Class Action Park & Showbiz Kids: More Delectable Documentaries

Netflix took care of me during the early months of the pandemic and now I have been subtly shifting towards HBO as they step up their offerings. This week, I watched two of their new documentaries and they were both an engaging and wild ride. So settle in.

Showbiz Kids: Written and directed by Alex Winter (who I was shocked to discover is the same Alex Winter from the Bill & Ted movies - more on those in the near future!), this is a great behind-the-scenes look at what it means to be a child star. Featuring some incredibly well-known faces and candid interviews, this documentary sets out to explore what led these kids into show business in the first place, and the price they paid as they grew up.

The movie starts out by interviewing Diana Serra Cary, who was the famous child star, Baby Peggy, in the 1920s. Between 1921-23, she made over 150 short films and was earning a $1.5 million annual salary by 1924, at the ripe old age of 6. However, thanks to her parents' wasteful spending, the stock market crash in 1929, and general financial mismanagement, she ended up poor in the 1930s and struggled a great deal. A story that is not uncommon among the other child stars interviewed for this film.

We get to hear from Evan Rachel Wood, Henry Thomas (aka the kid from E.T.!), Mara Wilson, Todd Bridges, Milla Jovovich, Wil Wheaton, and Cameron Boyce, a "Disney kid" who seemed to have gone through the ordeal of child stardom more unscathed than everyone else. The stories won't shock you (too much), and the common theme is around missing out on childhood. While other kids were playing with their friends and having regular experiences at school, these actors were on set, surrounded by adults, working at something that they may or may not have enjoyed, but not realizing what they were missing out on until it was too late. Some had family pressure to keep acting, while others thought they were doing it for themselves. There's a lot of trauma around loneliness, feeling misunderstood, and of course, the awful predatory nature of Hollywood that led many to experience childhood sexual abuse and turn to drugs.

Showbiz Kids isn't a feel-good documentary at all, but it's a vital look at how we treat those precocious "child stars" when they're off camera. I have admired the work of many of the people interviewed in this documentary, but hearing about their childhood experiences, I wonder if it was worth it. There are also some stories focused on current actors who are trying to make it big in Hollywood and Broadway, and while one has the hope that in the #MeToo era, both children and parents are a lot more clued in, it still seems like a gruelling process. There certainly is a good way to do it, but the consensus appears to be that ideally, you shouldn't do it for too long. Hollywood is too toxic and all good things come to a sudden and abrupt end.

Class Action Park: I haven't laughed so hard as I have while watching this movie. It is so utterly ridiculous and incredible that I found myself giggling non-stop as the former employees and patrons of Action Park kept describing various rides at this amusement park that operated in New Jersey from 1978-96 and had to shut down when the volume of personal injury lawsuits got too high. The movie's central tenet is that timing was everything - this park reached its peak in the 80s when America was all about deregulation, greed, and doing whatever you wanted. And Action Park was the living embodiment of that spirit.

Founded by disgraced trader (of course), Gene Mulvihill, the park featured three sections: the Alpine Center, Motorworld, and Waterworld, the latter of which was one of the first water parks in America. All three sections featured rides that were often conceived by Gene, involved shoddy construction with absolutely no feedback from an actual engineer, and trial runs by the park's teenage employees, many of whom would suffer unconsciousness or bloody injuries during these test runs. The documentary features interviews with former employees, as well as comedian Chris Gethard, who went to Action Park frequently as a child, and my God, hearing these people describe these rides and how insane they were, induces both hysteria and horror. And the staff were all teenagers, leading to a general sense of abject lawlessness about the place. Every day consisted of accidents, fights, and general chaos, and yet somehow, this place only got shut down in 1996. At one point, they even had to arrange to have their own ambulances, because they were taking away resources from the New Jersey residents around them. It's a wondrous story.

Halfway through, the movie does take a turn as it focuses on the story of a boy who died at Action Park. At least six people are known to have died after accidents on the park's rides, and who knows about the number of lasting injuries? The state of New Jersey had no regulations mandating that Gene accurately report injuries resulting from his crazy rides, so all we have to go on are the stories from the people interviewed in this film to guess at the devastation wreaked during the years of operation. In fact, I first heard of "Traction" Park from my colleague, Anthony, who used to visit as a kid and either broke something or got very banged up on one of the rides. It's a badge of honor connecting all park attendees - if you had no scrapes or bruises, you must have been doing something wrong. To paraphrase one of the interviewees, part of the thrill of going to Action Park was that it was a 50/50 shot that you would either have the greatest time of your life, or come out in a body bag. 

Directed by Chris Charles Scott and Seth Porges, Class Action Park is a scintillating documentary about a truly bonkers subject. I only finished watching it yesterday but I'm already planning on re-watching it because I still can't believe some of the things I saw. One hopes that you couldn't get away with such a place in 2020, but given how crazy life currently feels, it's nice to know that we've dealt with plenty of craziness in the past too. One particularly revealing factoid? Donald Trump had the chance to invest in this park in the 80s, and he didn't because HE thought it was too nuts. So strap on your seatbelts and get ready to watch this documentary - it's gonna be a bumpy ride. 

Documentary Double Feature: Boys State and The Speed Cubers

This Friday, I enjoyed yet another unusual double feature, this time focused on documentaries about boys. One gave me hope, one gave me some despair. So par for the course in 2020. 

Boys State: Every year, the American Legion runs a week-long immersive program in each of the 50 states where politically-minded teenagers can participate in an exercise in self-government. There is a separate Girls State, but filmmakers Jesse Moss and Amanda McBaine chose to make this movie about the 2018 Boys State in Texas, and the result is an intriguing documentary that won a Grand Jury Prize at Sundance.

It’s hard to know how to feel about this movie, given that it presents a mass of contradictions, much like our current political system. The film closely follows the boys who have chosen to run for State Party Chair or Governor of the two parties that the boys are divided into at the beginning of the week. It’s Texas, so the crowd skews conservative, but there is a particularly telling moment when a kid delivers a rousing speech about how he is passionately pro-life, but then in a private interview with the filmmakers, admits that he was just pandering to the crowd; he is personally pro-choice, but he recognizes the need to play politics. Which begs the question - why should a bunch of 17-year old boys have such strident opinions on abortion anyway? These are the dolts who grow up to become the men who tell women what they can do with their bodies. And of course, their political stance may be pro-life, but the minute their mistress gets knocked up, it’s pro-choice all the way.

On the flip side, there are the kids who genuinely want to change policy, establish gun reform, and embrace a "you do you as long as you’re not hurting me" ethos. They stick to their principles, rally the crowd, and deliver speeches based in genuine moral conviction. Of course, it's no surprise that the boys of color seem largely charged with doing the work and garnering votes based on actual policy reform and visions of bettering society for all, while the white kids thrive on rabble-rousing and generating faux outrage to muster votes. The challenge with Boys State is the same challenge with current political life - both types of candidates do enjoy some measure of success, so it’s a bit of a crapshoot regarding who gets to come out on top. I had strong views about who was the more empathetic and compelling speaker, but ultimately, there’s a clear distinction between personal passion and political ambition. For some folks, politics trumps policy-making, and it’s quite easy to tell which is which. The trouble is, voters seem to prefer the politics, and that's where things go awry. 

Setting politics aside, however, it’s obvious that this is an immersive and engaging experience and at the end, there is some overwhelming emotion and love that these boys express for each other. They have forged truly close bonds and friendships in just one week and maybe that's the only takeaway that matters. Political opinions come and go, but human connection makes a lasting impression. 

The Speed Cubers: This is a short 40-minute documentary about two very different but remarkably talented boys named Feliks Zemdegs and Max Park. They both share a passion for speed cubing, i.e. the ability to solve a Rubik's cube in an extraordinarily short amount of time. I learned to solve a cube when I was ten, using algorithms I learned from a Google search. I am not an innate solver who can see the patterns and right the cube without having to recite the formulas in my head, so it usually takes me two minutes to solve a standard 3x3 cube. Speed cubers like Max and Feliks, however, are solving these in under ten seconds.

Feliks is from Australia and was the world champion for years. Until Max came along and slowly started beating all of his records. Max is autistic, and we get his backstory about how his mom first introduced him to cubing as a way of improving his fine motor skills. This is a really simple documentary, but at the heart of it is the relationship between these two boys who have developed an unlikely friendship instead of an antagonistic rivalry. Rather than resenting Max, Feliks sends him congratulatory texts every time Max breaks one of his world records. When they meet up in Sydney for the 2019 World Championships, it's clear to see how much love and esteem they share for each other. It’s a very sweet story about how two people can challenge each other to be the best rather than tear each other down for a crazy competition. And of course, you get to see a lot of kids solving Rubik’s cubes in rapid time, sometimes one-handed, sometimes blindfolded, sometimes with their feet. 

I get it, it’s a niche subject, but by telling this story through the lens of two such unique and humble cubers, filmmaker Sue Kim hit the jackpot. The result is a genuinely heartwarming movie that has a pulse-pounding finale as you eagerly wait to see who will be crowned World Champion and if yet another world record is going to be smashed. It's a nerdy thrill, but it's also quite wonderful, and it's a worthy way to spend an hour of your day.

Weekend Watch: First Cow and An American Pickle

Let's be clear: the combination of First Cow and An American Pickle might be the most unlikely double feature ever devised. But in pandemic times, you watch whatever you can find, and that's what I did last Friday. These are two insanely different movies but at least one of them has to satisfy your itch for cinematic satisfaction. So are you looking for a spare and meditative western about two men in Oregon in the 1800s, or a bizarre comedy about a turn of the century Jewish immigrant who gets pickled in brine and re-emerges in present-day Williamsburg? Either way, I’ve got you covered!

First Cow: Written (with Jonathan Raymond, who wrote the novel the movie is based on), edited, and directed by Kelly Reichardt, this movie sneaks up on you. My main sentiment on finishing it was how I wished I had seen it in theaters, because this is the kind of slow, lush movie that is meant to be an immersive and absorbing experience, and not something that you distractedly watch while playing Candy Crush on your phone.

Set in 1820, it’s the story of Cookie (John Magaro), a cook who meets a Chinese man, King-Lu (Orion Lee) in the Oregon Territory. The two men team up and hatch a scheme based on Cookie’s excellent cooking skills and King-Lu's business acumen. They sell delicious biscuits for significant sums of money to the traders and trappers and other grimy men who are seeking their fortunes in Oregon but are also seeking a warm and delicious treat that reminds them of home. However, the magic ingredient in these biscuits is the creamy milk that Cookie gets by secretly milking the cow that belongs to the wealthy Englishman who recently moved to the settlement. This is the first and only cow in the area, and it’s a dangerous scheme to be stealing its milk like this, but the rewards seem to outweigh the risks.

First Cow is a mood piece. It is very quiet, with many long and languid scenes where not a lot happens. There is much excitement around the cow and the ensuing shenanigans, and the film does turn into a bit of a heist film, but at its core, it’s a deep movie about friendship, hardship, and the ingenuity that characterizes the American entrepreneurial spirit. Also, special shout-out to Eve, the cow that is the real star of the film (this was her first ever film role!). I have never wanted to drink a glass of milk more in my life than when watching this movie. And the line of folk waiting to get a biscuit reminded me of the line outside Dominique Ansel’s bakery to get a Cronut. While the setting of this film might be in the past and unfamiliar, the emotions and general capers feel just as relevant to the modern day, and it is a transporting and tranquil weekend watch.

An American Pickle: The one word I would use to describe this movie is, “cute.” Which you don’t imagine going into it, because the premise seems so utterly bizarre and ridiculous that you think it has to be a raucous, weird comedy. But instead, it turns out to have a rather heartfelt premise that sneaks up on you and makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

Seth Rogen plays Herschel, a Jewish immigrant who flees the Russian Cossacks and arrives in NYC in 1919 in search of a better life. He works at a pickle factory, and one day, in a freak accident, he falls into a vat of pickle brine. No one notices, and that happens to be the day the factory is shut down, so for the next century he is just slowly pickled in that vat, until in 2019, he is discovered, perfectly preserved and alive, a scientific miracle! He is released into the custody of his only surviving relative, his great grandson Ben (also played by Seth Rogen), who is a freelance app developer in Williamsburg. As you can imagine, it’s a challenge to explain to your pickled great grandpa what it means to be a freelance app developer. 

There’s a typical clash of the generations, and as things escalate, Herschel moves out and decides he is going to create his own pickle business. The jokes keep on coming, mocking Williamsburg and its hipsters, Jewish identity (for more Jewish humor, you should check out Seth Rogen's recent interview on WTF with Marc Maron, where the two men proceed to offend the entire nation of Israel), and the political and technological landscape of modern America. The movie is written by Simon Rich, based on a wonderful four-part story he wrote for the New Yorker in 2013 (even if you don't watch the film, I highly recommend reading the story), and the film wisely keeps its focus sharp and doesn’t wander off on too many tangents. In a breezy 89 minutes, we get a funny movie that mocks the sillier elements of how we live now, but also delivers a nourishing story about the importance of family, dealing with grief, and moving on with your life. Instead of broad shtick, Rogen delivers a splendidly nuanced performance, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he gets nominated for a Golden Globe. An American Pickle is a fun distraction, so figure out if you have HBO Max and give it a shot!

Folklore: The Album of the Year

One sign of how insane this year has been is that I’m about to write a gushing review of Taylor Swift’s new album, Folklore. Yeah, I’m as surprised as you are. But in the fiery hellscape that is 2020, this album has proven to be one of the rare treats that reminds you humans are still capable of greatness after all.

The only Taylor Swift song I was obsessed with was Love Story. Prior to writing this post, I was convinced I was in high school when that song came out, but nope, it was released in September 2008, when I had just started medical school. Swift was 18 when she wrote that song, and it does have a very high school teenager vibe to it, so perhaps that’s why I misremembered; or I was likely in desperate need of some escapism at the time. The song had a sweeping, soaring melody, with an irresistible hook and a 3-min tale about Romeo and Juliet, except in this case (spoiler alert!) they got a happy ending. The accompanying video was lavish and charming and tapped into my penchant for Jane Austen melodrama.

But I subsequently never really connected to her music. I was aware of the hits of course, but they always seemed too anthemic and over-produced, and just a bit too enthusiastic for my curmudgeonly tastes. Two songs did stand out, however: Style, which was released in 2015, and Delicate, released in 2018. Both feature my preferred Swift aesthetic; slightly ethereal vocals, a synth-pop, somewhat techno dance beat, and hooks that don’t quit. I can only remember the lyrics to the chorus for either song, but they are a jam. Which finally brings me to Folklore and how it has suddenly bundled up the things I love about Swift’s music into one perfect package.

Written during quarantine, this album was not designed with stadium crowds and screaming fans in mind. Instead, The National’s Aaron Dessner co-wrote and produced eleven tracks on this album and that man knows exactly how to employ lush instrumentation and impeccable production value to bring out what Swift does best. As a bonus, there’s the song Exile, a collaboration with Bon Iver, which adds to this album's For Emma, Forever Ago feel of “I recorded this in a cabin in the woods.” But of course, Swift is no Justin Vernon, and this is a carefully produced masterpiece that elides the fact that Swift isn’t a great singer, and instead places the focus on her greatest strength: songwriting.

Remember how I loved Love Story? I thought it was so clever and fun that a song would actually tell you a whole story instead of being an arbitrary collection of sentences where the band’s focus was more on a guitar solo or dropping a great beat. Well, with Folklore, you have sixteen stories to choose from, each a precious gem that you might not quite appreciate on the first go-around, but will later come back to and be awed by as you obsessively stream this album for the hundredth time. When I first read the track listing, I immediately fixated on Mad Woman - that title alone sounded like it would be my jam. And it was. I hummed that shit for two days straight, wrote angry posts about abortion and Indian Matchmaking, and lived my best Wellesley woman life. But as I looped through the album again, I found myself captivated by Illicit Affairs, then by Betty (who is Betty, what is the worst thing that you ever did, Taylor?!). The Last Great American Dynasty has led me down a rabbit hole to learn about Rebekah Harkness; Epiphany hearkened back to my med school days as well as reflecting the current nightmare besieging our hospitals today. 

But the song currently blowing my mind is Invisible String. Essentially a story about her current romance with Joe Alwyn, it is the perfect Taylor Swift song. It has this marvelous syncopated rhythm and melody that burrows its way into your head and just won’t let go. And once I got over that and started paying attention to the lyrics, I realized this was Love Story all over again. The greatest moment in the song comes when she says, “Cold was the steel of my axe to grind / For the boys who broke my heart / Now I send their babies presents.” I mean, come on. Within those few lines, you have the entire trajectory of this woman’s life. Infamous for her relationships and subsequent breakup songs, she has now gotten to the point where she can forgive and send her ex-Romeos presents for their kids. It’s not the fairytale of Love Story but the viewpoint of a mature songwriter, a woman who is older and wiser, and still knows how to craft the hell out of a song.

Folklore is a joy, and much of its joy comes from the fact that your relationship to it constantly evolves. I have been listening to it for less than a week and have already cycled through a slew of revelations and favorites, and who knows where I will be a week from now? I just re-listened to Exile, and given how much I love Bon Iver, I’m wondering how this hasn’t leapfrogged to the #1 spot in my brain yet, but just give it time. Or maybe with my birthday coming up, August will take precedence. It’s a wild ride, and I am grateful for it in a year that has offered very few pleasures. So give it a listen; this time, the hype is real.

Never Rarely Sometimes Always: An Affecting Quest

I wanted to watch Never Rarely Sometimes Always when it premiered in March. Unfortunately, the week it premiered coincided with when my office shut down, and a week later, all of New York went into lockdown. So, my priorities shifted from watching movies to attempting to stay alive. But now it's August, and the novelty of my imminent demise has dissipated. So I finally got around to watching this movie, and I was shook. I've watched a lot of movies over the past few months, and they have all been perfectly enjoyable, but this movie spoke to my soul on a variety of levels and stirred me up in a way I cannot begin to comprehend. Let's see if I can at least articulate some of it in this review. 

The movie tells the story of Autumn Callahan (the wondrous Sidney Flanigan), a 17-year-old girl in Pennsylvania who suspects she is pregnant. This is confirmed at a crisis pregnancy center where they tell her she is ten weeks along and then make her watch an anti-abortion video when she says she would consider that as an option. Desperate for help, she confides in her cousin Skylar (the also wondrous Talia Ryder), and the two buy bus tickets to go to New York City, where Autumn will be able to get an abortion without requiring parental consent. 

The majority of this movie could be a silent film: there isn't a ton of dialogue and instead you just watch Autumn moving through her world in a bit of a daze. She has the typical teenage loner affect: her face is closed off and blank, but in those eyes lurk some dark stories. She doesn't say much, but is clearly an intelligent girl with the maturity to realize that having a baby is not a viable option for her. Her cousin Skylar is also quiet, but a little prettier, a bit more effervescent, the kind of girl who is always getting hit on by gross older men at the grocery store where they work, or younger men on the bus when they travel to NYC. She could so easily be dismissed as a ditz, but as the story progresses, you see what a strong and brilliant support she is for Autumn, and how she will do anything to make sure her cousin gets the help she needs.

The turning point of this movie for me was the scene in which we understand this movie's title. It is based on a series of questions that the social worker at the NYC Planned Parenthood office asks Autumn about her relationship history. In that one scene, we finally see the facade crack, and the sullen Autumn is revealed as a vulnerable teenage girl who has been treated horribly by the men in her life. It's a tale as old as time, but that one scene is so powerful in that it still reveals no details about what exactly happened to this girl. It is purely emotional, overwhelming, and cathartic. For the first time, someone is listening to Autumn and telling her that it's all right and she is going to be fine. It is so sad that this girl hasn't had that until now, but such a relief that she is finally being heard. Also, if possible, I would like to nominate Kelly Chapman, the actress who plays the unnamed social worker in this scene, for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar. The camera isn't even on her for the majority of the scene; all we hear is her voice and then we watch Autumn's face crumple in reaction to these questions. But her soothing, calm, empathetic demeanor radiated off the screen and straight into my heart. This is the kind of social worker that every girl and woman needs to meet when they are facing one of the most difficult moments of their life.

Abortion is a topic that always moves and enrages me, as it is something that generally gets politicized by men who have no uteruses and religious women who have no compassion. You would have to have a heart of stone to watch this movie and come away from it thinking that this girl deserves to be punished for the rest of her life because she had sex and became pregnant. Naturally, that is still what a lot of pro-life advocates will say, but for me, this movie is yet another reminder of how frustrating it is that women have to navigate so many bewildering restrictions depending on the state in which they live before they can get the healthcare they deserve. During the pandemic, so many women have lost abortion rights or access to care, and this movie is a timely reminder that this isn't a religious or political issue, but simply a healthcare decision that should be based on a woman's right to choose what happens to her body.

This movie also affected me greatly in the way that it portrays New York City. Half of it takes place in the Port Authority Bus Terminal, which any New Yorker will tell you is hell on earth. And yet, I was filled with such bizarre fondness for that godforsaken place, remembering all the time I spent there during college as I took buses to and from Boston. It was so bizarre to watch a pre-pandemic New York as the girls took subways around the city and spent a brief interlude in Chinatown buying egg tarts and red bean bao: my mouth watered at the sight of all those delicacies and my heart ached to think of when I might get to enjoy that carefree freedom of movement again. Writer-director Eliza Hittman grew up in the city and she has perfectly captured all the wonder, all the grime, and the frenetic loneliness one can experience in Manhattan. I must also give kudos here to the wonderful cinematography by Helene Louvart. Everything feels dirty and gross, and you want to coat yourself in hand sanitizer. And yet--and yet!--the camera somehow perfectly captures how this city can also feel like your salvation.

Never Rarely Sometimes Always is a miniature masterpiece. It tells such a small, poignant story, but its themes are grand and universal. There is such an emphasis on how these young girls have been treated by men their whole lives, and how they have already learned as teenagers to commodify their bodies to get what they need. It's heartbreaking to see them go through the world with their heads down and witness their terror when they first arrive in the maelstrom of NYC. They are so acutely aware of all the ways that they can be harmed, and yet they are resolute and defiant in their purpose. At the end, this tiny story feels like an epic quest, and it is a celebration of the many women who have to fight this fight every day. It is moving, somber, oddly uplifting and showcases what happens when women have each other's backs. Their lives are still hard and full of pain, but the going gets easier.