The Good Life on Film//// Final Collumn

How is it that we refer to this state? Oh yes, the good life. Nebraska certainly is the good life, we have high speed internet, access to hallucinogens, and of course we are responsible for Dick Cheney. Our fine state produced the delicious McRib and also started Arbor Day. However, if your only knowledge of Nebraska comes from watching movies, you’ll likely want to stay as far away as possible.

Cinema has not been Nebraska’s best friend. In fact, it makes us either seem like cross-dressers, wolves or little blonde children lurking around in fields. To set the record straight, some of the events in movies that take place in Cornhusker State are indeed true stories. One of which, Night of the Twisters stars Devon Sawa as a teenager involved in the devastating tornadoes that touched down in Grand Island over 25 years ago.




Unfortunately the film that hurts us the most is a true story, involving Brandon Teena, a transgender portrayed by Hillary Swank in Boys Don’t Cry, a movie chronicling the time frame before and leading up to her being sexually assaulted and killed by her friends. Though the incident was headline news for a long time, it still set Nebraska back about 50 years.




If you found that crazy, here are some of the not so real murderous stories set in Nebraska. Children of the Corn was based on Stephen King’s novella and featured little blonde children who are in a cult in the town of Gatlin NE, where they are told by a supernatural force in the cornfields that they should kill the adults. A bickering couple drives through Gatlin to report a murder, when they find themselves in the midst of a religious rebellion. Pretty creepy, huh? We’ve yet to touch base on strange, the children of the corn are puppets next to this Nebraskan.



In the special effects driven Teen Wolf, the always charming Michael J. Fox stars as Scott Howard, a normal guy whose popularity and basketball skills drastically change as he discovers his family’s secret, they’re werewolves. Scott and his sidekick and nutty cousin Stiles market his Teen Wolf-iness and get wild on top of the family’s utility vehicle. It is absolutely true that Nebraskans love to jump on bandwagons. No one loved the Rockies more in the 2007 World Series than us and I bet no other state spent more money on United States flag items than Nebraskans, so I would agree that people in this state would buy loads of Teen Wolf gear.



There are sleepers when it comes to films around here. In one of Alexander Payne’s many Nebraska movies Election it features Omaha’s Chris Klein and Matthew Broderick in a tie for two of the most awkward sex scenes ever. It is a great flick, no doubt about it. In another he exposes Kathy Bates in one of the greatest ways I have seen her, and no not as the Unsinkable Molly Brown in Titanic. You may find it strange, but I must be honest, there is something strangely sexy about seeing Kathy Bates get down to her birthday suit in About Schmidt. Alexander Payne, you are a great Nebraskan.






Perhaps the state of Nebraska should stay out of film altogether. Iowa learned its lesson with Field of Dreams and hasn’t made a film yet. Lord knows they don’t want people to think there are voices telling you to do crazy things in their cornfields. Perhaps it’s best we leave it up to Hollywood. We’ll stock up on hallucinogens, put our Dorothy Lynch on our salads, and maybe go on a hunting adventure with Dick Cheney. Sounds like the Good Life. Sounds like a screenplay . . .