ot/ are Tom Hanks' stories just your type?

THAT THING YOU DO—a good Hanks starter. Still, don’t know what it is that she does....🤔

millar70 klawrencio79

a new national holiday!




Guilty Pleasures and the Meaning of ‘Crownesgiving’
observer.com/2018/11/guilty-pleasures-and-the-meaning-of-crownesgiving/


Wait, you think I should watch this movie?

Absolutely. From what I’ve described, you might imagine that this movie is bad or boring or unwatchable, but it’s not at all. The result is something fascinating. I get how most people shrugged it off for its pleasant, genial shine, but give it a fixed eye, and it can foster this constant state of amusement. You watch, your mouth agape, constantly squeaking, “Wait, what?” All while it continues to invite your curiosity about why these creative decisions were made in the first place. It all feeds the central question of “why make that choice?” It reminds us that movies are hard to make. So much of Larry Crowne, which is absolutely dripping in good intentions, reminds us of all the hard-earned lessons that actually go into crafting functional, entertaining stories. In a weird way, it is exactly the kind of movie I most advocate watching—because it invites so much thought and discussion.

Which brings us to the weird way Larry Crowne came into my life…



The Annual Tradition

My friends Andrew and Nick have been watching Larry Crowne every Thanksgiving for the past six years.

Yes, you read that correctly. “Crownesgiving” is now an annual holiday. How did it come to be? Andrew explains, “It was actually when it came out on HBO Go. Nick and I watched the trailer and became weirdly obsessed with its seemingly milquetoast quality. And so we just wanted to see it.” (I should mention Andrew watches pretty much everything).


He goes on, “We didn’t mean for it to be the night before Thanksgiving—that’s just when it lined up. But we were totally caught off guard by all the bizarre behavior. And at some point I made the joke about how we were celebrating ‘Crownesgiving.’ Then next year rolled around, and we joked that we should do it again. And since we like to run jokes into the ground, we actually did it. More people came. And then it just ballooned from there.”


Now it’s a fairly big event for which a ton of people get together. Everyone grabs some drinks, but it’s not exactly a rowdy affair because it’s always about the people who have never seen it. We all sit around as they take in this bizarre, strange, genial movie. It offers a perfect forum for making jokes, and yet you can still follow along with it if you miss a beat.

Crownesgiving works. And it’s become one of my favorite nights of the year. I mean that sincerely. But, of course, when I tweeted about being excited for the event, Twitter got all Twitter and had a variety of strong reactions. And not just because some people were assuming I was being cynical or making fun of “bad movies.” One person wrote, “I think a little less of you now,” then went on to complain about how they didn’t think the movie was any good at all. These reactions show how we get so caught up in evaluating “worth” that we forget that the most important conversations about our engagement with films have nothing to do with worth at all.

Engagement is about the act of engaging with the material. The deeper you go with it, the more you get out of it. The reaction of “wait, what?” isn’t just a joke. If you think about it, it’s literally the first step of analysis. And Larry Crowne is kind of a perfect movie because it’s all about questioning that which people normally glaze right over. The movie invites you to analyze and dig into it without ever being boring or dangerous or cynical. It gets you to notice the way it does things that other movies never do (and often for good reason).

Most of all, I love Crownesgiving because it inspires so much passionate, gawking, funny conversation in its wake. There’s nothing ironic about this reality. It’s even oddly celebratory. Which is why I think you, too, should watch Larry Crowne this Thanksgiving. And you don’t have to call it a guilty pleasure.

nope. but i wish i could go to that party!!!!



i'm noted here for my larry crowne passion: check 1:01:10+ 

soundcloud.com/consequence-of-sound/hanks-for-the-memories-episode-12-larry-crowne