I think there is a certain joyful independence when you
discover a great film on your own.
It’s liberating in a way that is very nearly indescribable. Sure, as children we all had our
penchant for certain films. I’m
pretty sure that I would throw a tantrum before afternoon kindergarten if I
didn’t get to watch Cinderella.
EVERYDAY. Don’t get me started on
the horrific anti-feminist values in that story, but sometimes kids just like
what they like. (I was also
obsessed with a weird sci-fi movie called Mac
and Me, as well as Bedknobs and
Broomsticks and Her Alibi.) But
on some level, your parents are still choosing for you, based on what is
available to you (unless you have older siblings, and even then you are limited
by their tastes).
What’s my point?
I have a distinct time-capsule memory of my first meaningful film
discovery. I was very much
invested in a top 40 countdown on MTV (I think this was perhaps pre-VH1 being
avail on basic cable, as well as when MTV still aired music videos on a regular
basis…. This makes me sound so old).
I had my tape recorder ready to record some songs… tape player firmly
pressed against the 3x3” square grated speaker on the lower right hand corner
of the television - the huge cubic box that sat on our indoor sunporch (yes,
that totally existed). I had heard
the single “Til I Hear It From You” by the Gin Blossoms on the local radio
staion (WNCI, 97.9) and I was waiting to see the video and record the song (I
also really wanted to record Seal’s “Kiss from a Rose”). It was then that I realized that the
song I had been obsessed with was from a movie. I decided that I MUST SEE THAT MOVIE.
I couldn’t see it in the theater, because I was 10. And my mom would totally scoff. I had to wait. Fifth grade started and I didn’t
forget about it, I just filed it away. I kicked myself for not seeing Clueless. But mostly I was obsessed with Val
Kilmer and Batman Forever. And let us not forget Yikes! pencils
and pogs.
Later, during one of our trips to the video store (it was
INSIDE the grocery store), that I saw the movie and rented it. I think I watched it over and over
until we had to return it. It was
everything I had hoped it would be without knowing anything about it. I hadn’t seen a trailer, I couldn’t
google it because google hadn’t been invented. I fell in love.
I was convinced that I should work in a record store, wear plaid skirts
with combat boots, and marry Johnny Whitworth. I wanted to live inside that movie.
During the summer of 1996, HBO aired both Empire Records and Clueless. I recorded
both and watched them on repeat.
It was the greatest summer of my life. I remember being frustrated that I couldn’t find a decent
plaid mini skirt at my local Value
City (the irony of course is that I had been wearing my school uniform plaid
skirt to school, but it wasn’t the right kind of plaid skirt).
Later that fall, I was at the library and I saw Dazed and Confused on the shelf in the
video section. The stoned-smiley face (I didn’t know what being stoned was…)
that was on the cover of the VHS is something I had remembered seeing on the
cash register in Empire Records. I
thought it was a sign. I
watched. I was obsessed. I was 11. I’m pretty sure I kept renting it from the library and
taking it to sleepovers. No one
wanted to watch it. I think we
ended up putting it on in the background at Mary Patrick’s house and me and
Kelly Crupski were the only ones who watched. I was totally ahead of my time.
Now that you’ve read and understood the elaborate backstory
for how I discovered my first set of favorite films, you can be equipped for
the dissection I’m about to engage in…
Why do I like these films?
QUALITY: The film has a strong narrative, real characters,
decent pacing, and you care about how it ends.
Clueless:
It’s a good film. It has
strong characters, great writing, snappy dialogue, and a plot. Not to mention
Paul Rudd. It essentially birthed the modern-day hipster vernacular for better
or worse. The story holds up, but
the fashions, technology, and social interactions are dated. It is very much a time-capsule film. As much as I would like to argue that
it is an epic, timeless film, it is not.
It is based on Emma, which is
an epic, timeless story. Do I like
Clueless because it’s good, or
because it’s “cool”, or because I’m nostalgic for the era shown in the movie as
well as the time in which I saw it?
Empire
Records: As much as it pains me to admit it, Empire Records is a weak film. The characters are haphazardly
painted stereotypes that are never quite realized. They are gestures of characters. The plot is thin and cloudy – the employees of a dear
independent record store wish to save it from becoming an evil corporate
franchise. This is
complicated by the resident screw-up blowing 9K of the sales money in Atlantic
City. There are a lot of weird
subplots, like a faded rock star, a suicide attempt, a sign that’s always
broken, and employees who rarely work while at work. I want that job.
It is flawed, but it is a “slice of life” type of film, which I do like,
but I’m not sure that it actually works in this instance. I think that this film is my mac and
cheese – it’s always a good idea, it tastes great, but it lacks nutritional
substance. It definitely has
the “cool factor” as well as the nostalgia, but I don’t think that it is
necessarily a quality film. This
pains me very much. It’s like the
first time you realize that you parents are human. It’s kind of devastating.
Dazed
and Confused: It’s a decent film.
It suffers from too many characters that each lack development beyond
their high school stereotypes.
However, the plot is simple: the huge house party gets shut down, so the
kids must find another way to drink, smoke, and rock ‘n roll. There is a secondary plot (or maybe it
is the main plot?) that the quarterback of the football team doesn’t want to
sign an oath the team about remaining drug-free or something. It’s one of those moments when a film
about nothing suddenly wants to be about something. Maybe I’m completely misreading it. Considering the number of characters,
it does a decent job of making you understand who is who, but since the plot is
so thin, you would hope that it would expend some energy revealing who our
protagonists are. The pacing is
kind of strange and while there are some great, really quotable lines, it’s a
time capsule movie. It’s got the
“cool” and the nostalgia (for a time I didn’t even get to experience) and to a
certain extent, it has quality.
COOL FACTOR: The characters in the film are people you would
like to emulate or become. You
want to live and breathe in their world.
There is no real threat to you in this world, and life would seem
somewhat easy (it’s not as if you’re casting yourself in a horror movie…) There also has to be a killer soundtrack full of bands you most likely have never heard of, or unknown tracks from well-known artists.
Clueless:
you are living life through the most popular girl in high school in California,
often seen as the “promised land” with it’s attractive residents and perpetual
sunlight.
Empire
Records: you are experiencing a community of fun-loving alterna-cool youths
(I was never really sure how old they were. I know Corey and Gina just graduated from high school, but
AJ has his own apartment…?) who work at a really cool record store and despite
having “real” problems, are actually fairly well adjusted and attractive.
Dazed
and Confused: there are varying cliques and sub-sets, but they are all
cool. Even the freshmen portrayed
in the film are the coolest freshmen despite getting whipped by the
seniors. Any character in that
film is “cool” based solely on their involvement. That film focuses on “cool” and “fun,” so any character on
screen could be seen as “cool.”
NOSTALGIA: The yearning to experience a past time and/or
place. I think this can be defined
as a past time in which the film takes place, or a past time in which the viewer saw the film. The films will probably also have "before they were stars"-type appearances from then up-and-coming actors.
Clueless:
While I know that I am nostalgic for the 90’s, I am also nostalgic for my
youth and the development of self.
I often think back on the person I was and how I became the person I am
today. It’s perplexing to ponder
how much film and television and media have all played a major role in my
personal development. Clueless was a huge building block in who
I am today. I think I yearn for
both the era within the film as well as the period in which I was obsessed with
the movie.
Empire
Records: I think it has to be both, as with Clueless. I loved the 90’s with it’s strange sense of weird-cool
and the perfect day in the film.
The entire film takes place in a day and it is one day that I wouldn’t
mind re-living.
Dazed
and Confused: This is an interesting film because it makes me nostalgic for
a period of time that I did not actually live through. I was constantly being told that I was
born in the wrong time and this film cemented that fact. I knew in my heart that I was meant to
be a dirty hippie or a bellbottom-wearing disco diva in the 70s, so this film
completely allows me to inhabit those alternate realities. It also makes me wish I was young
again, bringing VHS tapes to sleepovers.
Are these movies to be considered “cult films”? Maybe. I can’t help but look back and think about how these films
apparently didn’t make much money at the box office, but now I can’t run into a
person who hasn’t seen these movies and enjoyed them. I’m sure it’s because they have now been aired on TV about a
bajillion times, but if they didn’t have some merit, wouldn’t most people have
just channel surfed past them? As if.
