Posted by Todd on July 10, 2009 · 16 Comments
The whole family went recently to Legoland. Everyone had a wonderful time. Kit (6) discovered the thrill and terror of roller-coasters, a thrill and terror Sam (8) is not quite ready for, in spite of being 18 months older than Kit. Kit rode with me on The Dragon six times, and Coaster-Saurus once with her mother.
Last night, I read Roller Coaster by Marla Frazee to the kids, which they both enjoyed quite a bit, and the following conversation ensued.
KIT. I LOVE roller-coasters!
TODD. I know you do.
SAM. (a little fearful) Do I have to ever ride a roller-coaster?
TODD.No. You never have to ride a roller-coaster. There is only one power on Earth that can compel you to ride a roller-coaster, and that is: a pretty teen-age girl.
(KIT lights up at this idea. SAM, not so much.)
KIT. (excited) REALLY?
SAM. (fearful) Really? How?
TODD. (to SAM) One day, you’ll be a teenage boy, and you’ll be at an amusement park with a bunch of your friends, and a pretty teenage girl will say "Will you go on a roller-coaster with me?" and you will have no choice — you will have to go.
SAM. Really?
TODD. Absolutely.
KIT. WOW! Will that happen to ME?
TODD. Well, for you it will be different. One day, you’ll be a pretty teenage girl, and you’ll be at an amusement park with a date, and you’ll want him to feel all confident and strong, and you’ll say "Will you please protect me from the big scary roller-coaster?" and inside you’ll be thinking "Yeah!"
(This very much strikes Kit’s fancy. She immediately tries it out.)
KIT. "Will you protect me from the big scary roller-coaster?" "Yeah!" (She falls down laughing.) Will that really happen to me?
TODD. Kit, I promise you, you are going to have more boyfriends than you can shake a stick at.
SAM. Then why don’t you just take two sticks?
Posted by Todd on July 2, 2009 · 18 Comments
It’s been 20 years since I’ve seen Gone With the Wind, the jewel in the crown of the Hollywood studio system, released in its pinnacle year of 1939. When I last saw it, in 1989, it was under the most ideal circumstances imaginable — a restored print, at Radio City Music Hall, on a screen 80 feet high. (And, it so happens, sitting next to director James Ivory. A coincidence let me hasten to add; he was not my date.) The impact of David O. Selznick’s lush, meticulous production was immediate and overwhelming, but the callow young writer inside me dismissed the plot as simple romance and soap opera. I’m happy to announce that I greatly shortchanged the value of this American epic. I used to say that Gone With the Wind was okay for, you know, girls, but The Godfather was clearly the superior movie because it contains a powerful socio-political subtext. Well, more fool me.
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