ALMOST FAMOUS v.2 review

I just had a very poignant ‘eureka’ moment at my second viewing of Cameron Crowe’s ALMOST FAMOUS....

Everyone is looking at this film right now on the most superficial levels... My first review... shit. It’s all so incredibly clear now for me.... and I can’t believe I didn’t see this movie at all the first time I saw it.

This isn’t about a young fan getting to interview and hang out with a rock-n-roll band... that’s not the movie that made Cameron Crowe say that this is his most deeply personal film yet.

This film... the events, the journey that his character goes through... The band, the music... even the girls... that’s all set dressing... that’s the big boat and the iceberg and all the lost souls in the water....

This movie is about that moment that forever changed Cameron Crowe’s life. The turning point. The place in life where he suddenly found his calling, his drive and his muse. This is a birth of Cameron’s life and it all changed here.

These are those events for him.

And as I saw them unfold tonight, for whatever strange personal association way... I saw this William kid... I saw me... 1996... the Dobie theater. The rock stars.... Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, Richard Linklater. The girls... I’ll call them Rapunzel, Cinderella and Barbarella. The kid with the marker... Quint. Me... I was just a hobbled fanboy. Two canes in both hands...

I was just coming off being paralyzed... I had just begun writing on the site... only 3 months before. That accident for me, reduced me to an emotional state where I figured I would never be known, noone would ever love me and that I would just forever be that guy that people passed and would laugh about later. I didn’t drink, smoke or do drugs. And besides my father I was pretty much alone.

Now... this is pretty much the exact same situation that our fictional ‘William’ found himself in. I had had girlfriends prior to my accident, but with my legs just barely working... unable to drive and having to have Dad walk closely to make sure I didn’t fall... well, I might as well just put the ‘Loser’ sign on me, and leave it at that...

I didn’t go to that Tarantino Film Fest to hob nob with Quentin or Robert or Rick... I went because I loved the movies... I always have and imagine I always will.

My life was very low for me. I was not happy with it, and I wanted to change it. I needed to do something useful with myself... something to fill my days. And when I bought my pass for Quentin’s first film fest... It was just a furlough to fill that time. What happened over that next ten days... sitting in that Egyptian room on second row, second seat from the right side of the aisle... changed my life.

Now I know that sounds ludicrous, but for this William character in ALMOST FAMOUS... a Black Sabbath concert changed his life...

It wasn’t sage advice from Quentin... He was the rock star... The Movie star, director thing. And from my second row seat I saw him spill electric charismatic silly love for film in that room. He wasn’t screaming out, “I AM A GOLDEN GOD!!!!,” but he did scream out while wasted on beer, Jack Daniels and a plum jar of moonshine.... “BURT REYNOLDS IS A SWEATY FUCKING GOD!!!”

And the audience cheered as he backed into the screen and could barely hold his head up right. The three females I mentioned... they were directly charged by what they witnessed... pure unadulterated fans... Not throwing their bodies at Quentin, Quentin had Mira Sorvino with him at the time. But they were there... everyday... 2 hours early... and we’d sit in the food court of the Dobie Mall and we’d chat and talk... we’d tell our secrets, wishes, lives until that point.

They invited me to join their group... At the party that ended it all.... they’d switch places sitting on my lap and playing like in love.... It was silly wonderful fun... and Quentin and Robert and Rick... and especially Quentin... was just so damn cool.

And I could see that affect me, them... everyone around... And when I’d look at the three gals look at Quentin, and saw this... not desire... but hypnotic glazed over sense of glee and happiness to just be in the very presence of.

When Quentin left... I stayed in contact, but the moments just were not as electric as when Quentin was in the room. One of the girls I fell deeply and helplessly puppy dog in love with.... still am, truth be told... and in some weird misbegotten manner, my little simian brain told me that I needed to be famous, successful... COOL.

For I was painfully UNCOOL.

Heh, I have a site that asks the question of me everyday.... AINT IT COOL... and I’ve had moments, but am I intrinsically cool? No. In my natural at ease manner... am I cool? I don’t think so. I’m Harry Knowles... BIG FAN... But there is a perception to some that I am cool, that this site and this person that types and that I have become cool. I’m not. Because when I look in those girls eyes... when I talk and when I speak, they laugh... they giggle... they flirt... But it isn’t that same look.

And when my sister looks at Tarantino and Rodriguez... they’re cool.... perhaps someday I will be. And I think that this movie... is about Cameron Crowe... and his starting place... That moment in his life where he wanted to be more than who he was. Where he wanted to have his Penny Lane look at him with that same adoring worship, cause that’s the way he looked at her.

Today when I look at my Penny Lane... I have that look and someday if I’m lucky I’ll see it staring right back at me. I look in other eyes, other faces... and hope I recognize that look... and reciprocate it.

ALMOST FAMOUS... heh... What a perfect name for folks like me, journalists... critics... those that write about the famous. We write and reflect and study and rub shoulders with... It does make us feel cool, but still you can’t have that all the time. You come back to your lair... you still end up alone in that room with that keyboard and all those observations and thoughts... And you type and spill what dances in your mind for others to read, watch and listen to.

At some point, Cameron Crowe changed... made the turn... got tired of writing about the famous and about others’ works of art and created his own. From watching ALMOST FAMOUS the second time... I guarantee he still thinks about his Penny Lane as he writes and directs.... edits and posts.... Somewhere in his head she is still his initial muse...

My muse... she’s still around, I still talk with her on the phone... share moments of my life with her... check the eyes. I so wish I’d see what I want to see there... but I will continue to write about the reflections I see.... other people’s stories and maybe someday I’ll do that... but not for awhile... I’m not ready for that yet.

NOW... you want proof... It’s well established that Cameron Crowe wrote this William to be him. Now think as you watch this film how emotionally raw the film is for Cameron.... the scene in the bathroom... mere seconds before the lovely ‘let’s deflower the child’ moment... He grabs Penny... puts his hands on her shoulders... looks into her eyes and says, “Penny, I know that I’m not famous, but...” then he’s grabbed. When he is trying to keep her awake... he steals what he feels is his only chance to kiss her.... and tells her semi-catatonic self that he loves her. He can tell everyone but her that he loves her... and at the end of the film.....

HE STILL HASN’T TOLD HER HE LOVES HER...

Now... wherever Ms Penny Lane is... Whatever theater she see’s her William’s movie in... She’ll know he loves her because this entire movie is a love letter to an unrequited love that motivated everything in his life.

Or maybe that’s just a self-reflection of how I interpret this film. Now you talk back monsters... get to ripping my soul apart and laying waste to how pathetic and UNCOOL I am... I’m fairly bare.

And Mr Crowe... if you happen to read this... If this wasn’t what you were doing, thanks for making a work that I could interpret in this manner... cause it allowed me to say to my Penny Lane what I needed to say.