Sculpture on Film #1: My Cousin Vinny

Part of watching a movie with me is dealing with the fact that I spend a lot of time scrutinizing the frame around where the main action is happening for fun or worthwhile visual things, and when I find one, I tend to tug on the sleeve of whoever is sitting next to me to whisper about it, because I have a hard time keeping things to myself. This new feature, which will repeat at random whenever I have material for it, is the blogging version of my annoying whispering in the dark. Here, I hope to share films with scenes that prominently feature sculpture.

First up: My Cousin Vinny (1992)! This movie is one of my favorite guilty pleasures, at least partially due to my ongoing and slightly embarrassing crush on Ralph Macchio, and also for the fun it has with its goofy North v. South plotline, and for Marisa Tomei and her *thunk-thunk* biological clock. I had to come up with a way to justify watching it over and over again, and thankfully I found one that is related to my dissertation.

The first time we meet Joe Pesci in the film, he is driving his big, outrageous convertible into a sleepy Southern hamlet to defend his cousin and a friend, wrongfully accused of murder. As rock music blares, shots of Pesci's car are intercut with the locals, who are utterly shocked to see such a person pulling into their town. What interests me is the town itself: one of those typical Southern county seats, with the wide town green in front of a grand courthouse. The setting is supposed to be in Alabama:


Pesci gets out of the car first, followed by Marisa Tomei:


And what's that behind her? Why, could it be a Confederate war memorial? I think it might be!

Whoever was in charge of scouting locations for this film really did a great job. A lot of the film's exterior scenes take place in this town square, and it really adds a lot to the kind of juxtapositions that are so integral to the movie's storyline. It's a popcorn, Saturday afternoon kind of film, yes, but its visuals tell a compelling story.

I did a little sleuthing, and it turns out that the town square and monument actually belong to Monticello, Georgia:


Fabricated by the McNeel Marble Works of Marietta, Georgia, it was dedicated on April 6, 1910. I haven't visited the monument to photograph it myself yet, but I'm hoping to do so sometime in the fall. The second chapter of my dissertation is on Southern monuments, and I have a feeling the Georgia monuments are going to tell me some compelling stories.

And that's how I managed to work My Cousin Vinny into my dissertation!