My dad took me to see La Cage aux Folles when I was, like, 14, and I didn’t understand that they were gay, or more precisely, I don’t think I really knew what being gay was – I think I thought it just had to do with being weirdly shrill and fussy and dressing up in women’s clothing. I can’t imagine why he took me. Maybe he thought it was some artsy French film.
When I finally figured out that Charlton Heston’s character in Touch of Evil was supposed to be Mexican it started to make sense. Actually, any of those older movies where they have an actor playing a character of another race confuses me – Mickey Rooney, Alec Guinness, Marlon Brando – what’s the point?
I think I was in college before I understood the joke with the Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz saying, “Trapped like mice – rats!” I thought he was just sort of stammering, “Trapped like mice [or], rats!” instead of saying, “We’re trapped like mice – darn!”
It took me years to realize that Kris Kringle in Miracle on 34th Street was definitively just a nice old man with whiskers. I originally thought they left it up in the air, but the real miracle is about how everyone acting in their own self-interest (except Kris and Natalie Wood) leads to a happy ending. Of course, it isn’t helped by the fact that whenever they show it on TV now they cut everything that establishes this. (For instance, you see Macy and Gimble fight about who can give Kris the bigger bonus, but you don’t see Kris ask them for the X-ray machine.)
I don’t quite agree with you on this one. The lack of absolute proof that he is Santa Claus doesn’t prove definitively that he is NOT Santa. The fact that Kris didn’t deliver the X-ray machine with a sleigh doesn’t mean that he isn’t magic. Unless your point is that he IS Santa, but that Santa is just a nice old man with whiskers? Also, although it is far from 100% proof, let’s not forget Santa’s surprising knowledge of Dutch.
I own the DVD, which I have watched more times than I care to admit, and I don’t concede that Kringle isn’t Santa. Put me down for “unresolved.” There is no proof that Kringle (or Santa, for that matter) left the cane in the house at the end, but then, there is no proof that he did not, either.
Until I watched Back to the Future II on DVD yesterday I had no idea that Michael J Fox played his own daughter (and that was only because I listened to the commentary).
Having grown up with the movie Back to the Future, it was a long time before I ever really thought about the fact that the actors playing Marty’s parents in 1985 are younger actors playing older people with the help of makeup. Now it always kind of disturbs me to see actors wearing “old person makeup”.
And I’ve noticed that many people don’t make the connection that O Brother, Where Art Thou? is a loose retelling of The Odyssey until I point it out to them.
I saw The Crying Game when it first came out in 1993. At the time, ironically, I did not know the concept of transgender. I assumed she was just being a smart aleck when she called herself a “girl.” It took years to understand that she really meant it.
I did NOT see that coming when I was watching the movie, which I guess could be considered an embarassing epiphany. Even as the camera panned down her naked body, it didn’t register for a couple of seconds. I was watching with my brother and he saw the twist coming.
[sub]I’m embarassed to say this, but I didn’t realize the significance of the last scene in “The Sixth Sense” until the movie was over and I was in the theater parking lot.[/sub]
Wha? I don’t remember that at all…I haven’t seen that movie since I was a kid. I should watch it again.
Me too! It totally makes sense that a) after hundreds of years your body would look like that, and b) Being connected with the force would make you live a really long time. I only really noticed that wasn’t right when I noticed he’s only got two fingers and a thumb, and weird alien feet.
For a long time, I didn’t realize that the mice in An Americal Tail were supposed to be Jewish, or that Cats Don’t Dance was a sort of allegory for black actors in the early days of cinema.
My feeling is the fact that there’s not one scintilla of an iota of an indication that he’s anything but a nice old man with whiskers. It appears that there is, but that’s all tricks. Kris gets the job because Doris needs an immediate replacement; he keeps it because Shellhammer takes credit for the idea; Dr. Whatsis gets his X-ray machine because Macy and Gimble want to one-up each other; their customers are happy because only because the magnates see good business in customer satisfaction; Fred takes the case because he dislikes his big firm job and wants to strike out on his own (and is also legitimately concerned about Kris, but he still admits it’s going to get his name in the papers); Doris comes around primarily to convince both Fred and herself that she belongs with Fred; the mail comes to Kris because the post office is looking for any reason to clear out all its dead letters; and Kris ultimately wins his case because Boss Tweed tells the judge he has to let him. As for the Dutch, well, Doris speaks French but that doesn’t make her Joan of Arc. It goes on and on. The real miracle is that even though everyone looks out for their own self-interest, that all comes together in one moment to make them all happy.