Monthly Archives: January 2019

I Always Come Back to Up in the Air

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You may have noticed that it’s been a little quiet around here lately. I have a habit of not forcing myself to write unless I feel a great surge of inspiration. I wouldn’t say that this is the best way to complete your next piece as a writer, as it’s a good rule of thumb to fight through these periods of “writer’s block” and just get something down (a rule that I am admittedly very bad at following).

My goal for the future is to break this habit. My goal for today is to tell you about the surge of inspiration that hit me on Monday while I was taking the train downtown. It involves George Clooney and a little film known as Up in the Air. Why did a movie from 2009 randomly pop in my head while I was on the light rail? No idea. This is one of the reasons that I liken films to old friends: you can go months or even years without coming across them, but one day they just appear again and you instantly reconnect with them.

Maybe part of the reason it was this particular film is that Up in the Air is all about connections: the ones we don’t make, the ones we do and wish we hadn’t, and the startling realization that life just isn’t the same without them.

In order to truly explore this, I am going to go in-depth with the plot details here. If you continue, you’ve already seen the movie or just don’t care about spoilers. Power to you.

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Penny Marshall, Awakenings and Living Your Life

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A lot of people remember her as the Golden Globe Award winning actress from Laverne & Shirley, one of the most beloved sitcoms of the 70’s and early 80’s. I watched Big all the time when I was a kid, so I remember her as the director who turned a small boy into Tom Hanks. Others may recall her witty cameo from Hocus Pocus (possibly without even realizing it was her), who as “The Master’s Wife” cracked wise and told those witches to get the hell out of her house. Thanks to A League of Their Own, I always wait for Tom Hanks to show up and chastise someone for crying in baseball whenever I see a person crying in baseball.

Whatever your memories of the indelible Penny Marshall are, either her career as an actress, her collaborations with Hanks or anything in between, there is no disputing the impact that she had on both television and film. A trailblazer if there ever was one, an entertainer with a rather underrated body of work and whom unbeknownst to me was also a major sports fan, even possessing season tickets to both the Lakers and Clippers. I’ve been watching basketball for years and never knew, but it was likely both her intention to stay out of the spotlight during those games and the camera only cutting to Jack Nicholson at courtside that caused me to miss that.

Marshall’s desire to avoid that kind of attention while still endearing herself to those around her encapsulates her career as a director rather well. When I heard she had sadly passed away just a few weeks ago, I made a mental note to rewatch Awakenings because I view it as the ultimate Penny Marshall film.

My reasoning is simple: it’s likely the greatest movie that you have never seen.

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