This Is It, Michael Jackson
by Jen Shenk (not one of the Viners who regularly view movies)
When I was 11, and a 7th grade student at Narragansett in Templeton (then a combined junior and senior high school—before the term ‘middle-school’ was coined), my math teacher Mr. George Stathis, a scary man to someone like me who didn’t count math among her strong suits, had a side-job at Prime Value Mart. Prime Value Mart was a small-scale Best Buy before Best Buy existed, and was in Twin City Plaza right in the same spot where Hannaford is now.
In the middle of math class one day, Mr. Stathis hollered ANDREWS! In a panic, I looked up (WHAT? ME?)…In his gruff voice he said ‘Do you want to take this home for the weekend?’ What I saw amazed me. It was a betamax tape of Michael Jackson’s Thriller. It had JUST been released, and was currently available for purchase at the price of $99.99, the going rate for videos in the early 80’s. No one I knew *owned* any movies, but Mr. Stathis had gotten it for free for the weekend. We rented everything (we even rented the players) from Music Forum in Gardner. So to see something that was so ‘right now’, available to ME, the quietest kid in the class, was amazing! Mr. Stathis had brought it in from Prime Value and was willing to lend it to me (to this day I’m not sure why). Once over my initial shock, I wholeheartedly agreed and was barely able to contain my enthusiasm until the end of the day when I picked it up from the ‘portable classroom’ (trailer) that was Mr. Stathis’ classroom. Off for the weekend, I was pumped.
Then I remembered I had agreed to babysit for my cousin’s kids and my brother. (Back then it was not illegal to leave a whole lot of kids with one underage babysitter who was either unpaid altogether or perhaps given $1 per hour, and that was only if she cleaned the house). With my brother and 4 cousins watching, I got the player ready, then made the popcorn. The only problem was that they had pressed PLAY before I was ready. Back then the remote was (gasp) CONNECTED to the player with a wire—not so remote. All of a sudden the kids screamed ‘IT’S ON! IT’S ON!…and I went running in to the living room. Thriller was on and I was not to be distracted.
Only problem was that back in 1982 there wasn’t a microwave with a POPCORN button. There wasn’t even a microwave! It was a saucepan with oil and kernels. Next thing I knew, SMOKE! FIRE!, just when Thriller was coming on and no one knew how to work the pause button. True to the mindset of someone who is 11 and left alone with 5 small children, I panicked and grabbed the pan from the stove and put it on the floor. My father, reading this newsletter in North Carolina, probably remembers having to repair the linoleum. The house didn’t burn down, but the show went on. All weekend we watched the video over and over again, until we could dance every move and laugh like Vincent Price.
Fast-forward a very long time to 2009 when my tiny daughter Abigail is the same age I was when Mr. Stathis lent me that Thriller tape (28 YEARS LATER!!!). (Note: I do not leave Abigail home alone, let alone in charge of 5 other kids and a stove with hot oil in a pan). Abigail has been a fan of Michael Jackson for the past 2 or so years. I took Abigail and her equally MJ-obsessed friend Madison Skamarycz to the movies to see This Is It, the Michael Jackson ‘final film’. Both decked out in their MJ T-shirts, Abigail and Madison were hyped up for the evening.
Being that I’m not much of a movieofile … last movie I saw in a theater was Borat (2006), and before that Twister (1996), I settled in and prepared for the worst. However, I was pleasantly surprised. First, I expected a sell-out crowd. That was not the case. Good or bad? I’m not sure. Second, I have to give this movie the benefit of the doubt and assume that they didn’t know he was going to die before the This Is It series of 50 shows was to go live. If I take the movie at face-value, the producers/directors claim to have footage of ‘behind the scenes’ rehearsals of the This Is It tour.
After seeing the entire movie-mentary, my #1 impression is that I feel bad for the dancers and backup singers who so wanted this, the biggest chance of their lives, to perform with Michael Jackson. For all that we can say about his choices, his lifestyle, etc. he was a great performer. With his death, none of these incredibly talented people will be able to say they performed with Michael Jackson in the This Is It tour. However, what I liked was that several were highlighted in the movie. It was very clear that these people had worked their whole lives to hope to be part of this. The fact that Michael Jackson died and their dreams weren’t realized left me with compassion for them.
On to the music and performances. The thing that surprised me the most was how respectful and genuine Michael Jackson seemed to be. If they had footage of Michael-Behaving-Badly, it wasn’t apparent in this movie. In every scene he was quiet, respectful, and apologetic for requesting that the choreographers, sound and cameramen make changes to sound and lighting.
It’s strange to think that if Michael Jackson had not died this movie would not have been produced at all. Director Kenny Ortega (of High School Musical fame) had four months to pull together this movie from more than 100 hours of footage taped during the rehearsals for This Is It. The cast and crew seemed to really care about him. In one scene Michael Jackson was having a pre-song ride in the cherry picker that would be used in a song. One of the technicians was heard saying that he wanted Michael to get a feel for riding in it before they rehearsed the song, just for safety. Then when he was on the trial ride, Gary, the technician, could be heard saying ‘Michael, hold on’. A cynic (me) would say, well of course he wants him to be careful, there’s a lot of money riding on the ability of all involved to pull this event offs, but it seemed genuine.
There was a song where Michael gets up close to extremely talented female guitarist Orianthi Panagaris, telling her “this is your moment, and we’re all here for you.” He was so supportive of her and encouraged her to play it as long as she could.
The bottom line is that the movie was sincere and leaves us with a good memory of the performer who is no doubt one of the most influential in music history. We never quite understood Michael, but there was just something about him that we loved. That’s it.
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