Nothing Happens!

The title is my cry of distress for most movies that I don’t like. For reasons unknown to me, I’ve actually seen a number of these movies. If someone else had told me beforehand that nothing happened, I would have avoided them. But no one gives me a heads-up about these things, so I’m forced to watch a movie where NOTHING HAPPENS. For example, a group of friends and I watch “My Dinner with Andre” on one of our friend’s suggestion. The opening credits followed Wallace (“Inconceivable!”) Shawn as he walked to a restaurant, where he met his friend. The rest of the movie used about three shots, and showed both men talking. Just talking. Sometimes listening. NOTHING HAPPENED! I imagine it would be a nice experience to live in, but it was terrible to watch. Similar but opposite to how Die Hard would be terrible to live through, but an awesome movie. I can’t believe I got suckered into watching it (My Dinner with Andre, not Die Hard. I'm glad I watched Die Hard. Several times).

On the other hand, there are some good movies where nothing much happens. By that, I mean there are no high speed chases, no rocket propelled grenades, no bone-crunching martial arts. Just a good story (beyond “two people talking”) and good acting, and some humour. I’m also a sucker for a happy ending, so that affects my judgement at time.

Possibly my favourite movie where nothing happens is Field of Dreams. If you haven’t seen it, it’s about a farmer who hears voices in his head, telling him to build a baseball field. He does, and the ghosts of dead baseball players come play on it, eventually helping him to reunite with his father, with James Earl Jones coming along for about half the movie. Not a whole lot happens (there’s a road trip, but it’s by adults, not college kids). The tensest moment is when a child starts choking on a hotdog. Still, I like it. The music is great, Kevin Costner is actually good, and there’s enough humour in it to keep me entertained. Plus, it has a sappy ending, so there’s that.

Of course, there’s a lot of sports movies that might fall into the “Nothing Happens” category, but the argument can also be made that because sports are a metaphor for war, there’s technically a battle going on. Also, most sports movie have a lot of action, it just might not be guns, cars, or fists (except for boxing/mma movies). They also employ the quick camera cuts to imply intense action, combined with blood-pumping music. They’re basically using techniques from action films, only about sports. Sometimes action movies use these as well when they don’t have much action but want to pretend they do. For instance, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen had about an hour of space to fill before the climactic battle. So they used quick cuts, close-ups, and fast music to imply tension when the characters were pretty much just talking or travelling.

Anyway, another movie I like is The World’s Fastest Indian. It stars Anthony Hopkins as a New Zealander who travels to the Utah speedway in the 1960’s to break the motorcycle speed record. It follows him on his trip and all the bureaucracy he has to deal with, as well as the many people who help him on his way. I didn’t get to watch the whole thing, so I’ll have to make the effort to catch it again.

I like 10 Things I Hate About You and not just because it has the geeky guy getting the girl and putting Julia Stiles on my radar. It’s really funny. Yes, it’s a teen movie, and has music that’s now ten years out of date. It’s still funny.

I saw Mickey Blue Eyes on a plane. Normally, the experience of watching anything on a plane ruins it. The small screen, tinny headphones, and crowded seats tend to affect my opinion of the movie (even though they shouldn’t). Still, I remember liking it. Maybe Hugh Grant charmed me, I don’t know. Maybe I’m a bigger fan of James Caan than I thought. Who knows?

The last movie I want to bring to your attention is October Sky. It’s about a high school student in the 50’s who wants to break free of the mining town he’ll be trapped in. Inspired by Sputnik flying overhead, he sets about building rockets. This eventually takes him to the state-wide science fair (a movie event often limited to Disney movies for preteens). It’s not very funny. There are some explosions, but they all involve toy rockets. Someone dies quickly, someone dies slowly. It does have a good ending, though. And terrific music. And some good, solid algebra (I’m not-so-secretly a math geek as well as a movie geek).

So yeah. A movie doesn’t have to have violence, or comedy, or car chases, or any number of other things to appeal to me. But they should.