“What’s your favorite movie?”

That’s it. Right there, those four words (five if we didn’t have the contraction). Yup. That is the WORST question you could ask me.

When I a senior in high school I thought nothing could be worse, than someone asking me, “What I was going to do with my life?” But that quickly went away, and what was left in it’s place, was the inevitable unanswerable question. “What’s your favorite movie?”

Now when I was a kid, this answer was always easy to answer. Between the ages of 3-8 it was probably a tie between The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and whatever Disney movie was recently released. From about 9-10 it was whatever Ninja movie my mother would rent for my brothers and I, so any of the 3 Ninja movies and Surf Ninjas.

These are all classics, but if you’ve never seen them and they are not a part of your nostalgic repertoire, don’t watch them, because you’ll think I am crazy

The summer of my fifth grade year on, if asked this most probative and obnoxious question, my answer was always the same, Newsies. That summer my mom had received a free movie of her choice from our favorite video store (Rest in Peace Video Excitement) and even though my younger brother denies it, we both chose Newsies. We then proceeded, he and I, to watch that movie everyday for the rest of the summer. It may have been a flop at the box office, it may be the movie Christian Bale (yes that Christian Bale), regretted making the most. But it had some seriously catchy tunes and could make me smile every day.

Eventually as time wore on, saying that Newsies was my favorite movie, became more of a knee jerk reaction. It had long become a fond memory and watched seldomly, but it was an answer, and one I could easily defend when necessary, or was so baffling that it shut the person up rather quickly.

In college I quickly came to realize that answering this question was like navigating a mine field. Depending on who was asking the question, you had to an answer that was either just pretentious enough to satisfy the cine-files, just jock-y enough to satisfy the athletes/frat brothers, just rom-com-y enough to satisfy the gal pals, or just independent/musical enough to satisfy the theatre peeps.  Though in all honesty the theatre people were always a mixed bag, you just have to play it one on one with them and when in a group setting best to just ignore the question or defer to someone else’s answer.

So I developed a hard a fast way to answer this question. I never classify my answer as my favorite movie.  For example:

Them: “Kelly, what’s your favorite movie?”

Me: “Huh, well currently I’ve been on a Marvel kick and I’ve really enjoyed Iron Man.”

Them: “Oh yeah, I really liked that movie, but I think I prefer RDJ in Sherlock Holmes.”

Me: “He’s also really good in Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang and I can’t wait to see Chef. I mean it’s really just a small part, but between him and Jon Favreau there’s really nothing that can go wrong…”

See how that works? I just deflect, then overwhelm with information until we’ve steered the conversation into a safe zone, or I’ve bored them to death.

However, you have to be ready to defend your answer, because sometimes people won’t like your answer and they’ll be sure to let you know. Last summer, over dinner with friends I was asked to name my favorite movie.  I made mention of the fact that though it wasn’t my favorite movie, it was the movie that was most representative of how I felt about that time of the year. The movie I picked was  A River Runs Through It.  Apparently that was not the correct answer because it sparked a debate among the table as a whole. I defend my answer and I moved on.  At the end of the conversation, I had answered the question to my liking, albeit I had tweaked it a little bit, but I was comfortable with it, regardless of how my friend felt.

So here’s the deal, if you’re going to ask me that question, please be okay with the fact that I may just ignore you. Also I may answer without answering you and talk you in circles. But please know that if you ask the question with the intent of belittling the answer that I give you. Just save your breath, after all you’ll spare me the teeth grinding frustration of having to answer, in my opinion,  an unanswerable question.

So what’s your favorite movie?

Kidding! 

P.S. Props to my mom for always saying that Newsies would be way better as Broadway musical than a movie. You win again mom.