As antiquated as it sounds, New York City shuts down on Mondays.
Museums are closed; theaters are dark; and small restaurants
““ the ones you discover only by walking by them ““ take
the night off presumably so their chefs can get Chinese
takeout.
I don’t have any statistics to back it up, but I presume
that Manhattan’s Chinese-takeout business thrives Monday
nights as people get home from the longest day of the week and can
only console themselves with the familiar aromas of hot-and-sour
soup and sesame chicken coming out of a plastic grocery bag.
Chinese restaurants are open Monday nights, which ensures big
business on an island in which apartments with kitchens are rare
and ovens not used as storage space are even rarer.
For Manhattan’s working population not obsessed with
“24,” Monday nights are also movie nights. If theaters
remain open Christmas Day, then surely they sell tickets Monday
nights, and the potential combination of soup in a real bowl (as
opposed to Styrofoam) and popcorn from a real popper (as opposed to
the microwave) can tempt even the most exhausted of palates.
Naturally, I saw a movie last Monday night in New York over
spring break, preceded by eating Chinese food across the
street.
While Monday-night movies in Los Angeles tend to be emptier than
the message in my fortune cookie, movie culture in New York is an
entirely different story. Arriving to see “Inside Man”
about 15 minutes early, I was forced to sit in the fourth or fifth
row, and by the time the previews began, the theater was full. One
couple sitting next to me even came in from Brooklyn.
For anyone who hasn’t yet seen it, “Inside
Man” is the new Spike Lee movie about the perfect Manhattan
bank heist, starring Denzel Washington, Clive Owen and Jodie
Foster. It’s already Lee’s most successful movie at the
box office, making more than $53 million since its release March
24, probably ironically because it doesn’t look at all like a
Spike Lee joint. Lee’s development since “Do The Right
Thing” in 1989 really deserves its own column, or perhaps its
own book, but that would require far too many nights of DVD
research with Styrofoam soup than I’m ready to put in.
Like every other Lee film, “Inside Man” not only
takes place in New York, but also assumes a significantly close
relationship with the city. The film jokes about getting cabs, the
city’s racial makeup and the relative toughness of one
borough compared to the others, and while “Inside Man”
works because anyone can understand its comedy, it flourishes when
everyone shares in it intimately.
My brother saw the film in San Diego, and the moments he hated
were the moments I loved. To him the script’s comedy seemed
forced and unnecessary, but to me it perfectly reflected New York
City itself.
Since the city revels in its own size, it can’t help but
consume and enjoy everything around it, even if it doesn’t
fit together absolutely perfectly. Anyone who has eaten dim sum can
share in such an experience.
While I’ve talked to other people who enjoyed
“Inside Man” despite seeing it somewhere other than
Manhattan, I doubt I would have recognized the multifaceted nature
of its humor had I gone to a screening in California. Los Angeles
is a city that spreads everything out, so it should come as no
surprise that its filmmaking is so obsessed with clear-cut
distinctions of genre. The prevalence of Asian fusion restaurants
seems like a conspicuous renegade.
When the film ended I turned to my neighboring Brooklyn couple
and asked them what they thought. In a response conveniently
appropriate to the way New Yorkers protect their city, they
approved wholeheartedly. They were even laughing, which in my
experience is something New Yorkers rarely do when anywhere near
Midtown.
Leaving the theater I noticed my Chinese restaurant across the
street. Though I had just watched Spike Lee’s most Hollywood
product to date, I felt a long way away from Los Angeles.
When eating dim sum, Tracer is especially fond of char siu
bao. E-mail him your favorite at jtracer@media.ucla.edu.