Oregon Humanities

The Crying Game

In 1992, the film The Crying Game opened in Colorado Springs, my hometown. The film played in a cozy, fifty-seat theater tucked behind a café called Poor Richard’s. Next to the café was a restaurant and a bookstore, all bearing the same name. As a child, I had eaten in the restaurant with my family. In junior high, a friend and I entered a talent competition held there and won third for our impression of dancing like Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers to New Order’s Bizarre Love Triangle. In high school, I wandered through the bookstore’s poetry section with my boyfriend and tried to pretend I knew something about poetry, while also pretending to be mysterious and cool, like the French women I saw in the foreign films that played at Poor Richard’s.

I went to see The Crying Game because I thought it was a love story, and because it was my opportunity to see art. I didn’t go to the ballet or the symphony or the theater. I visited the art museum a handful of times. One time may have actually just been a drive-by as I was testing out roller skates in the museum’s parking lot. I went to see films, my only education in the arts.

I also went to see The Crying Game because my dance partner and friend, knowledgeable in many things potentially scandalous (he read French literature in its original language, in high school, if that helps paint a picture), said that there was a part in the movie that made him gasp. Those of you who remember 1992 and/or The Crying Game might remember the lovely secret that hung over the film. In what some consider a publicity stunt, audiences and critics were asked not to share a major plot point. I still prefer this kind of stunt, if that’s what it was, to today’s publicity stunts that often rely on viral marketing campaigns that expose exactly what will happen in the film. I’m talking to you, Snakes on a Plane.

I remember sitting in my seat, my fingertips ruffling through buttered popcorn, waiting for the jaw-dropping moment to unfold before my eyes. But first, the proprietor stood to welcome us. He told us that he had been on the brink of closing the movie theater until The Crying Game brought in packed houses for weeks. He thanked us for patronizing his theater and for keeping it open longer. I remember being really moved by this brief speech. First, to a seventeen year old, the romance of being part of the story of saving something was meaningful. Secondly, I realized that though my movie ticket cost less than $10, I had done something to support the arts. By going to this film, I was helping to ensure there would be more films to see. And that future audiences would have opportunities to be wowed and to discover what matters most to them.

About Kamla Hurst

Kamla Hurst (AKA bridge builder, stewardship czar, and dance fan) is the Development Director at Oregon Humanities.

09 February 2010 | Posted by Kamla Hurst in Inside O. Hm. New Ideas
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