I’ve never been a bad ass nor a criminal mastermind.
For anyone who’s known me at any point in my life, that opening statement will come as no surprise. There have been times when I’ve certainly tried to play the part, especially in the fall when the New England chill is crisp enough for me to put away the jean jacket and throw on the leather one. In those moments, with my beard and tattoo sleeved arms I probably at least look like a low rent hood. That effect will hold true until I open my mouth and wax poetic about the latest company wide comic book crossover or get into a heated discussion that yes, Hedwig and the Angry Inch is the best musical of all time. Once I’ve used the song “Wig In a Box” to win an argument, thetough guy facade is gone.
It was no different in my younger days. In past essays, I’ve talked about how my teenage years were consciously molded by my father and my overwhelming desire to be the complete antithesis of him, and that was before I even discovered the movie musical, something that would’ve broken his Rambo and Western mentality. While he was a troubling alcoholic, I was a teetotaler with only a slip on the occasions that adolescent peer pressure actually worked. My old man smoked cigarettes like he had the intention of saving up enough Marlboro miles to trade them in for the Mustang or whatever the hell the big prize was, so I made the choice to never take up the habit. I was fully aware that smoking made you look fucking cool, but at $5 a pack, that was enough to put three gallons of gasoline in my Chevy Chevette, which I swore got sixty miles to the gallon. I couldn’t be pressured into smoking because I could at least make a fiscal argument against it.
As a teenager, the majority of my vices were the stuff of parental daydreams, mostly limited by my desire to see rated R movies. I had HBO in my bedroom, so my mother saw the futility of limiting my viewing choices, knowing full well that she went to bed hours before I did, at which point HBO became a bazaar of nudity and violence. I’m sure she understood that even if I managed to see something that could damage my developing brain, it would be limited by the small twelve inch black and white television that sat upon my dresser.
My movie viewing wasn’t just limited to the home box office. Having just evolved past the need to rent VCRs as well as the tapes, my home town now found itself with its very own video store, to which of course we were members. After a few months of reasonable PG renting, I was able to convince my mother that I could be trusted to rent responsibly, so before long a note had been placed on the account stating I could rent rated R movies without her. Considering everyone knew everyone in that tiny burg, had I tried to rent something outrageous I’m sure a phone call would’ve been made to her just to make sure. While it was still a tiny rebellion against the world of law and order, I certainly felt like Al Pacino in Scarface, knowing the MPAA would scoff at my newfound ability to rent beyond my years, and while I was at it, I also thumbed my nose at the FBI because I took those rented tapes home and copied them onto blanks for my own personal collection.
However, despite my ability to watch whatever I wanted within the confines of my hometown, there was still one territory left to claim as my own…the movie theater. I’d heard stories from friends’ older brothers about sneaking into rated R films like Porky’s and Police Academy, but since the only theater was an hour away, I hadn’t yet been able to attempt such a bold maneuver yet. When your parents have to drive you to the movies, and likely see either the same film or something else in the complex, the risk versus reward of trying to sneak into a more adult choice becomes too much to comprehend. It would be misfortune enough to get caught, but imagine having to face your mother immediately after is enough to temper the desire.
That changes when your buddy gets his license and a car. That independence makes you a little bolder.
When I was sixteen, my seventeen year old friend finally got a car and first on our to do list was to take our girlfriends out on a date to the thriving metropolis of Bangor, Maine. This was a big deal for us because it was an hour drive away from our hometown to Hoyt’s Theaters, so that meant an entire night’s commitment. Not only would we have to convince our own parents this whole trip was above board, but also the parents of our girlfriends as well. Somehow we managed this and before we knew it we were driving a Dodge Caravan to the big city to watch a new release film. What we planned to see wasn’t even a choice because Jean Claude Van Damme had just made a new movie, Nowhere to Run, and thanks to their continued play on HBO, both Bloodsport and Kickboxer were favorites to both of us. (Side note: Neither of us asked the girls what they wanted to watch. How do teenage relationships ever work considering most of us young men were completely clueless?)
In our excitement to share in this double date, we overlooked some of the details that would be necessary to its success. Namely, how would we actually get into the film. My friend was seventeen, complete with a driver’s license to prove it, so we hoped that some social acceptance of the transitive property would get us all in. Despite my baby face and inability to grow facial hair at the time, I assumed no minimum wage ticket taker barely older than myself would give me a hard time and I’d be able to purchase a ticket without issue. Had it just been the two of us, we would’ve likely bought our tickets without incident, snickered to ourselves like we’d just committed a diamond heist, and would’ve been enjoying spin kicks delivered to faces within minutes.
But just like when we decided on which movie we were going to watch, we forgot to think about the young ladies who were nice enough to join us on this misadventure. They were both fifteen years old, barely an inch over five feet tall, and considering they both knew we were trying to buy tickets for a movie we couldn’t get into, had the wide eyes of potential kidnap victims. Somehow the collective excuse of “we didn’t bring our driver’s licenses” didn’t work on the well-trained theater employee, so our attempts to purchase entry to Van Damme’s latest masterpiece didn’t work. Driving home without seeing a movie wasn’t an option so a quick look at the marquee gave us our only option for entry.
Four tickets for Aladdin please.
In hindsight, had we just walked in requesting tickets for the Disney film, we might’ve gotten away with the resulting shenanigans, but by attempting to swindle our way past the ticket office we likely put a humorous target on our backs. Anything we did after this moment was bound for failure, but try telling that to any teenager, let alone one who far too often considered himself the smartest person in the room. Within minutes I had already formulated a foolproof plan for getting in.
Keep in mind, I hadn’t actually considered anything that might have ruined my plan in any way. For one, the layout of the theater wasn’t conducive to screen hopping. Each of the twelve screens is accessed from the same long, straight hallway. There were no corners to duck behind, no standees to block a sudden change in direction, and at the times we bought our tickets, there were no lines to get in nor no theaters emptying out. Also, the box office was located in a position so whomever sold us the tickets could make the simple gesture of turning their head to the left and have a completely unobstructed view of the hallway. My entire plan hinged on the hopes that after we had spent five minutes purchasing our snacks the employees would simply forget what we were meant to see and wouldn’t watch us as we walked down the hallway, past the first screen where Aladdin was showing, all the way towards the back were Van Damme would be getting ready to unleash hell.
My plan was to simply walk to that screen like we were supposed to be there, find seats at the back where we wouldn’t be bothered, and watch the movie having successfully completed a rite of teenage passage.
Only five minutes had passed before my elaborate scheme began to collapse, and I’m guessing it only took that long because it took some time for the employees to finish laughing at our brazen ignorance. The previews hadn’t even begun when the usher arrived with his flashlight of justice beaming in our direction, quickly pointing us out to the other two patrons in the theaters as the imposters we were. Why he even bothered to ask to see our tickets is beyond my comprehension, as he had us dead to rights. We sheepishly produced them to which he politely pointed out that we were in the wrong theater and he’d show us where we needed to be to watch Aladdin.
Humiliated by our failure, we made the slow march to rated G land, completely defeated and I came to the realization that no woman would ever find me desirable once word got out that my big idea of a movie night would take place in the hand drawn land of Agrabah. Any chance I had of making out and maybe getting to second base now felt obscene once we sat ourselves down to a wholesome film for the entire family.
My days as a rule breaking badass were over before they even began.
Imagine my surprise, when after about twenty minutes of me silently cursing myself, I began to actually watch the film and enjoy it. At that point in my life I hadn’t watched a new animated Disney film since the days of The Black Cauldron, and despite all the accolades for the prior year’s The Little Mermaid, I hadn’t jumped onboard to watch it. The thought hadn’t crossed my mind that Aladdin might actually be…enjoyable, but as soon as Genie appeared I was completely enthralled. Voiced by the appropriately manic Robin Williams, this character burst alive with free flowing monologues, and more importantly for a burgeoning pop culture geek like myself, enough film references to keep my brain spinning. Suddenly I didn’t care that I wouldn’t be spending the third act of the film making out because I genuinely wanted to see where this animated masterpiece would take me. The songs were catchy as hell, the animation gorgeous, and even the grating voice of Gilbert Gottfried wasn’t enough to take me out of the experience. The story of a boy who felt he was never going to be enough because of where he came from resonated and damn did I wish that Robin Williams would show up and make a prince out of me. By the time the credits rolled I was actually happy that we’d been denied our initial choice and when we got home that night I didn’t have to lie when my mother asked me which movie I’d seen.
Looking back on it now I certainly wouldn’t change what had happened. Disney was in the early stages of their animation comeback, and thanks to the enjoyment of that night I later rented The Little Mermaid with that same girlfriend and would eventually catch Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King with future girlfriends who surprisingly found it endearing that I wanted to take them to see an animated film. Aladdin reminded me that it’s okay to hold on to a bit of childhood, even when you’re desperately trying to become an adult, something that I’m sure the Van Damme film would not have taught me. I’m okay with that, and to this day I’ve yet to see Nowhere to Run.
Maybe thats why I’ve never been a badass.
