Get Shorty.

I have a confession to make. It's something that seems mind-boggling now, something that I rarely even remember as real.

I had a serious thing for John Travolta in high school.

Post-Pulp Fiction and pre-disastrous hairpieces, I sought out his old performances, taped his talk show interviews, and even bought a discount bin copy of his album, You Set My Dreams To Music.

I'm not going to share any of the songs because I wouldn't do that to you. We're friends.

Hold that thought.

At the same time, I interned at a magazine that was about an hour from where I lived, in a city with a downtown and a college and more shops and restaurants and coolness than my mind could process. In this haven of coolness was a "mall," only in the sense it was several stores in the same three level building, much taller than it was wide, with tin ceilings and creaky wooden floors and strange hallways that twisted into other stores just as often as they dead-ended. In this cooler-than-a-mall mall was a store called House which sold, and I remember this perfectly: "pop culture artifacts."

This was a time long before you could go online and find a Gumby lunchbox with a few clicks. There wasn't anywhere that carried Charlie's Angels silhouette posters  or Mork and Mindy ringer tshirts. In the year of our dog, 2015, the internet has made finding and purchasing almost anything a process that requires little to no thought. You go to Google, you type in "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles backpack," and ten sites come up offering you a variety of backpacks in a variety of vintages. But in 1997, seeing a TMNT backpack hanging on the wall of a store was a novelty that's probably impossible to convey to anyone born after 1990. Seeing something like that backpack was seeing an actual artifact from my childhood, that had somehow survived time and clutterphobic parents.  

Back to my Travolta crush. I bought a lot of things from House over the years, but one of my favorite purchases was a picture of him from Saturday Night Fever. Though I admitted to myself I didn't really "get" the movie, the aesthetic of it made me happy. It wasn't a vintage press glossy, but a picture printed on very thin cardboard. That pic was pinned on just about every bedroom wall I had for almost a decade. Despite looking everywhere for it, I can't find it now, so I leave you with this different picture of Tony Manero that I enjoy.

 

In seeking out his old performances, I also had to keep up with Travolta's new movies. I acquired my VHS copy of Get Shorty from the Columbia House movie club. Remember the mailings, with the fold out pages of stamps, each one with a different movie and code on it? You got something like twelve movies for a penny, as long as you agreed to buy x amount of movies at the "regular price" in the decided upon time frame. The regular price was of course much higher than you'd pay at the store, but the thrill of pouring over the massive selection, affixing the stamps to the order form, and getting that gigantic box of movies in the mail was something I finally succumbed to. Most of the movies in that initial batch were movies I hadn't seen yet, which makes me admire the adventurous spirit of a young girl with too much babysitting money.

This is where I start throwing the word "cool" around.

Get Shorty is coolness in film form. Look no further than the cover, all sunglasses and black clothing and crossed arms, not a toothy smile is sight. Cool is stoic. Watching Get Shorty as a teenager, I always had the feeling that it was truly a cool, grown up movie. I think it felt that way because it was an inside look at an industry I was interested in. Acting, screenwriting, producing - not the loan sharking, mob stuff. Well. I mean. Not really. Hearing Chili and Harry name check movies the way my friends and I did, that wasn't something I'd seen a lot of at that point, pre-everything-is-meta. A movie (mostly) about movies. It doesn't hurt that the script is great - funny and intricate and smart, pulled from the pages of an Elmore Leonard novel.

Watching it now I feel the same, still makes me feel cool. Seeing Get Shorty again was like getting a call from your coolest friend that you lost touch with; another pre-internet, pre-texting, so pre-Facebook phenomenon, where people would sometimes lose contact with one another, then regain said contact by using a telephone to dial a series of numbers to reach another telephone.

Get Shorty tapped into the best of Travolta at exactly the right time. Residual Danny Zuko vibes and that walk from Saturday Night Fever always gave Travolta The Cool, even when he was in the talking baby movies. In 1994, our lord and savior QT cast Travolta as Vincent Vega, arguably one of the "coolest" guys to ever Batusi. Get Shorty was the first film he made after the unexpected success of Pulp Fiction, and even though Chili Palmer is written as cool, calm, and collected, there's a grace and confidence that Travolta exudes in the part that's entirely his. It's enjoyable to watch him work, even when he's just sitting in a chair, staring someone down. It's just...fun. Travolta, and therefore Chili, are intense and commanding and sexy and sly.

There's not an off note in the casting. Travolta, of course. Gene Hackman as a very dim but well-meaning producer and screenwriter, in a role that may not stand out in his incredible filmography to anyone but me. I saw this movie so many times that even now, seeing him without a goatee seems a little off for me. Danny DeVito plays it so straight, as a serious thespian that could not be farther from Frank Reynolds. Rene Russo is the female lead, and totally fine, though she's never really set my world on fire.

Get Shorty was the first movie I ever noticed Denis Farina in, and he's menacing and violent, but still has some of the funniest lines in the script. Delroy Lindo, playing a different kind of  cool, calm, and calculating; his Bo a foil to Travolta's Chili. Bo's sidekick is James Gandolfini - but can Gandolfini ever be considered a sidekick to anyone? Jon Gries, David Paymer, Jacob Vargas, Bette Midler, and Alex Rocco all have smaller, but still memorable, parts.

My introduction to Alex Rocco. That voice.

With Denis Farina, James Gandolfini, and Alex Rocco gone now, Get Shorty serves as a reminder of what talented comedic actors these tough guys were. Alex Rocco, with his single scene, brings more attitude and back story to his character than some actors can muster in a whole movie. And he's laying down the whole time. Gandolfini is largely seen and rarely heard from, but he looms next to Lindo and delivers his threats with a huge grin and the soft-spoken voice of a shy new kid in town. Farina is, as I mentioned, a totally violent and unreasonable low level gangster, who winds up riddled with one ridiculous injury after another. He sneers and snarls in a way you wouldn't expect from someone who wears so many pastels. Each of these men demands your attention for a different reason, and it's a character actor showcase.

It's difficult to make a bunch of criminal scumbags amusing; to give them heart and wit despite what their implied off-screen personas are. Then again, The Sopranos ran for how many years? So maybe it's easier than it seems. But.

No. Not really. You need all the right elements for a movie this dark and this fun to come together so well. Elmore Leonard's book, the Scott Frank (Out of Sight, The Lookout) and Barry Sonnenfeld (Men In Black, Big Trouble) script, John Lurie handling the music, and that damn cast.

There's a lot of knowledge in Get Shorty - not specific to show business or the criminal life. Be straight with people. Ask for what you want. Pay people back.

Leave the sunlight in their eyes.