Monday, July 23, 2012

Nora Ephron

"She could peel an apple in one long curly strip..."

When I was a kid, the local library let you check out videos for free.  And not just educational movies, but popular theatrical movie-movies too.  "Sleepless in Seattle" was one of the first grown-up (non-animated or musical) movies I watched and really liked.  I don't know what drew me to this particular film in the first place, but I checked it out of the library over and over again until I had it pretty much memorized.  Sure, some of the jokes were a little over my head, but I didn't care.  And as time went on, I started to get more of them and the movie just got better.  Even this past week, I discovered a new level to one of said memorized jokes --

Sam (on returning to the dating scene): "What is tiramisu? ... Some woman is gonna want me to do it to her and I'm not gonna know what it is!"


Now, tiramisu is, in fact, an Italian dessert so... funny.  The extra layer that was lost on me until recently is that "tiramisu" literally means "pick me up."  That is something a woman may want you to do to her (one way or another.)  Ha!  Bonus humor finally dawning on you over a decade after first viewing -- I'll credit that to a good writer.  Which Nora Ephron certainly was. Thanks for a very worthwhile introduction to movies, Ms. Ephron, for proving repeatedly that romantic comedies don't have to be junk, and that a good script is essential.

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