In Pairings, artists and creators pick the movies that complement their latest work.
2nd Grade is an indie rock band whose new album Girls and Boys is out on October 30 wherever you get your music!
We asked the band to pick a few movies that pair well with Girls and Boys. Here’s what they wrote about them.
Muriel’s Wedding
This movie about a reclusive ABBA obsessive who spends a lot of time at tiki bars is my Mamma Mia! Toni Collette’s Muriel is exactly the kind of person who might populate these songs, a person who doesn’t fit into any preexisting box or category and is demanded to do so anyway. I hear “Dancing Queen” through Muriel’s ears and fall in love with it all over again.
Sherman’s March
I haven’t seen this in probably a decade, but my imagination is forever stuck with it. In 1985 Ross McElwee set out to make a Civil War documentary and ended up with a classic piece of cinéma vérité about romantic failure and Southern women. His search for historical and personal truths goes astray in a jungle of strange, beautiful, and deeply human perspectives. I see parallels with our album, which started as an impartial genre exercise and ended up as an abstract mess about people.
Masculin Féminin
The title obviously reminds me of Girls and Boys, but really Godard’s entire ’60s run has a lot to do with the way we operate. Those films are largely self-reflexive, poppy and stylish, and head over heels in love with an era of Hollywood disdained by the cultural elite of the time. Masculin Féminin goes out to “the children of Marx and Coca-Cola” whose dream world is shaped by money and bright colors and impossible expectations.
La Pointe Courte
Agnès Varda’s debut feature film is one that has quietly stuck with me over the years. A nameless couple tenderly navigate a rocky stretch of their marriage against the backdrop of a small fishing village. Life goes on, we get the sense that life has been going on for awhile and will continue to do so forever, and we find ourselves moved. I think of our album in a similar way—these aren’t vignettes or characters to me, just little lives.
One Man Up
The first film of Paolo Sorrentino deals with two famous men both named Antonio Pisapia whose lives follow parallel courses in a strange kind of quantum entanglement. It’s funny and thoughtful, and Tony Servillo is especially electric as a washed-up pop singer. I’m thinking of this movie because one of the major musical themes of our record is the sound of two distinct voices getting tied up and blurring together, sort of seeing what each voice reveals about the other.
Deathtrap
You can tell Sidney Lumet wanted to have some fun with this one before diving into The Verdict. Perhaps one of the most entertaining movies I’ve ever seen! It’s a movie that’s constantly trying to outdo itself, luring the viewer ever deeper into the maze of its parameters. What I wouldn’t give to write pop songs this clever and constantly engaging.
