Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby

Hi kids –

You know you want to see this, really bad. But maybe you’re embarrassed to go alone, because people might think you’re dumb for enjoying low-brow comedy. But you’re not dumb – you’re just intellectually confident. [OK, some of you are dumb, but I’m trying to be inclusive here.] But, if we go in a group, and wear turtlenecks and carry copies of On The Road or something similar, we can all pretend we’re just there to appreciate the irony of how eager the unwashed NASCAR masses are to be entertained. [We went to college; we know what we’re supposed to think.]



But I will lead you there, because I have no shame when it comes to the low-brow – no jokes, please, Mary Hoffman – in fact, I embrace it. I embraced Jean-Claude Van Damme in the early 1990’s; I embraced Jim Carrey in the mid-1990’s; and I embrace Will Ferrell in Old School, Anchorman, and whatever else he chooses to put on film. So come with me – on August 4th, 2006 – to the opening of Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby. Show times are not available yet, but we should go to the movie, and then out afterwards to discuss the thematic congruencies with the Nouvelle Vague cinema of the 1950’s. It’ll rock!!



I will organize, if you will open your mind, and set it free. If it comes back to you, it was always yours. If it doesn’t, your name is Chad Hartley.



Signed,


Meredith, “The Master Cylinder” (get your own racecar name here)