BROOKLYN @ 25

[XMASTIME NOTE] I moved to Brooklyn 25 years ago this past January; throughout the year I'll be noting things, no matter how small they are in reality, that I remember & associate with those first few days/weeks/months of living in the greatest city in the world.

Whenever my mind flashes to that first flush of my first few months in New York City, I think of exactly three movies I watched in the theater - 3 more than I've seen in a theater in almost every year since. Here's a few thoughts on each. Enjoy!

RUSHMORE

The soundtrack is a fully rich, wonderful character all to itself both in the songs themselves and how it plays throughout the entire movie. Which I think became a Wes Anderson "thing", particularly as he'd go on to learn "when in doubt, just throw in another amazing song by The Kinks".

The George Plimpton joint on PBS was wonderful, but it leaves me with one question: was he the real-life version of Max Fischer?

How much did Steve Carell base Michael Scott on Max, particularly the scene with Luke Wilson?

The one negative thing about the movie is that it seems to have been the launching pad for Bill Murray's now-signature hazy sleepwalk routine that's lasted a decade and a half now.

PRIMARY COLORS

Every time I see it, I swear to fucking christ that Travolta's acting job in that flick is one of these best I've ever seen. Cine-buffs will refute this, but it's true. Dude was dead-on the whole flick. I understand that it's a caricature of Bill Clinton, but he nailed it way past an A++; his details are amazing. And he has at least three hair-raising moments 1) the first scene 2) the Krispy Kreme scene 3) him singing Good Ole Boys Like Me.

I remember once flipping back and forth between Primary Colors and The War Room. Trippy to the point of wondering which one was real and which one was the farce.

I don't know why they couldn't get an American to play the Hillary Clinton role but I'm ALWAYS Team Emma Thompson, so 🤷‍♂️   🕺

NO LOOKING BACK

Nowhere near as funny as his first two films, which are both stone-cold classics, but still a really, really good movie with a typical Ed Burns cast & set in such a definitive time and place.

Say what you will about how crappy his music is - and I'm all here for it, people - but Bon Jovi was just dead-on fantastic in it, and it's a shame he didn't go on to more acting roles like this. It's not like he was playing some cinematic version of himself either, it was a real role and a real character and he killed it.

Again, the movie's very of it's time, just awash in that mid-late 90s warmth of hues & colors that seem so quaint today. Looking at the bar scenes today you're reminded "oh yeah, there was a time we'd all wander into our local bar and hopefully our friends were there and we'll just hang out."