CH America! Tour: Salt Lake City – Omaha
Cinematically, the Salt Lake-to-Omaha stretch of our tour isn’t exactly packed. With the exception of westerns (one could make a case that lots of non-location-specific westerns could take place in these states), the west-mid-west region doesn’t attract tons of productions, despite being heartbreakingly beautiful. Thankfully, a few films actually did get made.
Colorado - Catch and Release: This slightly bizarre romantic comedy (or “comedy”; the best part is a scene in which Jennifer Garner gets drunk and tries to put her fist in her mouth at dinner) is mostly about death, healing, and disillusionment, but it’s also a fantastic advertisement for Rocky Mountain scenery. Watch Garner and her friends fish and frolic around in the Rockies and you, too, will want to vacate there. Promise.
Wyoming - Brokeback Mountain: The number of Wyoming residents (Wyomingans?) who’d like to be associated with everyone’s favorite gay cowboy movie is debatable, but its impression on critics and audiences alike isn’t. Heath Ledger nearly won an Oscar for his performance, and the movie in general is both a cultural touchstone and fair game for satire these days. Love story aside, this is a movie very much about place; Wyoming itself is practically a star. Beautiful.
Boys Town, Nebraska - Boys Town: “He ain’t heavy; he’s my brother!” Awww. Spencer Tracy founds a town for troubled boys, and everybody wins. Which may mean it’s the original inspiration for the Mighty Ducks and many other boy-bonding movies, but we won’t hold that against it. Even better, it’s a true story, and everybody likes a true story. Right?
Next up: A very special CH America! Chicago Edition
November 12th, 2008 at 8:47 am
Ooh, ooh - Ferris Beuller! And High Fidelity! And uh…The Break Up? Bad movie, but it was shot right outside my office when I worked in Chicago.