Month: March 2018

“The beginning of a wonderful friendship”

RORY: Louis, I think this is the beginning of a wonderful friendship.
TRISTAN: Who’s Louis?

Rory is referencing the 1942 romantic drama film Casablanca, directed by Michael Curtiz and based on the unproduced stage play Everybody Comes to Rick’s by Murray Burnett and Joan Alison.

Set in Casablanca, Morocco during World War II, it is about an American nightclub owner named Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) who must choose between his lost love Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman) and helping her husband Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid), a Czech Resistance fugitive, escape from Vichy-controlled Casablanca so he can fight against the Nazis.

When the corrupt prefect of police Louis Renault (Claude Rains) tries to arrest Victor, Rick forces Renault to instead assist Victor and Ilsa to escape by holding him at gunpoint. At the last moment, Rick makes Ilsa leave with her husband. Louis suggests to Rick that they join the Free French in Brazzaville, in the Congo, and in the final scene Rick says, “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship”.

Rory seems to be suggesting that she and Tristan could form a friendship based on doing the right thing – that is, forgetting all about their kiss (which was apparently mutually enjoyable) and putting others’ needs before their own. Tristan doesn’t recognise the slight misquote, which dooms him as a potential love interest. Even Dean got Rory’s movie references.

Casablanca was the #9 film of 1942, received very good reviews, and won three Academy Awards, including Best Picture. Its reputation has only increased with time, and it continues to be well loved and popular with audiences. Casablanca is generally regarded as one of the best films ever made, and a shining example of the Golden Age of Hollywood.

This is another of Lorelai and Rory’s favourite films.

Hannibal Lecter

RORY: You said you were going to swear off girls – it’s funny.
TRISTAN: You don’t think I can?
RORY: No, I think you can, I just think it would be hard for you. It’d probably involve some kind of lock up facility, one of those Hannibal Lecter masks.

Dr. Hannibal Lecter is a character in a series of suspense novels by Thomas Harris, first appearing in the 1981 Red Dragon as a highly intelligent and cultured cannibalistic serial killer.

Rory is almost certainly thinking of the 1991 horror-thriller film The Silence of the Lambs, directed by Jonathan Demme, and based on the 1988 novel of the same name by Thomas Harris. In the film, Dr. Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins) is incarcerated for his crimes, and while being tranferred to another psychiatric facility is forced to wear a mask that acts like a muzzle (it doesn’t work).

The Silence of the Lambs was the #4 film of 1991 and won five Academy Awards, including Best Picture and a Best Actor for Hopkins. Hannibal Lecter is often regarded as one of the most frightening villains in cinema history.

Interestingly, the director of the sanitarium where Hannibal Lecter is confined is named Dr. Frederick Chilton, a self-important, incompetent man who is easily outwitted by Lecter. The film strongly suggests that Lecter will eventually murder and eat Chilton in revenge.

This is possibly where the name Chilton came from for Rory’s school, to suggest a strict and pompous confinement, yet with a certain laxness as well, giving the possibility of escape.

Miss Manners

LORELAI: You gave me a second hand present, like something you got at the junk store.
EMILY: You’re being a little dramatic. It was still in the crate.
LORELAI: You actually went, “Huh, what should I get Lorelai this year? You know what, I can’t be bothered. Let’s give her something we don’t want anymore”.
EMILY: You’re not funny.
LORELAI: What would Miss Manners say about this?

Miss Manners (born Judith Perlman in 1938, now Judith Martin) is an American journalist, author, and etiquette expert. Since 1978 she has written an advice column which is published in over 200 newspapers around the world.

Miss Manners does give her blessing to regifting, as long as the present is still new (not used), and that the recipient never finds out. She would think it quite okay that Lorelai received the unwanted hat rack from her mother still in its crate – the real rule of etiquette Emily has broken is telling Lorelai that her gift was previously given to her. Although as Emily says, she would probably understand if she met Richard’s mother.

“The fish flies at night”

EMILY: [on phone] I need the hat rack.
LORELAI: [whispers mysteriously] The fish flies at night.

A parody of the messages given in code in spy films, such as the James Bond and Mission Impossible series. Lorelai decides her mother’s comment sounds like a code sign, so she jokingly gives the “countersign”. Get Smart often used ridiculous signs and countersigns like this.

It’s rather similar to an exchange in the sitcom Murphy Brown, where Murphy tells someone she’s pregnant by saying in shock, “The stick turned blue!”. The other person thinks it must be code for something, and mutters back, “The dog barks at midnight”.

“Upcoming month”

LORELAI: I didn’t do anything wrong. I did the same thing I always do when I’m pulling up reservations for the upcoming month, but nothing happened.
MICHEL: You typed in the name?
LORELAI: I typed in the name.
MICHEL: You clicked on the April 5?

If April is the upcoming month, it must still be March. The only way it can still be March is if the month has about six weeks in it, but February seemed to have about seven weeks, so we’re clearly in Gilmore time now and just have to go with it. From Lorelai’s comment, it seems to be Friday March 30.

Marx Brothers

TRISTAN: Uh … you left this [handing Rory her notebook.]
RORY: Oh yeah, I did. Thanks.
TRISTAN: Sure. [both try to go through the doorway together and back up]
RORY: Well, that could have been a potential Marx Brothers moment.

The Marx Brothers were an American family who formed a highly successful comedy act in vaudeville, on Broadway, and in film, from 1905 to 1949. They are generally known by their stage names: Groucho, Chico, Harpo, Zeppo, and Gummo. Considered to be among the greatest comedians of the twentieth century, several of their films are regarded as comedy classics.

During the show, it became apparent that The Marx Brothers made some of Lorelai and Rory’s favourite films. Amy Sherman-Palladino is also a big fan of The Marx Brothers.

“Too cabin-in-the-woods?”

PARIS: Read my manifesto, I want your thoughts.
RORY: First thought – lose the word “manifesto”.
PARIS: Too cabin-in-the-woods?
RORY: Don’t open your mail.

A reference to domestic terrorist Theodore “Ted” Kaczynski (born 1942), also known as the Unabomber. In 1971 he moved to a remote cabin in the woods in Montana, where he lived as a recluse.

He first began his bombing campaign after witnessing the destruction of the wilderness around him, and between 1978 and 1995 mailed or hand-delivered a series of increasingly-sophisticated bombs that killed three people and injured twenty-three.

In 1995, Ted Kaczynski’s lengthy essay, Industrial Society and Its Future, (known to the police as the Unabomber Manifesto) was published in The New York Times and The Washington Post. He promised that if it was published he would desist from further terrorism, and police hoped that its publication would help lead to his identification.

That proved to be the case: Ted’s estranged brother, David Kaczynski, recognised his brother’s writing style from family records of letters that Ted had written to newspapers in the 1970s, and an earlier essay by Ted.

Ted Kaczynski was arrested in 1996; he pleaded guilty to all charges in 1998 and was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole. He is currently serving his sentence in a Supermax prison in Colorado.

“Even Barbie ended up being a stewardess”

PARIS: I just think it’s strange that you don’t wanna be queen.
RORY: You know, not all girls want to be queen, Paris. Even Barbie ended up being a stewardess.

Rory is referring to the doll named Barbie, previously discussed. One of her early “careers” was becoming a stewardess with American Airlines in 1961, where she wore a uniform and carried a flight bag. Barbie never has been a queen, although since the 1990s she has been a princess.

Quarter Sessions Court

PARIS: We are talking about Government class, not the movies. God, why can’t I get one person to care about this as much as I do?!
LOUISE: Okay, fine. I’ll be the head of the Quarter Sessions court, but I’m still wearing the dress.

The Quarter Sessions courts were local courts held in each county – named such because they were held four times a year. Their reputation was very poor, and the chairmen did not not need legal qualifications. Even in imaginary situations, Louise doesn’t seem to aim very high.