Day 8: Almost Famous
Directed By: Cameron Crowe
Starring: Billy Crudup, Kate Hudson, & Fances McDormand (with appearance by Zooey Deschanel)
Released: 2000
Genre: Dramedy
Does it matter if I watched this movie on Netflix? I watched it with the (soon to be infamous) Justin S., host of this blog. I digress.
This movie captured me from the start. As a writer, I was drawn to the world that Almost Famous presents, a world where there is no red tape or barriers, just writing, the open road, and the 70s.
I recommend this movie to you. Even if you're not a writer or rock god, you'll like it. It's funny, heavy, carefree, and everything you want out of a movie. It's not cheesy Hollywood, either. ....seems too good to be true.
Too Good to Be True?
Then again, all movies are too good to be true (except for I Am Legend, maybe). Maybe 1973 was utopia, who knows? The Too Good to Be True (here on out TGBT) in this movie didn't bother me, and here's why:
1. The fully grown 15-year-old: William Miller is 15 years old, but he has the mannerisms and personality of a slightly immature CPA. He travels with Stillwater for weeks and experiences the crazy mayhem that is a cross country tour without breaking a sweat. Literally. There's not one scene in the movie where his heart rate tops 120. He is one cool cucumber. While the idea of a 15-year-old boy pretending to be older and getting hired by The Rolling Stone is improbable, so is William Miller, the most adjusted, mature, confused, non-adolescent adolescent ever. So it works.
1. The fully grown 15-year-old: William Miller is 15 years old, but he has the mannerisms and personality of a slightly immature CPA. He travels with Stillwater for weeks and experiences the crazy mayhem that is a cross country tour without breaking a sweat. Literally. There's not one scene in the movie where his heart rate tops 120. He is one cool cucumber. While the idea of a 15-year-old boy pretending to be older and getting hired by The Rolling Stone is improbable, so is William Miller, the most adjusted, mature, confused, non-adolescent adolescent ever. So it works.
15 years old, senior in
high school, journalist for
Rolling Stone, tour groupie?
....no pasa nada.
2. Pay Phone Heaven: William Miller's mother is one of those moms that forgets that the placenta got cut at birth. If she can't be attached to her son by the umbilical cord or "family whistle," she's attached by phone cord. She calls her son, like, 20 times in the movie for updates and whatnot. [Wait, you're saying, She let her son go on tour in 1973 with a rock band. Don't you think it's justified to be worried for her virgin, prude son?
Well, no.
If you're a protective mom, you're a protective mom. You make sure your kid's home before 11 on school nights, you watch TV with him to make sure he's not watching any of that nasty, unwholesome stuff, you pack his lunches and Sharpie his name on the outside of the brown bag. That's cool.
Accordingly, if you're a protective mom, you DON'T let your only son go on tour with a bunch of semi-alcoholic druggie musicians. Stands to reason. There is no 50/50 on this--either you're protective mom or you're slack mom. ]
Anyway. This movie is set in the dinosaur age before cell phones and Ipods and Dippin Dots. Yet William's mom manages to call him in EVERY CITY. She finds his hotel phones and concert venue payphones across the US. How the hell did THAT happen?
I will concede that this thread is necessary for the movie. Mom's constant nagging disbelief at how her son is throwing his life away balances William's perceptions about family and life and reality and whatnot. Without his needy mother, he'd probably forget that he had a stable house and his own bed.
Well, no.
If you're a protective mom, you're a protective mom. You make sure your kid's home before 11 on school nights, you watch TV with him to make sure he's not watching any of that nasty, unwholesome stuff, you pack his lunches and Sharpie his name on the outside of the brown bag. That's cool.
Accordingly, if you're a protective mom, you DON'T let your only son go on tour with a bunch of semi-alcoholic druggie musicians. Stands to reason. There is no 50/50 on this--either you're protective mom or you're slack mom. ]
Anyway. This movie is set in the dinosaur age before cell phones and Ipods and Dippin Dots. Yet William's mom manages to call him in EVERY CITY. She finds his hotel phones and concert venue payphones across the US. How the hell did THAT happen?
I will concede that this thread is necessary for the movie. Mom's constant nagging disbelief at how her son is throwing his life away balances William's perceptions about family and life and reality and whatnot. Without his needy mother, he'd probably forget that he had a stable house and his own bed.
Once upon a time, you had to pay to use a phone that didn't fit in the palm of your hand.
It didn't have Tetris installed, either.
Like I said, these are improbabilities, but they make the movie.
Now go watch the movie.
Now go watch the movie.