If These Walls Could Talk

When I was a little girl my room was the bright pink foofy collection of flowers, bunnies, hearts and patterns that most girl's rooms are. After fighting my mother's interior design instincts for several years, I finally won the right to tack posters on my wall at age 12. Like most pre-teen girls, I flew to the pages of teeny bopper magazines with free pin up posters of my favorite boy crushes. So why am I blogging about this, you ask?

Last night I was lying in bed thinking about the boys I chose to riddle my walls with and how ironic my choices actually were.

First poster: Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Long before he starred in Inception and Batman, and I mean long, long looooong before, he starred in my dreams. I watched him guest star in Dr. Quinn Medicine woman (and rewound it and re-watched it multiple times), I didn't miss the obscure Sunday night movie where he played a kid moving to Africa. And I watched as many episodes of 3rd Rock From The Sun as I possibly could before my parents deemed it unfit for me to watch. And while my crush for him faded, my interest in his work didn't. I followed his independent movies like Brick, which sidenote is an amazing movie, if you haven't checked it out.... you should. And then 500 Days Of Summer came around and I thought to myself how nice it was to have him back in the mainstream. Ofcourse, Inception, Batman, and Looper came into the mix and he just blew up. I'd like to think my hanging him on my wall had something to do with it.

Second poster: Leonardo Dicaprio

I'm sure most girls developed a crush on Leo during his Titanic debut as the adorable Jack who's famous last words were, "Never let go!" But I'm talking about the loveable young teen who was adopted by the Seavers in Growing Pains. Yes, I spotted a star in Leo even then. Of course his winning role as Romeo in Romeo + Juliet sealed the deal for me. I will not insult your intelligence in listing of the ridiculous amounts of amazing and Oscar-winning movies he's starred in, but I have to say that I'm not sure he would have been quite so successful if he wasn't tacked to my wall.

Third poster: Jonathan Taylor Thomas

Okay, so clearly I mistepped here, but in my defense, every seventh grade girl was taping episodes of Home Improvement and ever-watching The Lion King back then. Unfortunately for JTT, he stopped growing at age 12. Wah wah.

Fourth poster: Elijah Wood

I had a MAD obsession with Elijah Wood when I was a pre-teen. Forever Young was where I first spotted him, next it was The Good Son, where he was victimized by the kid from Home Alone. I could not get enough of him in Huck Finn. Shoot I even watched North a million times. But then, he just disappeared for a while. Where did he go? Would my crush ever come back? Then Boom. The Lord Of the Rings trailer came out and I turned bright red with embarrassment. Yeah, that's right, I was in college. Of course his stardom rose to the ranks of hall of fame status. I can't say for certain, but it might just have been because his poster was right next to my closet in eight grade.

In short, the walls of my bedroom when I was 12 read like a who's who of American Film Culture in 2012. Could it be because they're a group of extraordinary talented and good looking people? Oh possibly. But I'd like to think that maybe it's just because I plucked them from the pages of TeenBop and displayed them all over my room for a few years that was the REAL ticket to their success.