Motoring

A few weeks ago Don and I were at Bar Coastal (his east side sports bar; he has a separate west side bar he visits as well and never the twain shall meet) watching a baseball game (Red Sox, duh) and Tom Petty's "American Girl," came on the stereo (iPod? Satellite radio? Internet jukebox?). I cannot hear that song without thinking of two things: 1) my college sorority WOO! days in which friends and I would paint our toenails baby blue and listen to music and claim OMG THIS IS TOTALLY MY SONG, during which I may or may not have WOOed over American Girl, and 2) Silence of the Lambs. I love Brooke Smith and I loved her in Silence of the Lambs and I loved her in Weeds and I loved her in Matilda & Matilda, and if I watched Grey's Anatomy I'm sure I would have loved her in that as well but to me, she is forever and always linked to Buffalo Bill, the lotion in the basket, and American Girl. Silence of the Lambs came out in what? 1990? Nearly twenty years later that song and that scene are inextricably linked in my mind.

I asked Don for some examples of what he thought were the best uses of music in movies, and over the course of the following five innings we circled round the topic, refining the criteria and making mental notes of items to fact check later on IMDB. Without much thought or hesitation, we both immediately mentioned the scene in Boogie Nights with Alfred Molina, the coke deal, and Night Ranger. I threw out Layla playing over Goodfellas and the bus scene in Almost Famous in which everyone sings Tiny Dancer. We both agreed that Martin Scorcese, Quentin Tarantino and Cameron Crowe were probably the directors who best use music; the effing stereo over John Cusack's head is so iconic it's disqualified from my list while Gimme Shelter played over the beginning of The Departed definitely earned a spot. Narrowing down examples of music in Tarantino movies is challanging: Don went with Urge Overkill singing Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon while I was torn between Son of a Preacher Man and Stuck in the Middle With You (from Resevoir Dogs).

There is a giant soft spot in my heart for the movie Beautiful Girls and I love the Afghan Whigs in it; Don nominated the Ghetto Boyz song/scene from Office Space (because what is funnier than Michael Bolton wailing on the printer? Not much.) I love the moment in High Fidelity in which John Cusask says, Want me to sell 10 copies of this album? Watch this, and then plays Dry the Rain by the Beta Band. We had this conversation shortly after John Hughes' death and had a hard time choosing between If You Leave (OMD) and Don't You Forget About Me (Simple Minds) and certainly Twist & Shout gets a nod for Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

Eye of the Tiger goes without saying, pretty much...I love Bill Murray singing Roxy Music's More Than This in the karaoke scene of Lost in Translation (warning: recurring theme. I love everything about Lost in Translation.)...I can't remember who brought it up, but The Bangals, Hazy Shade of Winter in Less Than Zero got a mention...Which is all just to say: We're working on our final lists.

Watch this space.