by Liz Locke, Staff Writer

With the publication date of my debut novel Follow the Sun quickly approaching, I can’t help but reflect on the movies that have shaped my writing. Although much of the visual inspiration for this book comes from the work of photographer Slim Aarons and his prolific coverage of the mid-20th century Jet Set, cinema has always been my muse and method of escape. That’s one of the big themes of Follow the Sun: escape. Maybe, if you watch these ten movies and read my love letter to the 1960s, you’ll find the summer escape you’re looking for too. Cheers!

Goodbye, Columbus (dir. Larry Peerce, 1969)

I knew before I ever wrote a word of Follow the Sun that it would begin and end in a swimming pool. When I pictured this pool, I pictured Ali MacGraw as Brenda Patimkin in the film adaptation of Philip Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus. A tan girl in a colorful bikini walking past rows of lounge chairs at the country club, diving into the water like she’s diving into this story. She’s young, she’s rich, she’s beautiful, and she knows it. I’ve always thought it was a hell of a way to open a movie, and a book.

Before Sunrise (dir. Richard Linklater, 1995)

The image of two people walking and talking about nothing and everything, each trying not to reveal too much too soon, unsure if they’ll ever see one another again when this vacation is over—this is what inspired the opening chapters of Follow the Sun. Acapulco may have been traded for Vienna, but those quick looks, long walks, and first rushes of attraction are the same.

Romeo + Juliet (dir. Baz Luhrmann, 1996)

With any good romance, the first kiss is a big deal. The mood has to be set, the tension has to build, and the reader has to really feel the spark of attraction. A great example of this is the scene in Romeo + Juliet where Romeo (Leonardo DiCaprio) kisses Juliet (Claire Danes) in the pool at the Capulet mansion. There’s something so sensual about the water and the way the lighting reflects onto their costumes and skin, and when I picture Follow the Sun’s main characters Caroline and Tex in an Acapulco pool at night, it’s this visual I come back to.

Charade (dir. Stanley Donen, 1963)

Early in this classic Audrey Hepburn/Cary Grant caper, we see Audrey enjoying lunch on the veranda of a ski resort. Everyone is chic in their oversized sunglasses, the umbrellas are a crisp, bright yellow, and you’d almost think this was a pool deck if not for snow-covered mountains in the background. But then you look past her (through the window of the resort), and you see that indeed it is a pool deck. In this winter wonderland, wealthy people can afford to make swimming seasonless, sealing themselves off from the cold inside glass-lined atriums. Hats and gloves outside, bikinis inside? It’s decadent, it’s stylish, and it’s the vibe I wanted to bring to all my Gstaad scenes.

Two for the Road (dir. Stanley Donen, 1967)

Audrey Hepburn’s mod designer wardrobe in this film is exactly the type of clothing I pictured my characters wearing. Daring, bold, and very, very sixties. There are some wonderful “Jet Set” scenes that influenced some of my dialogue and descriptions, but really, it’s the clothes that make this movie what it is. Audrey in her silver Paco Rabanne dress that shimmers like it’s alive—let’s just say this dress comes back again in Follow the Sun and takes a bit of a trip.

Friends (dir. Lewis Gilbert, 1971)

No, this forgotten 1970s film has nothing to do with Central Perk or “Smelly Cat”. I first discovered it via its stellar soundtrack, recorded by Elton John early in his career. What Simon & Garfunkel are to The Graduate, Elton John is to Friends. This movie about a pair of teenagers who flee Paris to run away to a remote cabin by the sea inspired Caroline and Tex’s escape to Formentera. While this movie gets a little problematic in terms of the characters’ ages (Friends is like a less-tropical The Blue Lagoon), the scenes of Paul and Michelle walking down desolate dirt roads, in this place that’s beautiful but also a little bit haunted, have always stayed with me.

La Piscine (dir. Jacques Deray, 1969)

Slim Aarons’ motto was, “Attractive people doing attractive things in attractive places”, and it doesn’t get more attractive than La Piscine. Alain Delon and Romy Schneider are almost too beautiful to be real, as is the St. Tropez pool they spend their days lying next to while drinking rosé and dealing with unexpected visitors (Maurice Ronet and Sixties “It Girl” Jane Birkin). It’s stylish, it’s sexy, and so very, very Jet Set.

Inside Llewyn Davis (dir. Joel and Ethan Coen, 2013)

The decision to make my main character an aspiring singer-songwriter sprung from my lifelong love of 1960s folk music, so you can imagine what a thrill it was to see this Coen Brothers movie for the first time. As Llewyn says about the genre, “It was never new and it never gets old,” and this timelessness is something I wanted to explore within the book. When I imagine Caroline performing on stage, I picture Carey Mulligan at The Gaslight. And then, sadly, I picture the men in the audience, with all their outdated notions about a woman’s role in society. It’s wild to me that Carey is performing next to one of our biggest pop stars (Justin Timberlake), but she’s the one I can’t take my eyes from, not him. Her voice is the one that lingers.

Blow-Up (dir. Michelangelo Antonioni, 1966)

Thematically, this Antonioni thriller has little to do with the lush romance of Follow the Sun. But when one of your main characters is a photographer in 1966, you go to the film that best captures what his world might have looked like. Although the character of Jack “Tex” Fairchild bears more of a resemblance to Clint Eastwood’s Robert Kincaid in The Bridges of Madison County, it helps to see the equipment, the models, the backdrops, and again—the clothes. Blow-Up was such an incredible resource, and such a good representation of the changing cinema landscape of the 1960s that I ended up giving it several shout-outs throughout my novel. And despite what one of my characters says, I think Verushka’s great.

Shampoo (dir. Hal Ashby, 1975)

One of my favorite Follow the Sun side characters is a Los Angeles hair stylist (at the Jay Sebring salon, for all you Manson historians and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood fans). Naturally, I turned to the master for inspiration: Warren Beatty in Shampoo. In addition to some great salon scenes, this fantastic “slice-of-life” film about Los Angeles in the 1960s is so authentic that watching it makes you feel like you’re in a time machine. The parties, the cars, the hair, the music—it takes us back, much in the same way Quentin Tarantino would do half a century later.

Purchase Follow The Sun here.