Before the movie started, Cinemark suggested an iPhone app---RunPee, which lists movie titles, lengths of movies, and best places in the movie to run to the bathroom. I kid you not. It'll list 3-5 minute long scenes that don't have crucial plot twists. It must have worked because there was a steady stream (so to speak) of our Centrum Silver crowd shuffling in and out of the theater during the 2 1/2 hour movie. Oh what a night.
The film tells the story of four young men from the wrong side of the tracks in New Jersey who came together to form the iconic 1960s rock group, The Four Seasons. The story of their trials and triumphs are accompanied by the songs that influenced a generation, including “Sherry,” “Big Girls Don’t Cry,” “Dawn,” “Rag Doll,” “Can’t Take My Eyes Off of You,” “Who Loves You,” and many more. We tapped our toes, bobbed our heads, and did the synchronized finger click. I couldn’t get enough of Frankie Valli’s super-nasal, yet famed, falsetto voice. It was, indeed, Valli-esque!
I strained to see if I could spot Bob and Justine during the American Bandstand segment. Who could forget Justine’s bobby sox, Bob’s Brylcreem, and the hint of their raging hormones in the 60s? Watching Jersey Boys was like being at a big party with a few hundred close friends. The song “Let’s Hang On To What We Got” made me swoon and I’m still elongating my vowels and dropping my consonants.
Nostalgia triggers memories. The era of hanging clothes on the clothesline and then sprinkling them from an RC bottle with a holey stopper doesn’t appeal to me, but a toasted three-decker ham salad sandwich for 50 cents at Woolworth’s DOES. Oh, and I’ll take a twenty-five-cent ice cream soda, too. Maybe a stick of clove chewing gum would be a companion to a game of jacks. Onesies, twosies...
Songs like “December 63” gave me a flashback of the bellowing voice across the skating rink: “Okay, folks, this’ll be an All-Skate.” The song “Working My Way Back to You” meant one thing---Ladies Choice. Bop shoo bop.
Lanny resisted the urge to run to the bathroom during the movie, for fear he'd miss something. As a result, it was difficult for him to
... walk like a man.