The barred glass door swinging back on it’s hinges as the chimes above it jingled, noon heat poured inside along with the slow bass rattle of a car stereo. Shouting in Spanish, two boys sprinted to the back for cold sodas, flip-flops slapping dirty tiles as they raced. The pair tore past the Korean cashier’s argument with a stooped, sweaty man in his early seventies about the convenience store’s refusal to accept unrolled pennies in the purchase of lottery tickets.
Author Archives: admin
The Pick-Up Artist
This week’s viewing of The Pick-up Artist (1987) highlighted a landmark event in Robert Downey Jr.’s career–a leading role. Hold the phones. Stop the press. He’s a sidekick no more.
Making Chit-Chat
She told him all about Harvey Milk; told him how homosexual teens have the highest suicide rates in America; told him how her cousin had been stuffed inside a gymnasium locker and whipped with towels until he bled when he had ‘came out’. These were topics he thought it was a bit weird to broach during intercourse, but the whole thing just went on for so-so-so-so-long that they had to talk about something, he guessed. Mostly he wouldn’t listen. He’d just go on, turning her over, this way or that. She’d never break a sentence for anything other than a coldly placed, “Wait. Ok. Right there. Good.” What did he care anyways? It was actually kind of refreshing to talk to someone, well… listen to someone, at least. He hadn’t talked to a soul since he’d been fired from the pants factory. Not a one unless you count that guy who asked him for directions to the L-train to whom he hadn’t responded. ‘Loneliness’ was not a ‘thing’ to him; he couldn’t understand it. Why did all these people, all crammed together, all busy and angry and hungry and constipated, why did they all have this desperate need for human contact? Hunan interaction? Couldn’t they just exist in their own little atmosphere? They were never really alone anyways. Who knew, he guessed.
The Ad-Driven Love of a Father for a Son
The Dad they’d sent me was everything I’d imagined – a pronounced graying at the temples that framed a face which appeared to have only just recently left youth behind. He had this wide smile that came with a booming laugh you could hear from a mile away. You could tell from his eyes that if on the rare occasion he might be forced to lose his temper, you would not make the same mistake twice.
Island Story
The girl lived on a rock in the middle of the water. Tall buildings rose on the land to one side, and buildings and smokestacks squatted on the other shore. She could see the smokestacks from her bedroom window, and hear the squall of seagulls from time to time. The rock was old, very old, and ran in a long thin strip from north to south. People had buried their dead long ago on the rock, and exiled their paupers, and lepers, and men with the blinding sickness. Now men with no legs roamed the streets, in packs or alone.
Back to School
Robert Downey Jr. took me Back to School (1986) this week. In the film, Thornton Melon (played by Rodney Dangerfield) decides to take a break from his lucrative Tall & Fat clothing enterprise to bond with his nerdy son at college and advance his high-school-level education. Hilarity ensues in a series of one-liners and oh-so-many puns.
4:10
JP’s hands are shaking. The scars on his hand – where their father threw the scalding water onto the boys when they were just six and eight – glare at me white against his tan skin. He goes to set the coffee mug on the counter but it rattles too much so he clutches it tighter.
“That’s George’s backpack.” He gestures with his chin, then goes to take a sip from the mug and can’t seem to get it to his lips. I take a sip of my tea.
Weird Science
I’ve always been an unwavering John Hughes fan. Unabashedly so. Truth be told, the man was a pop culture powerhouse. From the The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (which he wrote, directed, and produced) to the Home Alone movies (writer/producer), Hughes made a lasting imprint on several generations of viewers. I’ll even admit to watching the live action Dennis the Menace film more times than I can count, loving it increasingly more with each viewing. Somehow, despite my years of John Hughes cinephilia, I had never seen Weird Science, his much-beloved 1985 classic. Finally, with the guiding hand of Robert Downey Jr., I accomplished the task this past week.
True Love Travels
What is love but a push in the wrong direction? We took a left turn, a right turn – whichever it was that sent us in the wrong direction.
And I was never impressed by horses. As I stood with you, once, on the laneside while they passed – my disdain, you thought, reserved for the riders. What was I doing there, anyway? Why was I out in the woods? The open air, the countryside, the animals: a similar stink.
Tuff Turf
Tuff Turf (1985) is a bit like Pretty in Pink—both are high school movies rife with class issues and pumping synth riffs. But imagine Pretty in Pink set in the Valley. Andrew McCarthy’s character—now the protagonist—has just moved to town. Due to hard times, rather than buying another big, fancy house, they’ve relocated to the wrong side of the tracks. Give him a touch of Kevin Bacon à la Footloose and add a sprinkle of Ferris Bueller can-do, and you have Morgan Hiller (played by James Spader). Molly Ringwald’s character—with a far lesser role—is played by 80s Coke Whore Barbie and dates the leader of a Warriors-style gang. Ringwald and McCarthy fall in love. Class conflict and gang-related violence ensue.
Texas
by Jackie Doherty
I finished college in December. Chicago winters had made me as miserable as community responsibilities had made me sleepless, so I decided upon graduation to run southward to Austin, Texas, in the name of self-discovery. I took a suitcase and a guitar, checked into a hostel, and was so excited about [...]
Baby It’s You
Only days into 2010, it is impossible to predict exactly what will set the new year apart. That being said, with Sherlock Holmes pulling in major revenue as we speak and the second installment of Iron Man a merely months away, one trend has already emerged: 2010 is the year of Robert Downey Jr. In honor of his reign over blockbusterdom, I have decided to watch every Robert Downey Jr. film available on Netflix—from earliest to most recent.
Ice Age
By Nicole Martorana
Something in her eyes said ‘No more. No longer. I don’t want to. That’s all.’ and it made me feel that this was the end. Worse than the shouting, worse than the awkward TV-watching in separate rooms, there was the silence – the endless, impossible, unbearable silence. It buried us all and we [...]
On a Toupee
Phil remembered the specifics of the day he went shopping for a toupee. It was a crisp day, one of the first of autumn. A faded baseball cap covered his burning shame. Phil considered the generous patch of flesh on his skull an ode to his many failures.
The toupee store smelled like an OTB. A blend of cigar smoke and squandered paychecks. The clerk that came to help looked shockingly akin to the forty-five year old Denny’s manager who had just sat Phil in his usual booth-for-one, to eat his usual Sunday morning Moons-Over-My-Hammy…
Covenant Confirmers Ministries
by Jared Davidson
November 26, 2006:
Morning Worship
Welcome & Prayer Pastor Ron Baptiste
Today begins the Motorcycle Rally & Outreach Revival at Covenant Confirmers Ministries, and I’m the only worshipper not wearing leather. Most folks, men and women [...]