When Harry met Sally,

They hated each other;

He acted the typical know-it-all man.

He said men and women

Who dated each other

Could never be friends without sex as the plan.

 

The next time they met

They were both still at odds,

Involved in relationships separate and sure.

The time after that,

They are mournful facades

Whose romance has sputtered and failed to endure.

 

At last they endeavor

To simply be friends

And talk to each other with humor and ease,

Supporting each other

Wherever life wends,

Upon a relationship’s changeable seas.

 

When sex enters in,

Their whole friendship’s in danger,

For petulant words are not backpedaled fast;

But Harry tells Sally

He never would change her

And realizes theirs is a love meant to last.

______________

 

Few movies can boast a screenplay in which nearly every line could be a best line. I consider Elizabethtown and Airplane! to be such films, but perhaps the best example is the immortal rom com When Harry Met Sally…. Born from the experiences and insights of Nora Ephron and director Rob Reiner, as well as the comedy of Billy Crystal, the entire film is essentially a treatise on dating in the ‘80s, which is surprisingly as entertaining now as it was when it earned a Best Original Screenplay Oscar nomination.

Quirk is not always easy to pull off. At times, it becomes uncomfortable or weird rather than endearing, and even when it tows the line, some realism is often lost amid the characters’ eccentricities. When Harry Met Sally… possesses the best balance I’ve seen between charming idiosyncrasy and realistic character development. Harry especially may be a caricature of smug male self-confidence, but who hasn’t encountered the “high maintenance” girl or a romance that didn’t necessarily start on the best of terms?

Meg Ryan is gorgeous as Sally, the kind of woman to request every meal just so. (I’ve been a cashier so I know those people are out there.) Ryan has, or had, a unique talent for amazing chemistry with her male co-stars: as great as she was with Tom Hanks (and to a lesser extent Dennis Quaid, Kevin Kline, and Hugh Jackman), her first memorable cinematic connection was with Billy Crystal. Crystal’s Harry is irresistible, he thinks, and manages to make spitting grape seeds hilarious. So much of the film’s humor relies on Crystal’s delivery (the “pepper in my paprikash” exchange, his depressed moaning in bed, his silly attempts at karaoke) that no one could have taken his place. Bruno Kirby and Carrie Fisher also fill strong supporting roles as the titular couple’s friends.

Famous scenes and lines abound, not least of which is the restaurant scene concluded by a laugh-out-loud one-liner from Rob Reiner’s own mother. Another interesting element is the brief true-story interviews with happily married couples throughout the film, who serve as the hopeful reminder of a relationship’s potential success and where Harry and Sally may and do end up.

While there’s some language and much frank sexual dialogue, When Harry Met Sally… is tame by today’s standards, and as lecherous as Harry is, the film does imply that sex can ruin a relationship just as much as deepen it. Harry’s speech at the end is one of the best cinematic professions of love, capping off an endlessly watchable standard for the genre.

Best lines (not the obvious): (Harry, leaving a voice message for Sally) “The fact that you’re not answering leads me to believe you’re either (a) not at home, (b) home but don’t want to talk to me, or (c) home, desperately want to talk to me, but trapped under something heavy. If it’s either (a) or (c), please call me back.”

 

(Sally, to Harry) “It’s amazing. You look like a normal person, but actually you are the angel of death.”

 

(Harry’s friend Jess) “You made a woman meow?”

 

VC’s best line: (Sally’s friend Marie, when told a fact she ignores) “You’re right, you’re right. I know you’re right.”

Rank: 57 out of 60

 

© 2014 S. G. Liput

262 Followers and Counting

Awful days come and awful days go,

But none quite compare with Drew’s big fiasco.

Spasmotica shoes were his golden brainchild,

Until they lost millions. On him was blame piled,

And soon the whole shoe-wearing planet will know.

 

Death’s seeming attractive until someone dies,

His dad from Kentucky, beloved and wise.

Drew heads to Elizabethtown, as he must,

And on the plane there minor facts are discussed

With Claire, the attendant who talks when she flies.

 

Drew’s own distant relatives warmly welcome,

Although they can’t handle which state he is from.

While waiting for requisite grief to sink in,

He phone-chats with Claire of what is and has been,

And into the morning their ramblings come.

 

While everyone copes in their personal way,

Drew bonds more with Claire when she chooses to stay,

Yet he is too haunted by failure, it seems,

To move past the shoe and to chase other dreams,

Like family and romance he should not delay.

 

An off-beat memorial honors Drew’s dad,

So they take the road trip the two never had.

With lessons, directions, and music from Claire,

He spreads his dad’s memory all the way there

And finds life’s surprises too great to stay sad.

________________

 

I first viewed Elizabethtown simply on the impulse to check out a movie most critics disliked, but I was pleasantly surprised that it instead became one of my favorites (so much so that my family visited the town on one of our road trips). A romantic comedy with some unusually dark overtones, Elizabethtown contains almost as much wit, heart, and romance as When Harry Met Sally…; in fact, I wouldn’t hesitate to call it the best rom com of the new millennium (so far).

Directed and written by Cameron Crowe, the film stars Orlando Bloom as depressed prodigal Drew Baylor and Kirsten Dunst as his garrulous romantic interest Claire. Bloom is at the top of his game, evoking a blend of sullen discomfort and awkward grief, like someone having such a bad week that he doesn’t know how to cope anymore. He doesn’t have any resentment toward his dad or the clichéd parental issues that he must resolve; instead, his father’s death serves as an opportunity to rekindle hope and conquer his own personal demons before they consume him. Another catalyst for this renewal is Dunst’s Claire, who was criticized for her superficial eccentricity and prompted the creation of the term “Manic Pixie Dream Girl.” While that stereotype pretty much sums her up, I fail to see why that’s a defect on the film’s part. She’s not nearly as pushy or insolent as Barbra Streisand in What’s Up, Doc?, and as angelic as she seems, her unrealistic outreaches never come off as contrived. It’s a movie; I’d like to believe that two people can fall in love over the phone!

Like When Harry Met Sally…, there are so many underrated scenes and lines that I find exceptionally classic: Drew’s insightful narration, his life-saving ringtone, his loss of direction trying to find town, the phone tag with three separate calls, his bizarrely emotional hallway exchange with Chuck the newlywed, the equally bizarre rendition of “Free Bird” at his dad’s memorial, his ramblings with Claire about the pronunciation of Louisville and “substitute people” and “the inimitable ‘them,’” and especially that epic educational video he shows his cousin’s out-of-control son. The many relatives he meets are the very definition of quirk (or perhaps the word is “whimsical”), including Paul Schneider as said cousin Jessie and famed Southern cook Paula Deen as Aunt Dora (in her only film role to date). Other great performances come from Susan Sarandon as Drew’s overwrought mother, Judy Greer as his ineffective sister, and Alec Baldwin as an unsympathetic shoe CEO.

One more reason to love Elizabethtown is the music. In addition to a folksy score by Cameron’s then-wife Nancy Wilson of the band Heart, it boasts one of my favorite soundtracks (which I had to buy), with tunes from Lindsey Buckingham, Elton John, Tom Petty, U2, and more, all of which complement each of their respective scenes (for example, “In the Name of Love” when Drew visits the motel where Martin Luther King, Jr., was shot). The result is a perfect example of editing and music placement.

Though the film yields to the cliché of romance inevitably leading to premarital sex and includes an unnecessary vulgar comedy sketch from Sarandon, the overall film is a beautiful and poignant reflection on success, failure, life, death, family, and the interplay among them all. The repeated symbolism of a bird on fire is subtly used to imply a crash-and-burn fiasco and perhaps a resurgent phoenix. Elizabethtown is a film for anyone who has ever lost a loved one, taken a nostalgic road trip, or met with defeat and risen again.

Best lines: (Ellen, Drew’s ex-girlfriend with a farewell line I’ve recycled myself) “Drew, it was real, and it was great, and it was really great.”

 

(Claire) “I’m impossible to forget, but I’m hard to remember.”

 

(Claire) “You want to be really great? Then have the courage to fail big and stick around. Make ’em wonder why you’re still smiling. That’s true greatness to me.”

 

VC’s best line: (Claire) “I will miss your lips and everything attached to them.”

 

Rank: 57 out of 60

 

© 2014 S. G. Liput

262 Followers and Counting