Growing Up In Summers
Some things are so innately seasonal that you can completely forget about them, then fall right back into them when the time comes around. Coming-of-age contemplation is one of those things for me. It's like there's this trip wire that I shuffle over right around May each year, and I feel that summer nostalgia coming on again.
What is it about summer that gives it this weird, thoughtful, mysterious quality? It's baseball season and the nights are warm and hazy. There's a nightly hymn of crickets chirping and the blinking of fireflies in the grass. You start to see that familiar glow of a sunburn on your nose and the apples of your cheeks, which can make even the most serious adult seem a little childish. There's this smell in the air of someone, somewhere cooking hamburgers at any given hour of the day. Fireworks suddenly become less illegal in the state of New Jersey. It's about the marshmallows, man! It's about the S'MORES!
Those summer things all come together for me in the same movies. Movies with a sort of wisdom-inducing nostalgia that seems like it's speaking to you from a place you've been. They're funny and classic but they've all got the same knowingly sad undertone, like their stories are all played in the key of B-flat. That's what sets them apart from the other white meat of American summer cinematography- the American Pie's and Wet Hot American Summer's of the pack. Those are parodies of what we all wish our summer selves could be.
The true classics stare down the grit of young adulthood with the meek bravery of David facing Goliath. These movies make us believe we can be heroes, if only for the summer.
1. Stand By Me (1986)
2. Now and Then (1995)
(Brendan Frasier makes a cameo as a badass Vietnam Vet. That alone is worth seeing.)
3. The Sandlot (1993)
4. My Girl (1998)
(Disclaimer: secretly the saddest movie ever. Sorry in advance.)
5. The Goonies (1985)
But the wisdom wasn't completely tapped by the late '90s. Here are some more recent summer favorites. The New Classics, if you will.
6. The Kings of Summer (2013)
7. The Way Way Back (2013)
BONUS FLICK:
8. Grease (1978)
Don't judge, just hand jive.