True Stories Movie Not really, But What A Ride!
Talking Heads singer David Byrne plays host to this bizarre patchwork of tabloid-inspired tales, set in the fictional town of Virgil, Texas. Cruising the streets in his cherry-red drop-top, Byrne introduces viewers to the local eccentrics gearing up for the town’s 150th anniversary. They include a community leader (Spalding Gray) with a thing for veggies, a woman (Swoosie Kurtz) so lazy she won’t leave her bed, a lovelorn country singer (John Goodman) and more! (Google blurb)
Not the Indiana University Cinema blurb this time, for a change of pace. But what can you say? It was Monday night’s showing at the Cinema, and it was fun. Except of course the tales in TRUE STORIES aren’t really true, but they almost could be. They’re tales of middle American individuals and families that ought to be true, the eccentrics and characters you likely met yourself when you were growing up — and that you still might be now if you [image error]pause to look. Well, maybe not quite the fashion show at the local mall, but even it sort of. And it’s clean, gentle fun, enhanced this time, I thought, by seeing on the big screen in the theater partly because of the people around me, picking the humor up, laughing out loud at times but never raucously, always with its own kind of politeness.
It was a good film for an unseasonably warm day at its afternoon best, but for which the rains had come when we got out. A residual warmness on the walk home, and even the rain more of a friendly drizzle. And one thing I noted, but kind of strangely: The film, really a series of vignettes, has at its closest to a plot the fictional town of Virgil, Texas preparing for its 150th anniversary, culminating in a parade and a nighttime talent show, the latter of which gave me a sudden reminder — and maybe a new understanding as well — of President Trump’s inaugural concert three years ago. Small town acts in spirit, yet for the performers a kind of love too. But in overall context still with a touch of weirdness that gave the feeling that this is a film that might be most enjoyed if one watches it having been mildly soused.
