5: Man on the Moon

December, 1999

North Raleigh

with: Alison

Bless me, for I have sinned....


I actually said these words to a priest once.  Seriously, no kidding. Episcopalians get absolution in extra special cases,  I know this to be true.  You guys probably don't believe me, but I really do sit down and think, "What movie should I write about?"  It came to me. This is an extra special movie confession.  I am a sinner when it comes to movies.  You guys probably think I rented a naughty movie, or something obnoxious like that.

No...

I ....I......I.....

like Jim Carrey.

I decided I despised the man when I was flying home from a year in Sevilla, Spain.  I was forced to watch Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls on the flight back to the United States. I couldn't take it.  With the rhino birth scene, that man became a colossal waste of my time. So be it.

I grew up watching Taxi.  The girls next door liked it and they were cool girls.  But even at age six, I liked some of the other comedy lines better. Judd Hirsch and Marilu Henner were just as funny in a less obnoxious way. Maybe it was because my mom was a language teacher, but making fun of someone from another country didn't always appeal to me.   Even still, I was an American child growing up in the 80s, Thank you very much.

When the biopic about Andy Kauffman came out in 1999, I had already developed a cynical scorn for this Canadian comedian named Jim. But-I was offered a free ticket and a night at the movies. I was interested in it from a US pop culture perspective.  Let's do it!

I think when someone gets successful over one thing, it's hard to re-invent yourself doing something else. Andy really, really wanted to get rid of Latka. He did anything and everything he could not to have to thank anyone for anything again.  But that's the downside of it-Taxi got him love and attention. It's almost impossible to shake that kind of popularity.

Jim was able to shed his brand of comedy for Andy's.  AND I felt Andy's angst and pain of wanting to do one form of art but having to do another. BUT- it seems like one common theme among the talented is thinking you can't be replaced.  Anyone, anywhere can be replaced.  My blog may make someone spit their drink out, that doesn't mean I'm the only person making anyone aim for the floor instead of their laptop.

After that night at the movies, when I laughed over the wrestling matches and cried over the psychic surgeries in the Philippines that were not going to cure lung cancer, I left with a little more respect for Jim Carrey.  He had done it.  He had completely left himself and stepped into the Elvis costume of someone else.

Bravo.

What else could he do?

Then I saw the Truman Show. That was a movie with an NPR essay and a few years before reality television and the internet boom and no one had heard of Facebook or blogs.  I loved it-"Good afternoon, good evening, and good night!"  Who would have thought  we could film ourselves all day long if we wanted to?

Then I saw Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind-Um, no.  My mind is not spotless and it can't be.  Every time I wish I could forget something, I realize that to forget one thing would alter the memory of a hundred other little details that need to be held on to.  So no, I need one for the other.  Watching him realize that was awesome.

I just posted about Meryl Streep a few days ago-no children's movie has cracked me up the way Meryl and Jim did during their scenes in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events. I'm laughing about it now.  Jim also took the edge off a mean villain.  I loved his Count Olaf.

So now you know.  Now you know that in high school, I cried during Doing Time on Maple Drive.  He was the alcoholic older brother.  Now you know he was my favorite vampire teen movie star until I met Edward Cullen (Once Bitten with Lauren Hutton).  He was Wiploc in the camp classic Earth Girls are Easy.  Loved it!

So what if I despised Cable Guy, The Mask, and Dumb and Dumber?  He said a prayer for Simon Birch, and I said one for Owen Meany before I left the south for the north. Hatred for the slapstick genre doesn't mean I didn't learn a lot from Man on the Moon, especially don't share a popcorn bucket with someone who has the flu...

On Oprah, when he was promoting Bruce Almighty, which I didn't see,  Jim gave me the only weight loss advice that I think works.  He said something along the lines of,  "You have to sweat for an hour every day and you can't eat junk."  Yep.....that sums it up.

You know what Jim?  It's Lent.  It's time to come clean and look at myself and ignore the devil telling me you should only watch anything worthy of an essay on NPR.

Jim....keep...... keep up......well heck..... keep up the awesome!  You rock when you want to!

Am I absolved?

4: My Week with Marilyn

Madison art Cinema in MADISON, CT

December 4, 2011

With Maria

My grandfather has cracked me up twice in my lifetime.  The first was when he was looking through the newspaper in 1990 and said completely seriously, "Page (my grandmother, not me) and I were looking forward to the 2 Live Crew concert.  So disappointed it was canceled." 

The second time he cracked me up was about twelve years ago.  I never knew what to buy my grandparents because when you get to be a certain age, you have everything.  I was actually in a Walgreens when I saw classic movies in a sale  bin.  I grabbed Some Like it Hot along with a tin can of Altoids for their glove compartment.  On Christmas day, Grandmother opened the mints and Grandaddy had the video.  As the paper came off I heard the man shriek "MARILYN MONROE!" like the Braves had won the series.  Then he hid the video before anyone could take it from him.  I'm laughing now...

I had never seen a single one of Marilyn's films-Grace Kelly is my blonde of Hollywood legend. But that very next day, I went to my local video store and came home with a ukulele playing blonde.  It was cute.  More for the cross dressing musicians hiding from the bad guys than her, but still, it was a fun way to spend the 26th of December.

Last December, I went to my favorite town of Madison to see Michelle Williams in My Week with Marilyn. It was based on a memoir by film maker Colin Clark.  After university, his first job was with Laurence Olivier working on the set of The Prince and the Showgirl.  He had the opportunity to spend a week with the icon herself-Marilyn Monroe. To be honest, I only wanted to go because Emma Watson is in it too.

Young adults, ages 16-30, should be required to watch the opening scenes when Colin is trying to land the job.  He doesn't give up.  He goes above and beyond to work for Olivier. He sat in a waiting room for quite some time.  He did any menial task they offered him. There was no sense of entitlement or waiting around until it fell in his lap, he made it happen.  We seem to think everything should be given to us, but those scenes reminded me that more than a little work is involved in success.

Emma plays Lucy the wardrobe girl on the movie set.  She is the standard cute brunette that Colin likes and has a date with, but she's no Marilyn Monroe. At the end of the film, Lucy asks him if Marilyn broke his heart-he replied yes, and she said, "Good." I am convinced this is why I developed such a quick wit. The sexy blonde is going to always win the guy in the short run, and strong women walk away with a smirk.

 I have seen lots of biopics and made for television movies about Marilyn Monroe-but this one focused on one small part of quite a drama filled life.  Any little part of anyone's life is worthy of a story.  A chapter of a life doesn't have to last for a very long time to remember it forever and for an audience to find entertaining.


It's Oscar night, and I want Michelle to win the gold statue.  She was the Marilyn Monroe.  She nailed the voice and the silliness.  She handled the emotional outbursts and the flirtation.  She annoyed that poor man to the point that he didn't direct again until 1970.  As sick as that classic actress was, she had pure comic slapstick talent. Michelle did that too, and I don't think I'd ever seen her in a comedy before.


Dawson's Creek was my guilty pleasure those first years as a teacher-again, the blonde taking Dawson away from the brunette next door.  No matter-who ended up with Tom Cruise?  Michelle  didn't win for Brokeback Mountain or Blue Valentine.  Maybe this is her time...but then again, Marilyn never won either-she didn't get a nomination.

What matters?  Recognition for your work by professionals and critics, or love by fans for years and years to come?

You know what matters to me?  My serious grandfather busting out with a joke.

3: Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

Year:  1989
With: Random date
Where: Janus Theater,  Greensboro, North Carolina

There are a couple of memories that led up to finally going to see an Indiana Jones film in the movie theater.  The most vivid is a kid named James Durfel telling me every single disgusting scene that happened in the first two films. To this day I haven't seen either.  The first movie involved someone's face melting off and the second involved eating something but I don't remember what-except this kid on the bus felt a need to go into detail with me about it.  As much as I hate my bus memories, they are a rite of passage. I wouldn't give them up now for anything.

I only agreed to see the third one in the theater because I loved River Phoenix. I didn't get the gasps in the audience when he pulled the legless reptile off the other guy and said, "It's just a snake, don't worry about it."  Why did everyone bust out laughing? Well, it was quite the action packed film and I'm thrilled they found the Holy Grail-hey, that's perfect for Lent, isn't it?   But my personal River/Harrison combo is The Mosquito Coast. ( Sidebar:  Joaquin has surpassed the older brother and then some, but that's another post).

Anyway, it was a great night out, blah blah blah. I'm headed to high school and all grown up and hanging out at the Janus just like everyone else. Yay me-I only wish I had discovered the glory of hair gel back then. Oh the fun I didn't get to have.

Let's fast forward twenty (f$#@!) three years...

My six year old is obsessed with Indiana Jones.  He loves the action of it.  He wants to be that archeologist.  It's to the point where he can be dead asleep in his top bunk bed and I'll hear him bust out with the theme song in the middle of the night. There is just one problem with this-it's all about the whip.

My biggest fear is that I'll be in our cute little public library and he will come running through the aisles in a leather jacket with a whip.  Why bother picking out your library books when you can just catch them with a whip?  And the day this happens is going to be the day the best of the best absolutely perfect, size zero, her three children never misbehave, eat sugar, or wear their shoes on the wrong feet, mom is going to be there picking out third grade level reading books for her Kindergartner.  That will be the day I go hide in the life sized dollhouse and stay there until it is 80 degrees in February.

To avoid this from happening I ask myself this question-what is a mom to do with Indiana?  I hate to say it, but you need to embrace him-and take him to a different level.  We have been having a lot of fun with archeology.

First off, I made him watch this video.  He really got into it.  Go figure.

Second, for his birthday and Three Kings Day, he received several "dig" kits.  This is one of his favorites. He also got lessons in geology and paleontology out of these projects-but hey, digging, carefully brushing, and putting it all together is the same in all the sciences.  What is even better is that he was dead quiet and occupied for at least two hours each time, and it only took fifteen minutes to mop it up later!

Third-we busted out the Magic Tree House books in the library WITHOUT pulling them off the shelves with a whip.  The one about mummies and the one about the lost city of Pompeii are the best two for wannabe archeologists.


Who remembers the show Happy Days? Mrs. Cunningham was an archeology major.  Too bad Richie grew up before Indiana made it cool to love to dig in the dirt and grab what you find with a bull whip.

Last year when this obsession began, and he asked me if I had seen any of the movies.  I told him I had only seen the one with River Phoenix in it.  Then he wanted to know where that river was.

Well son, that river is up in heaven with James Dean and Heath Ledger-humming that catchy song by Billy Joel.

Now I am craving My Own Private Idaho....

2: The River Wild

Year: 1994
Place: Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
With:  Deanna, Phillip, and Binnie

Everyone: Think of your favorite Meryl Streep....you have five seconds...go....

Kramer vs. Kramer?
Death Becomes Her?
Music of the Heart?
The Devil Wears Prada?
Sophie's Choice?
A Cry in the Dark?

Damn...she is quite the actress. She has won two Oscars and nominated several times. I have a feeling they could film her blowing her nose and put it on youtube and it would get an Oscar nod.  I'm not kidding. I also like that she is an incredible mom to four grown children.  Meryl was just in Guilford filming at our little grocery store.  I didn't go try to catch a glimpse of the greatness-the thirty-somethings upstairs did though. Wait, I'm a thirty-something too....ugh.  Life and definitions get complicated.

The movie I'm thinking about tonight is The River Wild.   Meryl has played all kinds of roles, has she not?  A holocaust survivor, a music teacher, an incredibly tall and well loved chef.  In the early 90s, she decided to take on the hardships of being a mother and white water rafting guide-that happens to be fluent in ASL.

One of my college roommates was from Myrtle Beach. I pity people that don't have college roommates.  There is no other relationship that compares to that one.  The cool thing about that was, if she invited you to go "Home" with her, you were going to the beach!  Woo who!!!!

I went "home" with her a couple of times.  One time, her mother really wanted to see "The River Wild."

Unlike the little girl two doors down in 3rd-5th grade, Deanna and I were very in sync when it came to movies.  We liked the weird crap no one else would watch.  She called me the night she and her now husband went to see Lost in Translation and told me I had to go. When Pulp Fiction came out, we both forgave John Travolta for making Look Who's Talking.  Her mom wanted to take us to a nice dinner at the Olive Garden and then go see this movie.  We heard Italian Dinner and we heard Meryl Streep.  So we said, "Heck yes!"

I have to admit, while it wasn't The French Lieutenant's Woman, I was on the edge of my seat.  First off, Meryl had some freaking muscles.  Rowing crew is not a joke and I'm sure she had to work out for the role.  In between the bad guys and the rapids, she was using sign language to tell her little boy all would be fine.  That was pretty awesome.  Little did I know in 1994 that I would get pretty proficient in sign language around 2005.  Motherhood changes everything.  The film was an adrenaline rush and a chance to say that any Meryl Streep film could get you back to Kevin Bacon.  I'm glad Meryl made it.  The best of the best drama queens can make a thriller!  It was a good film and a good night with Deanna and her parents.

Dee's mom has been sick for a while now.  Tonight, I called to check on her and tell her how my kids were doing.  All she wanted to hear about was the time we took all four children, her grandson and my three, to the art museum.  When I had to go because I heard a crash, she said, "Thank you for calling me." and I said, "No, thank you for letting me and all those other crazy college girls come crash at the beach for free."  She had a really good laugh at that.

What I learned from Meryl Streep is that you can play, literally, many different roles. And no matter what role you are playing-if you are Out of Africa or a She-Devil, you need to remember who was with you for each one, and you need to take the time to say thank you for them.

1: The NeverEnding Story

Year: 1984
Theater: Friendly Center Greensboro, North Carolina
Who went?: Mom, Dad, Brother and Sister


There was a little girl my age two doors down. She had moved to North Carolina from Indiana and she only lived in NC for two years.  It was fun to have a girl my age in the neighborhood.  We had the 80s sticker books, we road our bikes to the park.  We hid from the boys playing soccer in the street. There was one glitch. From the moment I met her until the moment she left, she had opinions. Her opinions usually reflected those of her mother, and she was always right.

Catholic school was better.  Lindley Elementary was dirty and the education was horrible.  She knew this because when we played school she was always the teacher and I never knew the answers to the questions she picked out.  I was some kind of mad I had to go to public school after that.  I wanted a cute uniform.  That's not a bad idea now, a Catholic school uniform......


During the summers at the Green Valley pool, I had a black bathing suit and she had a pink one.  So immediately I was told, "little children should never wear black. It was completely inappropriate." I wanted to go home and get rid of all of it. 


Then one Saturday for fun, my family went to the movies.  I'll give it to us-we were a fantasy/science fiction loving family.  All five of us.  No, we didn't stay a nuclear family but I'm not going to pretend like we never were.  This is Lent reflection.  We went to see The NeverEnding Story.

I loved it very much and was very excited to tell my little BFF all about this wonderful gem of a film. She didn't respond the way I thought she should.  "We don't watch films like that. Why would some kid be riding some white thing through outer space? You can't breathe in outer space."

That did it.

Maybe she didn't get the wonder of escaping into a good book on a bad day like Bastian does to forget about the bullies.  Perhaps she had never been consumed by "The Nothing." Because trust me, even at age ten, I understood that nothing was far worse than anger, hate, or sadness.  It could be that she didn't have to keep wishing to make everything better and happy again-so that Atreyu would get his horse back.   But I did.

"If you don't like it, find someone else to boss around...." and I took my Cabbage Patch doll home to have a tea party with my sister.  It was never mentioned again. So much for NeverEnding.....


She left NC for CONNECTICUT two years later.  We kept our friendship going through college and I don't think we ever agreed on fantasy movies ever-although we both thoroughly enjoyed Four Weddings and a Funeral ten years later! I wish she could see me in Connecticut, it would crack her up.

I'm starting with this one because the point is, watch what you want to watch. If you liked it, that is all that mattered.  If a group of your buds are going off on how ridiculous they found a movie, either in the real world or the Facebook one-jump in and comment that you thought it rocked.  It's your opinion.  I don't go near anything with Meg Ryan.  I fell asleep during Get Shorty.  It's your time, memory, and money on the ticket.  Don't change your opinion for someone else.

My second  point-if you disagree, and you will every now and then because well, you will.  Try to do it without stirring a strong emotion in the other person, K?   K....

And just so everyone knows,  I don't let Frances wear black....

40 days of my life in film

I avoid Lent. 

This is my 7th grade self remembering what I was told about Lent:

Jesus went into the wilderness for forty days to fast and pray, so we do it too.  He didn't have fun, so we don't have fun. 

It's the forty days before Easter.  There are roughly twenty five days of Advent before Christmas but we need forty to get to Lent. The wait is much slower.  With Advent you add on and get psyched, with Lent you reflect and let go.

OK...maybe Lent is longer than Advent because you need more time to take a really good look at yourself?

I got my ashes tonight.  The last time I went to an Ash Wednesday service was 2004-I had one little baby I could hold through the service.  I really needed a new set of ashes.  I haven't washed the dust off my forehead yet tonight.  I still have the dust.

I'm not big on housework, but I like to dust. Dust is annoying.  You open the blinds or turn on the lights and there it is. You want to get rid of it.  It makes the place ugly.  Everyone is sneezing. Your high and mighty neat freak friends and neighbors are judging.  The goal is to get rid of the dust quickly, but this Ash Wednesday dust is supposed to be thought about for forty days.

So here is my "Lent Epiphany":

I need to take a really good look at myself.

There is only one angle to take on this-film.

I like movies and I always have.  I have lost and gained friends over films. I want to tell forty stories about my life with the help of 40 films. It isn't just the movie-it's who you were with and where you were in your life when you saw it. It's the coffee you drank afterwards.  Most happened in a movie theater, but I'll share on a couple of trips to the video store because 1) those stores don't quite exist anymore and 2) the incidents were pretty funny and typical Page situations.  I hope this works.  It does in my notebook.  Maybe you will remember seeing a film for the first time, or maybe you won't. Maybe you will cue something new on your Netflix account. Maybe you will skip over to someone else's blog.  Whatever.

Here is to growing, and reflecting, and starting a new life in Easter...

but to start a new life, you have to  dust off the old one!

The Valentine Scavenger Hunt

I don't normally create work for myself.  In fact, I go out of my way to avoid it. BUT-there is something about Valentine's Day that makes me want to work twice as hard. If the day is really supposed to be about love and friendship, we should put some effort into it.  That's just my feeling.

This year, my boys are in a public school in the morning and a private one in the afternoon. That meant not three but FIVE sets of Valentines for the parties.  Like I said, work created...

To top that off, I don't let them buy Valentines. We make them. We have always made them and we always will. The theme this year was supposed to be glitter...love those sparkles!

We made three sets of red and gold glittering Valentines and quite a mess in the process:

They came out cute, and are absolutely worth the glitter I am still sweeping up off the floor. 

However, I had one child that didn't want glitter cards.  We had this problem last year when he wanted a non-Valentine shoebox for school.  So, he came up with his own plan-and since it was for the Montessori Center, I followed the child.

What would you rather have?  A bug or a hug? That's a good question.  I was the one that insisted on the heart sticker, just to remind him of why he was passing out insects.

When the goal is not to create work, we try to get rid of all this Valentine stuff immediately.  I can only imagine how creative some moms get about tossing things out when their kids aren't looking.

I couldn't  just let them tear it all up for the pencils and trinkets and then wait until next Sunday night to take to the curb before my buddy Quincy comes to get the garbage while the boys watch in fascination.  Yes, I talk to my garbage man-I talk to everybody. Service is better that way....

 We had a "Valentine Scavenger Hunt." They each had to go to a corner of the family room and dump their Valentines out on the floor so they could see them:

Frances was ready!

Once they were ready, I called out something for them to look for in the cards and bring it to me.  We kept score of who had the item.  All three of them REALLY got into it!

Just a heart!

Cats!

 

 When we were done, I set the stopwatch to see how quickly they could put everything back in their Valentine boxes....2 minutes, 35 seconds!  THEN, I counted their tally marks and gave them candy for them. Yes, it was real Valentine candy.  Sometimes you need a little, but they earned it!

Right now the artwork wall is all love and hearts:

I'm going to miss all the pink and purple when the green and gold arrives in March!