GoCertify Wishes You a Pleasant Labor Day

Salutations from all of us at GoCertify. It's a regular ol' Monday for most of the world. Here in the United States, however, where GoCertify HQ is located, a great many people are kicking back and taking it easy in honor of the, um, hard work, ingenuity, and diligence of the legions of honest laborers whose energetic zeal built America from the ground up.

We will return to normal operations on Tuesday. Until then, however, we're making an effort to keep things hopping around this joint by presenting a short Labor Day-themed quiz. We know, we know: Who could have predicted this? We're nothing if not creatures of habit around here.

Past Labor Day quizzes have dealt with people and events actually connected to the history of labor in the United States. This year, however, we're making a small departure from that overall gamplan. Instead of reflecting on truth and history, we're taking a left turn into pure fiction and sweet holiday romance.

This year's quiz is about the 2013 film Labor Day starring Kate Winslet and Josh Brolin. So you can see that we're still topical: The words "Labor Day" are right there in the title of the movie, after all. Not only that, but after you take the quiz you can rent and watch the movie on either Amazon Prime or YouTube for just $3.99! Everybody wins!

So, what's your degree of seasonal cinematic savvy? Let's find out!

1) True or False: Labor Day the movie is based on a novel of the same title written by Joyce Carol Oates.

2) True or False: Labor Day was directed by Ivan Reitman, director of Ghosbusters and also the similarly holiday-themed comedy Groundhog Day.

3) True or False: Kate Winslet competed with several other actresses to win the female lead, lonely single mother Adele Wheeler, in Labor Day.

4) True or False: While not about the Labor Day holiday per se, Labor Day does includes the holiday weekend in its internal timeline.

5) True or False: Labor Day was theatrically released over the Labor Day holiday weekend in 2013.

6) True or False: Josh Brolin's character, escaped convict Frank Chambers, forces his way into Adele's home to recuperate from a gunshot wound after meeting Adele and her 13-year-old son, Henry, in a grocery store.

7) True or False: The culinarily gifted Frank prepares chili, homemade biscuits, and peach pie during Labor Day.

8) True or False: Adele deals with both axiety and depression, struggling to parent Henry, but no reason for her condition is ever given in the film.

9) True or False: In a surprise revelation near the end of Labor Day, the never-seen narrator is revealed to be Adele's neighbor, Mr. Jervis.

10) True or False: While promoting the film, Brolin compared co-star Winslet to both a truck driver and his own mother.

[Answers on the next page]

ANSWERS

1) False. We pulled the kind of trickeration that CompTIA always does on its certification exams. Labor Day the novel did indeed inspire Labor Day the film, but the novel was written by a different famous female author named Joyce, Joyce Maynard.

2) False. Labor Day was directed by Ivan Reitman's son, Jason Reitman. Also, Ivan Reitman did not direct Groundhog Day, though it was directed by one of his Ghostbusters stars, Harold Ramis. Ivan Reitman did direct two other "day"-themed movies, the romantic adventure Six Days, Seven Nights and the NFL drama Draft Day.

3) False. Jason Reitman had Kate Winselt in mind to play Adele in Labor Day from the start. He even rearraged his filming schedule and directed Young Adult before making Labor Day so that Winslet could wrap up other projects and be available for Labor Day.

4) True. Labor Day the holiday in included in the timeline of events that unfolds in Labor Day the movie.

5) False. It would seem that there's only so much symmetry in the universe. Labor Day did have its initial unveiling at the Venice Film Festival over Labor Day weekend in 2013. It was not theatrically released, however, until Super Bowl weekend (Jan. 31-Feb. 2) of the following year.

6) False. Frank does corner Adele and Henry in a grocery store, and forces his way into their home, but his bleeding has been caused by undue strain on the stitches in his abdomen following surgery at a hospital to remove his appendix.

7) True. Frank even spoon feeds his special chili to Adele after tying her to a chair on his first night in her home.

8) False. After giving birth to Henry, Adele (mild spoiler warning) suffered through a string of miscarriages that culminated in the full-term stillbirth of a baby girl.

9) False. The events of the film are narrated by the adult Henry, looking back on the late summer weekend that changed his life. Mr. Jervis (played by J.K. Simmons) does bring over the bushel basket of peaches that provides an opportunity for Frank to demonstrate his pie-making prowess.

10) True. In an interview promoting Labor Day with film website Indiewire, Brolin said the following of Winslet: "She's a truck driver to me. She's like the mom that I grew up with. My mom's from Texas, she's a fun, fun, fun lady, a lot of personality, and Kate has a ton of personality. I didn't expect that, by the way."