I Take You With Me

Boys On The Side 

Director: Herbert Ross

Cast: Whoopi Goldberg, Mary-Louise Parker, Drew Barrymore, Matthew McConaughey, James Remar

Released February 3, 1995

Spoilers for a 20 year old movie...just in cases! 

This movie came out when I was in middle school and I remember seeing it in the theater with my mom. While I remember that, I didn't remember anything about the movie except the singalong to "You've Got It". And that Mary-Louise Parker's character dies at the end. Well, she was still alive at the end, but it was implied she died although for some reason, I remember a funeral scene. It's funny what your mind chooses to remember and what not to remember. Other than that, I didn't remember anything so I decided to see it again. I didn't even look at the rating on the DVD cover because I just assumed it was PG-13. Nope, it's an R. I was shocked that my mom let me see this movie as a young middle schooler! There is language in this movie that would make even Nancy Botwin blush! 

This movie reminded me a bit of Steel Magnolias (a group of women with a friendship and one of them is dying and one of them has a baby....luckily it's never been the same woman!) and then I realized it's directed by the same director, so there you go. This movie reminded me of a cross between that one and Thelma and Louise since the group of women are on a road trip. (And Whoopi Goldberg even makes a crack about how she's not driving over a cliff for the others). 

Jane (Goldberg) is a lounge singer in New York who has broken up with her girlfriend and has been fired from her job so she is looking to start over somewhere. She meets Robin (Parker) who has placed an ad in the paper that she is looking for someone to accompany her on a trip to California. I can tell you one thing, there is no way I would ever let a stranger join me on a road trip. That could end up either being very dangerous...or very irritating! But both women agree on taking the trip together and drive to Pittsburgh so Jane can see her friend, Holly (Barrymore). While traveling, we see the first glimpses of Robin acting odd. They have to stop at a fast food place because Robin gets sick. She tells Jane it's just allergies, but I knew (or thought I knew!) she had cancer. Well, no, I was wrong. I THOUGHT she had cancer because I guess that's what I remembered, but no, she has AIDS. Because this was 1995 and AIDS was all the rage in the '90s! It was kind of weird she had AIDS because she was this very uptight woman...she didn't look like the type to use drugs of have unprotected sex. I guess they just wanted to show us anybody could get AIDS? I don't even know how she got them.  

Hey, hey, hey, it's McConaughey!

When they pick up Holly, her abusive and drunk boyfriend is with her and won't let her go until he gets his drug money that he thinks she's stolen. Holly hits him with a baseball bat and the women tie him up. While they are gone, he tries to get to a phone, but ends up falling and hitting his head and dies. When they see this in the paper, the other two convince Holly to join them because she can't go back. She reveals to the others that she is pregnant. They make it to Tuscon before they have to settle there because Robin has gotten really sick and needs medical care. I believe this is when Jane and Holly (and the audience) finds out that Robin has AIDS. 

Holly starts seeing an old friend, a young cop played by a young  and pre-famous Matthew McConaughey (who, ironically won an Oscar for portraying a man with AIDS in Dallas Buyers Club. It's like the circle of life, film style!) He finds out about her dead boyfriend and is torn between his feelings for her and obeying the law as his duties as a cop. Even though Holly goes to court and serves a short sentence, they end up married. Oh, and she names her daughter Mary Todd because McConaughey's name is Abe. :::GROAN::::  

Jane and Robin live in a house together with Holly and Abe until they have a fight and Jane moves out. While at a bar, they meet some people and one of them is a guy (Remar) who appears to be interested in Robin and Jane tells him that she has AIDS just so he already knows and Robin doesn't have to worry about having that awkward conversation so Jane thinks she's doing Robin a favor. One night, Robin and the guy get really drunk and pretty much start having sex outside right in the open. I mean, really! They do make it to a hotel room before clothes start coming off, but when Robin is about to tell him about her condition, he tells her he already knows and that he has come protected. I can understand why Robin was so upset, but at the same time, shouldn't she be relieved that at least he already knows and seems to be okay with it? (Obviously as he has his hands all over her). It doesn't surprise me that this guy was willing to have sex with her because he seemed like he would do it with anyone...he even makes a comment earlier in the movie about how hot the bar owner's 12 year old daughter is. It was really creepy.

Robin finds out Jane told him about her AIDS and that's why they have a fight and Jane moves out. When Robin's mother comes to visit, she is aghast when she learns that a lesbian (and a black one to boot!) has been living with her daughter! She should meet Keira Knightley's mother from Bend it Like Beckham! 

Like I mentioned earlier, the only scene I really remember is when Jane and Robin sing "You've Got It" to each other in a room full of people. It's a very sweet moment and got me choked up. 

This movie came out twenty years ago nearly to the day...and did you know that Drew Barrymore turns 40 this month? She was a very young 19 when she was in this movie and yet it seems like she had already been around forever! 

Secret's in the Sauce

Fried Green Tomatoes

Director: Jon Avnet

Cast: Jessica Tandy, Kathy Bates, Mary Stuart Masterson, Mary-Louise Parker, Chris O'Donnell, Cicely Tyson

Released: December 27, 1991

Oscar nominations:

Best Supporting Actress - Jessica Tandy (lost to Mercedes Ruehl for The Fisher King)

Best Original Screenplay - Fannie Flagg and Carol Sobieski (lost to Ted Tally for Silence of the Lambs)

This film alternates between two storylines: present day with Evelyn (Kathy Bates in a more mundane role for her..this was one year after she was in Misery, a far cry from this character!) and Ninny (Jessica Tandy) and the early 1900s with Idgie Threadgoode (Mary Stuart Masterson) and Ruth Jamison (Mary-Louise Parker). Evelyn is a housewife, a desperate one, who is trying to save her marriage because all her husband wants to do is sit in front of the TV and eat his dinner while watching sports. Evelyn, fearing her husband does not find her attractive anymore, joins a group for women on how to seduce their husbands and put the spark back in the marriage. There is one session where they are suppose to take mirrors and pull down their pants (or hike up their skirts/dresses) and inspect their vaginas. And in front of each other! What kind of freaky group is this? 

While at a nursing home with her husband to visit his mother, Evelyn meets Ninny Threadgoode who starts chatting Evelyn up and soon, over the course of a few more visits, tells her the story about Idgie and Ruth, two friends who grew up together in Alabama. Ruth is older than Idgie and was Idgie's older brother's (Chris O'Donnell) amour until he was killed by a train when his foot got stuck in the tracks while trying to fetch Ruth's hat. Both a teenaged Ruth and kid Idgie are witness to this gruesome death and all I could think while the train is barreling down the tracks and Ruth and Idgie are looking on with horrified expressions, is why doesn't Ruth shield Idgie's eyes or turn her away from seeing her beloved older brother being killed right in front of her eyes? Well, at least he got her hat!

Idgie is a tomboy who gets into fights while Ruth is more of a proper young lady (no selling weed for her!), but despite their differences they grow to become close friends. There is a time when the two friends are separated after Ruth moves to Georgia and marries a man named Frank Bennett who abuses her, including throwing her down the stairs while she's pregnant. While visiting her, Idgie sees Ruth has a black eye and takes away a pregnant Ruth. Even after that nasty fall, the baby is okay and grows up to be a young boy who will eventually lose his arm while playing near the train tracks. I would say like father, like son, except his dad wasn't Idgie's brother. (Although he was named Buddy, after her brother.) They don't show what exactly happens to him to make him lose his arm. One moment he's playing near the train tracks, the next everyone is running towards the tracks with concerned looks on their faces. They do a fake out where you think Buddy Jr. died because they show a bunch of people in black mourning around a gravestone, but then the camera pulls out and you see the grave is for the kid's arm. I really don't know what Buddy Jr. was doing around the train tracks to lose his arm. Was he laying down on the tracks and the train pinned him? It was just...odd. 

After Ruth's son is born, Frank shows up and threatens to take him, but Idgie tells him to never show his face again or he will regret it. She and Ruth have opened the Whistle Stop Cafe where they are best known for their fried green tomatoes (and they also become well known for their ribs!). Frank does return to try to kidnap his infant son while Ruth and Idgie are at a pageant and Buddy Jr. is being watched over by one of their cooks, Sipsey (Cicely Tyson). Frank is hit by a shovel and you don't see who does it, but when the sheriff comes to town to investigate the disappearance of Frank, Ruth thinks Idgie has something to do with it as she tells Ruth she will never have to worry about Frank bothering them again and she has made death threats to Frank many times in the past. Even though we later find out Idgie didn't indirectly kill Frank, she did have a part in his disappearance. And so did the sheriff who was investigating Frank's whereabouts because he was the one who loved the ribs - which were Frank's ribs he was eating after they cut him up and barbecued him! - so much. A bit sadistic, but kind of awesome at the same time. They are put on trial for the murder of Frank Bennett, but since there is no proof that neither one of them killed him (since they really didn't), their charges are dropped.

Each day Evelyn spends with Ninny, listening to her stories, she begins to gain more confidence and starts caring about her appearance and the way she dresses. She changes her hair style and starts wearing make-up and stops wearing her sweats. In one of my favorite "present day" scenes, she's about to park at the grocery store in a "rock star parking space" as my mom would call it, but just as she's about to turn in after the car that was in it prior pulls out, a little red convertible with two young blondes zips in and takes it. When she confronts them about it, they say, "Face it lady, we're younger and faster!" Evelyn takes matters into her own hands and rams their car several times until they come running out and she drives past them and says, "Face it girls, I'm older and have more insurance!" 

Like any film that focuses on female friendships (see also Beaches and Steel Magnolias), one of the main characters (Ruth) dies at the end of the movie of cancer. While Ninny is telling this story to Evelyn, she tells it like she is a third party, saying she was Idgie's sister-in-law, but it was pretty obvious she was Idgie as she knew an awful lot about Idgie's and Ruth's life. Idgie and Buddy have an older brother who is getting married at the beginning of the story Ninny tells Evelyn, but the brother and his wife are never mentioned again after that. Also, when Ninny and Evelyn are walking through the cemetery where Ruth is buried, Evelyn discovers there is a jar of honey from "The Bee Charmer" (Idgie's nickname) and that's when she realizes that Ninny is actually Idgie...which I realized from the start!

I had seen this movie two or three times prior, but this was the first time when I really noticed the lesbian undertones. Now the only physical contact between Idgie and Ruth is them hugging and the least amount of clothes they wear around each other are shorts and tank tops, but this time I was watching the movie with a bit of a different eye and you could tell there was something more to their friendship. After doing some research, I discovered that the book the movie is based on, Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe by Fannie Flagg, lesbianism is a big theme although Ruth's and Idgie's relationship is never specifically labeled as such. In the movie, Ruth was being courted by Buddy, but in the novel, she comes to live with Idgie's family while she teaches at a Bible School. It is unclear to me whether Ninny is actually Idgie in the book or if they changed that for the movie. From the description I read about the book, the backstory Ninny gives Evelyn of how she came to know the Threadgoodes is more fleshed out than it is the movie so it is possible she could have been a third party witnessing the relationship between Idgie and Ruth, but being that I have never read the book, I cannot really comment on that.