Meet the Faculty: “Hurricane” Katrina, Pt. 2
We continue with part two of our faculty interview with Idaho Potato Queen Katrina Swaim, an old high school friend of the Dean. If you missed part one, you'll want to read it or some of this segment will seem more disjointed than even regular readers are accustomed to. Scott: So we both like good literature. That's fine and well, but let me pose you a question I asked my last interviewee: what are your guilty pleasures, artistically speaking? Katrina: I used to love to read Stephen King. His eye for the minutiae of moment-to-moment human experience and his great feel for thrusting Everyman into the most unthinkable situations just to see how his inner strengths and weaknesses come to the fore make him one of my favorite authors. So many of his protagonists are writers, too, that one can't help but notice his fascination for the half-practical, half-mystical process of writing. It's as if even he doesn't know where it comes from sometimes. I bet his book, On Writing, has a lot of great insights. Your point about Aragorn [from the last post, campers—SG] is well taken. I admit I've never considered him in that light before, but now that I do, I wonder that I could have overlooked the parallels between Christ and Aragorn. He comes, unlooked for, from the least likely quarter, in the garb of a commoner. His return, though long foretold, has ceased to be expected and has nearly receded into the realm of myth. His claim is unwelcome by those who have profited in power or wealth in his absence (true of pre-crucifixion Christ, too, if you remember the Sanhedrin). I've always considered Frodo, with his sacrifice and enslavement to the quest, to be the central savior figure of LotR, but now that I look at it more closely, you're quite right. The triumphant return of the King is the pinnacle of the gospel story. Perhaps Frodo, in a sense, is us--our personal journeys of discovery and purpose, serving a power higher than ourselves and being transformed by that power. Hmmm... You've given me lots of delicious food for thought. World of Warcraft, that massive multiplayer online role-playing game of geek legend, claimed another victim on the day I created my first character, a night elf druid blessed with incredible healing powers and a nineteen-inch waist. What started as a show of marital solidarity ended in a full-blown gaming addiction, and though I don't play as much as I used to, I still spend an unhealthy amount of time at the keyboard in pitched combat against the ravaging Horde. Player vs. player skirmishes are my favorite aspect of the game. There's a certain delight in knowing, as I smack down a level 70 orc mage, that some guy in Toledo is slamming his keyboard against his head in frustration. Procedural dramas: CSI (the New York cast is the best), Criminal Minds, Law & Order. I shouldn't watch as much as I do; add in an episode of Without a Trace and a dose of the local news and I'm a hair's breadth away from becoming an agoraphobic and installing a five thousand dollar home security system in our two bedroom apartment. The Joss Whedon Sci Fi Channel series Firefly is one of my favorite pieces of science-fiction. Though short-lived (only fourteen episodes and a movie), it paired everything I love about space adventure with all the best elements of a classic western. The characters are engaging and the dialogue is witty and entertaining. I only discovered the series after it had already been cancelled, but I was glued to the DVDs from start to finish. The Office, Star Wars, superhero movies, Bridezillas, Janet Evanovich books, Starbucks, YouTube, and X-Files complete my list of transgressions. Now that you know, will you use the knowledge for good or evil? Scott: Wow, you play WoW. Alas, I was just too late coming to the party for World of Warcraft. There were entire societies and economies and languages that used words like "noob" already in place. Plus, every time I got my ass handed to me in one-on-one combat, I thought of a pimply-faced 15-year old (probably very much like myself at 15) chugging down his fifth Red Bull and doing the Tiger Woods fist pump while I gathered up my pride like spilt notebooks in C Hall and mumbled about how I had seen Def Leppard, Don Henley and the Who by 15—what the hell had he done? Just too much frustration for a relaxing activity. This blog is pretty much dedicated to my guilty pleasures, so I won't go into a long list. But I was thinking about how we are finally reconnecting after over a decade incommunicado (which has been, by the way, a real treat) and I started thinking about the movies we used to love in high school. I even bought Dead Poet's Society the other day. Since we last talked on a regular basis—and for the sake of argument, we'll say that was 1996—what have been your favorite movies, and why? Anything from 1997 to the present is fair game, and Lord of the Rings is already in. You can always check the release of a movie with Internet Movie Database. I'll give you my list and reasons after you send yours along. Katrina: The online version of Dungeons & Dragons? Oh, the calumny! I've never rolled a ten-sided die in my life, I'll have you know. Many intelligent, socially adjusted, non-LARP-inclined, emotionally healthy people play WoW, and if you were still playing, I'd track you across the land of Azeroth and smite you down with my Staff of Divine Infusion in comeuppance for your scorn! Okay, so I am a geek. Which brings us to favorite movies, post-1996. I could probably name a lot of movies I appreciated for their artistic merit or sensitive treatment of an important subject, but I'd rather talk about the ones I truly love, the ones that we've added to our DVD collection and watch over and over, the ones I pop in when I'm sick, or the apartment is too quiet, or I want to laugh or cry or hug myself as the happy ending soaks into me again. So here we go. Pride and Prejudice: I own two versions of this, and love each one on its own merits. The much-longer A&E/BBC version (I'm cheating a little since it was released in 1995, though I didn't see it till a few years later) boasts the quintessential Mr. Darcy in Colin Firth, and is five hours of delightful human interplay rolled up in period costumes and true-to-the-book dialogue. The more recent feature film preserves all the spirit of Austen's wit and social commentary, but with a faster, more cinematic pacing and a romantic ending scene more tailored to American sensibilities. I watch them both regularly, sometimes one right after the other. A lot of my other favorite movies walk around in these same shoes: Sense and Sensibility, Mansfield Park, Jane Eyre, The Importance of Being Earnest, Emma. Clearly, I have a thing for costume dramas. Dear Frankie: Another Gerard Butler film (yes, I admit to having a little celebrity crush), Dear Frankie is a poignant, slow-moving character drama set in Scotland. It centers around Frankie, a young deaf boy, and his mother, who secretly writes Frankie letters purporting to be from his seafaring father. This loving, interested fictional father is as far from the harsh reality as can be, and the story of Frankie's real father unfolds throughout the course of the movie. All is well, however, until the ship that supposedly carries Frankie's dad turns out to be a real ship and is scheduled to dock in their small port town. His mother is forced to either abandon the charade or enlist the help of a mysterious stranger to take part in it. A beautiful, moving, sweet treasure of a movie. I see something new every time I watch it. The Fifth Element: It's Die Hard meets Star Wars, a piece of pulpy sci-fi that is fast and fun and, best of all, never apologizes for its over-the-top plot or its campy style. Pure entertainment. Also, Gary Oldman. What more needs to be said? Elizabethtown: This film was something of a flop, critically speaking, but it just touched me in all the right spots, from the word "fiasco." Things to love: Alec Baldwin's turn as Drew's terrifyingly upbeat and cold-blooded boss, Drew and Claire's all night cell phone call and their subsequent adoption into a drunken stranger's wedding party, Claire's road-trip-to-emotional-healing map and accompanying soundtrack, Susan Sarandon's interpretive funeral dance, "Free Bird" setting the hotel conference room on fire, and on and on. As far as I'm concerned, the critics can stick it in their popcorn bowl. The Harry Potter series: It's a tall order, bringing to life a beloved fictional world from a set of books that has enjoyed as much popularity as J.K. Rowling's finally finished masterwork. Despite a parade of different directors, I've been thrilled with every one of the Harry Potter movies thus far released. Great special effects, attention to story, and careful casting have served the transition from book to movie well, owing, no doubt, to an extraordinary amount of involvement by the author herself as a consultant in the filmmaking process. I can't wait to see (and own) the final two installments. I really could go on and on, but I'm so interested to hear your list that I'm going to stop there. Great question, though. I love movies. I love seeing them in the theatre with a bladder-buster sized Diet Coke in my hand, and I love watching them at home snuggled up next to my honey under a warm blanket. Netflix is the most painless bill I pay every month and I rarely go grocery shopping without picking up a new DVD. And felicity of felicities, Paul and I have a remarkably similar taste in movies (except for a long-running debate we have concerning Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion, but I won't air our dirty laundry here.) So, lay it on me. What movies do you love? And do you usually get your way at the movie store? Scott: Top notch list. If you liked Mystery Men, check out this clip (the language is bleeped before going rated 'R' but still not for little tiny ears): Yep. Many of these guys are my friends. "Liquid Courage" actually has his own blog in my sidebar (look under "Derek"). We're waiting to see if Rev. Jake can play at our wedding (he's currently touring with a country music band that has been on the Billboard charts with a tune called, "Kill the Mullett"—you can't make this stuff up). I also love The Fifth Element, if only to hear Milla Jovovich say "awtowash" and "moolti-pass." I get tingly. She is perfect. I'm also awfully fond of The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Since Knocked Up was good and the same guys are doing Superbad, I'm very stoked about going to the movies this weekend and laughing like a hyena. And yes, I'm an Office fan. Swingers was fantastic, also. When I was moving back to Georgia from Reno, my dad and I had been in the moving van for about five hours (of a three day trip) and were just outside of Las Vegas. I suddenly yelled, "Vegas, baby! Vegas!" He hadn't seen the movie and was mostly just startled. So, yeah, my sense of humor has actually gotten more juvenile since you knew me in high school. Away from comedy, I really like Quentin Tarantino. Kill Bill (1 & 2) are fantastic movies, and although they aren't pre-1996, I love the trio of Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs and True Romance (which Quentin Tarantino wrote, but Tony Scott directed—a masterpiece). Pulp Fiction changed my life, really, in terms of how I see storytelling. I think it is the most important movie of the last 20 years. So, yeah, I'm a geek, too. The thing is that Tarantino just has this way of creating a mood with everything from costumes to set dressing to camera shots to his direction of the actors. Jessica watches Kill Bill about every 10-12 days. What I loved about Almost Famous, though, is how much the story is about just loving something and someone, no matter what. After my brother and I went to see Cracker earlier this summer, we got to meet the band. We gushed. At one point, he turned to me and said, "dude, we are such band aids." "So what," I said. In typical guy fashion I loved 300 and Saving Private Ryan (although HBO's miniseries Band of Brothers is even better). I like the idea of putting your loyalties ahead of yourself, which permeated both of those movies. And lest you think I have forgotten my roots in the theater and our AP English class, I really fell for Shakespeare in Love. Since '96 I have also really, really become a fan of two films that would be considered "chick" flicks: Sliding Doors and Love, Actually. I was going to list Beautiful Girls, but it came out in 1996. As far as battling over movies, Jess and I are like you and Paul—we like pretty much the same stuff. Even when she was reluctant to go see Transformers, she found herself enjoying the movie.
And now, speaking of delicious, you asked me about my pop culture guilty pleasures. Wherever shall I start?
iPod. From the moment I saw it, I knew I had to join the ranks of those crazy silhouette dancers with the telltale white earbuds. I love iTunes, too (but don't get me started on the DRM). In my foolish youth, I scoffed at the idea of downloading music online, maintaining a purist's attachment to holding a glistening CD in my grubby hands rather than deal with the dubious attractions of bits and bytes. Now I can't click the "Buy It" button fast enough. I recently downloaded the best of Bon Jovi, and I can barely describe the great satisfaction of cruising down the road while my daughter joins me in crooning "Keep the Faith" from the backseat.
I tried to get started on it and had a good time for a little while. Essentially, the game is just Dungeons & Dragons set online, and I misspent enough of my high school years playing that incredible waste of time with Chris Dunbar. Between D&D and having a mad crush on Katie Jaffe, my first two years of high school were pretty much booked.
My fiancé Jessica saw Uncle Buck for the first time the other day (she's 10 years younger than I am, so she was still learning multiplication tables when the flick came out—I shudder) and I caught myself thinking that no matter how dated the outfits and music seemed, the themes of those good high school movies were still standing up. I'm thinking about the whole John Hughes lineup—Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller, etc.—as well as some of the classics like Say Anything. I even found myself looking at the two-for-eleven rack at Wal-Mart hoping to come across The Lost Boys on DVD.
Phantom of the Opera: A beautiful send-up of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, starring (hubba, hubba!) Gerard Butler in the titular role. Webber noted in the extra features that he chose the non-classically trained Butler to give the Phantom something of a "rock-and-roll" edge to his voice. The effect is outstanding! Though I've come around to believing that Christine made the better choice in staying with Raoul, don't think for a moment that the gothic romance of life with the captivating Phantom in his sparkling underground labyrinth didn't hold some allure.
Mystery Men: "Maybe you should put some shorts on or something, if you want to keep fighting evil today." "Do you think there's a really angry way I can say I'm sorry?" "This is why mad scientists are generally less desirable than your common or garden variety scientist." "We struck down evil with the mighty sword of teamwork and the hammer of...not bickering." Best superhero lampoon ever. We quote it all the time.
My most quotable movie since 1996 is Anchorman. I nearly peed myself in the theater the first time I saw the movie. Considering that I was alone in the theater and I laugh very loudly, I think some of the other patrons were a little afraid. "What? You pooped in the refrigerator? And you ate the whole... wheel of cheese? How'd you do that? Heck, I'm not even mad; that's amazing." "Sweet Lincoln's mullet!" "I ate fiberglass insulation. It wasn't cotton candy like the guy said... my tummy itches."
I have a parallel to your list, too—when you sited Elizabethtown, you hit on my favorite writer/director of coming-of-age flicks, Cameron Crowe. I think Almost Famous is the best movie of that ilk since Crowe did Say Anything. On an unrelated note, the song "Come Pick Me Up" which is the centerpiece of the "road trip CD" sequence is one of the songs I love most to play on guitar. Yep. Since high school, I've taken up guitar. I can play maybe a dozen songs. That's one of them.
Both Sliding Doors and Love, Actually are British comedies, which may say something about how much more deftly the Brits deal with their romance. There are all the same themes in these two comedies as a typical American chick flick, but without all the whiney angst that seems to seethe out of the collective American psyche. Each has some really poignant lessons, too, and while Love, Actually has some of the typical feel-good moments you'd expect from a Saturday night date movie, there are also some crushing moments and ambiguous endings in the ensemble comedy/drama. I actually thought about suggesting this movie to you when I read about your marriage class.
Monday: The grand finale—of this interview and of the Harry Potter series. We cover it all and return to 1991 in suburban Atlanta. Jeeze, Mr. Peabody, whatever will we see there? I don't know, Sherman. I don't know.
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