How to say anything

Ladies and gentlemen, John Cusack

Sometimes there's no good way to say what you want to say. Or the meaning gets lost in translation, even when you try to translate.

Say Anything... is not a movie that has this problem. Released in 1989, it has since turned into one of the great cult success stories of the eighties. The film starts with John Cusack at the height of his powers as hyper-articulate slacker Lloyd Dobler, who happens to be in love/lust with a girl named Diane Court. Even the names in this movie have impeccable grammar.

Ione Skye, aka Diane Court

When Diane actually agrees to go out with Lloyd everyone is surprised, inspiring what I will argue is the greatest bit of dialogue between three teenage girls ever filmed:

DC: Hey, I know this is a strange thing to say, but maybe Diane Court really likes Lloyd.
COREY: If you were Diane Court, would you honestly fall for Lloyd? [pause] Yeah.
DC: Yeah!
REBECCA: Yeah.

I mean, feel free to fight me on this, but I feel I have a pretty solid case.

So. They go out. It's a date, it's a scam--whatever it is, it's magical. It's that instant connection based on romantic gestures and charm and incredible attraction. It's great.

It's also a movie.

By which I mean that it misses the mark, in terms of brutal honesty. It doesn't say just anything; instead it says very specific things about very specific circumstances. Like the fact that Lloyd doesn't want to buy anything, sell anything, or process anything as a career. And the fact that Diane has a theory of convergence. And the fact that jukeboxes cost about 9000 dollars. (Or did, anyway. This was the late eighties.)

There's something really unbelievable about all of this. For one thing, real relationships aren't montages. They require effort, and the willingness to have difficult conversations. For all their articulation sometimes when I watch Lloyd and Diane talk I am not sure they are really saying anything after all. They are talking to each other, not with each other.

That's the problem, isn't it? When you talk to someone, you aren't listening to them.

What brings me back to this movie over and over again isn't the infatuation or Lloyd's boombox. It's the last scene, when they are just sitting quietly on a plane, waiting for a sound.

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