It's hard to predict much about Frank Ocean's new album from its title alone. Surely Boys Don't Cry is a callback to the Cure's 1980 album of the same name, but what if Ocean is referring to something else? What if instead, it's a stoic nod to the 1999 film of the same name? Directed by Kimberly Pierce, Boys Don't Cry is based on the true story of American trans man Brandon Teena, though it is as much about the broad themes of identity, nascent sexuality, and body politics as it is about the violence experienced by transgender bodies.
It wouldn't be the first time Ocean's music has alluded to a movie. From the Richie Tenenbaum outfit (yellow blazer, striped sweatband) he wore during his performance of "Forrest Gump" at the 2013 Grammy Awards to the mention of Dragon Ball-Z character Majin Bu in "Pink Matter", Frank Ocean is obsessed with film and TV.
Sometimes, Ocean quotes movies directly – the "too weird to live, too rare to die" line in "Lost" is lifted from Terry Gilliam's madcap desert orgy Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998), whose influence also looms large in the "Pyramids" video. In other instances, his imagery is subtly suggestive; the drugged-up silver-spoon students in "Super Rich Kids", for example, are from the same cinematic universe as their Less Than Zero (1987) counterparts. Occasionally, Ocean's film references are esoteric; who is "Novacane"'s "model broad with the Hollywood smile"? With her "stripper booty and a rack like wow", it's not that much of a stretch to read his "brain like Berkley" pun as a cheeky wink to Elizabeth Berkley in Showgirls (Paul Verhoeven, 1995).
Pitchfork's own Ryan Dombal described Ocean's 2012 album Channel Orange as a "Magnolia-style cross-wired heartbreak epic", with its collage of multiple narratives connected by the thematic through-line of unrequited love, and indeed Paul Thomas Anderson's film would fit neatly within the canon of new New Hollywood movies from the 1990s that Ocean references. But Channel Orange and Ocean's 2011 mixtape Nostalgia, Ultra don't just engage with independent films—they also reference Gen X blockbusters and big-budget, conservative films like Pretty Woman and Forrest Gump. Ocean—a bisexual black millennial—uses these films to insert himself into a distinctly American mythology. He is neither fanboy nor voyeur. He is Richard Gere in a tux. He is Jenny Curran. He is Leaving Las Vegas. He is the history of American movies, revised.
In an interview with The New York Times, Ocean describes being inspired by "the anonymity that directors can have about their films." Channel Orange is too rich with life to truly claim anonymity, though given the grand narrative that runs through that album, there's certainly a case for Ocean-as-auteur.
Here are some of the movies that Ocean returns to again and again, paired with the corresponding tracks in his catalog:
Eyes Wide Shut (Stanley Kubrick, 1999)
Corresponds to: "Novacane"
"Bed full of women, flip on a tripod, little red light on shooting/ I'm feeling like Stanley Kubrick, this is some visionary shit / Been tryin' to film pleasure with my eyes wide shut but it keeps on moving"
In Kubrick's swan song, Tom Cruise's Dr. Hartford stumbles upon a secret society that hosts masked orgies. The bed full of women, the seedy voyeurism, the play on Eyes Wide Shut's title—Ocean cherry-picks from the tropes of this erotic thriller.
And Eyes Wide Shut might not the only Kubrick film being referenced here; the little red light is potentially a nod to HAL 9000, the sentient computer represented by a blinking red eye in 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), while "Novacane"'s music video takes place in a hotel room whose 1960s-style paisley patterned wallpaper recalls The Shining's (1980) Overlook Hotel.
Corresponds to: "Lovecrimes"
Eyes Wide Shut crops up again in "Lovecrimes", though this time Ocean samples Nicole Kidman's scornful, marijuana-fueled diatribe on infidelity in relationships. In the film, the scene plays out as a back-and-forth between the couple, but Ocean strips away Cruise's retorts. The effect is a monologue that makes Kidman's Alice sound completely irrational—in keeping with the protagonist who "pleads insanity" in "Lovecrimes".
The Matrix (The Wachowski Siblings, 1999)
Corresponds to: "Sweet Life"
"The water's blue, swallow the pill/ Keeping it surreal, whatever you like"
In The Matrix, Keanu Reeves' Neo is famously presented with two pills—the red pill, which allows him to wake from the virtual reality he is trapped within, and the blue pill, which offers him the chance to live in comfortable obliviousness once more. The narrator of "Sweet Life" encourages (with winking irony, of course) the song's privileged protagonists to take the blue pill and continue to luxuriate in their moneyed bubble of ignorant bliss.
Reservoir Dogs (Quentin Tarantino, 1992)
Corresponds to: "Sweet Life"
"Living in Ladera Heights, the black Beverly Hills"
"Sweet Life"'s privileged personae are coded as black; Ocean introduces them as from the black Beverly Hills—an explicit reference to Mr. Pink's (Steve Buscemi) description of Ladera Heights in Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs. In both the film and the song, Ladera Heights is a pejorative.
Rush Hour 2 (Brett Ratner, 2001)
Corresponds to: "Lost"
"Got my buttercream silk shirt/ And it's Versace"
Not all of Ocean's references are quite so highbrow. A scene in which Chris Rock and Jackie Chan are mistaken for a gay couple during a visit to buy suits is a fun nod to Ocean's own interest in style and fashion—and possibly his queerness, too.
Pretty Woman (Gary Marshall, 1990)
Corresponds to: "American Wedding"
"My pretty woman in a ball gown/ I'm Richard Gere in a tux"
In his riff on the Eagles' "Hotel California", Ocean casts himself as sugar daddy Richard Gere to his "teenage wife". Gere was paired with Julia Roberts (who is 18 years his junior) in both Pretty Woman and Runaway Bride (1999), and it's possible Ocean is playing homage to both films. Importantly, in Pretty Woman Gere waves the magic wand of money, rescuing Roberts' down-and-out sex worker from financial ruin and immersing her in a capitalist version of fairytale romance. Ocean touches on the delicate relationship between sex, work, and money in Nostalgia, Ultra, though it's not until Channel Orange that he explores this theme explicitly in songs like "Sweet Life", "Super Rich Kids", and "Lost".
ATL (Chris Robinson, 2006)
Corresponds to: "End/Golden Girl"
"I can't believe I'm even talking to you, telling you this right now/ You're special/ I wish you could see what I see"
In Channel Orange's outro, Ocean lifts dialogue from hip-hop drama ATL. Yet, as with his use of Alice's soliloquy from Eyes Wide Shut, he only quotes from the female lead. By doing so, he embodies Lisa London's character New New in all her wide-eyed vulnerability, flipping the gendered script at stake. The sound of keys locking a car plays in the transition between "End"and "Golden Girl", another nod to the romantic confession scene from which London's speech is taken—which happens in a car.
Forrest Gump (Robert Zemeckis, 1994)
Corresponds to: "Forrest Gump"
"Forrest Gump, you're on my mind boy/ Running on my mind boy/ Forrest Gump, I know you're Forrest/ I know you wouldn't hurt a beetle"
On "Forrest Gump", the closing track on Channel Orange, Ocean likens his lover to the eponymous Forrest, who is characterized by his slow, sweet naiveté and wholesome wouldn't-hurt-a-fly nature. In the film's most famous scene Forrest's childhood sweetheart Jenny urges him to sprint from his tormentors; here, Ocean's Forrest races through his mind.
"I saw your game, Forrest/ I was screaming 'run 44'/ But you kept running past the end zone/ Oh where'd you go Forrest?"
Here, Ocean quotes the scene in which Forrest (whose jersey number is 44) literally runs past the end zone and into the locker room. In Forrest Gump, Jenny initially rejects Forrest's marriage proposal (though she does concede to sleeping with him). While the film has a happy resolution, in "Forrest Gump" Ocean is interpolated as this earlier version of Jenny—the recipient of Forrest's unrequited love. The two Forrests run headlong into heartbreak, past the end zones of their respective relationships, leaving both Ocean and Jenny regretting what they have enabled.
"My fingertips and my lips/ They burn from the cigarettes":
Lastly there's "Forrest Gump"'s mention of cigarettes. In Forrest Gump, the inexperienced Forrest is startled by a sex worker whose kisses taste like ash; "I'm sorry I ruined your New Year's Eve party, Lieutenant Dan. She tasted like cigarettes." By noting this small detail, Ocean aligns himself with the woman, underlining the fundamental incompatibility between him and his virtuous Forrest-type love interest. It's a subtle reference that shows how their relationship was doomed from the start.
Throughout these songs, Ocean's point of identification moves between male and female, heartbreaker and heartbroken, narrator and protagonist—yet all of his reference points are cut from the same American cloth. Using these reference points, Ocean is able to create a map of America through a collective cinematic imagination. From the magical realism of "Pyramids" to the taxi driver in "Bad Religion", movies are key to understanding the way Ocean understands both himself and his place as an American citizen. When Boys Don't Cry is released, I won't be trying to figure out what Ocean's been doing or who he's been seeing. I'll be listening to find out what he's been watching.