Feasts for the eyes
A humble holiday weekend viewing guide that will feed your eyes and soul after you've stuffed your face
Now that my first semester of my MFA is officially over (final summaries submitted, second draft of my play finished, sanity mostly intact), it’s time to focus on more important things: cooking, eating, and watching movies.
If you live in America, I don’t have to tell you tomorrow is Thanksgiving, which means the holiday season has officially arrived like a “teen pop sensation” you’ve literally never heard of lip synching poorly on a Macy’s Parade float rolling down 6th Avenue to Herald Square. If you don’t live in America, this is the part where I explain that Thanksgiving, a holiday whitewashing violent colonial oppression, is always a minefield for most people who have to interact with family members they haven’t seen in months or years that remind them why they haven’t seen them for months and years. And since we just had yet another REALLY BAD ELECTION, people with any common sense and antifascist ideals are not really feeling celebratory at the moment nor willing to break bread with family members who said “hey it’s fine to elect a convicted felon to the White House! I see no problem with that whatsoever!”
But I digress.
For being the kickoff to the holiday season, there aren’t a ton of Thanksgiving-centric movies like Christmas. There are some that make the list every year (I have a soft spot for Hannah and Her Sisters even though W**dy is persona non grata around here and also Jodie Foster’s Home for the Holidays that has a very beautiful queer-centric message about found family vs. blood family) and there are tons of great Thanksgiving TV episodes (back when television shows did 22 episodes a season and could afford to have more fun), but I’m also interested in films that thematically connect to all the complicated feelings Thanksgiving tends to bring up. Also ones that showcase food.
Anyway, I’ve compiled some holiday weekend viewing options that maybe capture the myriad of feelings many of us in this country are feeling at this moment. This is by no means a comprehensive list, but you should feel satisfied by any you choose to consume this weekend.
The Ice Storm (1997, dir. Lee)
A movie that perfectly captures the dissatisfaction and cynicism at the heart of American suburban life and politics. The adults are just as lost as their children. Nobody wants to admit they’re unhappy. Despite being set during the Watergate Era, this movie has remained gorgeous and prescient over the years. Sigourney Weaver, Kevin Kline, and Joan Allen do some of their finest work in Ang Lee’s drama.
Holiday (1938, dir. Cukor)
This achingly romantic dramedy starring dream duo Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn is also a sharp critique of “the American dream” and its obsession with wealth and industry. Grant’s wanderlust charmer Johnny falls for a rich girl, Julia, whose father expects him to join the family business rather than travel the world for a year to “find the meaning of life.” When Johnny meets Julia’s spunky, idealistic older sister Linda (Hepburn), it’s obvious the two are better matched in every way. While the film is set mostly around New Year’s Eve, its cozy production design and complicated family dynamics are a great match to Thanksgiving.
Mistress America (2015, dir. Baumbach)
I finally saw this one for the first time this year, and it instantly rocketed to the top of my list of Noah Baumbach’s films. A bonafide hilarious screwball comedy about two almost step-sisters (their parents are set to marry and then ultimately don’t), college freshman Tracy (Lola Kirke) and thirtysomething Brooke (Greta Gerwig at her breeziest), who embark on a series of harebrained adventures around NYC as Brooke tries to start a restaurant and settle scores with her best friend turned nemesis Mamie-Claire. A film, which Gerwig co-penned with Baumbach, that wrestles with the thorniness of growing up, American ideas of “success,” identity, and sisterhood in such real and funny ways. It’s a spiritual big sister to Gerwig’s 2017 directorial debut, Lady Bird.
The Age of Innocence (1993, dir. Scorsese)
A feast for the eyes! My favorite Scorsese movie that shows how the veneer of beauty and "genteel" societal rules hide the innate emotional violence humans inflict on one another. While I tend to think of this as more of a winter movie, its sumptuous costumes and production design plus mindless chatter over multiple-course dinners will feel familiar to anyone forced to make polite conversation with people they can’t stand. Michelle Pfeiffer and Daniel Day-Lewis are off the charts smoldering in this.
Alien (1979, dir. Scott)
No matter how bad your Thanksgiving dinner goes, it cannot be worse than having an alien burst out of your chest while you’re eating colorless glop with your co-workers on a routine space mining mission gone wrong. OR just think of the xenomorph as your creepy uncle that really really wants to hug you and the only way to get rid of him is to literally blast him into the vacuum of space like Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley. Alien is a perfect Thanksgiving movie for this year because it features evil AI, a corporation who cares more about weapons and profit than its workers, a woman who nobody listens to until it’s too late, and a Republican creature that wants to force you to breed its spawn whether you want to or not all under the watchful eye of “mother.” Relatable!
Moonstruck (1987, dir. Jewison)
Perfect movie about how “love don’t make things nice.” Perfect Cher performance. Perfect Olympia Dukakis performance. A feel-good story about a woman giving into love and desire against her better judgment and blossoming into her true self. A cozy, hilarious crowd-pleaser that will warm even the heart of your most curmudgeonly family member. A great Italian Family Movie alterative to the traditional Italian Family Movie choice this holiday weekend, The Godfather.
Liz Taylor Triple Feature:
Giant (1956, dir. Stevens), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958, dir. Brooks), Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966, dir. Nichols)
I’ve been on a real Elizabeth Taylor kick this past year, so while these three are among her best performances, they also show a progression of not only her acting talents but a willingness to look at the cracks of American culture and psyche. Giant is a sweeping film—with Rock Hudson’s most layered performance to boot—that encapsulates so much of the post-WWII ideas of America like manifest destiny and legacy-building in the mythic West. It also has a strong undercurrent of anti-classism and anti-racist values that make it more interesting than it appears on the surface. While Cat on a Hot Tin Roof couldn’t make the homosexual themes in the play explicit due to the Hays Code, the film is still explosive in its exploration of desire, daddy issues, family drama, and societal expectations. Arriving squarely in the mid-60s, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf is, of course, a dinner “party” gone very wrong, but it also is an unflinching examination of the illusions at the heart of American domesticity. This is not a triple feature for the faint of heart, but it is a snapshot of a changing country and an actress in full command of her talents.
Mother (1996, dir. Brooks)
Of course you could watch Albert Brooks’ 1996 comedy, Mother, for Mother’s Day, but its particular blend of mommy-issues plus food-centric comedy, including a grocery shopping trip from hell and a frozen orange sherbet that “tastes like a foot,” makes it a great choice for this holiday weekend. Debbie Reynolds is spectacular in it, but what makes this my favorite Brooks by a mile is the specificity of the mother-child dynamic. It’s relatable, biting, but ultimately a loving look at the sacrifices so many women make in service of motherhood and how even the people we think we know best can surprise us when we least expect.
Nobody’s Fool (1994, dir. Benton)
This 1994 midbudget dramedy features one of Paul Newman’s best later-era performances as a sixty-something, irascible handyman in upstate New York who has spent his life avoiding more “adult” responsibilities, including being a husband and father to his now grown adult son who’s arrived back in town and going through marital troubles of his own. Nobody’s Fool, which takes place over the holiday season, is a gentle look at the bonds of small-town life and all its worries, but it’s also a coming-of-age story that proves it’s never too late to change.
Goldie and Liza Together (TV Special, 1980)
We used to be a proper country that had a plethora of kitschy variety shows and specials on television throughout the year but especially during the holiday season. While some holiday variety specials do still happen (I’m looking forward to Sabrina Carpenter’s A Nonsense Christmas on December 6th on Netflix because her recent album and tour feel like smart, spiritual successors to this era of witty, kitschy entertainment), none will ever truly match the chaos and fun of the network specials that aired in the 1970s and 1980s. This one, featuring recent birthday girl Goldie Hawn and icon Liza Minnelli (whose Emmy-winning Liza with a Z special is mandatory viewing), is just the right amount of kitschy, cuckoo-bananas charming and features a performance of “All That Jazz” from Chicago in part because the pair were openly auditioning to play Roxie and Velma in a movie adaptation that got scrapped until the 2002 version. Both women’s talents are on full display and clearly they had fun together making this special. If you’re looking to escape reality for a bit, this one should do the trick!
Happy Thanksgiving/Happy Holidays/Happy Whatever You’re Celebrating this Weekend! Stay safe, stay sane, eat many desserts!
Until next time.
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