You Can Quote Me

In several conversations over the last week, friends and business associates have remarked that I must be awfully glad to see I Love Your Work finally hitting theaters.

And, certainly, I am. Sure because of all the work that went into making it, or because of how much easier Cyan’s life will be once we have a release under our belt.

But, mainly, because I’ll no longer look like an idiot when I quote lines from the film.

By way of disclaimer, I should point out that I’m not normally a movie quoter. I don’t walk around saying “here’s looking at you, kid,” or “I’ll make him an offer he can’t refuse,” or even (perhaps my favorite movie line of all time, from Royal Tenebaums) “I guess we’ll have to be secretly in love with each other and leave it at that.”

My brain is overflowing with dialogue lines – the occupational hazard of watching movies all day long. But I don’t let them out, because, frankly, everybody hates people who do that.

But with I Love Your Work, because I’ve read the script beginning to end more times than I can count, because I saw it brought to life on set and sliced and diced in the editing room, because I’ve watched the finished film endlessly through, the dialogue is so deeply entrenched in my subconscious that I can’t help myself. I say something, thinking it’s normal conversation, and then realize I’ve unwittingly recited verbatim a line from the film.

Which, of course, invariably leads to odd blank stares, considering that nobody I’m reciting to has actually seen the movie itself.

And, the thing is, whatever flaws the movie has (and it certainly has plenty), the writing is great. It’s natural enough that several extended stretches of the dialogue have played out in my own life, even if I’m the only one who knows that’s how it’s all supposed to go.

It makes me giddy when that happens, and I inevitably start to point as much out, which, if you think the blank stares you get off of a single quoted line of an unreleased movie are bad, hoo boy.

So, yes, I’m thrilled to see I Love Your Work hitting theaters and coming out on DVD. And I hope you all go out and watch it. A little bit because I’m (literally) banking on its fiscal success. But more because I’ll be glad if, when I say something in real life that unintentionally imitates filmic art, you’ll all understand what the hell I’m talking about.