HAPPY MOVIES WEEK: Jerry Maguire

"Have you ever gotten the feeling that you aren't completely embarassed yet, but you glimpse tomorrow's embarrassment?


Considering my feelings for Tom Cruise, which are of the eye-rolling and chuh!-noise-making variety, it's strange to me that one of my favorite movies of all time is Jerry Maguire. But who could resist this happy-ending movie with all its funny one liners and uplifting theme of nice guys finishing first and getting the girl and the enormous contract for his football player?

One of the best moments of the movie is, oddly enough, when his football playing client (played by Cuba Gooding Jr.) takes a smashing hit from a linebacker and is lying on the field, unconscious. The player's wife is watching the game on television with a bunch of other football wives and when she sees her husband, she hysterically dials Jerry's cell phone to find out what has happened. "This family means everything to me, Jerry," she says tearfully, trying to contain her fear, "and it doesn't work without him."

And that's what it's all about. Families with their loyalty and trust and committment to one another, whether the family in question is a husband and wife with their children, or two sisters making a household with one another, or whether it's in the relationship Jerry wants to forge with his clients -- he's a sports agent with a difference.

This movie, of course, is also famous for Jerry's "You complete me" speech to his wife/business associate Dorothy (Renee Zellweger), as is her following line, "Shut up. Just shut up. You had me at hello."

There is just no maintaining composure during this happy moment. My husband has even been known to clear his throat loudly a time or two. It's just that kind of movie. If you don't come away from it loving Jerry, you're eating the wrong brand of popcorn or something.