A reluctant boyfriend goes to the 'Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour' movie. Was he won over?

I’ll be honest with you; I’ve never paid all that much attention to Taylor Swift.

Oh, sure, I’m partial to "Shake it Off," and I don’t mind that song where she continuously references Romeo and Juliet — you know the one — but I could probably count the number of Swift songs I could name on one hand.

Historically, my main connection to the singer has come through her role in the 2012 song “Both of Us” by B.o.B, who I was a massive fan of in middle and high school. In my early teenage years, I really wanted them to date, and I could have sworn I saw chemistry between the two in the behind-the-scenes look at the “Both of Us” music video.

But love never blossomed, B.o.B regrettably became a fervent espouser of the flat-earth theory, and I stopped paying attention to Swift altogether. It wasn’t until I started dating my lovely girlfriend Kaitlin — a big fan of the singer-songwriter since middle school — that I began to understand just how extraordinarily famous and influential Swift was.

Kaitlin, along with countless others, knows every lyric to every song. And she, like many, has remained a fan for years. Swift seems to have retained all her original supporters, and scooped up a swath of every generation that’s followed.

Still, I didn’t quite understand what all the hullabaloo was about. Sure, I now knew how gigantic of a star Swift was, but I didn’t know why. After the Ticketmaster debacle tied to ‘The Eras Tour’ — which resulted in many of Swift’s diehards missing out on seats — my teenage cousin told me that many tears had been shed by people at school. Good grief, I thought, tickets had sold out; their cats hadn’t died. And why exactly were Swift's albums being referred to as "eras" anyways?

But Kaitlin went to an “Eras” show in Nashville this spring, and she loved it so much that she decided to attend the filmed version of the concert with friends on Oct. 13. Through a series of events, I ended up tagging along, and much to my chagrin, found out that it was, gulp… 2 hours and 49 minutes.

I was about to get a heavy dose of Swift, surrounded by her unwavering supporters. And a question arose: Would I somehow undergo an indoctrination process and join Swift’s titanosaurus-sized legion of fans?

Would I become a so-called “Swiftie?”

Reliving the Taylor Swift concert

My assumption was no, but I could tell, even before the show started, that this film was a big deal. The ticket cost about $22, and when we stepped into the lobby of the Malco Paradiso, Swift’s music was already purring through the speakers. There were Eras Tour-themed popcorn buckets and drink cups. You had to show your ticket to an employee not just before you entered the auditorium but after, too; and everyone but me seemed to be wearing either casual Swift-referencing sweaters or sparkly outfits that paid homage to her music.

I had some questions for these Swifties, and in the waning moments before the start of the movie, I hopped around the theater and chatted with them about their admiration for the singing sensation. What had brought them to the show? And how long had they been fans?

Addison, a teenager there with her mother as part of her 14th birthday celebration, had been listening to Swift for about 10 years. She had unfortunately missed out on the live show but was psyched to experience it in the theater.

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Lily and Samantha, on the other hand, two freshmen at the University of Memphis, had seen the live show, but found it so spectacular that they wanted to “relive it” through the film. These two seemed like they could have talked about Swift for hours, and they had been listening to her “since forever.” They assured me that they’d be treating the film like the live concert, and sitting with them was Lily’s mother, who was wearing a T-shirt that said, “It’s me, hi, I’m the Swiftie mom, it’s me.”

"Here, have a bracelet," she said, and she handed me one of the many Swift "friendship bracelets" that had passed around during the Eras Tour.

It should be noted that not all the fans present were young women. Bucking that trend was Joseph, an older, grandpa-like fellow with a walker who was wearing a hat that said “College of Natural Sciences” and sitting alone in the front row. I was wondering what in the world he was doing there, but when I asked him if he was a fan of Taylor Swift, he said “well of course,” as if it was an absurd question.

But I digress. The show was starting, so I shut my mouth and sat down. The camera appearing to descend through colorful clouds and onto SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, where her Eras show had been shot. There was scattered applause in the theater. And Kaitlin, along with much of the audience, started to sing along.

It had begun.

The long, long performance

I’ll say this. Swift knows how to put on a show. The choreography, costumes and set pieces were elaborate. In some ways, it felt like a musical more than a concert.

And as the show progressed, I began to see why Swift was so famous. The woman was oozing with charisma, yet at the same time, she came across as extremely personable. Whether she’s actually personable I don’t know — Swift hasn’t exactly called me up and invited me to lunch — but she certainly seemed that way. Plus, a lot of her songs are legitimately good; she knows how to write a catchy tune.

That’s not to say I was enthralled. Around an hour in I started to grow restless, and when Swift prepared to sing “All Too Well,” Kaitlin excitedly whispered to me that she would be doing the 10-minute version. This sounded to me like a good time to take a break.

I went to the bathroom, stretched my legs, took a brief stroll, saw a little girl in a sparkly outfit sprint out of the theater and toward the bathroom, and returned to my seat. “All Too Well” still hadn’t ended, but there must have been something to it because Kaitlin was continuing to sing along, and in the back row, the U of M freshmen, Lily and Samantha, were standing and swaying back and forth like they were back at the live show. Later, when Swift played a piano and sang “You’re on Your Own, Kid,” I heard one of them cry out, “This song breaks my heart." To my right, a nurse named Jules — or maybe it was her friend and fellow nurse Kate — said loudly, "I agree."

When the show did finally end, the audience applauded, and I let out a deep sigh. As Lily and Samantha walked out, they asked if I was now a Swift fan.

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Did the Taylor Swift movie win me over?

But it was way too soon to answer that question. Sitting through a 3-hour Taylor Swift performance is like drinking a vanilla milkshake out of a firing hose, and I needed time to clear my mind of Swiftemonium.

But doing so was surprisingly difficult. When I got home, I realized that the friendship bracelet Lily’s mom had given me was still on my wrist, and I couldn't bring myself to throw it out. That night, I dreamed I was standing in my parents’ kitchen, telling my dad about the movie. In the morning, I woke up wondering if I had perhaps subconsciously been a Swift fan this whole time, given that in high school I had so badly wanted her to date one of my favorite musicians. And that day, my friends all wanted to know whether I had liked the movie.

But a few days have since passed, I’ve cleared my head, and I am prepared to answer the question.

Am I now a true fan of Taylor Swift?

The short answer: Nah. As talented as she is, I would have preferred for that show to been 60 minutes instead of 169, so the word “fan” might be putting it a bit strongly.

Or wait, maybe it isn’t. Because this is the thing. Swift performed that 3-hour, extremely thought-out show throughout the country. She seems to have brought people together in a polarized world, serving as a common denominator for her supporters who might otherwise be at odds. And her music has brought Kaitlin, as well as millions of others, joy for nearly two decades now.

And that, I’d say, is definitely worth being a fan of.

John Klyce covers education and children's issues for The Commercial Appeal. You can reach him at [email protected].

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Did Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour movie win over a reluctant boyfriend?