I Drink Your Milkshake!

Last Thursday night, I took the final opportunity to see There Will Be Blood at the local multiplex before it was replaced with the destined-to-be-classics Fool's Gold and Welcome Home, Roscoe Jenkins (which is, for some reason, playing on two screens). So, I went to the 10:20 show, knowing full well that I wouldn't be getting out of the theater until Friday morning.

As I anticipated, I was the only one in the theater for the screening, which is the best way I can imagine watching this film. I was totally immersed in it, and I even found myself at times speaking aloud some of the movie's great dialogue.

As I left the theater after 1:00 am, I discovered that my car was the only one in the parking lot, so it may have been that the employees left me there to my own devices, as all the other movies were long done by then. While driving home, one line in the movie stuck with me, and I kept repeating it over and over:

I drink your milkshake!

Little did I know that this line also resonated with a lot of other viewers. There are already t-shirts, and a website has devoted itself to an appreciation of the phrase (in fact, that site is now serving as an intelligent and civil discussion board for this film and others by Paul Thomas Anderson). The site also provides an mp3 of the line, so if you didn't see the film, you can still hear it in all its glory. Entertainment Weekly this weekend ran an article about the line's popularity as well (though the writer complains that it diminishes Daniel Day-Lewis's outstanding performance to turn this line into a parody). Snell also came up with a use of the line that I wish I had thought of, and could itself become an internet phenomenon.

But the less said about the YouTube remix of the Blood trailer with Kelis's "Milkshake," the better.

Anyway, after hearing the line, I vowed to use it in ever situation possible. But what situations would provide the best opportunities to deploy an effective "I drink your milkshake"? Over on the IDYMS board, there's a discussion of that very question. One poster suggests that the phrase should replace "pwned." Though I agree that "pwned" is played, I think that the circumstances for using "I drink your milkshake" must be narrower. Keeping with its context in the film (which I'm hesitant to explain, as it may reveal some spoilers), it should be used only when one has achieved success at the direct expense of another.

So, for example, if you were playing a multiplayer, first-person shooter video game, and you took all of the ammo and life that showed up, while your fellow players were running out of ammo and dying, you could effectively shout, "I drink your milkshake!"

Or in the workplace: if, during a pitch to a client, you presented one of your co-workers ideas as your own and got a raise or promotion for "your" creativity, then you could send an interoffice memo to that co-worker with the single sentence, "I drink your milkshake."

You could also probably use it if you managed to cuckold a rival.

Politics may offer many opportunities as well. In fact, Keith Olbermann used a variation of the line to describe the Democratic race on Super Tuesday. He said something to the effect that Obama did not drink Hillary Clinton's milkshake. So, it's possible to use the phrase in the negative as well. However, when would it have been appropriate for Obama to use the line? If Obama had won New York, and gained more than,say, 70% of the white female vote in the process, he could have announced in that evening's victory speech, "I drink your milkshake!"

Now that I think about it, at the recent CPAC convention, if McCain had gone on after Romney announced that he was pulling out of the race, it would have been entirely appropriate for McCain to begin his speech with "I drink your milkshake."

So, barring the rare occurrence where I can actually use the phrase, I will probably just randomly shout it out when it comes into my head, as a kind of cinematic Tourette's.

And, at the risk of pushing things too far, here's something that I just couldn't help doing: lolplainview!