Strawberry Summer (2012) - I hope there’s a database somewhere of fictitious country stars. This movie gives us one “Jason Keith”, who dresses sort like a porn version of the terminator and is currently riding high on the back of the hit crossover song “Easy Heart” (sample lyric: “don’t break my easy heart / I wear it on my sleeve”. Also, the chorus includes people softly harmonising on the words “yee haw”!) Despite being reportedly a bad-boy with a reputation for bailing on his own concerts he is engaged by a small town to come help emcee their big yearly strawberry festival.
I wonder if there’s a study somewhere that tries to pinpoint the exact degree of bad behaviour that the love interest in a Hallmark movie is allowed to get away with. But I don’t think this one could prove the case much either way - evidently nervous of reawakening memories of George Jones, the writers hedged their bets with perhaps the most tepidly manageable brooding pop star I’ve ever seen. Every so often he acts like a mildly sullen teenager, is immediately called out as an idiot child + coward by the female protagonist, sheepishly admits all his faults and tries to make more of an effort, and then the cycle repeats over and over for 30 minutes to increasingly pliant result. This character is so meekly acquiescent to somebody telling him what to do that you have to wonder if nobody had tried it before or if he was just grown fullsize in a tube or what. At one point the main lady is yelling at him for not being grateful for the fantastic PR opportunity that is showing up to host this smalltown strawberry festival, and the contest of wills between the two was so lopsided that I half expected the scene to end with her picking a cigarette butt up off the floor and forcing him to eat it.
Some minor details as the story progresses:
-
Since he’s a country music star and she’s a country girl the writers have to jump through some hoops to provide the kind of culture-shock comedy reactions traditional to the setting. In this case the male lead at the strawberry festival is revealed to have never eaten a strawberry in his entire life. Of course he turns out to be allergic - I kind of wish the filmmakers had saved that for a dramatic hospital based conclusion of some kind, but it does lead to a scene where the two leads exchange romantic looks as she gently dabs his hives.
-
The lead lady is also involved with coaching a highschool glee club for the festival talent show. There’s a weirdly unremarked-on cynicism in the scene where the kids are trying to think of a song to do and she just tells them to do “When The Saints Come Marching In” because talent show judges eat it shit up when kids play an old song and just mildly jazz it up in a respectful way. They also end up changing the lyrics to “When The Strawberry Fest Hits Town”.
-
Raw chemistry as the leads discuss their contrasting lifestyles:
“Superman and kryptonite.”
“Which one am I?”
“It’s a metaphor…”
- The main lady needs a full four hats for when she’s looking up information on the Internet Encyclopedia Search:
As the film goes on we find out that the country star’s background includes a stint at NYU and that his true musical ambition is to be “a folk rock guy like a young James Taylor”. Never before has a bad-boy reputation been so coldbloodedly put to rest. Also, there’s a big reveal where we find out that the reason he skips concerts is… because he has panic attacks at his own lack of authenticity!! Rather than anything prosaic, like cocaine. Anyway, his artistic inhibitions can only be overcome when the female lead gives him the novel advice to try writing songs about his own life - immediate cut to him waking up in the middle of the night to grab his guitar and notebook in a flurry of ideas. His eventual artistic maturation takes the form of a Pearl Jam-esque ballad called “Ridin’ The Horse” (“my head says to go, my heart says to stay / wish I could put off decidin’ til another day” - even his big musical number is passive)
There’s a good line in weird background extras throughout, including a whole series of people dressed in large strawberry costumes - my favourite were the two slow-dancing in the background for the entirety of the big romantic conclusion.
But even they can’t approach my affection for the one guy who chooses to act natural in the background of one scene by standing in place, repeatedly tossing a lemon a short distance into the air and then catching it. My friend… thank you for your service
