And now she’s in me

Recently, I made a compilation of fey / drinking at the bar after last call / cabaret type music. I was listening to it in my car this afternoon, and I got to thinking about the final track, Elton John‘s “Tiny Dancer.”

To me, there are few more trancedent musical moments in film than the scene in Almost Famous where a full-on band blow up turns into a full bus singalong. The full film doesn’t really stand up to repeated viewings, unfortunately. The “I am a golden god” scene, while entertaining, seems a bit cheeseball after the second or third viewing.

Now, you’d think that I, with delusions of rock star journalism, would watch this movie on a daily basis, all the while pleasuring myself like a retarded rhesus monkey. This is true. Only in the scene when Anna Paquin dances around in her underpants, though.

Despite the dubious moral nature of the preceeding statement, I do truly find a resonance in the bus scene. Nobody in the scene is drunk or stoned. It’s this awesome domino effect as everyone on board gradually comes into the song. The whole emotional hold of the scene is pretty much dependent on the music. No matter how good the actors involved (and I consider Jason Lee a god among men), without the right song, the scene would fall flat. Would it have worked with Three Dog Night‘s “Joy to the World” (the number one song of 1971, the year “Tiny Dancer” was released).

The whole scene’s similar to the boombox bit from Cameron Crowe‘s Say Anything. According to something I saw on teevee once, they considered quite a few other tunes before settling on Peter Gabriel‘s “In Your Eyes.” Would Lloyd’s plea to Diane been as tear-jerkingly sweet had they used Fishbone‘s “Skankin’ to the Beat” (which also appeared on the soundtrack)? Nooooo… not one bit.

Really, these two scenes alone are enough to forgive Crowe for all of Jerry Maguire.

Elton John – “Tiny Dancer