I'll never forget those early, heady days when I was in second grade, immediately after the release of Star Wars (1977). It was a time when I hoped and dreamed every new science fiction movie would thrill me in the same way.Didn't happen with Starship Invasions (1977), which I made my parents take me to see in the theater (d'oh!!!) and still haven't lived down. My Mom and Dad for years were able to make jokes about the moment in that film (in a grocery store) when an alien's "killing ray" makes a little girl commit bloody evisceration..of a tomato.
And since I was at the tender age of eight at the time, that thrill didn't really happen with
Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977), either. Why? Lots of talking, it was too scary, and where were the cute robots? Hmm???Of course, in a few short years, I viewed Close Encounters of the Third Kind again, and was ready for it. I was going to write that I had matured, but let's face facts...I've never matured.
On a later viewing, circa 1981 or so, I could admire the glorious, thrilling and hopeful film Spielberg had crafted. And the scene wherein young Barry is "abducted" from his house at night - with the eerie apricot alien light bleeding into the home - is a high-water mark in terms of cinematic scares. And I can appreciate now Richard Dreyfuss's slowly-going-bonkers method performance. I understand his obsession, though (as of yet...), I haven't created a giant trash-can
diorama of Devil's Tower. I'm just waiting till Joel is older, so he can help. I think it would like nice in the living room...Even as a kid, however, I was thrilled and awe-struck by the film's ending at Devil's Tower. The arrival of the alien mothership, and humanity's attempt to make first contact with an alien species still gets me veklempt. I remember sitting in the theater disappointed that we didn't get to go aboard that giant chandelier spaceship in the original cut (we had to wait for the Special Edition...) but still...it was an awesome climax.
So today, for my trading card close-up of the week, I'm featuring Close Encounters of the Third Kind, not just because I so seriously admire the film as a work of 1970s art, but because - of all the sci-fi movies I covet - this is likely the only one that I can claim a personal connection with
No, not because I've been abducted by aliens. But because on a cross-country trip with my family in 1979, my parents took me to Wyoming to visit Devil's Tower...the site of the alien rendezvous in the film. I'll never forget the shivers I felt when I first saw that giant monolith for the first time in real life. The outcropping was huge and totally imposing.
Yet actually getting to Devil's Tower was somewhat harrowing, because the only road leading to the mountain was overrun by darting and running prairie dogs. I'm not kidding. There were tons of little prairie dogs bolting in front of our van. Sadly we struck a few...it was impossible to miss them. That didn't exactly make us feel happy.
Then, when we got to Devil's Tower, the family took a tour around the base of the mountain. Again, I was disappointed, this time that I wouldn't be able to climb the rock edifice, like the characters in the film. But the final disappointment occurred for me when we reached the other side of Devil's Tower! There was no landing pad for UFOs!!! The movie lied. Where was the airforce base?
Dammit! Still, the trip was lively, if for no other reason than a tour guide told us to watch out for rattle snakes, and that got everybody nervous.
So in memory of that great family trip, and - of course - the film too, here for your viewing pleasure are three trading cards, numbered 21, 40, and 41 of the climax from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, trademarked Columbia Pictures, 1978.
See that mountain? I've been there...
No comments:
Post a Comment