Off Topic: The unofficial state movie of Mississippi (and what's yours?)

As a diversion, state legislatures go on sprees of declaring "official state" things. During a brief stint as a political writer in Nashville in the mid 1970s I watched lawmakers consider tagging various flora, fauna and other non-persons with the "official state" prefix. As I recall, the firefly was named an official state insect that year (Tennessee has more than one).

One young lawmaker, making light of the whole thing, entered a bill naming the oldest member of the state senate as the "official state fossil." The elder statesman was not amused.

What I've never seen anywhere is a state with an official movie.

Here in Mississippi, I would nominate O' Brother, Where Art Thou?, the 2000 comedy from the brothers Coen, Joel and Ethan.

It already ranks in my mind as Mississippi's unofficial state movie. People who've watched it more than once almost invariably have their favorite lines.

It's a comedy, but the whole premise sounds anything but funny: 3 convicts escape from a chaingang, seeking an alleged treasure, all of it set during the Depression in hardscrabble rural Mississippi in the midst of a gubernatorial election. Oh, and did I mention that it's a retelling of The Odyssey by Homer?

But funny, it is.

My personal favorite line comes from the scene in the stolen car when the escapees have just picked up Tommy Johnson, the bluesman. Tommy admits to having sold his soul to the devil the night before. As it happens, 2 of the escaped convicts, Pete and Delmar, had just stumbled into a riverside baptism service and, being caught up in the fervor, were submersed, themselves.

The third escapee, Ulysses, played to the pop-eyed hilt by George Clooney, declares:

"I seem to be the only one who's currently unaffiliated."

That's my favorite.

I"ve heard other people say that their favorite lines are, among others:

• "I'm with you fellers."
• "She done R-U-N-N-O-F-T."
• "Is this the road to Ittie Beenie?"
• "Watch your language, young feller, this is a public market!" and, related to that, "I'm a Dapper Dan man."
• "Hot Damn! It's the Soggy Bottom Boys!"
• "Oh, George, not the livestock!"
• "I didn't seem to be needin' it."
• "Well, ain't this just a geographical oddity!"

Granted, none of those seem funny if you haven't watched the movie. But in context, they are memorable gems and rank right up there with round up all the usual suspects and I'll worry about that tomorrow as dialog that people will recite decades from now.

Most states don't have such a close enough tie to a movie that anyone would want to make it an "official" part of the state's symbolism.

Maybe folks in Georgia would point to Gone With The Wind as a nostalgic favorite. Having the state's name in the title is no cinch. I don't think the citizens of one western state would want to enshrine the 1954 yarn Cattle Queen Of Montana as its celluloid icon.

If I lived in Texas, I would throw my weight behind Giant, the 1956 drama that tells of the state's evolving economy and gradually shifting social outlook. A writer with Texas Monthly several years ago, in fact, did declare it to be the unofficial state movie of Texas. Many people in the power structure of Texas actually hated Giant when it first came out, the article noted. But then it kind of took hold and in many ways portrayed the state as its natives would want the rest of the world to see it. Rough and tough but progressive and forward looking, full of adventure, opportunity and, yes, romance. And don't forget the wide open spaces.

I guess that would be the hallmark of an official state movie: a story that would show the world who we think we are as a people. Mississippi could do worse than O' Brother.

But past Mississippi and Texas, I can't think of any other state that has that sort of relationship to a piece of cinema. I don't mean to slight my friends in other parts of America, but tell me what would be the state movie of Arkansas or California, Alabama or New York?

Any further suggestions about Mississippi -- or elsewhere?

- Owen Taylor