5 Potential Cinematic Butter Sculptures

Well, you probably heard, the Iowa State Fair this year will feature a Field of Dreams made out of butter. Wait, on second thought, why on earth would you have heard that? Never mind. Doesn’t matter. The point is, the Iowa State Fair, famous and frustratingly known for its Butter Cow (which is, unfortunately, exactly what it sounds like – a cow sculpted out of butter), will feature a replica of the baseball diamond Ray Kinsella built just for Shoeless Joe carved out of butter alongside the dairy-based ol’ Bessie.

It’s no secret I despise the Butter Cow. Iowa has an acreage of great things, and I’m not just talking about Donna Reed’s Oscar (though I have – many, many, many times). Chicago’s great and all but Zanzibar’s Coffee makes Intelligentsia – fine, though it may be – taste like the dispensed swill from Dennis Duffy’s Coffee Vending Machine. Even so, what people do people in Iowa want to talk about? The State Fair. And what at the State Fair do they most want to talk about? The Butter Cow. They talk about that damn thing like it’s the Pietà. And it drives me loony. To quote Rob Corddry in “Butter”: “Oh, and newsflash, butter’s bad for you!” Still, if this is the road, State Fair “taste”makers, that you wish to go down, creating Iowa-based film items out of butter, who is better qualified to submit other future ideas than Cinema Romantico, a film-obsessed native Iowan? No one, that’s who. So I’m gonna help here. Because I feel it’s my civic duty.

5 Potential Cinematic Butter Sculptures

Butter Deansie & The O Fox, “Cedar Rapids” 

“Cedar Rapids” centers around an innocent insurance salesman played by Ed Helms, but what stands out is the failing-to-act-your-age antics of his cohorts Dean Ziegler (John C. Reilly) and Joan Ostrowski-Fox (Anne Heche), better known as Deansie and The O Fox. I mean, is that not the best duo name of all time? Would you not join their wild west posse? Sure, sure, Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid is pretty good, but it’s Malone & Stockton when compared to the Jordan & Pippen that is Deansie & The O Fox. In fact, I am desperate to see this butter sculpture. I would legitimately be excited to see a Butter Deansie & The O Fox. This needs to happen. (Note: It will not happen.)

Butter Patrick Bergin Moustache, “Sleeping With The Enemy” 

Yes, yes, yes, Madam Julia Roberts starred in “Sleeping With The Enemy”, wherein she moves to scenic Cedar Falls to escape the titular enemy, played by Patrick Bergin. But what do people really remember? Madam Julia? Or Patrick Bergin’s Moustache? The defense rests, your Honor.

Butter Kat Araujo, “Mystic Pizza”

Annabeth Gish, as I have noted before, was born in Albuquerque but moved to Cedar Falls when she was all of two years old and spent all her formative years there. Why she was still officially a Cedar Falls resident when she filmed “Mystic Pizza” with what’s-her-face, and that’s why there should be a Butter Kat Araujo. Because Iowa is not Daisy. Iowa is Kat. *Thumps chest.*

Butter Spring Break Massacre Sorority House 

Portions of 2008's “Spring Break Massacre”, of which IMDB reviewer innocuous wonders “I'm a bit unsure about why exactly this movie was made” were filmed in scenic Dubuque, Iowa, and featured……hold on, what’s that? My apologies. Iowa Governor Terry Branstad is telling me to tell you “this movie does not actually exist in terms of ‘Iowaness’. The state of Iowa is formally rejecting claims that any parts of it were filmed within its borders. Please remove it from your list.’” So, uh, never mind! Nothing to see here!

Butter 76 Trombones, “The Music Man”

I’m sort of surprised to learn this particular butter sculpture has yet to happen. Granted, it’s gonna take a lot of butter but hey, it’s Iowa! It’ll be epic! It’ll take up a quarter of the fairgrounds! It’ll be the Synochdoche, New York of butter sculptures!

Butter Sugar Santos, “Sugar”

Admittedly, most people, Iowans and others, will probably look suspiciously at a Butter Sugar Santos like it’s the high-falutin’ Des Moinesean who just walked into the one bar in all of some 500 person town in the northwest corner of the state, but so be it. Because look, Iowa already has the Best Baseball Movie Of All Time (“Field of Dreams”) but it also has the Second Best Baseball Movie Of All Time, which is “Sugar” (not all of which but a good and crucial portion of are set in Iowa). Yes. “Sugar.” If you blanch at such a proclamation, you haven’t seen it. If you accuse me of Iowan bias, you’re not necessarily wrong, but you are wrong, because “Sugar” is just that freaking good. And different. If there was ever a movie that deserved to be called “a breath of fresh air”, it’s this one, because it doesn’t merely turn baseball movie clichés on their head, it takes baseball movie clichés and runs them through the wood chipper. It’s magical but also unsparing, and utterly brilliant. And really, be honest now, what’s more Iowan than Sugar made out of Butter?