Almost Famous

I love Almost Famous. I really do. From the opening scene of William and his mother walking down the street, discussing To Kill A Mockingbird to the last shot of the bus driving away into the orange sunset, I love this movie. I love it for so many reasons.

I love it because it has everything-humor, drama, heartbreak, rock and roll. The comedy is funny, the sadness is deep, the music is good. Try, just try, to find a better heartbreak scene than the one where William tells Penny that the man she loves sold her to another band for $50 and a case of beer. Penny turns away, takes a moment to collect herself, wipes a tear away. She looks back at William, smiling as she says "what kind of beer?" But everyone knows that she's using humor to cover her sadness, that she is always putting up a front to the world so no one can see the real girl. She asks what kind of beer, and she smiles as a tear rolls down her cheek.

I love it because I relate to the main character, William. I have always been the young one, the naive one, the one who is swept up in the whirlwind of a world of older, more mature yet still immature people who see something in me that they like. For some reason, I don't connect well with people my age. Like William, I am embarrassingly and overtly earnest, a trait I am coming to terms with. In the film, William is wide-eyed as he walks into concerts, into parties, into his version of heaven where angels are scantily clad Band Aides and the gods are the men with the guitars and the flowing hair. The reason the film is so potent is because William finds a place to belong through music. In the guitar solos and intense drum beats, William finds magic and wonder that, for him, exist no where else. I am the same way with movies. That's why I love this one so much. I experience a feeling unlike any other as I watch a character experience a feeling unlike any other. I'm watching myself on screen.

Multiple times, I found myself laughing, but it was a different laugh than usual. It was a laugh of empathy, of understanding. It was a laugh that came from the fact that I knew exactly what William was feeling. I heard echos of my mother in the way his mother guilted him for not calling everyday- "you told me you would call me twice a day. You told me you wouldn't miss more than one test..." I understand the mistake of introducing two people to each other when have already met. I know what it's like to have too much responsibility overtake you suddenly, and all you want to do is cry. I understand loving something so much and wanting to succeed and not knowing what's going on and feeling awkward at parties and singing while driving and having an overprotective mother and seeing the world only as that one thing that you love the most. I know William because in so many ways, I am William.

I love the movie for more reasons, like when Penny Lane dances alone among the trash and debris in the empty venue. Like when Penny Lane does anything, for that matter. Like when William's mother scares Russell into submission, but then tells him that he still has the potential to be a man of substance. Like when William finds out that he's 11 instead of 12. Like when... well, you get the idea. There are myriad reasons why I love this film. But mostly, I love this film because I am a part of it. Because it is a part of me.