When your life resembles an earlier movie

[Rowdy Roddy McDowall]

A serious question: for good or ill, have events in your life recalled an earlier film of any genre or quality?

Here's the first/greatest similarity I can personally think of: FIRSTBORN with Peter Weller was released in 1984, a few months following BUCAKAROO BANZAI, and Weller was a magnificently-manipulative bastard who was five percent more evil in each of his scenes during the second half. No film I'd seen at that time seemed to tighten the screws as slowly and surely until Scorsese remade CAPE FEAR.

Then from 1989 to 1996 I seemed to be trapped in an endless remake with many others in my family, including my parents.........because one of my older brothers was basically Peter Weller without the drug subplot. It eventually ended well, even though it took seven tense years to resolve.

No need for further specifics, except to say that The Man Who Wouldn't Leave finally did when things got too physical. No one was seriously hurt. (FIRSTBORN ended when Teri Garr's son crotch-kicked Weller, which actually got him to leave without seeking revenge.) Since it was the end of the movie, Weller got the message at last. My brother took a hell of a lot longer.

Second example: when another, younger brother of mine switched political allegiances almost overnight in 2016, I couldn't help but think of Paula Prentiss's sudden turnabout in THE STEPFORD WIVES.

Your examples, please.

 

[Oddish]

My life's not interesting enough to make a movie out of.

 

[cardinal biggles]

Does it really resemble the movie that much, or are you simply using the film as a framework to cope with real-life fuckery you had to deal with? "This is so awful it's incomprehensible, but if I compare my brother to Peter Weller and me to Teri Garr's kid, I can wrap my head around it better."

 

[flandry84]

Some unfunny tragi-comedy.
I’m having a week where I can’t win for losing.

 

[The Wormhole]

I've compared the start of working an overnight shift to the opening scene of The Hunt for Red October. You stand there, commenting on how cold and hard life can be, until finally declaring "it's time." Then the Russian choir starts and you begin working.

 

[HIjol]

My entry is not exactly made yet, but if you want a great (?) mini-series of Love, Love Lost, Progress, Egress, Failure and Success with a little bitty bit of the Tribble/Quadrotriticale scene, help me crowdfund the soon to be LackLuster...er...BlockBuster release of HIjol1 - 1701

 

[Owain Taggart]

Not me, but i have an Aunt and Uncle who were professional wildlife photographers (now retired), having published many books over their careers, and they had told me once that The Gods Must be Crazy felt like it had been based on one of their many adventures.

 

[Rowdy Roddy McDowall]

Does it really resemble the movie that much, or are you simply using the film as a framework to cope with real-life fuckery you had to deal with? "This is so awful it's incomprehensible, but if I compare my brother to Peter Weller and me to Teri Garr's kid, I can wrap my head around it better."

I'll say it was similar, especially in its tension, while the real variation of it extended beyond belief. Deva vu times 2222. FIRSTBORN's a well-done exercise in fictional tension, and nobody stares down protagonists like Peter Weller. And it's well-done enough to watch again, since I don't expect to go through that again. Weller's a much better actor than my seven-year-itchy brother. At least the main character only had to put up with it for 120 minutes. But it's not a coping mechanism, then or now.

When my brother was ejected at last it was rather CRIMSON TIDEish to boot. Nobody killed or punched, but pretty satisfying at the time....perhaps cathartic.

For your own personal examples, if they deal with sore points, they needn't be as specific unless it suits you.

 

[Tosk]

I try not to think about it too much these days but back when I was in high school, a friend of mine was showing me his new car when there was a drive-by shooting and he was killed. I had no idea what to do so I jumped in the car and sped off and accidentally went back to nineteen fifty-five.

 

[the G-man]

Well, my father drove a red ford pick-up truck, married a woman (my mother) with large feet and sold propane and propane accessories...but I never became a prop comic or had a Laotian girlfriend.

 

[flandry84]

/\Most excellent profile picture mate!

Not Boggs..Maxwell?

 

[Timewalker]

I had a Scavenger Hunt-type moment (okay, several) one drizzly Sunday afternoon while working at the front counter at the local wildlife sanctuary interpretive centre. I was there alone, as the two interpreters had gone off to patrol part of the trail system and wouldn't be back for awhile.

Everything was quiet until a trio of costumed people walked in...

Them: We're looking for a used tea bag and an acorn.

Me:

Them: We're on a scavenger hunt, and this is the closest place we could think of that's open.

Me (definitely not gonna ask about the weird costumes, while filing the information away that one of the people was on the board of governors at the college I was attending at the time; he was dressed as a very large baby): Sorry, the only used tea bags here would be in the garbage. I can't let you go through the garbage.

Them: But do you have any acorns?

Me (suddenly envisioning scavenger hunters blundering around the sanctuary and possibly falling into the lake or scaring the animals or getting into all sorts of other trouble visitors aren't supposed to do): There's a yard in the neighborhood where you could find some. It's on the corner of ___ and ___ and the tree is next to the fence. Just take from what's fallen outside the fence and do NOT enter the yard.

Them: Are you sure you don't have any used tea bags?

Me: We sell tea. It's 25 cents each and you could wet it in the drinking fountain and call it 'used'.

Them:

(one of them handed me a quarter, took the tea bag, and set it in the drinking fountain; when it was wet enough, they left, thanking me for solving their problem)

10 minutes later...

Two more costumed people show up. They want a used tea bag and an acorn. Conversation goes as above.

Another 5 minutes goes by...

Another trio of people, not all of whom are costumed, come in. They also want a used tea bag and an acorn. I wonder how many more tea bags I'm going to sell that afternoon. Thankfully nobody is adamant about rooting through the garbage or going out into the sanctuary to look for acorns. They take their sopping wet tea bag and leave.

A few minutes later, two women come in. They make a beeline for the counter.

Me: Let me guess - you want a used tea bag and an acorn.

Them: We're not the first?

Me: You're the fourth team to come here.

Them: (thinking that by now I must be out of used tea bags and acorns)

Me: I'll tell you what I told everyone else, since I'm not playing favorites. (explanation follows about buying a tea bag, using the fountain, and going to the address where I sincerely hope nobody has trespassed; I know that's where they could find acorns since I walked past that yard every day for years on the way to school)

Them (as they leave with their wet tea bag): Thank you!

Another 10 minutes or so... another group... same conversation, by now I've sold $1.25 in tea bags...

The door opens again and I'm wondering just how many people are on this scavenger hunt, anyway. But thankfully it's the two interpreters back from inspecting the trails. They look around, everything's quiet, and I tell them, "You should have been here. I saw the strangest thing..."

Them (excitedly): Did you see a deer? (it's a wildlife sanctuary; anything from a mosquito to a bear could have wandered past)

Me: About a dozen scavenger hunters in weird costumes. They all wanted a used tea bag and an acorn.

Them: Ohno! (envisioning a horde of scavenger hunters getting into trouble out along the trails or getting lost) What did you do?

Me: I sold them the tea bags and told them where to find acorns in the neighborhood a few blocks from the school. They never went into the sanctuary.

Them:

Later at home, when I told my dad about all this, he said, "You should have told them, "There's 92 acres out there. Help yourself."

I think my solution was more professional. While the trails there are usually safe during the day, there are still times when people who don't know their way around can get lost, fall in the lake, or have an accidental meeting with various mammals you really don't want to meet (ie. bobcats). And if memory serves, that was the year when the beaver dam flooded part of one of the trails.

Anyway, I did my best to be helpful while keeping them out of trouble.

At least they didn't have any live animals on their list (anyone who's seen the movie might remember that one item on the list was a live ostrich).

 

[Rowdy Roddy McDowall]

SCAVENGER HUNT was one of Schwarzenegger's earlier mini-roles, wasn't it? I'm not aware of later versions, though they may well exist.

 

[Timewalker]

SCAVENGER HUNT was one of Schwarzenegger's earlier mini-roles, wasn't it? I'm not aware of later versions, though they may well exist.

I just did a quick google. The movie was out in 1979, and Schwarzenegger played a trainer at a gym (the item on the list was, if memory serves, a medicine ball). Schwarzenegger's character assumed the character was there to sign up for training sessions and gave him a free workout - whether he wanted it not.

It has not, to my knowledge, been remade.