My introduction to the Dixie Chicks came in 1998 with the band's release of "There's Your Trouble" from Wide Open Spaces. Before that time, I likely would not have paid any attention to them as I avoided their brand of music almost entirely (save for a few Garth Brooks hits). I generally considered country antithetical to what I saw as my more sophisticated and suburban pop music sensibility. I therefore thought country was out of touch with my reality and world perspective. Until the late 1990s, that is.
The times were a changin' during my sophomore and junior years at the University of Minnesota Duluth (thanks for the quote, Bob Dylan). Some of my close friends and roommates convinced me that my preconceptions of the genre lacked substantial justification, and soon I found myself in the midst of a country music baptism. Shania Twain initiated the mind-changing process with "Any Man of Mine" and "No One Needs to Know," which really sounded more like pop songs than down-home twangy ditties. Regardless, I thought maybe this stuff wasn't so terrible after all, and perhaps I'd been a little too quick to pass such harsh judgment on an entire genre of music. With a new and burgeoning appreciation for country music, I eagerly sought out popular recording artists like Trisha Yearwood, Deana Carter, Tim McGraw, Jo Dee Messina, Mindy McCready, and, of course and probably most of all, the Dixie Chicks. After I picked up Wide Open Spaces in 1998, it entered frequent rotation in my car and residence hall room CD players. I quickly learned each of the songs, and you could often find me singing along with the tracks from start to finish. When the Dixie Chicks' next album followed in 1999, I rushed out to purchase that CD, too. A little more edgy and confrontational, Fly sounded different from Wide Open Spaces but still largely fit into the country-pop genre and what I expected from a Dixie Chicks record. Then came Home. Even before the release of Home, the lead single, "Long Time Gone" enticed me. The song kept a thread of the group's signature country-pop sound but also teased another change. This further fueled my anticipation and excitement for Home, and I did not hesitate to add their 2002 album to my collection as soon as I could. Upon first listen, the evolution "Ready to Run" hinted at became clear--the band all but dropped their pop crossover status and traded it for more of a bluegrass sound. It was their most country-sounding album of the three I knew, and I loved it, I really loved it. More mature than the previous two albums, Home tackled the feelings of loss in the wake of September 11 while also exploring love and the promise of hope. It was both timely and timeless, a feat achieved by very few albums, and therefore established itself as one of my most favorite albums of all time. The fact the CD also holds "Truth No. 2," #11 on my Hot 101, only buoys my affinity for Home. I used to say I liked all kinds of music except country. In fact, you may have even heard me say as teenager that I hated country music. But like the Dixie Chicks, and thanks to them, I matured and no longer make such sweeping and disparaging comments about entire genres of music, especially considering I could not get enough of country for a brief period of time (and there are always exceptions to the rules). This transformation in my feelings for country music also helped to change my world view by encouraging me to open myself to new things more willingly. In fact, now when people say they hate any specific type of music, I raise my eyebrow ever so slightly, and whether or not it's warranted, I take those blanket statements as symbols of a person's unwillingness to try new things. Of course, we all have preferences in terms of what music we connect with the most--and there's nothing wrong with that--but closing ourselves off entirely from certain types of music, movies, books, and/or television shows effectively prevents us from growing as a person and developing a sense of empathy. So thank you, Dixie Chicks, for helping me become a better version of myself.
0 Comments
I love Pixar movies. The end.
In all seriousness, I could probably and justifiably start and end this post with only those two sentences to accompany the graphic above, but that would do little justice to the pantheon of Pixar features I adore so much. Stopping there would also fail to provide an explanation for why the post covers a collection of films rather than a single stand-out. When Toy Story debuted in theaters during the fall of 1995, I was still adjusting to my freshman year experience. Moving away from home and finding my way through those first few months at college helped nudge me further along my path of self discovery. While continually expanding my knowledge of the world around me and discovering more about myself, I also retained several core tenets of my identity that developed over the preceding 18 years. One of those essential attributes was my love for Disney movies, a truth I established early in posts about Bedknobs and Broomsticks and The Lion King. So, because previews for Toy Story advertised the film as a joint venture with Disney, I was initially excited, even if Pixar was a relatively unknown studio at the time. As Disney released more information about Toy Story, I will confess one thing had me a bit worried--Pixar's well-publicized breaking with the Disney Renaissance film convention of characters breaking into song, a convention I had grown accustomed to and loved dearly. I need not have worried. Pixar's groundbreaking first computer-animated film exceeded all expectations. Toy Story proved winsome, heartwarming, and beyond infinitely entertaining. (See what I did there?) With a single film, the studio's creative team effectively changed the landscape of animated motion pictures and established the medium as worthy of well-developed stories that appeal to adults on multiple levels and every bit as much as they engross children. With the subsequent releases of A Bug's Life, Toy Story 2, Monsters Inc, Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, Ratatouille, Wall-E, Up, and Toy Story 3, Pixar delivered a string of near-perfect and brilliant movies, raising the bar for live-action and animated films alike and setting ridiculously high expectations for themselves (perhaps unfairly). In fact, prior to the release of Cars 2 in 2011, each new contribution to Pixar's oeuvre either improved upon the achievements of its predecessors or further solidified the studio's foundation with pure and honest emotion, poignancy, imaginative storytelling, and beautiful animation. Originally, I planned on writing today's post strictly about my favorite Pixar film, Finding Nemo. But then I got to thinking, if I only focus on Finding Nemo, what happens to Toy Story 3? I decided, okay, I'll write about that instead. But wait. What about Up? Maybe I should pick Up. No--that leaves out A Bug's Life, and I can't leave out A Bug's Life! I'd be fired, courtesy of Tuck & Roll. I mustn't forget Inside Out, though, either. I loved that movie. And Wall-E. How could I write about a Pixar movie and not include Wall-E? Or Ratatouille? Or The Incredibles? My gosh, I almost forgot about The Incredibles! Not to mention Monsters Inc and Cars. Jeez. What was I thinking, picking just one of Pixar's films? Clearly, then, when I say Finding Nemo is my favorite, I mean that very loosely, and primarily only make the distinction because the summer when Brave came out, Bryce and I challenged each other to rank all of the Pixar films released at that time. Afterwards, we compared our lists. Turns out the exercise proved more difficult than it seemed at the outset. We both agreed on which two movies rounded out the bottom of the list--Cars 2 and Brave--but the remaining 11 movies were practically interchangeable, with mere minutiae separating them. And that was before Pixar added Inside Out and Finding Dory to their arsenal. Which, at the end of the day, is why I couldn't settle on just one of their outstanding offerings for today's post.
Preparing for my Countdown to 40 blogging adventure was a multi-step process. I brainstormed lists of movies, albums, books, video games, and television shows that included what I considered sure things along with likely contenders and long-shots. (I plan to share some of the cast-offs on an honorable mention list sometime near or shortly after the final post on March 12th.) One of the items I always knew would be the focus of a featured post is Michael Jackson’s Bad album, an album intricately woven into my developing taste for pop music in the late 1980s.
By the 6th grade, my family had relocated from suburban Saint Paul to the vast and sparsely populated prairies of west-central Minnesota. As I shared in my first post about Entertainment Weekly, I felt isolated from the cultured life I longed to live, regardless of whether or not that was justified or true. My feelings of remoteness stemmed from the 200-mile move, yes, but I also felt disconnected from my older sister, Missy. (She prefers Melissa these days, but to me she’ll always be Missy.) Ten years separated my sister and I in age, and I always looked up to her as one of my role models, which meant I wanted to spend time with and be like her as much as possible. I probably annoyed her when I was not yet ten and she was a teenager. I’d intrude on her time with her high school friends (and boyfriends) and talk with them on the telephone before getting Missy for them. For her part, she rarely seemed bothered by my brotherly antics, at least as far as I remember, and had nothing but patience with me, taking me under her wing in many ways. As a result, I often felt we shared a unique bond, one that followed me into adulthood, and on more occasions than I can count, it seemed as if we knew what the other was feeling and/or thinking. Throughout those developmentally important years, I picked up a lot from Missy, including her taste in music. The connection we made over artists, albums, and songs was one thing I treasured most about our relationship (and still do). Like so many others in the 1980s, one performer she loved was Michael Jackson. So, naturally, I did, too. A year or so after my parents moved my younger siblings and I to Alexandria, Missy called one day to invite me to see the King of Pop in concert. She wanted to take me to his Bad tour stop at the Met Center in Bloomington—perhaps as a birthday gift, the details escape me now—and because it provided me the opportunity to spend time alone with her and return to our old hometown, I felt more than excited. That we were going to see Michael Jackson perform live was tertiary. As the concert date approached, a little nervousness emerged alongside my constant excitement. How loud was it going to be? Would I like it? Not as familiar with Bad as with Thriller at the time, I wondered, would he sing any of his other music? My eleven-year-old mind started psyching itself out. But I persevered, and the big night finally arrived, and although many of the details surrounding that night escape me, several important memories stick out in my mind. My sister somehow managed to get us tickets for floor seats in the 17th row. I was eleven at the time and my growth spurt hadn’t really happened yet (I was short), so I needed to stand on my chair in order to see Michael Jackson over the heads of the people in front of us. Every time Missy told me to jump onto the chair, however, a security guard would walk by and order me down. Unfortunately, the constant to and fro between floor and chair is what I remember most about that night. I must have loved it though, because in short order I became obsessed with Michael Jackson. I memorized every lyric to every song on the Bad album. I got the Moonwalker VHS tape, which served as the visual accompaniment to Bad, and repeatedly watched it, the short film for “Smooth Criminal” being my favorite. I put on little lip sync shows, dressed in boots and the concert t-shirt Missy bought me. I even wanted to grow my hair long and curl it, just like Jackson. Clearly, the concert experience with my sister and the album played a large role in defining my cultural identity during those last years before becoming a teenager. Today I consider myself extremely lucky that the first person I ever saw in concert was Michael Jackson. It fueled my love not just for Jackson, but pop music in general—undoubtedly including the work of his sister, Janet. The concert also sparked a desire to see other performers live, which would eventually include the likes of Janet Jackson, Prince, Madonna, Fleetwood Mac, Garth Brooks, and Simon & Garfunkel. It also reinforced the bond between Missy and I, and I cherish that above all. Downfall first hit theaters in the United States during 2005, following its release abroad in 2004. Advertisements and previews touted the film as the first German-made film starring German actors to depict the final days of the Nazi regime from within Adolf Hitler's Berlin bunker. (A claim I later discovered ignores certain historical facts.) Largely based on the memoirs of one of Hitler's personal secretaries, Traudl Junge, and a book written by historian Joachim Fest, Downfall also promised to provide a rather intimate portrait of Hitler, dangerously bordering on sympathetic. My predilection for films dealing with World War 2 and Nazi Germany practically dictated I would see it. What I did not realize at the time was how influential Oliver Hirschbiegel's motion picture would become in just a few short years.
Watching Downfall for the first time, I immediately started questioning its presentation of Hitler as a man rather than a monster. Like you, I knew what history says about the author of Mein Kampf and man behind the Final Solution--he was a xenophobic demagogue who exploited fears, employed powerful propaganda, and utilized an armed paramilitary to coerce ordinary citizens to commit extraordinary crimes. So it should not surprise you that scenes hinting at Hitler's softer side made me rather uncomfortable, whether through his love for his dog, his romance with Eva Braun, his gentleness towards Junge, or his sadness at being abandoned by Albert Speer. Why? Because those scenes challenge the image of Hitler solely as a monster, and I wondered how someone responsible for the systematic extermination of so many millions of people could also possibly be the guy next door. When finding myself sympathizing with the character of Hitler on screen, even if only for a scene or two, I wondered if that meant I connected to Hitler on some level. And what does that mean? Could I be Hitler? Perhaps the filmmakers intended Downfall to pose such questions to audiences, a strong statement to be sure. Still, the exercise proved not all that pleasant and therefore resulted in an unsettled feeling, at least for a while. In the following months and years as the film's subject matter sank in more deeply, my perspective changed a little, and the thing that stood out to me most about Hirschbiegel's Downfall was not its presentation of Hitler as the man but rather its portrayal of Germans as victims of National Socialism. This theme of victimhood appeared perhaps most provocatively in one of the most disturbing scenes of the film. Frau Goebbels enters her children’s sleeping quarters, where they are reading a nighttime story. With the help of a doctor, she administers a sleeping draft to her six children, telling them it’s to help them stay healthy in the dampness of the bunker. Having successfully drugged all six children, Frau Goebbels then wishes them a good night’s sleep and leaves them in the darkness of their cement room. She returns to the sleeping children a short time later, and one by one Frau Goebbels inserts a cyanide pill into each child’s mouth, killing her own children because she cannot fathom they live in a world without National Socialism. I made several important observations because of this scene. By denying her children the chance to live in a Germany free of Hitler and the Nazi Party, Frau Goebbels chose ideology over life. The children, in a way, symbolized the German conscience, unable to combat the oppressive influence of the Nazi party, and the murder of the children therefore represented the killing of German innocence, in which fanatical Nazi leaders misled the German public. Narratives like this one piqued my interest and inspired a certain degree of historical inquiry. I wanted to know, how could Germans now claim victimization, especially considering those specifically persecuted by the regime? How accurately does the film portray the German wartime experience? What are the implications of placing German civilians among Hitler's victims? How do Downfall and several other post-2000 German films that depict Germans as victims fit into German society's larger, over-arching process of coming to terms with their Nazi past (ie. A Woman in Berlin and Sophie Scholl: The Final Days)? These questions about victimization in the postwar period eventually formed the base of my thesis research, which centers on the confluence of history and popular film as purveyors of cultural memory. And while I certainly recognized the problems posed by Downfall when I left the theater that day in 2005, I had no idea it would help lead me to graduate school and a Masters of Arts in History. Strictly speaking, the Academy Awards do not fit into the categories I set out to explore in my Countdown to 40 blog, not in the traditional sense anyway. About movies but not a movie, on television but not a series, they celebrate the year’s best movies in an annual ceremony telecast live, with celebrities and other members of the film industry parading their fashion hits and misses on the red carpet as they prepare to honor their peers’ work. Yes, the Academy Awards sometimes seem to exist for the sole purpose of stroking the egos of the rich and famous. Yes, they are self-indulgent and superfluous, often focusing on pageantry rather than substance. Yes, they often overlook many of the year’s most artful and boundary-pushing films and performances in favor of more mainstream, self-congratulatory pats on the back. But then they also get things right once in a while and open my eyes to many wonderful films I may not have encountered otherwise. On top of that, they serve as a yearly reason to gather family and friends together to bask in the glow of Hollywood’s stars. (Or is that the glow of the TV?) And I love every minute of it.
The first Oscars broadcast I recall experiencing aired in the spring of 1989 and honored films released in 1988. I sat on the sofa that evening, taking in all of the glitz, glamour, and glory. I watched the numerous clips of movies and performances in awe, many of which I was previously unfamiliar with. One in particular, Gorillas in the Mist, always comes to mind when thinking back on my inaugural Academy Awards telecast. The film earned five nominations, including one for Sigourney Weaver’s portrayal of naturalist Dian Fossey. The repeated mention of the movie compelled me to rent the video and more than likely shaped my preconceptions of what an award-caliber performance should look like. That the film and Weaver’s performance did not disappoint only solidified the Oscars as my most-trusted source of cinematic suggestions prior to Entertainment Weekly. Amid the pomp and circumstance of the show itself and the expansion of my film awareness, my preteen penchant for ranking a few of my favorite things went into overdrive. I mean, what are the Academy Awards if not an ultra-glamorous best-of list, where the nominees represent the runners-up to the recipients crowned the year’s greatest? To put it mildly, the Oscars cast a spell on me that spring, nurturing my love of movies and establishing the tradition of tuning into the ceremony every year thereafter. After that fateful spring night, my fondness for the Academy Awards only grew stronger. In the early 1990s, I created my own awards for movies modeled on the Oscars called the Golden Film Awards. Initially, I selected all of the nominees and winners myself, but over time I invited my friends and family to participate by voting for their favorites among nominations still provided by me. Once in college, the Academy Awards telecast truly became an event—especially after The English Patient, one of my favorite films that did not quite make the Countdown to 40 list, took home the night’s big prize in 1997 (for 1996). Each subsequent year, I challenged myself to see all the films nominated for Best Picture prior to the broadcast (haven’t achieved that goal yet) and check out several of the more obscure titles introduced to me during the show. (Achievement unlocked!) Somewhere along the road I started hosting Oscar parties. After all, there’s nothing like the Academy Awards to bring movie-lovers together. Over time the parties became more elaborate, adding rounds of Oscar-related trivia to the Predict the Winners game, complete with movie-themed prizes for attendees who score highest in each game. This year, we even booked a venue for the event, where the signature cocktail will be the Bourbon Streep in honor of the one and only Meryl. It’s no wonder I look forward to Oscar Sunday every year and often refer to it as my second favorite holiday after Christmas. When people ask what my favorite television show is, I do not hesitate to answer--it's The Wonder Years. It has been ever since I first started watching the show when it originally aired on TV in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
For those unfamiliar, The Wonder Years follows the coming-of-age story of Kevin Arnold as he maneuvers adolescence between 1968 and 1973, some of the most tumultuous and socially turbulent years in American history. Told through one long flashback, the adult Kevin narrates his memories of growing up during those years, recalling the most important events and feelings of his formative years. Throughout the process, Kevin falls in and out of love with his neighbor, Winnie Cooper, while relying on the support and of his best friend, Paul Pfeiffer. He struggles to establish his identity and assert himself within the framework of his post-war, suburban family life, often butting heads with his dad, Jack, and older brother, Wayne. His older sister, Karen, represented much of the social upheaval occurring at the time as she fell in with the hippie crowd, protested the Vietnam War, and generally challenged the constraints of the patriarchal society. I connected with the show on multiple levels. The Wonder Years spoke to my burgeoning interest in 20th century American history while also reflecting my own stage of development--I was approximately the same age as adolescent Kevin and aged right along with him. Despite the twenty year difference, many of my own coming-of-age experiences mirrored those he faced, and I wanted to be Kevin Arnold--I even had a little prepubescent crush on Winnie Cooper for a while. I often found gym class awkward and degrading, much the same as Kevin, and I knew how it felt to skirt the edges of junior and senior high school cliques, never really fitting into a certain one but not entirely outcast from any but the jocks. I also understood needing best friends to help navigate the awkwardness and tricky situations that define what it means to be a teenager. It's a funny thing, growing up and going through high school. I always considered those years as the most challenging, not really fitting in anywhere or knowing myself until I graduated and moved on to college. While much of that remains true and though I would not like to go back and relive my teenage years, I realize now more than ever (largely because of this Countdown to 40 project) so much of my sense of self formed during those years. And perhaps that's another reason why The Wonder Years has stuck with me all this time, for as the final lines of the series finale perfectly convey: "Growing up happens in a heartbeat. One day you're in diapers, the next day you're gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul. I remember a place, a town, a house, like a lot of houses. A yard like a lot of other yards. On a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is, after all these years, I still look back... with wonder." I declared my feelings for Disney movies earlier this month when ruminating over the live action-animated crossover musical, Bedknobs and Broomsticks, and if you asked me to describe those feelings in a single word, I would choose enamored. My process of discerning which of the studio's movies would earn full blog posts therefore proved difficult, especially considering Disney films accounted for approximately a dozen finalists for my Countdown to 40. While it pained me to cut many of them, Beauty and the Beast and The Hunchback of Notre Dame above all, four ultimately made their way onto the list, and of those four, I was most obsessed with The Lion King.
When I saw it in theaters for the first time, The Lion King amazed me like no other animated film had before. With its breath-taking animation (the opening sequence anyone?), heart-warming cast of characters, tragic death of Mufasa, triumphant return of Simba, hilarious one-liners, and unparalleled music, the 1994 African savanna fantasia epitomized everything I loved most about Disney movies. These qualities cemented what many consider the ultimate Disney Renaissance Film as not only one of my all-time favorites but as one of the greatest films ever made. Period. I was and am not alone in my adoration of the film. I mean, you've seen it and probably love it, just like other people of all ages who flocked to theaters to experience the magic of The Lion King. In fact, according to Box Office Mojo, it held the title as highest-grossing animated film for nearly an entire decade before Shrek 2 outsold it. More importantly, one of my best friends in high school, Debbie, was just as obsessed with The Lion King as I was. We saw the film repeatedly in the theater and countless additional times on VHS after purchasing our copies the day they went on sale (probably at Target), watching it so many times we knew the whole script by heart. (My friends in college teased me for how well I knew the film, noting how I would even sigh when the characters sighed.) We listened to the soundtrack incessantly, memorizing every song. We collected The Lion King trading cards, piecing together full sets of both series one and series two. We acquired stationary products, toys, and ornaments. We accumulated tie-in coloring books, too, and spent many a summer afternoon perfecting the right combination of Crayola crayons in our efforts to perfectly recreate the colors we saw on screen. We were all too happy and eager to spend the summer leading up to our senior year almost totally immersed in the world of The Lion King. And when something pervades so much of your life and becomes such an important part of a friendship, it truly helps to define an era and therefore my 17 year-old sense of identity. If I am being totally honest with you, Will & Grace almost didn't make my Countdown to 40 list. I initially thought it would be all too cliché to pick a show that very clearly spotlights members of the gay community, living in New York City no less. I figured people would read the post and think to themselves, "well, that was an obvious and easy choice." Except, settling on Will & Grace proved anything but obvious and easy for me, and until today, this post was set to focus on The Mary Tyler Moore Show.
As my good friend Erin can attest to, I waffled on which of the two television shows to write about as late as this afternoon and struggled to explain why The Mary Tyler Moore Show and not Will & Grace should be today's feature item. Yes, The Mary Tyler Moore Show was groundbreaking for centering on a single woman establishing a career as well as an identity independent of men, marriage, and children. Mary Tyler Moore's character of Mary Richards confronted several tricky topics in addition to gender roles, like abortion, sex, divorce, and homosexuality...during the 1970s. In so doing, the show truly challenged many of the social norms of the time and helped change the definition of what it meant to be a woman, all while setting a gold standard for television sitcoms. Quite revolutionary, if you ask me. When you think about it, Will & Grace followed much the same revolutionary trail blazed by The Mary Tyler Moore Show. At a time when more and more people were confronting and struggling with the reality of homosexuality, either their own or that of gay family and friends around them, Will & Grace featured two out men, one as a title character. This groundbreaking concept was made all the more groundbreaking by the show's portrayal of Will as a normal, down-to-earth, guy-next-door type. Through the complicated but entirely relatable (and often times hilarious) relationships between Will, his straight BFF Grace, his gay BFF Jack, and his drunk BFF Karen, the show helped to normalize homosexuality and gay people, thereby challenging society's stereotypes of what it meant to be gay. Neither Will nor Jack were creepy, perverted guys who lived on the fringes of society, mired in drugs and sex. Instead, they lived rather mundane lives, just like everyone else around them, trying to find the perfect balance between work, life, and relationships, with one another as well as their significant others. As a young man coming out, I very much needed Will & Grace and its humorous brand of normalizing the lives of gay people, for I felt alone during the early stages of accepting my own homosexuality. Of all the people in my life at that time, I knew no other members of the GLBTQ community and therefore had no one in my inner circles who really understood what I was going through or what was in store for me. I had my friends and family, of course, who surrounded me with nothing but love and acceptance, and I will be eternally thankful for that. (We all know the heart-breaking and horrible realities many people of all ages face after sharing the most beautiful and honest truth about themselves.) What Will & Grace helped offer me to supplement the love and support of family and friends was permission to accept my homosexuality as simply a part of who I was but not solely who I was. After all, I was still the same son. The same brother. The same friend. The same uncle. The same cousin. The same nephew. The same grandson. The same college graduate. The same Janet Jackson fan. The same lover of Christmas and snow. The same connoisseur of popcorn. The same Chris. Actually, acknowledging and accepting my homosexuality as just another part of myself made me a better, truer, stronger Chris. So, at the end of the day, my own life experiences and path of self-discovery connected more with Will & Grace than with The Mary Tyler Moore Show, no matter how much I love them both. We all have them, classic works of literature we were required to conquer for high school English classes, and yes, I do mean conquer. Trudging through most assigned readings proved daunting, primarily due to my general but waning indifference toward reading that carried over from my younger days. If you read my post about Shel Silverstein's Where the Sidewalk Ends, you know my relationship with reading developed slowly and could be defined as noncommital, at best. Completing the books and plays for class therefore demonstrated a rather impressive feat of accomplishment in my mind.
Many of the works I encountered during high school left striking memories for one reason or another. I will never forget the scenes of violence depicted in The Lord of the Flies. Likewise the dystopian future American society of Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451. Hiroshima conveyed the utter despair and complete destruction caused by the dropping of atomic bombs me and forced me to question the purpose of such weapons. The racism and incest detailed by Toni Morrison in The Bluest Eye further opened my eyes to inequality and injustice. None of those works stuck with me more than Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Disguised as a Mississippi River adventure, Twain's satirical take on the inane nature of America's attitudes towards race and class drew me in almost immediately and managed to hold my attention more than the other novels we had to read. Actually, I'm pretty sure The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was the only book I plowed through faster than we were supposed to despite not wanting to get too far ahead. I truly loved it, regardless of the fact I had to read it for class. I found the racism portrayed throughout the book appalling, both because of its staunch support in American society and the general apathy felt towards the slaves and their plight. It was also enlightening, for Twain's prose communicated more about racism and prejudice than history texts ever did or probably could. Sadly, we continue to confront the entrenched racism that plagues our society. Or, more accurately, we continue to avoid confronting the reality of the entrenched and institutionalized racism that plagues our society. Thus, the lessons of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn remain as important as ever in today's politically divided and seemingly intolerant society. If Huckleberry Finn, a stubborn white kid from rural Missouri concerned primarily with his own wellbeing over that of those around him, can look beyond Jim's status as defined by a deeply-prejudiced society, anyone can. After all, once he began to see Jim first and foremost as a person and not what society prescribed him to, Huck came to regard Jim as one of his only true friends. There seem to be two different kinds of people in this world, Star Trek fans and Star Wars fans. I always thought that demarcation quite silly and considered myself an equal opportunity supporter of both franchises. I anxiously await the release of new Star Wars and Star Trek films and have fond memories of both. I've thoroughly enjoyed sporadically joining Bryce throughout his years-long journey to experience all of the Star Trek films and television series, from the original 1960s series all the way up through Enterprise and the J. J. Abrams cinematic reboots. (Fun fact: While The Next Generation remains my favorite iteration of the Star Trek canon, Deep Space Nine proves a close second.) As I sat down to work on my Countdown to 40, though, I finally faced the actual (rather than alternative) fact: as much as I try to convince myself I fall definitively into the Star Trek camp every bit as much as I fall into the Star Wars camp, it's just not true. I connect more with the latter than the former, an admission I'm sure Bryce would argue was obvious from day one.
Now, I mean no disrespect towards Star Trek and the fans who adore it, Star Wars simply signifies so much more for me. As a child, A New Hope was the first movie I ever saw with my dad. Whether he realized it or not and whether I accepted or not, I often sought things over which the two of us could bond. I never was much of a sports guy, and though I wouldn't consider my dad a sports fanatic, he could usually be found taking in the weekly Vikings game with my mom and brother on Sunday afternoons. The older I got, the more I gravitated towards the arts and longed to connect with my dad through them. I knew very little about his taste in movies and music, however, since we rarely talked about what he liked. One thing I did learn over the years: my dad liked the original Star Wars films. I therefore took advantage of and loved every opportunity I had to experience them with him. That alone is reason enough to justify the inclusion of Star Wars on my Countdown to 40, but that would cut short the story of the saga's ongoing relationship to my life. In the late 1990s, George Lucas re-released all three films to theaters in anticipation for the debut of a new addition to the series, Episode I: The Phantom Menace. I learned then how a good friend of mine in college idolized Star Wars, and his enthusiasm for the sci-fi epic rejuvenated my own enthusiasm for A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and The Return of the Jedi. We made sure to catch each one in the theater on opening weekend, discussing in depth the lore surrounding the Star Wars universe afterwards and hazarding guesses as to where Lucas would be taking us with the forthcoming Episodes I, II, and III. By the time The Phantom Menace debuted in May of 1999, my rejuvenated enthusiasm had transformed into genuine excitement. As with any heightened sense of anticipation, I wanted to share my delight in the new films and could think of no one better to accomplish that than with than my niece, Brittani, and nephew, Jordan, who were 9 and 6 at the time. When the chance came to treat the two of them to seeing the film in the theater, I snapped it up. They both seemed to love the film, especially Jordan, and I happily spoiled them with repeated viewings of Episode I as well as the original trilogy. (Confession: The character of Jar-Jar Binks never bothered me as much as he did other people.) Today the Star Wars universe continues to expand, adding on three more episodes to the original series and tacking on several stand-alone films that focus on backstories and fill in the holes exhibited by the nine episodic movies. I will no doubt see them all, remembering all of the happiness, contentment, and fulfillment that accompany the rest of the Star Wars anthology. |
AUTHOR
I am a self-proclaimed pop culture geek and list enthusiast who is celebrating the big four-zero by counting down the most important, influential, and favorite music, movies, television shows, books, and video games of my life so far. Categories
All
Archives |