Van Helsing and Mother's Day

Today, a special Mother's Day tribute. I wrote a week ago that Cinco Paul turned me on to movies--not entirely, though. When my brothers and I were young, my father was often away on business, my mom would--more than anything--take us to the movies. Sometimes it would be all of us to something PG (Rocky, The Bad News Bears). Sometimes she would leave my brothers with a babysitter and take me to something R: North Dallas Forty, . . . And Justice For All. Occasionally she would break down and take one or both of my younger brothers along with me to somethng R; most memorably, Saturday Night Fever, whose language she dismissed by saying, "Well, you know, they dolive in New York." (My mother, who grew up in New Jersey, was well acquainted with the notion that to say "F-- you" to someone before noon was to say, "Good morning," and to shout "Get the f--- out of here," was to express mild disagreement.)

So, as a special Mother's Day Tribute, I will take on the Van Helsing movie quiz from Jim Emerson's blog, with my best mom-guesses wherever I can.


1) What film made you angry, either while watching it or in thinking about it afterward? The Contender. I understand that Republicans will always get slammed in Hollywood, but their portrayal here was downright ghoulish. For my mom, The Silver Bears, a film she saw with my father and trashed to me the next morning, a film notable almost entirely as the film debut (and, leaving aside Leno-as-Leno portrayals, his more or less curtain call) of Jay Leno.

2) Favorite sidekick Me: Paul Reiser's Modell in Diner. Mom: Hmm. Have to think about that one.

3) One of your favorite movie lines Me: "What'd you do, place?" (Woody Allen in Love and Death, in reponse to a fellow soldier's saying "He was our village idiot.") Mom: "I'm majoring in Gavin." (Jessica Lange, Everyone's All-American).

4) William Holden or Burt Lancaster? Me: Burt, due to Atlantic City. Mom: William Holden, due to Picnic (see next).

5) Describe a perfect moment in a movie. Me: DeNiro and Pacino in the coffee shop in Heat. Mom: Holden and Novak's dance in Picnic.

6) Favorite John Ford movie Me: Liberty Valance. Mom: none.

7) The inverse of a question from the last quiz: What film artist (director, actor, screenwriter, whatever) has the least–deserved good reputation, artistically speaking. And who would you replace him/her with on that pedestal? Me: Oliver Stone should be replaced with . . . nobody. Mom: dunno.

8) Barbara Stanwyck or Ida Lupino? Double Indemnity, The Lady Eve--I'll say Stanwyck, and I'll bet Mom votes with me.

9) Showgirls-- yes or no? Harmless stuff, but I'll vote no. Don't even bother asking my mom.

10) Most exotic or otherwise unusual place in which you ever saw a movie I once saw Happy Together upstairs at Star Pizza. My mom went with her mom to see Butterfield 8 at Radio City Music Hall.

11) Favorite Robert Altman movie Me: Nashville, by a nose. My mom: I'm guessing The Player.

12) Best argument for allowing rock stars to participate in the making of movies Can't think of one for either of us.

13) Describe a transcendent moment in a film (a moment when you realized a film that just seemed routine or merely interesting before had become become something much more) The Rocky-Mickey reconciliation scene in Rocky. My mom always talks about Holden and Novak, so I'll leave that here, too.

14) Gina Gershon or Jennifer Tilly? Me: Gershon. My mom: I'm guessing Tilly, after Bullets Over Broadway.

15) Favorite Frank Capra movie For both of us, I'll say It's a Wonderful Life.

16) The scene you most wish you could have witnessed being filmed Me: Paul Newman's summation in The Verdict. My mom: I'm guessing here, but when the professor reads Redford's story in The Way We Were.

17) Robert Ryan or Richard Widmark? Me: Widmark, after he pushed the woman in the wheelchair down the stairs. Mom: she'll probably go Widmark, for his solid career.

18) Name a movie that inspired you to walk out before it was finished Me: Grand Prix. Went when I was fiove or six with my mother's mom (Nanny, we called her).I couldn't get into the drama and found the endless racing boring, and asked to leave, so we did. My mom: never heard tell.

19) Favorite political movie I, and probably my mom, would choose All The President's Men.

20) One-sheet you'd like to have Me: Swingers. Don't know about my mom.

21) Jeff Bridges or Jeff Goldblum? You're kidding, right? Bridges in a walk, from both of us.

22) Favorite Ken Russell movie Next question

23) Accepting the conventional wisdom that 1970-1975 marked a golden age of American filmmaking in which artistic ambition and popular acceptance were not mutually exclusive, what for you was this golden age’s high point? (Could be a movie, a trend, the emergence of a star, whatever) I'll say the two Godfather movies, and I think Mom agrees.

24) Grace Kelly or Ava Gardner? Me: Kelly. Mom: I'm thinking Kelly, not least for her work with Cary Grant.

25) With total disregard for whether it would ever actually be considered, even in this age of movie recycling, what film exists that you feel might actually warrant a sequel, or would produce a sequel you’d actually be interested in seeing? Me: Excellent question. First, LA Confidential deserves a sequel called White Jazz, another book by James Ellroy. Second, Coppola needs to make amends by directing Godfather Part IV, something along the lines of II, with Andy Garcia as Vincent and flashbacks to Michael Imperioli as young Sonny, with DeNiro as the middle-aged Don. I ran the second of these past my mom and she agrees.

Anyway: Happy Mother's Day, Mom, and go Sun Devils (save when they play the Trojans).