Monday Musings: Movie Favorites!!

Last week, I wrote a Monday Musings post about my rock and roll favorites. I meant it as a diversion, something fun to write (and, I hope, to read) that had nothing to do with the pandemic or politics or any of the other stuff that makes the news so fraught right now.

This week, I thought I would take on my cinematic favorites in a variety of categories. Some of those categories are “serious.” Others, as you’ll see, are pretty goofy. I hope you enjoy reading them.

Again, as with last week, these are MY favorites, and are not in any way meant to be statements of what is “best.” This is meant to be fun. I’m not looking for arguments, though I welcome other opinions offered in the same spirit of amusement and sharing.

That said, and without further ado….

My Favorite Drama: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. This is a movie that can tick a lot of boxes. Some might call it a comedy – there are a lot of laughs here. Somehow, though, when both your heroes die at the end in a hail of bullets… well, not so much a comedy in my view. This is also my favorite Western of all time, and my favorite Buddy Movie of all time. Stars Robert Redford, Paul Newman, Katherine Ross. Directed by George Roy Hill.

My Favorite Comedy/RomCom: High Fidelity. Based on the novel of the same title by Nick Hornby. If you’re a music lover, you should see this movie. Wonderful. I know John Cusack is a bit of a wacko, but he’s great in this (he’s great in everything, actually). Stars John Cusack, Iben Hjejle, Jack Black, Joan Cusack. Directed by Stephen Frears.

My Favorite Oldie Drama: Casablanca. Yeah, not really going out on a limb here. But good lord, what a movie. Intrigue, forbidden romance, Nazis to hate, ex-Pat mysterious Americans to love. It’s got it all. Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Dooley Wilson, Claude Raines, Peter Lorre. Directed by Michael Curtiz.

My Favorite Oldie Comedy: Philadelphia Story. Charming love triangle farce with a stellar cast. Really a fun movie once you get by the upper crust, high society classism of the thing. Katharine Hepburn, Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Ruth Hussey. Directed by George Kukor.

Movie that Makes Me Cry. Every. Single. Time: Field of Dreams. It’s not just the Dad-son thing, though yeah, that turns me into a puddle. But also that moment when Moonlight Graham has to choose between baseball and being a doctor. Damn. Got something in my eye just writing about it…. Kevin Costner, Amy Madigan, James Earl Jones, Ray Liotta, Burt Lancaster. Directed by Phil Alden Robinson.

Movie I Can’t Help But Watch Every Time It’s On: Tie – The Godfather and The Godfather: Part II. Brilliant movie making, spectacular casts, utterly compelling. The first movie is probably the best adaptation of any novel ever. And the second is probably the best sequel ever made. Al Pacino, Marlon Brando (I), Robert DeNiro (II) James Caan (I), Diane Keaton, Robert Duvall, Talia Shire, John Cazale. Directed (both) by Francis Ford Coppola.

My Favorite Movie That Led Directly to My Favorite Television Show: The American President. Written by Aaron Sorkin, this is the movie that basically gave us The West Wing. Similar themes, similar quality, in a really delightful romantic comedy/political drama. Michael Douglas, Annette Bening, Martin Sheen, Michael J. Fox, Richard Dreyfus, Anna Devere Smith. Directed by Rob Reiner.

My Favorite Animated Movie: Monsters, Inc. As a dad, I have sat through my share of terrible movies and TV shows. I have also been treated to some wonderful movies from the folks at Pixar and Dreamworks. This one is so funny, so touching, so exciting. Voiced by Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi, Mary Gibbs, Jennifer Tilly, James Coburn, Rob Peterson. Directed by Pete Docter.

My Favorite SF Movie: Blade Runner. Let me say first (and I know this is not a widely shared opinion) that I LOVE the new J.J. Abrams Star Trek franchise. I think those movies are marvelous. And I love, love, love Guardians of the Galaxy. But this movie is so atmospheric, so thoughtful, and weird, and noir. Love it. Harrison Ford, Rutger Hauer, Sean Young, Daryl Hannah, Edward James Olmos. Directed by Ridley Scott.

My Favorite Fantasy Movie: Excalibur. Similar to the SF films. I love the LOTR films, and also several of the Harry Potters, but this treatment of the King Arthur legend is an underrated gem. Nigel Terry, Nicol Williamson, Helen Mirren, Cherie Lunghi, and a host of young future stars (Liam Neeson, Gabriel Byrne, Patrick Stewart). Directed by John Boorman.

My Favorite Caper Film: The Sting. Redford and Newman together again in a movie that won seven academy awards. The plot is complex, at times almost impossible to follow. But it is so, so good. Redford, Newman, Robert Shaw, Eileen Brennan.

Two Movies That Convinced Me Steven Spielberg is a Freaking Genius: On June 9, 1993, just in time for summer blockbuster season, Spielberg premiered Jurassic Park, which went on to become the highest grossing movie Hollywood had ever seen (to that point). Less than six months later, on November 30 of that same year, he premiered Schindler’s List, which went on to win seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. That combination of achievements in a single year is, I am certain, unequaled in cinematic history.

Best Movie I’ve Seen In the Last Six Months: Just Mercy. This was screened at the university here just before the pandemic, and followed by a lengthy community discussion. Fantastic, devastating film. Michael B. Jordan, Jamie Foxx, Brie Larson, O’Shea Jackson, Jr., Tim Blake Nelson, Rob Morgan. Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton.

My Favorite Actor: This is hard. Let’s go with a list – Pacino, Denzel, Redford, Bogie, James Earl Jones, Jimmy Stewart, Dustin Hoffman.

My Favorite Actress: Cate Blanchett, Katharine Hepburn, Zoë Saldana, Ingrid Bergman, Meryl Streep, Octavia Spencer, Emma Thompson.

Actor (and Role) Who Might Make Me Re-Think My Sexual Orientation: Robert Redford as Sundance in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. I mean, get real. He’s gorgeous.

Actress (and Role) Who Might Make Me Leave My Happy Home: Ingrid Bergman as Ilsa in Casablanca. She is luminous, strong but also vulnerable, and simply exquisite.

And there you go! Hope you enjoyed this. Have a great week!

Photo Friday: A Hike to Jackson Lake

As the pandemic progresses, the limitations placed on what we can and should do grow more stringent. Here in our little town, that has meant, most recently, a ban on parking at many of the more popular trailheads in and around campus. Too many people are coming from out of town to take advantage of the amazing physical surroundings of our university (the school is located on 13,000 acres atop the Cumberland Plateau) and they’re congregating in the parking areas. Hence the ban.

For those who live in town, this prohibition is not that big a deal. The town is small enough that they can walk to most of those trailheads from their homes. But for those of us who live too far outside of town for such a walk to be feasible, the challenge is greater. And so this week, after having already given up access to the gym, and while still desperate for ways to stay active, I have lost access to some of my favorite hikes.

In the end, though, this turned out to be a boon. Two days ago, faced with this newest limitation, I finally tried a hike near our home that I had been putting off literally for years. I don’t know why I avoided it. Lots of people told me it was a great walk, but I had my favorites, and I am nothing if not a creature of habit. Now, without other choices, I was forced to try this hike.

It was magnificent. The roundtrip was about five and half miles, and it took me to a couple of great spots, chief among them a pair of lakes. One of the lakes, photographed here, is about a mile and a half from our house. It is overgrown and picturesque and stunningly beautiful, even with spring foliage just beginning to emerge. When I arrived there, I flushed a pair of Wood Ducks. Newly arrived warblers and vireos sang from hidden perches

It is called Jackson Lake, and I am already planning my next visit and thinking of times when it will be even more spectacular – at the height of fall color, after a snow in winter, in the midst of one of our many foggy mornings, etc.

For now here is one of the images I captured the other morning. Enjoy. And have a wonderful weekend.

Jackson Lake, Early Spring, by David B. Coe

Writing-Tip Wednesday: Dialogue, Part I

I love writing dialogue, in part because I love reading dialogue. I believe that people are natural eavesdroppers. We like to listen in on other people’s conversations. That’s what reading dialogue is all about – it is one of the few times we can be privy to the private conversations of others without violating social mores.

Writing good dialogue is difficult. Attributing that dialogue skillfully and clearly can be incredibly challenging. So this week and next week I am going to focus my Writing Tip Wednesday posts on writing and attributing dialogue.

This week, let’s talk about the “spoken” words themselves. What are some of the tricks to writing good conversations among our characters?

Perhaps more than any other element of writing, constructing effective dialogue is an exercise in finding balance. What do I mean by that?

It should go without saying that our characters’ conversations need to have purpose. Every scene we write should be accomplishing multiple things at once – providing necessary background, deepening character development, furthering our narratives. Conversational scenes are no different. So our conversations need to be directed, they need to accomplish something – in other words there needs to be a point. But, you don’t want the conversations to be so directed that their outcome feels predetermined, nor do you want every encounter among characters to feel agenda-driven. We seek a balance in which the conversations accomplish all that we need them to in a way that feels completely believable.

We want our characters to get their points across without the conversation meandering too much, but we also want the dialogue to sound natural and easy, as opposed to stilted and formal. If you listen to humans conversing in a restaurant or bar, you can’t help but notice that we are remarkably inarticulate beings. We rarely speak in complete sentences, and even less frequently in sentences that are devoid of syntactical errors. We throw in a ton of “uh”s and “ummm”s and “like”s and “you know”s. Generally, we writers leave most of that stuff out of our written conversations, or else we throw in an instance or two, just to make things sound a bit more realistic, or to give a verbal tic to one character. My point is, we don’t necessarily want to make our characters sound like real people when they talk, but we also don’t want them to sound so perfect that they’re unrealistic or unrelatable. The balance here is, in effect, to make our characters talk the way we wish real people would.

So then the question becomes, how do we strike these balances?

Here are a few things I do. First, when I begin work on a scene in which, say, two characters are speaking, I already (I would hope) have some sense of the characters themselves – who they are, what they usually sound like when they speak, what they bring to their relationship with each other. For instance, if I’m writing a Thieftaker story and have Ethan interacting with Sephira, I already know that Ethan will be defensive and wary of her motives, but also willing to stand up for himself. I know that Sephira will be mocking and rude. She will use sexual innuendo to try to keep him off balance, and she will be driven always by greed and ambition. And they will have their conversation against a backdrop of extended enmity, rivalry, mistrust, but also familiarity and grudging respect. Knowing all that helps me find the right tone. Obviously, if Ethan was interacting with, say Diver, or Sam Adams, the equations would be quite different. The point is, knowing these things up front is incredibly important.

Second, I will have in mind throughout the conversation exactly what each character wants out of this particular encounter. I know that some of you are dedicated pantsers – you don’t like to plan any part of your books. And actually, when it comes to writing dialogue, I do as little outlining as possible, and I never plan ahead of time what actual words the characters will say. But this isn’t about planning or pantsing. This is about understanding our characters’ motives, and we should always be aware of that. Motive is particularly important in scenes with dialogue, because motive allows us to direct the conversation without making any of it sound predetermined. So knowing what every character privy to the conversation wants to get out of the exchange is crucial to the scene’s success.

Finally, as I write, I speak the dialogue. Or, more accurately, I carry on the conversation in my head, and then transcribe it into the manuscript, line by line. I tend to speak as I write anyway – if you were to watch me write, you’d realize that I am constantly sub-vocalizing everything. But I find the practice especially helpful when writing dialogue. If the words come naturally to me in the course of “conversing” on behalf of the characters, chances are it will read well on the page.

A couple of other things to keep in mind. Again, if you listen to people speaking in the course of everyday conversation, you’ll notice that we almost never call each other by name. As an experiment, try ending every other sentence in a real-life conversation with the name of the person you’re talking to. It sounds utterly ridiculous. So resist the urge to use names in your written dialogue. We all do it WAY more than we should. It is one of the first things I get rid of in revisions. I’m not saying don’t do it ever. But once in an entire scene is plenty.

Contractions: If you are writing in a world in which contractions do not exist, or if you have certain characters who never use contractions, do not use them. (See what I did there?) Otherwise, use ‘em. We all speak with contractions, and they help to make our words sound informal and natural. They’ll do the same for your characters.

Remember, you want your dialogue to sound as believable and unforced as possible, and at the same time, you want it to accomplish specific tangible things for your narrative. Yes, that’s a fine balance to strike, but with practice and a bit of forethought you can absolutely do it.

Next week, dialogue attribution!

Keep writing!