Philadelphia Movies

I’m headed to Philadelphia next week with my family for spring break—yes, Philadelphia, famed spring break destination. We’re going there as part of our “cities other than New York City” tour. No shade to NYC—I lived there for over twenty years—but we’re trying to introduce our kids, who love and miss the bustle of city life, to other major metropolitan areas. So far we’ve visited Toronto, Montreal, and Boston. Chicago is where I’d like to go next because I’ve never been. I’m also curious about Quebec City, which isn’t that far when you live in Maine.

Even though Mike and I both have family living outside Philadelphia, and even though Mike is a huge Eagles fan, and even though Abbott Elementary is our favorite family TV show, we rarely go into Philadelphia when we visit Pennsylvania. So this time, we’ve decided to stay in Philly for a few days to get a feel for it. To prepare, we watched several YouTube videos about Reading Terminal Market (a major food mecca) as well as movies based in Philly. Except for The Philadelphia Story, most of the films were pretty dark, thematically. Philadelphia is not a city that people tend to romanticize. Nevertheless, I enjoyed my foray into the cinema of Philadelphia.

Birdy (1984)
Directed by Alan Parker
Written by Sandy Kroopf, Jack Behr, and based on William Wharton’s novel, Birdy
2 hours; Streaming on Roku/VOD $3.99

A friend recommended this under-the-radar 1980s drama. I’d never heard of it and was intrigued by the premise: Birdy, a Vietnam veteran (Matthew Modine), returns home after being a prisoner of war. He refuses to speak, so the doctors enlist his childhood best friend Al (Nicolas Cage), also an injured vet, to try to get through to him. Al immediately recognizes that his old friend is pretending to be a bird; Birdy earned his nickname for his obsession with pigeons, which he raised in his backyard as a teenager. Much of the movie is a flashback to Al and Birdy’s childhood in Philadelphia. Of all the films on this list, Birdy gives the most comprehensive and loving glimpse of the city. You see the backyards, houses, public transportation, high school, waterways, and industrial areas. Al and Birdy are an unlikely pair—Al is popular, girl-crazy, extroverted, and easygoing, while Birdy is a loner, introverted, and something of a mystic. I liked how Birdy is centered on the friendship between the two men rather than “curing” Birdy. The only thing that didn’t ring true were the flashbacks to the Vietnam War. This may have to do with the fact that the original source material—William Wharton’s novel of the same title—was based on WW2 vets (see Janet Maslin’s review, linked below). I think some of the original DNA of the novel comes through in the story and makes the time period feels slightly off. But this is a very small complaint. Birdy is an oddball gem that’s worth seeking out. IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

Philadelphia (1993)
Directed by Jonathan Demme
Written by Ron Nyswaner
2 hours 5 minutes; Streaming on Amazon Prime/VOD $3.99

Philadelphia was one of the first mainstream movies to address the AIDS crisis. It’s a courtroom drama based on a real life discrimination suit brought against a Philadelphia law firm that fired one of its attorneys because they suspected he had AIDS. I saw Philadelphia when it came out—I was 13—but had almost no memory of it except for one scene, when Tom Hanks listens to Maria Callas. This passage is the film’s most emotional; it’s when you realize that Hank’s character, Andrew Bennett, the lawyer who was unfairly fired, is not going to live much longer and might not even see his discrimination suit to its end. What I had forgotten about the scene is that Denzel Washington, who plays Bennett’s lawyer, Joe Miller, is also in it, listening. He says almost nothing, but he’s a proxy for the audience as he, too, realizes that Andrew really is going to die—and at far, far too young an age. Hanks got the Academy Award for playing Bennett, but Washington is right there with him in almost every scene. Of course, the Academy is always going to honor the actor playing against type—thus Happy Hanks playing a dying man wins over Washington playing a winning prosecutor—but I was struck, upon rewatching, by how Philadelphia is as much a story about Washington’s Joe Miller coming to terms with homophobia—his own and society’s—as it is about Hank’s Andrew Bennett fighting for his rights. IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

Mikey and Nicky (1976)
Written and Directed by Elaine May
1 hour 46 minutes; Streaming on HBO, Criterion, Kanopy/VOD $3.99

Some regard Mikey and Nicky as Elaine May’s best film, an underappreciated masterpiece of the 1970s. For me, I think it’s going to be one of those movies that I remember for a long time, even as I didn’t really enjoy watching it. What I liked: the acting, the directing, and the writing. What I didn’t like: the cinematography. Oh, this movie looked awful. The camera never seemed to be in the right place. There were hardly any establishing shots—and I don’t think this was on purpose. From what I’ve read about the production, May shot hours upon hours of footage of the actors improvising and then edited from that. The story unfolds over one chaotic night, following two friends, Mikey (Peter Falk) and Nicky (John Cassavetes), as they try to outrun a hitman who is after Nicky. Falk and Cassavetes genuinely seem like old friends but there is also something unstable in their relationship—an element of betrayal. They’re both gangsters, but small-time ones, and May doesn’t glamorize their lifestyle one bit. Every single person in this world seems real, and there is not a line of dialogue that doesn’t seem true. IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

The Philadelphia Story (1940)
Directed by George Cukor
Written by Donald Ogden Stewart, Philip Barry, Waldo Salt
1 hour 52 minutes; Streaming Amazon Prime/VOD $3.99

I don’t know what is wrong with our children, but they both got bored watching this. Maybe they would prefer the musical version, High Society, with Grace Kelly and Frank Sinatra? This version—with Katherine Hepburn, Cary Grant, and Jimmy Stewart—is my favorite. What’s not to like? There are so many costumes and pithy lines. I love drunk Hepburn saying, “Put me in your pocket, Mike.” And then the next morning, Ms. Imbrie consoling her when she’ s hungover: “We all go haywire at times and if we don’t, maybe we ought to.” I don’t know what this movie has to say about Philadelphia except that it’s home to some fancy houses with fancy people inside, acting like fancy fools. Or as reporter Macauley Connor (Jimmy Stewart) observes, from his ironic perch: “The prettiest sight in this fine pretty world is the privileged class enjoying its privileges.” IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

Rocky (1976)
Directed by John G. Alvidsen
Written by Sylvester Stallone
2 hours; Streaming Amazon Prime/VOD $2.99

Obviously, I had to revisit Rocky. I had seen it before, as a teenager. I believe I may have liked it more then, when I was first getting into running and athletic conditioning. Now, I find the boxing scenes a lot more upsetting. One thing that surprised me upon rewatching was how it seemed like an indie movie. Rocky came across like a quirky guy. I forgot he had pet turtles and that he was a nervous, talkative type. The cinematography was much more expressive than I remembered, and so were the performances. It’s a classic for a reason. IMDB * REVIEW * TRAILER

There’s a new exhibit coming to the Philadelphia Art Museum about the Rocky statue, an artwork that the museum has had to learn to love. Sadly, I’m going to miss the exhibit’s opening by two days. (Gift link)

The other night I spent an hour on YouTube watching different live versions of Bonnie Raitt singing one of her signature tunes, Angel From Montgomery. Here are some favorites (and I recommend listening in this order): Bonnie Raitt solo on Stephen Colbert in 2020; Bonnie Raitt with her band in 1976; Bonnie Raitt singing it as a duet with Brandi Carlile in 2024.

The oldest chicken in the world is named Gertie, loves jazz, and lives in Portland, Maine. (Gift link)

R.I.P. Hampshire College

My good friend Jen Acker’s novel Surrender, came out this week. It’s about goats, farming, and finding new love in midlife. (I am especially eager to read the ending because she only showed us the first half of the book in our writing group.)

My novel, We Were Pretending, is on sale this month on Kindle for $2.99—cheaper than an iced coffee!