Midnight Top Five - Mother's Day Spectacular Edition!

One of the most common questions asked of me, now that I'm a mostly full-grown dude, usually sounds like this: "Hey The Mike, you know things about things....what's the most powerful force in the world?" Normally, an emotional response leads me toward saying either a) Hulkamania or b) The A-Team. But when I stop to turn my noggin on, and consider the force that allowed me to experience the combined efforts of the above, I realize that these are small potatoes compared to the force of the dynamic duo that made The Mike possible. The story of one member of that duo goes something like this.

Approximately several years ago, a young woman nearly died while farting out a strange-looking CHUD of a baby whose peanut-shaped head resembled a disfigured version of Michael Berryman. (I can only assume that's where his first name came from, but that's not the point.) The point is that this young woman and the young man (more on him next month) who coproduced this odd thing then devoted herself to helping that creature become the right kind of full-grown dude.

In the early years, that meant she needed to turn a dark-skinned cabbage patch doll into Mr. T with her bare hands. Later, it meant she needed to blitz a closing video store in the name of finally acquiring the VHS copy of Clownhouse she'd sunk so many dollars into already. To paraphrase Pulp Fiction, that video was her children's birthright, and she'd be expletived if some expletive's gonna put their greasy hands on that tape. But a lot of times, it just meant she needed to point the child in the right direction.

It's with that thought in mind that I, that previously deformed youngling's older self, present a special Midnight Top Five focusing on things I love due to the love of my dear mum - or, as she prefers to be known - The Masha. She did this to me.....Rear Window - I'm still unsure how this happened, but I've learned to never doubt The Masha. In the middle of a time span while Rear Window, was out of print, the above VHS somehow appeared in our household. Though a young Mike, well before acquiring his The, was resistant to the film for some reason. Like Hogan, Masha knows best, and it wasn't long before I was showing the film to others with excitement. A couple of years later, the realization that's lasted nearly 15 years set in - The Masha had most certainly brought forth the movie that is undoubtedly The Mike's favorite.Young Frankenstein - As a 16 year-old, The Masha gave The Mike the best Valentine's Day gift he's ever received. (Yes, I will pause for you all to have a moment of sadness regarding that statement.)

Grievers be gone, because Young Frankenstein rules my school. Appealing to The Mike's comedic preferences and love of horror nostalgia, it's still an all-time favorite film that the all-too-wise Masha knew would succeed in every regard. If I'm blue and I don't know where to go to, I don't have to go where fashion sits....because The Masha brought this happy-making movie to my attention.The Fog - When I really started to dig in to horror films during my teen years, there was one quote The Masha would always relay when I asked for suggestions (Because really, after Rear Window and Young Frankenstein...wouldn't you go to her for suggestions too?): "There's something in THE FOG!" Though later travels into the work of John Carpenter have knocked it out of my favorite five or six Carpenter films, and there's one aspect of it that drives me absolutely batty, I still have a supremely soft spot for whatever that something in The Fog is.The Phantom of the Opera - In all regards, I do enjoy the tale of The Phantom of the Opera. It was early in my days that I was brought a cheap VHS of the 1925 silent film, my first horror film, which served a double purpose of bringing me a "scary" story and helping me practice my reading. Though I've never harnessed the latter fully, the first purpose stuck.

(Also, The Masha pushed the musical version of the tale heavily on us children, and we did attend a performance of it in my early teen years. I don't think I've ever admitted it, but it was pretty darn cool.)Transformers: The Movie - Just in case one could ever think The Masha may lose her powers of awesome movieness with age, I'm reminded of the time within recent years when she excitedly told me of finding a VHS copy of Transformers: The Movie, which made me cry like a baby while sitting in theater circa 1986, and bringing it home. She's at the point where she's discarding old VHS movies she buys cheap, but she made sure to point out that, no matter what, she'll keep that on hand just in case of emergency. If that's not Masha-ly love, I don't know what is.

When I look at this list, I realize one gigantic truth - if I can go through five great influences she's had on me without bringing up the fact that she brought The Blob into my young life; that must mean The Masha holds powers that I can never fully understand. Regardless, I'm as appreciative as is humanly possible for all that she is to me. To her, and to all the others out there - Happy Masha's Day!