movie that looks an awful lot like a reboot of The Mechanic.  And somewhere this summer is going to be the latest chapter of The Expendables, with Harrison Ford and young'un Wesley Snipes (he's only 52) along for the ride.

Seventy is the New Fifty

The Seventies aren't what they used to be. I don't mean the decade, I mean the age. Case in point. I saw Expendables 2 last weekend. The whole audience exploded when Chuck Norris showed up. He was the Chuck Norris he's always been--and he kicked ass. And he is ... 72 years old. (Stallone and SArnold are both 65.)
I just got back from the Neil Diamond concert in Anaheim. Two hours of beautiful noise without a break and three encores. The Honda Center was sold out. (Floor tickets were $400 a pop.) His voice isn't what it used to be, but he gives one hell of a show. He is 71.
Harrison Ford is 70.  So is Aretha Franklin. So is Stephen Hawking.
Journalist Charlayne Hunter-Gault and designer Betsy Johnson have both passed the big Seven Oh,
Judge Judy, Calvin Klein, and Garrison Keillor are all 70.
It doesn't surprise me that Sir Paul McCartney is 70 but ... Andy Summers of the Police? Monkee Michael Nesmith? Beach Boy Brian Wilson???
Where did the time go?
I was born on the trailing edge of the baby boomer generation and am facing down that first really scary birthday. I hope when I'm 70 I'll be a force to be reckoned with.
To Seventy and Beyond!!!