Say Anything (film)

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Say Anything...
Say Anything DVD cover
Directed by	Cameron Crowe
Produced by	Polly Platt
Written by	Cameron Crowe
Starring	John Cusack Ione Skye John Mahoney Joan Cusack
Cinematography	László Kovács
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date(s)	April 14, 1989
Running time	100 min.
Language	English
IMDb profile

Say Anything... is a romantic film directed by Cameron Crowe and released in 1989. In 2002, Entertainment Weekly ranked it as the greatest modern movie romance. This movie ranked number 11 on Entertainment Weekly's list of the 50 Best High School Movies.

Taglines:

• To know Lloyd Dobler is to love him. Diane Court is about to know Lloyd Dobler.
• She's got every thing going for her. He's going for her with everything he's got.
• A Lloyd meets girl story.

Contents 1 Basic plot 2 Memorable scenes 3 Trivia 4 Pop culture references 5 External links

[edit] Basic plot

The movie, which is set in Seattle, Washington, features John Cusack as Lloyd Dobler, an average student and aspiring kickboxer who improbably attempts a relationship with school valedictorian Diane Court (played by Ione Skye), despite the fact that she is out of his league. Diane falls for Lloyd, partly because of his gallant ways and partly because he makes her laugh. However, their relationship is beset by several obstacles. Diane has just won a major scholarship to study in England and will be going there at the end of the summer. Her father James, played by John Mahoney, is under investigation by the Internal Revenue Service for alleged tax violations committed at his nursing home, and Diane worries she should be spending more time with her father rather than Lloyd. Also, Diane's father does not approve of his daughter dating an underachiever like Lloyd, and pressures her to break up with him.

[edit] Memorable scenes

• After Diane breaks up with Lloyd, he appears outside her bedroom window at night while she sleeps, in an attempt to win her back, holding a boombox over his head playing the song "In Your Eyes" by Peter Gabriel. It is now a standard pop culture reference for romance.

• Four losers hanging out at the gas station give Lloyd advice on his girl troubles, and he finally asks them, "If you guys know so much about women, how come you're here at like Gas 'n Sip on a Saturday night, completely alone, drinking beers, no women anywhere?" They pause, look around, and answer back, "By choice, man, by choice."

• A little while after the break up, Lloyd is on the phone with his sister (who is his actual sister in real life) and says, "I gave her my heart and she gave me a pen".

[edit] Trivia

• Crowe asked The Smithereens to write and record the theme song to the movie. When the finished product, "A Girl Like You," was given to the producers, it was rejected due to the lyrics giving away too much of the plot. It was released on the band's album 11 and went on to be their first Top 40 single.

• Lloyd Dobler lives with his sister, Constance. Constance is played by Joan Cusack, the real-life sister of John Cusack.

• In the film John Cusack is seen wearing a Clash t-shirt, this is a recurring reference in Cusack's films even working with Clash frontman Joe Strummer in a later film.

• In the original draft, the story was set at Lakeside School, the most prestigious private school in the Seattle area. In the film, the school was changed to Lakewood.

[edit] Pop culture references

• Say Anything frontman Max Bemis named the band after the movie because he could relate to the character of Lloyd Dobler.
• In an episode of Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law, Phil Ken Sebben attempts to woo Birdgirl by playing an "In Your Eyes"-sounding song through a boombox.
• In the South Park episode Raisins, Stan, when advised to win back his ex-girlfriend Wendy by playing Peter Gabriel outside her window, shows up at her house in a Lloyd Dobler-ish outfit but plays a decidedly unromantic Peter Gabriel song, "Shock the Monkey." Unsurprisingly, this tactic fails. The film is referenced again in the episode when Stan consults the school goths for advice in a scene which parallels a similar scene in the movie where Lloyd asks his male peers for their advice.
• In "It's Good To Be Queen", an episode of American Dad, Stan Smith attempts to make up with his wife after an argument by holding Peter Gabriel himself over his head to sing "In Your Eyes." The tactic is unsuccessful, in part because he is mistakenly using Gabriel Byrne, not Peter Gabriel.
• Lloyd Dobler Effect is a band named after the film's lead character.
• In the performance poem The Wussy Boy Manifesto, poetry slam artist Big Poppa E references John Cusack as "the lord-god-king of the wussy boy movement." During the performance of this section, Big Poppa E holds his arms above his hands as if holding a boombox.
• The Hawthorne Heights song "Niki FM" prominently features the line, "I'm outside of your window with my radio."
• In The Starting Line "Best of Me" music video the main character is standing outside his dream girl's window in a trench coat and boom box similar to Lloyd's.
• In Good Clean Fun "The Myspace Song" music video the main character stands outside of a girl's window donning a similar trench coat and carrying a boom box. There is a line in the song "We were like Lloyd and Diane, two hearts in the same place" during the video as this line is sung it shows a picture of Lloyd Dobler and Diane Court.
• The film's iconic boombox sequence is parodied in Date Movie, in which the lead character, Grant (played by Adam Campbell) gets pelted with fruit and various other debris whilst standing in front of Julia's (played by Alyson Hannigan) window.
• In "Bring the Pain", a Grey's Anatomy episode, Meredith Grey tells Dr. Derek "McDreamy" Shepherd that she loves him in such a way that she would "hold a radio over my head outside your window," a reference to the movie.
• In Two for the Road, a Lost episode, Hurley explains the famous boombox scene to Sayid.
• In the final episode of the Channel 4 sitcom Spaced there is a homage to the boombox scene. In order to apologise to their landlady the main characters roll up to her house in a tank. A boombox is raised upon which is playing Take That's "Back for Good".
• In A Night at the Roxbury, when Steve is going to marry Emily, Doug shows up in a robe with a boombox over his head, with the boombox playing "What Is Love?" by Haddaway, Steve's favorite song.
• While not a pop culture reference, Hot Topic has a t-shirt on sale that says "A high-school kickboxer uses chivalry, dry wit, and a boom-box to woo a pretty valedictorian bound for the UK (1989)." Under it, has a three star rating. [1]
• In the 8-23-06 episode of The Daily Show With Jon Stewart, in the short segment at the end of the show where Stewart talks with Stephen Colbert about the upcoming episode of The Colbert Report, Jon Stewart told Colbert that there was not enough time to finish the segment. Moments later, the camera cuts to Colbert screaming and holding up a stereo with "In Your Eyes" playing (but which soon changed to the theme song for The Benny Hill Show).
• In the book Bet Me by Jennifer Crusie, Min, Bonnie, and Liza are explaining to Cal, Roger, and Tony how they would show this movie on first dates in college as a type of "test."
• In a deleted scene of The Office, Toby lists this as one of his favorite movies. Jim agrees.
• The first chapter of Chuck Klosterman's Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs states that no woman will ever be satisfied because of the Lloyd Dobler image.
• The Achewood strip for January 21, 2005 contains a reference to the film.
• The Fall Out Boy song "Honorable Mention" contains the lyrics, "I can be your John Cusack." Patrick Stump, who wrote the song, has confirmed the song is based on Say Anything. (Even though Pete Wentz is the lyricist, it was also confirmed in a magezine article that Pat wrote the song.)
• In a Season 5 episode of Gilmore Girls, Lorelai tells daughter Rory over the phone that her boyfriend, Luke "stood outside my bedroom window all night playing In Your Eyes on a boombox."
• In a season 2 episode of Arrested Development Oscar stands outside Lucille's apartment and recreates the boombox scene in an effort to win her back, even though she is married to his twin brother, George.
• In the Drawn Together episode "Freaks & Greeks", Ling-Ling's father recreates the boombox scene for Toot.
• In the February 3rd, 2007 episode of Saturday Night Live, Andy Samberg parodied the boombox scene for host Drew Barrymore during the opening monologue.
• The clothing company Heartcore Clothing produce a T-shirt called 'modern day cusack' in which there is a scene kid holding up a radio.
• Issue 159 of the online comic strip xkcd has a man holding a boombox outside a woman's window; when the woman realizes that the boombox is playing "Ice Ice Baby" (actually, Under Pressure,) the man apologizes that he's "not very good at this."

[edit] External links

• Say Anything at the Internet Movie Database
• skyjude - movie legends

Films directed by Cameron Crowe
Say Anything • Singles • Jerry Maguire • Almost Famous • Vanilla Sky • Elizabethtown

The band Pencey Prep, fronted by singer Frank Iero (now guitarist of My Chemical Romance) wrote a song entitled Lloyd Dobler.