Tag: Love Story

Dramas

Love & Basketball

LizLocke2 Comments
Image credit: Love & Basketball, 2000

When I watch a movie with ‘love’ in the title, I always hope it’s going to trigger the same kind of feeling I get from reading romance novels. When a story works, every part of me is rooting for these characters I know intimately, even though we only just met. I think about them the next day, and I wonder if they’re still off living their happily-ever-after’s. Gina Prince-Bythewood’s Love & Basketball (Disc/Download) has all the hallmarks of my favorite sports romance novels, but it’s a story that truly comes alive on the screen. If you’re looking for a great Valentine’s Day pick, make some time for Monica and Quincy this year.

Starring Sanaa Lathan and Omar Epps as neighbors, friends, lovers, exes, and potentially lovers again, Love & Basketball gets its title from the movie’s signature quote, “All’s fair in love and basketball.” Both characters dream of becoming star athletes, but along the way their slow-burn romance starts to heat up. The audience knows they’re better when they’re together (on the court and off), but of course there would be no movie if the characters knew it too. We follow them from childhood into adulthood, and it’s a romantic journey that feels honest. Neither of these characters is perfect on their own, but the great thing about romance is that it has the power to turn people into the best versions of themselves. Monica and Quincy challenge each other, and that’s why you know they’re meant to be together. They are soulmates who can survive anything—injury, infidelity, distance… even cringe-worthy nineties fashions.

Post-college, Monica lands a spot on an international women’s basketball team based in Barcelona. While Quincy is never far from her thoughts, I imagine she was able to enjoy some of the perks of her foreign city, namely sangria! I’ve never done a rosé sangria on the blog before, so now seems like a great time. While watching Love & Basketball, I recommend drinking a Sparkling Rosé Sangria.

Sparkling Rosé Sangria

½ bottle dry Rosé Wine

½ bottle dry Sparkling Rosé Wine

1 ½ oz Brandy

½ oz Cointreau

Fresh Raspberries

4-5 slices Blood Orange

4-5 slices Cara Cara Orange

Combine Rosé, Brandy, Cointreau, raspberries, and orange slices in a small pitcher. Chill for two hours in the refrigerator. Top with Sparkling Rosé, then pour into ice-filled glasses.

If you enjoy Love & Basketball as much as I do, then I’d highly recommend the Hoops book series by Kennedy Ryan. It’s sad to me that more love stories like this never make it onto the big screen, so I’m even more grateful this one did. And thanks to the tireless preservation and curation work of The Criterion, we can keep watching Monica and Quincy find their way back to each other again and again. Cheers!

Dramas

Farewell to the Summer Light

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Farewell to the Summer Light
Image credit: Farewell to the Summer Light, 1968.

For fans of Wong Kar-wai and Richard Linklater, I present to you the 1968 gem, Farewell to the Summer Light (avail. on YouTube). A love story featuring two Japanese expats walking and talking about nothing and everything, this movie hits me right where it matters. Watch it, but be warned- this one will stay with you.

Beautifully shot in Lisbon, Paris, Madrid, Scandinavia, and Rome, Yoshishige Yoshida’s film is a tapestry of European cities. Kawamura is searching for a mythical church when he meets Naoko, a married furniture/art buyer, still traumatized by the loss of her family to the Nagasaki atomic bomb. Kawamura and Naoko relate to one another initially through their heritage and the displaced feeling of being foreigners in a Western world, but eventually, their friendly wandering turns into attraction. In a constant push/pull, we feel the disappointment each time they leave one another, then the heart-lifting triumph when they find each other in a new city. It’s a love grounded in fate, but stymied by circumstance.

This gorgeous film deserves an equally lovely cocktail pairing with Japanese and European influences. While watching Farewell to the Summer Light, I recommend drinking this Low Tide cocktail.

Low Tide

1 ½ oz Sake

3-4 oz Dry Cava

½ oz Lime Juice

½ oz Mint Simple Syrup

Lime Twist

Combine Sake, Lime Juice, and Simple syrup in a shaker over ice. Shake until chilled, then strain into a or flute. Top with Cava, and garnish with a twist of lime.

Low Tide

I’ll admit, my 1960s international film tastes have largely skewed toward the French and Italian, but Farewell to the Summer Light makes me want to learn more about what was happening in Japanese cinema. When Naoko and Kawamura kiss in front of a cathedral built on the beaches of Normandy, you realize what their love truly is—a beautiful sandcastle not meant to last. There’s such poetry in the way it’s shot; a desperation that practically tears through the screen. I may still look the same on the outside, but inside I’ll be carrying that scene with me forever. Cheers!

Comedies

Long Shot

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Long Shot
Image credit: Long Shot, 2019

I’ll take any excuse to watch Long Shot again, and this week my justification happens to be Valentine’s Day. Gone from theaters before anyone knew it had arrived, Long Shot (Disc/Download) was the 2019 gift to rom-com obsessives like myself (and to jaded people like my husband who just didn’t know what they were missing). I’ve made it my personal goal to get the word out about this whip smart, endearing ode to unexpected romance and Boyz II Men, and if Motown Philly doesn’t entice you, maybe a cocktail will.

When one hears the name Charlize Theron, the phrase “Seth Rogen movie” probably doesn’t come to mind. This is the tough-as-nails actress who takes on Immortan Joe and misogynist pigs. The woman who sashays across our television screens in Dior, looking like a glamorous gazelle. This woman does not belong in a comedy with a teddy bear-shaped funnyman and weed jokes, right? WRONG. Long Shot proves definitively that Charlize can do it all. As the U.S. Secretary of State vying for the job of President, she’s calm and collected. But underneath the polished facade, she’s a sleep-deprived woman who stopped noticing how lonely her life has become. That is, until speechwriter Fred Flarsky  comes along to remind her that politics isn’t everything; love is. Sure, the script has some of that infantile bro humor typically found in a Rogen movie, but I beg you to look past that. Focus on sweet moments like when they’re dancing in an empty kitchen to the Pretty Woman soundtrack, or Seth’s face when he realizes this beautiful, impressive woman actually wants him. The guy with the goofy jacket and big heart, who everyone makes fun of; he’s the one who finally gets the girl of his dreams. Not since Lloyd Dobbler called up Diane Court have I felt so hopeful about life.

As Secretary of State, Charlotte Field spends a lot of time traveling the world. Thus, the official cocktail of the DC Beltway (the Gin Rickey) needs to be tweaked just a bit for her. With the addition of lychee syrup, you’ll feel like you’re right there in that Manila hotel room, watching two people fall in love over their laptops. When viewing Long Shot, I recommend drinking this Traveling Rickey.

Traveling Rickey

2 oz Gin

½ oz Key Lime Juice

½ oz Lychee Syrup

Club Soda

Lime Slice

Combine gin, key lime juice, and lychee syrup over ice in a Collins glass. Stir well to combine. Top with club soda, and garnish with a lime slice.

Traveling Rickey

While the film is obviously meant to be a parody of our current political dumpster fire, at the center of it all is a love story that gives me so much joy. To see the chemistry of this unlikely pair is to witness pure cinema magic. Charlize, I beg you to run for president in 2020- but only if you bring your First Mister with you. Cheers!

Classic Films · Dramas

Love Story

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Love Story
Image credit: Love Story, 1970

We all know the classic line: Love means never having to say you’re sorry. But really… does it?? I may have only a decade of marriage under my belt, but I would’ve thought that love means defying your family to be with the person you want. Or working a crappy job to support the dreams of someone else. Or maybe love is holding your spouse in a hospital bed while they die from a mysterious illness that only makes them look more beautiful. Really, there’s a lot of love in Love Story (Disc/Download). It’s just not where the script wants it to be.

Oliver (Ryan O’Neal) and Jenny (Ali MacGraw) meet in college, trade barbs, then kisses, and eventually wedding rings. They struggle to make ends meet while he’s in law school, and just as things start looking up financially, Jenny gets sick. From what, we’re never told. All we know is she looks ah-mah-zing during mournful winter scenes in snowy New York, and especially on her death bed. We know from the very first line of this movie that Jenny’s not going to make it, and yet I spend 90 minutes thinking somehow, someone made a mistake. Maybe Ryan O’Neal is talking about a long-lost little sister, not the wisecracking wife who’s way too good for him.

For such a sad, serious movie set in a bitterly cold climate, all I can think about when I watch this film is an earthy, warming cocktail. Aptly named, this Widow’s Kiss will have you thinking about poor Oliver, cradling his wife for the last time. I’m not crying, you’re crying!!!!

Widow’s Kiss

1 ½ oz Calvados apple brandy

¾ oz Yellow Chartreuse

¾ oz Benedictine

2 dashes Angostura bitters

Luxardo Maraschino Cherry for garnish

Combine Calvados, Yellow Chartreuse, Benedictine, and bitters in a shaker filled with ice. Stir until chilled, then strain into a glass. Garnish with a cherry.

Widows Kiss

One of my great disappointments in life is that Ali MacGraw did not make more films. It’s through her performances in Love Story and Goodbye, Columbus that I learned how to dress with confidence, and how to stand up for myself in relationships. In Love Story, she’s brash, she swears, and she doesn’t take sh*t from anybody. But she also looks fabulous doing it, in wool peacoats, tights, and a scarf for every occasion. If clothes are a woman’s armor, she’s ready for anything, even the inevitabilities of love and death. Cheers!