Post 83

Time for some movie reviews. It's been a while; I've seen a few:

Groundhog Day

'Tis the season, no? I watched this with some of my roommates during the span of time when February 1st became February 2nd. It's a good movie; it was fun; I enjoyed it. As far as romantic comedies go, thisun's top-notch. But today I was pondering on it, and it got me thinking about a lot of things--so my opinion of this movie is improving exponentially since my stance has always been "if it makes me think, it must be good." And the more I think about it, the more I like thinking about it because it doesn't present itself as any sort of moralistic movie or self-proclaimed thought provoker.

When Phil first figures out that he's stuck in one day, that there is no tomorrow, that his actions can bring no long-term consequences, he decides to do all those bad things that he normally wouldn't do--get chased by the cops, have random romance, punch Ned in the face, pig out on pastries, steal money, and so on. Finding no satisfaction in this, he despairs and turns to suicide, killing himself in every way he can think of (many of which we don't see, judging by the list he rattles off to Rita). Thus the parameters of the social experiment are set: if all long-term consequences (defined as results of actions that happen more than 24 hours from the time of the action), good and bad, are taken away from man, how will man find meaning in existence? This is mortal man completely outside of his natural element--time. Normally, every aspect of our mortal existence is impacted immeasurably by time; what if that suddenly wasn't the case?

I recently read a children's novel called The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane by Kate DiCamillo. It was a nice story--the kind I imagine myself reading to my little larvae, when I have them (I'm a butterfly, remember)--but really it gave me some not very nice thoughts about eternity.

The thought of immortality frightens me--mostly because I have absolutely no concept of what that would mean. About a year ago, in a fit of bitterness, I wrote a description of eternity that is probably the most cynical thing that I have ever created. It was a story comparing the afterlives of two men, one who is "saved" and one who is "damned." My thesis was that, in popular Christian theology, there's no important difference between heaven and hell--in one of them, you sit and moan; in the other, you stand and sing--but who can remember which is what, and what's it really matter anyway since, in the end (which never comes because we're talking about eternity), you're still spending FOREVER doing nothing that really matters, and, let's face it, that's gotta get old at some point. As I recall, the story ended when, after four or five eons, the god in my story capriciously decided to send everyone in heaven to hell and bring everyone from hell to heaven so he could have some new faces in his choir (which had been getting progressively less and less enthusiastic over the millennia), and when this happened, all the people in heaven and hell rejoiced--yes, rejoiced--because something had finally happened to shake up the monotony of immortality.

Now, that's a pretty pessimistic outlook on the afterlife, and it really isn't how I feel--it certainly hasn't any similarity to what I actually believe, and I try not to paint the beliefs of others in such disparaging tones--but I include it here because some of those feelings were dredged up as I read about Edward Tulane.

Edward Tulane is a porcelain rabbit doll and is, by virtue of the book's targeted audience, fully aware of everything that happens around him. But his is not the sort of story wherein toys come to life and walk around, going on grand adventures. No, Edward is a very realistic sort of doll in that he can't move on his own or communicated with those around him--basically, even though he is conscious, he is unable to affect his environment in any way. His story is one of pain and disappointment because life--or existence, I guess--just sort of happens to him, and there's nothing he can do about it. Of course, the blatantly obvious happy ending that I saw coming the whole time did, in fact, come (though there were some rather surprising bumps in the road getting there), so I suppose that this book counts as a happy story, but it really isn't. Edward is a nearly immortal being dwelling in a very mortal world, and so he is constantly faced with loss. To me, the thought of being ageless in an aging world is a thought far more frightening than death.

But I'm wrong; immortality is only a cruel fate if 1) you, like the people in my cynical story, have nothing to live for, nothing to do, no reason to exist and/or 2) you, like Edward Tulane, are unable to act. If you have a cause, and if you are capable of working for that cause, so long as your cause is eternal, eternity is never too long.

In Groundhog Day, Phil ultimately discovers that life becomes meaningful when it is spent in the service of others--he still wishes that he could get out of February 2nd and move on, but so long as he's stuck in the 2nd, he makes it the best 2nd he can. There is nothing in the film that necessarily denotes that it is his righteous living that releases him from his prison--the inference is there to be made, and people often interpret the movie that way, but it's just as likely that the glitch fixed itself or the bug ran its course or the deal expired--but regardless of why or how he was freed from his trap, the important thing is that he learned what really living actually entails.

I'm still Mr. I-hate-anything-that-doesn't-relate-directly-to-real-life, though, so that thought alone isn't enough to make me like this movie. Using all I've said as a backdrop, then, let me tell you why I decided that I love this movie:

There is a quiet place where I know I can be alone that I walk to from time to time. I go there to pray aloud to the only Person who really understands me, and I seek to understand myself, how I fit into His plans, and what His plans require of me. Occasionally, He gives me bits of inspiration and direction, and I have sometimes sprinted away from that quiet place, knowing that there was some action I had to take immediately. Far more often, though, He just smiles and shakes His head, and I get the silent assurance that I'm doing alright--all my stress and anxiety fade away and are swallowed up in the words "Trust Me." Through such experiences, I have come to realize that the future is not mine--it rests safely in God's unfathomably competent hands. The present is mine; it is the piece of the future that God has given to me to do with as I will. When I get caught up in looking ahead or behind, wishing that time would pass more quickly or slowly, I realize that I am being rather ungrateful.

I would not want to get trapped in a single day--there isn't any day that I wish I could relive. All too often, I have supposed that I have been a royal screwup only to find out later on that I did the exactly right thing, and the opposite is true too--"The best-laid plans of mice and men," dontchya know. No, I am happy that time continues onward in its ever-quickening tempo and hope that it continues to do so until the end. The reason that I love Groundhog Day is that, if it has any underlying message, it's an admonition to live in the present. Don't live for tomorrow or dwell on the past, just live--and live well. "Take no thought for the morrow" certainly doesn't mean to take advantage of everyone today; it just means live well today and leave the future up to God. In one scene of the movie, Phil catches a kid falling out of a tree; after setting the kid down and watching him run away, Phil says something like, "Yeah, you didn't thank me last time, either." We can't do kind things in the hopes that we will be repaid--not even with a thank you--but we have to live in love and charity because that's the only way to really live. Maybe tomorrow never will come and all the nice things we did today will be forgotten and go unrewarded, but what's it really matter? Was it really love if you offered it in hopes of reciprocation? As one who has attempted such acts, let me assure that doing so will only leave you very, very jaded.

Okay, well, I've spent enough time on that high horse; I still have other movies to review!

I, Robot

What? What's this?? Schmetterling saw a sci-fi movie‽ Yup, and it wasn't really wretched or anything--I actually kinda enjoyed it, I'm sort of ashamed to say--but let me tell you why it wasn't really fantastic, either.

Maybe I missed something, but the whole premise of the movie struck me as very flawed--and I don't mean in the sense of robots taking over the world and such; despite my lack of love for speculative fiction, I won't attack it for being speculative. No, the thing that rubbed me the wrong way was that the old man knew there was a problem, knew how to fix the problem, and had made a robot that was capable of fixing the problem--so why'd he leave a trail of breadcrumbs for a detective to figure out and then commit suicide? And that the detective was able to figure out the trail--darn near deus ex machina, I'm afraid to say.

That said, the overall effect of the movie was pleasing--a mildly entertaining story without a repulsively contrived ending--and I don't think watching it would make you a worse person (which, coming from me, is pretty high praise for a sci-fi flick). Sure, the movie's estimation of what 2035 will look like is totally out of the realm of possibility, but that doesn't make it a bad movie, I guess.

Well, that's plenty enough content for one post, I'd say. I saw a couple of foreign films a week ago, but since I missed the beginning of one and have very little to say about the other, I don't really feel inclined to say anything about them. So, that's all for today. See ya.