MY MOVIE SHELF: Sleepless in Seattle

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 181  Days to go: 126

Movie #257:  Sleepless in Seattle

Nora Ephron could really pace a movie. Sleepless in Seattle comes in under two hours — one hour, forty-five minutes, to be exact — and yet it is as rich and as full a film as you could hope for. The lives of Sam (Tom Hanks) and his son Jonah (Ross Malinger) are just as lovingly developed as that of Annie (Meg Ryan), on the other side of the country. There aren’t thinly drawn characters, and there isn’t a haphazardly thrown together plot. No, it’s just that Ephron knew how to make a scene count, knew how to impart valuable character insights as efficiently as possible, and, basically, knew how to tell a great story.

Sleepless in Seattle is one of the great romantic comedies of the late twentieth century, it’s true, but that’s only partly because of the love story. The chemistry between Hanks and Ryan is palpable, even when they aren’t in any scenes together at all, which is why they starred in so many movies together. You feel the magical connection when Annie is listening to Sam on the radio. You feel Sam’s heart catch in his throat when he sees her in the airport and on the street. You become invested in these characters. But more than just the two of them, you care about and are invested in the people around them as well.

The friendship between Annie and Becky (Rosie O’Donnell) is as sincere and authentic a portrayal of female friendship as can be. They gossip together, they confide in each other, they poke fun but only with love, and they support each other without judgment. They are true and dear friends who share interests and feelings and desires, and it comes across that they’ve been friends for a long time and that they understand each other. That’s the kind of friendship that transcends romantic relationships, and it’s just portrayed so beautifully here.

Moreover, Sam’s sister Suzy (Rita Wilson) is a sheer and utter delight. Even though she only has one big scene, in describing the plot for An Affair to Remember, she makes such an impact. She’s silly and emotional and lovely and so very like so many friends I know who talk about their favorite love stories that way. Plus she takes the good-natured ribbing of Sam and her husband Greg (Victor Garber) with aplomb, so you just know she’s delightful to be around. How Rita Wilson didn’t star in a dozen blockbuster romantic comedies on her own is a complete mystery to me.

Another small matter that Sleepless in Seattle wins big with is the treatment of the children. Jonah, Sam’s son, is eight. He has a best friend named Jessica (Gaby Hoffman), and the two of them spend a lot of time together. In a way that is completely believable and true for their age, Jonah parrots a lot of what Jessica says, because she is far more knowledgeable about things like destiny and reincarnation and airlines, plus she has her own coded language. And Jonah is demanding and tactless and naive in all the ways young boys tend to be. Again, they aren’t featured a whole lot (Jessica far less than Jonah, of course), but the scenes they are in are hugely telling and insightful and not once do they seem forced the way a lot of child actors sometimes do.

The biggest success, however, is with Annie’s fiancé Walter (Bill Pullman), who is a lovely, if boring, man, who is never once painted as a brute or a flake or a bad match at all. On the contrary, he and Annie are very much alike, and they very much like each other. They have similar tastes and are incredibly compatible, but there just isn’t a spark between them. It’s really kind of a beautiful sentiment, in its way, that sometimes everything can look right on paper and there’s no reason in the world why it shouldn’t work, except that it just feels wrong. And Annie bears no ill-will against Walter. She has no desire to hurt him or mislead him. Indeed, she thinks he’s a great man. But she doesn’t feel magic with him. And he doesn’t want to be the guy someone settles for. It’s a sad ending for them, yes, but a completely believable and respectful one, and one that is ultimately for the best for both of them. (The movie does this to a lesser extent as well with the woman Sam briefly dates, but it’s Annie’s relationship with Walter that’s really examined in this way.) It was truly refreshing for a romantic comedy at this time to acknowledge that the person you’re with doesn’t have to be a villain to be the wrong person for you, and it’s a lesson that’s stuck with me through the years.

It’s really a great little film, with fully realized characters and a fully formed plot that is funny and charming and sweet in all the right places, with a touch of sadness to make it feel real. And it does all of that in a densely packed 105 minutes. That Nora Ephron sure could pace a movie.

MY MOVIE SHELF: A League of Their Own

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 209  Days to go: 210

Movie #168:  A League of Their Own

Hey, does anybody know if there’s any crying in baseball? No one’s ever said.

A League of Their Own, in case you were born yesterday or have lived in a cave the past twenty-two years, is the tale of Dottie Hinson (Geena Davis) remembering the year she played for the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. She has a competitive relationship with her kid sister Kit (Lori Petty), takes on a leadership role within her team, the Rockford Peaches, builds a grudging respect and collaboration with their drunken manager, Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks), and is seen as the best, most important and most dynamic player in the league.

I love stories about women and about their relationships, and this is a really well-told story. It’s the story of a women’s professional baseball league that is officially titled with “Girls” in the name and how it’s simultaneously freeing and objectifying. It’s about women lifting each other up and succeeding together. Some of these women have been put down all their lives, some of them have never learned to read, some are venturing out of their tiny little small-town existences for the first time, some are their families’ breadwinners, and all are finding camaraderie, companionship and a world of opportunity they never knew was there before. It’s such a refreshing change from lots of stories about women, that almost always involve a steep rivalry. Here the only real relationship rivalry is between Dottie and Kit (almost entirely on Kit’s side, since Dottie doesn’t know what Kit’s problem is half the time), and they’re sisters, so there’s more love than animosity, and always will be. If you focus on just the conflicts, you miss the part where Kit makes a plea to Dottie for her very well-being at the beginning of the film, begging for the chance to leave their hometown and to be someone, and Dottie gives it to her. You’d miss how supportive she is, how much she praises her. You’d miss how they come together at the end, mingling happy and sad over the result of the World Series, but with a love for each other that binds them together stronger than time or distance or even baseball can break. You’d also miss how they stick together in Fort Collins, Colorado, as Marla (Megan Cavanagh) is trying out for the scout Ernie Capadino (Jon Lovitz), and if you miss anything to do with the scout, you’ve done yourself a grievous wrong.

Ernie Capadino is the most perfect perfect perfect character in this film. He’s brash and cold and cuts to the chase, and literally almost every single line of his is hilarious. Whether he’s sarcastically cutting down the “milk maids,” as he calls them, and their naiveté, or offering to drum up a pistol for a man whose job is so boring Ernie would kill himself if he had it, or simply going home to “give the wife a little pickle tickle,” he’s fantastic. But the absolute best moment is when Marla lifts her head to show her face to him at, let’s say, not the most advantageous angle. He makes a face that is priceless in its shock and disgust, and it is my favorite face of all time.

There are parts of the film that feel clunky to me — the framing in the present, the silly earworm song about the league (even though it was the real song of the league, it’s still so oddly wedged into the film), and the casting of Madonna as a woman who liked to show off her bosoms named “All the Way” Mae Mordabito, to name a few. But so much of it is strong and moving (and funny), that the ill-fitting aspects are easily overlooked. Tom Hanks’s performance grows on me every time I watch it, always giving me a slightly greater glimpse at all the nuance he put into this role that initially struck me as just bluster. Yes, hitting Stillwell Angel (Justin Scheller) in the head with a glove is a perfect moment, but so is the time he wrestles away the telegram and solemnly delivers it to the player whose husband has just died in the war. (If you do not bawl your eyes out in that moment, even when you know it is coming, you’ve got a stronger constitution than I.)

One of the things that has always struck me about A League of Their Own, though, is the opening scene. A grandmother is preparing to go on a trip across the country to the induction of women (and the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League) into the Baseball Hall of Fame. She’s reluctant, but her daughter is insistent and as they are leaving, the woman’s two grandsons are playing basketball. To the older, she offers a reminder that his younger brother is still smaller, no matter what he does, so give him a chance to shoot. To the younger, she says, “Kill him.” I’ve thought about this so many times, how this woman’s relationship with her little sister growing up (because we will soon find that this is an older Dottie Hinson, played by Lynn Cartwright in these opening and closing scenes) frames how she treats and encourages her grandchildren. It’s something we all do to a certain extent, of course. Our experiences inform our perceptions. But I find it infinitely interesting all the same.

It’s as if Dottie feels regret toward her relationship with Kit, as if it’s somehow Dottie’s responsibility that Kit feels inferior to her. And yet, being that older, protective sibling, she’s going to feel responsible for her younger sister. It’s fascinating how cyclical these patterns are, and I honestly can’t tell you if I think Dottie is justified or not in her regret (not that anyone has to justify regret, but you know what I mean — does she have a reason, something she did, etc.). I might be the only person to focus in on that, but I come across it a lot — in how my experiences have shaped by behaviors, how my kids are shaped by their experiences, and how much of an excuse that gives us, if any, for the way we act going forward. It’s a puzzle.

I also like the funny parts, I’m not a monster. I like the decorum classes. I agree that “avoid the clap” is good advice. I like the idea of calling someone Betty Spaghetti, and if I knew anyone whose name rhymed with spaghetti, I’d be on it. I like Rosie O’Donnell as Doris, but I love her dad and her admirers just a little bit more. I love “singing to Nelson.” I love thanking God for “that waitress in South Bend.” I’m a fan of an uncomfortably long pee joke. I like Ann Cusack learning to read “grabbed her milky white breasts,” because, after all, it only matters that she’s reading. I like Garry Marshall as fictionalized candy pioneer and league owner Walter Harvey, who keeps his socializing short and sweet. I like David Strathairn as Ira Lowenstein, who, until Jimmy scratched his balls for an hour in the 5th inning, didn’t know if he was drunk or dead. I like dirt in the skirt and “accidentally” hitting jerks in the stands with baseballs. I even like seeing Tea Leoni playing for Racine. And heaven knows I love all those really well-done baseball montages.

However, with only four teams in the entire league? There are way too many games in a baseball season. I will die on this hill.