On Tom Hanks, John Grisham, and Chevy Chase

What, you might ask, could I possibly be writing about three disparate folks listed in the headline? 

Read on....

Tom Hanks

While shopping at Sam's Club a few weeks back, I noticed that actor Tom Hanks had written a novel, and I couldn't resist.

In this rather awkwardly titled novel, Hanks is giving us a fictionalized version of what goes into making a "major motion picture masterpiece."  Sounded intriguing for a movie buff like me and who doesn't love Hanks, right, so I bought the book.  The book is about 400 pages long, and after 200 pages, I threw in the towel.

Why?

First off, it's fiction.  All the names are made up.  For example, the director of the movie being described is named "Bill Johnson."  How's that for a bland and unmemorable character name.  And it goes on from there.  Actors, writers, behind-the-scenes fixers and movers and shakers, agents, production assistants, cinematographers, gophers....there were so many of them that it was hard keeping track of them all.

Next, Hanks used asterisks on almost every page, often times to refer to other fictional movies that these fictional actors, directors, writers et al had previously made.  I found that to be very distracting.

Finally, the "movie" being made in this novel was a comic book/superhero movie, a genre that I just don't care about.  Maybe if the movie was thriller action movie or detective story or even a RomCom, but this one just didn't hold any interest for me.

Libraries and bookstores are filled with books about the "Making of..." actual movies like Casablanca, Wizard of Oz, High Noon, Citizen Kane and any number of others.  I still love Tom Hanks, but read those books instead of this one.

One-half Star from The Grandstander.

John Grisham

John Grisham published his first novel, "A Time To Kill", in 1989.  HIs second novel, "The Firm" (1991), became a #1 best seller, and he has never looked back since.  He has written over 40 books that have sold over 300 million copies, and he continues to churn them out.  I have not read all of his books, but I've read a lot of them, and every one of them has sucked me in from page one until the final sentence.

While shopping at Target two weeks ago (notice that I only shop at upscale  retailers), I spotted his latest novel, "The Boys from Biloxi", which looks good, but instead I bought this newly published paperback.

This was published as a hardback in 2022, and contains three novellas of Grisham's - the longest is 125 pages, the shortest 55 pages - and each one is pure Grisham:  tense, exciting, intriguing, and you don't want to stop reading until the end of the story.  Two of the stories, "Homecoming" and "Sparring Partners" are legal stories involving crime and lawyers, some shady, some honest, and the third, "Strawberry Moon" is about a 29 year old convict on Mississippi's death row, whose execution is scheduled to take place in three hours.  How he spends those hours and one special final request that he has makes for a most haunting tale.

Three Stars from The Grandstander.

Chevy Chase

While on our trip to Annapolis last week it came out in the conversation that Linda had never seen one particular classic American comedy from Chevy Chase and the good folks at National Lampoon:

Can you believe that?  Better still, can you believe that this movie is now forty (40!!) years old?  I remember that when this was released, it was at  time when everyone was first getting VCR's, so it was easy to record this off of HBO, or to purchase a VHS copy of the movie, and, as a result, "Vacation" was a movie that was watched again and again and again to the point where you could recite the lines as they were being spoken on the screen.  You know, lines like....

"The family Truckster.  You think you hate it now, but just wait until you drive it", or

"Who wants to see the world's second largest ball of twine", or

"The bank's been on me like flies on a rib roast", or

"Dinkums had the shits last night so we kept her in the garage", or

"See that sign that says 'Rib Tips' up ahead? Well, F--- that" or

"Hey, underpants!", or

"Can I have that sandwich from the gas station.  I'm so hungry I could eat a sandwich from a gas station", or...

Well, you get the idea.

I used to watch this movie every year on the day before we left on our own family vacation to the Outer Banks.  However, it had been many years since I had seen it, and the fact that Linda have never  seen it prompted us to pull it out and watch it again.

The verdict after all of these years:  It holds up great and is still as funny as ever, praise be to Marty Moose!

As we are now into summer and your vacations are upon you or soon will be, grab a copy (streaming for free on HBO Max), and ride along with the Griswold Family.  You'll have so much FUN that you'll be whistling Zip-a-Dee-Do Dah out your, well, you know.

Three Stars from The Grandstander.

Oh, and as a special treat, here are the closing credits from the movie as Clark, Ellen Rusty, and Audrey go Dancin' Across the USA on their way to Wally World to the tune of Lindsey Buckingham.