SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Summer is underway - if not in the calendar, in our hearts. Memorial Day weekend just happened. We are in the summer movie season. For a lot of us, summer is defined just as much by what is playing in the theater as it is by the pool and the barbecues and vacations. But just what defines a summer movie? And what are some of the best ones? To discuss this very important topic, we have brought in ALL THINGS CONSIDERED producers Marc Rivers. Hey, Marc.
MARC RIVERS, BYLINE: Hey, Scott.
DETROW: And Avery Keatley - hey, Avery.
AVERY KEATLEY, BYLINE: Hey.
DETROW: So Marc, I will start with you. I want to get to both of you. When you think about what makes a summer movie, what do you think about? What are the key ingredients?
RIVERS: I mean, you mentioned vacation up top, right? And I feel like the movies are kind of the cheapest, easiest way to go on vacation.
DETROW: Yeah.
RIVERS: I think a great summer movie is kind of like going on vacation and...
DETROW: Settle into that air conditioning.
RIVERS: ...Settle into the air-conditioned space and just let go, right? And I think with the summer - right? - there's kind of an air of possibility, almost. You hope to experience something wonderful, something memorable. And...
DETROW: You're kind of, like, trying to get back in touch with your younger self if you're an adult.
RIVERS: Exactly. And you want - and I think with a good summer movie, there's also that air of possibility and excitement.
DETROW: Avery, what about you? What are the key themes, ingredients?
KEATLEY: Yeah. I mean, I think, similarly to Marc, like, this is a time where I want to be transported through the movies. This is not the time of year when I want to sit down and watch something, like, really intense or bleak or, you know, kind of claustrophobic. I want to go on a journey. I want to go on an adventure, whether that's hopping around the world with Indiana Jones, or we're going on a mission with Barbie or even, like, doing a heist in "Oceans 11." I think all of these...
RIVERS: So no, like, "English Patient," no "Schindler's List"...
KEATLEY: No.
RIVERS: ...Nothing like that.
KEATLEY: You know, and, like, there's nothing wrong with those movies. I do like those experiences. But when I walk out of the theater in the summer, I want to feel buoyant, right?
RIVERS: Yeah.
KEATLEY: Like, I want to feel joyous and that nothing has weighed me down.
DETROW: Yeah. I think the only thing I would add to what both of you are saying is, like, when it's going well, it creates kind of a Zeitgeisty (ph), fun moment that you can connect with and talk about with. Like, I feel like "Barbie" was a recent example.
RIVERS: Totally.
KEATLEY: Yeah.
RIVERS: Yeah.
DETROW: Like, everybody had thoughts on "Barbie." Everybody saw "Barbie."
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "BARBIE")
RYAN GOSLING: (As Ken) Hey, Barbie.
MARGOT ROBBIE: (As Barbie) Yeah?
GOSLING: (As Ken) Can I come to your house tonight?
ROBBIE: (As Barbie) Sure. I don't have anything big planned, just a giant blowout party with all the Barbies and planned choreography and bespoke song. You should stop by.
DETROW: And I feel like increasingly that beat is harder and harder to find, but, like, to me, that's kind of a classic. Like, this is a movie that defined the summer in a way (ph).
RIVERS: I mean, it was - I mean, that year was the - that was the Barbenheimer summer...
DETROW: It was.
RIVERS: ...Which I was going to get to later. But, I mean, Barbenheimer was all about the movies as a communal experience, right?
DETROW: Yeah.
RIVERS: Like, we all kind of experienced that together. And it was a rare example of two big event movies that weren't sequels, and they weren't about people in caves.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "OPPENHEIMER")
CILLIAN MURPHY: (As J. Robert Oppenheimer) The world will remember this day.
RIVERS: I have some trivia for you. What do you think was the last year where, in a list of top 10 highest grossing movies of the summer, there wasn't one sequel or one superhero movie? Could you guess what year? This is based off of Box Office Mojo.
KEATLEY: Oh, my gosh. I'm going to say 2004.
DETROW: I was going to put it around there - 2007.
RIVERS: 1996.
(LAUGHTER)
RIVERS: And the top movie was "Independence Day"...
DETROW: Wow.
RIVERS: ...Another great summer movie.
KEATLEY: Wow.
DETROW: We'll get back to that in a moment...
RIVERS: Yeah.
DETROW: ..."Independence Day," specifically. But to that end, I feel like - let's talk about what defines a summer movie, right? Like, I feel like you can have a few different camps. You can have the big-budget spectacles, "Transformers," superhero movies. I will say, I specifically remember walking into a theater to watch "Independence Day" for the first time and having it just, like, packed with people who were ready to, like, scream at the screen. And that is just, like, a very key movie memory in my brain.
RIVERS: Back when Will Smith was slapping aliens and not people.
KEATLEY: (Laughter).
DETROW: Yes, yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "INDEPENDENCE DAY")
WILL SMITH: (As Capt. Steven Hiller) Look at you - ship all banged up. Who's the man, huh? Who's the man?
DETROW: Punching aliens.
RIVERS: Punching aliens. Yeah.
DETROW: So you've got that. You've got kind of the classic genre-y (ph) movie where summer is a key part of the plot. Marc, you produced a very important piece of journalism we did last year when we talked to people from "American Pie."
RIVERS: Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
DETROW: And that is one classic example of just, like, summer vacation, things happen. Like, what are some of your favorite films in these categories, Avery?
KEATLEY: If we're talking about blockbusters, I think we've got to start with the original, which is "Jaws."
(SOUNDBITE OF JOHN WILLIAMS' "MAIN TITLE (THEME FROM 'JAWS')")
KEATLEY: "Jaws" is...
RIVERS: The prototypical blockbuster.
KEATLEY: It really is. And I think - I mean, "Jaws," I feel like delivers in so many ways. It is my hands-down favorite summertime movie. It deals with summertime things, right? We're at the beach. We're worried about swimming 'cause there's sharks, there's a monster. There's, like, this fun tension, but it's also just very kind of light. And honestly, like, I just think the writing in "Jaws" is really good, right?
DETROW: Yeah.
RIVERS: You don't come out of it thinking of - thinking most of the creature. You know, you remember the characters, yeah.
KEATLEY: Yeah, the characters really are the ones, like, who are driving it.
DETROW: Some amazing monologues.
KEATLEY: Yeah, there's this particularly famous scene with Captain Quint, who's played by Robert Shaw. He tells this war story that really reveals as much about him as it reveals about what they are up against.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "JAWS")
ROBERT SHAW: (As Quint) You know the thing about a shark, he's got lifeless eyes, black eyes, like a doll's eyes. When he comes at you, he doesn't seem to be living until he bites you and those black eyes...
RIVERS: I was too young to deal with the emotional intensity of this monologue.
(LAUGHTER)
KEATLEY: That's fair.
RIVERS: Yeah.
KEATLEY: I mean, it is an intense monologue, but I feel like it sets the stakes of what they're up against so well.
RIVERS: Oh, yeah.
DETROW: Yeah.
KEATLEY: I think it just really delivers as an adventure movie that you go on with these characters.
DETROW: So that's one. Avery, I know you want to talk about another movie that is wildly different than "Jaws" but perhaps not as widespread appreciation, but those who know, they know.
KEATLEY: Yeah, I think that's a fair way to put it. You know, I know I said that I don't usually do heavy or intense movies in summer, but this is a go-to summer movie for me. And it does involve a ritual human sacrifice.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE WICKER MAN")
CHRISTOPHER LEE: (As Lord Summerisle) Now, there's children out there - they're jumping through the flames in the hope that the god of fire will make them fruitful. Really, you can hardly blame them.
KEATLEY: So that is Christopher Lee in the original 1973 "Wicker Man" directed by Robin Hardy, not to be confused with the 2006 remake starring Nic Cage.
DETROW: "The Wicker Man," it's just an insane movie. There's no - right?
KEATLEY: (Laughter).
DETROW: Like...
KEATLEY: It is.
RIVERS: Summers can get kind of crazy, though, so it kind of - I think it fits, right?
DETROW: Yeah.
KEATLEY: Yeah.
DETROW: Summer is - that's a key part of it (ph).
RIVERS: Yeah.
KEATLEY: Summer is a key part of it. And yes, it is so delightfully weird, and it only gets weirder the longer you watch it, right? It takes place on Summer Isle with this - it's this fictional island off of the Scottish coast, and the inhabitants are just kind of bizarre people who routinely break out into, like, somewhat menacing songs.
DETROW: Yes.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE WICKER MAN")
UNIDENTIFIED ACTORS #1: (As characters, singing) Along that tree, there was a limb. Along that limb, there was a branch. Along that branch, there was a nest, and in that nest, there was an egg. And in that egg...
RIVERS: It's not quite Dua Lipa, but it could be a bop. It could be a seasonal bop (ph).
KEATLEY: There's some good songs in here, man.
RIVERS: Yeah.
KEATLEY: I mean, they'll stick in your brain.
RIVERS: Yeah.
KEATLEY: But it's just - it sort of, like, just raises the level of kind of creepiness...
DETROW: Yeah.
KEATLEY: ...Where they're constantly kind of singing about what they're doing and what their belief system is. It just creeps in at the edges that something is, like, really weird here.
RIVERS: Too many folks frolicking in, like - in the (inaudible), singing.
KEATLEY: Yeah, yeah.
RIVERS: Yeah, just every morning, dancing around (ph).
KEATLEY: Like, way too many puffy sleeves and skirts and - yeah (laughter).
RIVERS: Yeah.
DETROW: Yeah. Marc, I know it's hard to follow "Jaws" and "The Wicker Man," but...
RIVERS: Yeah, I mean, definitely cosigning "Jaws" - I mean, but if you went kind of intense, I'll go a little bit intense. And I think one movie that, to me, just embodies the summer where I watch it and I feel the heat emanating off the screen, and it's Spike Lee's "Do The Right Thing," which I know we talked about trying to escape from burdens, and "Do The Right Thing" is very much kind of about the things that burden social life. But it's an example of a movie that can make heavy social issues fun and entertaining and colorful. And when I think about the summer and the summer where people just - they're outside, and they're - they come alive. And "Do The Right Thing" is just alive, you know? Like, Giancarlo Esposito's character, Buggin Out, you got Rosie Perez's character. You have the DJ played by Samuel L. Jackson, who's kind of just providing this constant commentary across the movie.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "DO THE RIGHT THING")
SAMUEL L. JACKSON: (As Mister Senor Love Daddy) Doing the ying and the yang, the hip and the hop, the stupid fresh thing, the flippity-flop (ph). (Howling). I have today's forecast for you - hot.
RIVERS: These are just such larger-than-life and colorful figures, and it just puts me in that summertime mood of just anything can happen, and emotions are high. And people are sweating, and they're exhausted. And summertime, it can be exciting, but it's also exhausting. But my lighter choice, the choice that I also watch every summer, it's "Magic Mike XXL" - not the first one, but the second one.
KEATLEY: The sequel, which you...
RIVERS: The sequel.
KEATLEY: ...At the beginning, you know, you were kind of ripping on sequels.
RIVERS: This is...
DETROW: We've broken every rule we started this conversation with - I just want to say.
KEATLEY: (Laughter).
RIVERS: Sometimes the summertime is about breaking the rules.
KEATLEY: You know what? I cosign that.
RIVERS: So I think it fits.
(LAUGHTER)
RIVERS: And you might call "Magic Mike XXL" "The Godfather Part II" of male stripper movies.
DETROW: When you say you might, it seems like you do.
RIVERS: I do.
DETROW: Yeah.
RIVERS: I would call...
DETROW: Just own it (ph).
RIVERS: ...It "The Godfather Part II" of male stripper movies.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "MAGIC MIKE XXL")
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #1: (As character) I got a little treat for y'all tonight. It's a man I knew as White Chocolate.
(CHEERING)
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #1: (As character) Some might know him as Magic Mike.
RIVERS: This movie is just a good time distilled. It's like, if you just, like, injected it into your veins, like, it's just a great time, a magical portrait of untoxic masculinity, just, like, dudes just enjoying their time together.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "MAGIC MIKE XXL")
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #2: (As character) What are you? You're not a fireman.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #3: (As character) I'm a male entertainer.
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #2: (As character) Oh, yeah. What are we?
UNIDENTIFIED ACTORS #2: (As characters) Male entertainers.
RIVERS: It's a movie that's unapologetically about pleasure and desire and just being liberated. It has no story to speak of - because what summer vacation does have a story, really? It's kind of plotless. But it is constant motion and constant fun. That's what I want out of a summer, and that's what I want out of a movie.
DETROW: That was NPR's Marc Rivers and Avery Keatley. Thanks to both of you.
KEATLEY: Thank you.
RIVERS: Thank you, Scott.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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