My last truly important birthday was probably my 18th, and that was a long, long time ago. I still feel like I’m 18, act like I’m 12, and sleep like I’m 5 months old. But life doesn’t often let you live in the blissful ignorance that I’ve mastered. Nothing will make you feel the icy fingers of mortality around your neck like cleaning out your childhood home, putting it up for sale, and preparing to close that lengthy chapter of your life.
That’s what has occupied me for the past two weeks. My sisters and I looked through our parents’ remaining belongings, decided what to keep and what to sell. Eventually the rooms in that very familiar house became empty and small. We sat at the kitchen table and repeated the stories we’ve told many times about life in that house. We noticed that a cardinal flew by — an in-family omen of my Mom — and that a penny appeared on the floor of my bedroom — an omen of my Dad. We cleaned and straightened and prepared for the realtor to usher through interested buyers and nosy neighbors. I focused on the garage and set aside some of the odds and ends that my Dad had left there, grabbing at the rapidly disappearing threads that connected him to the life I now find myself wandering through.
And today, my odometer clicked up another meaningless notch. Which is strange, because I never feel any older on this anniversary, but I know that I must be, because those days with them in that little warm house seem so long ago. And I know now, sadly, that the empty house is part of my life going forward, as much as the one that rocked with laughter and happiness. I guess that growing up, which I am still doing at 48, is a matter of trading experiences for memories. I’m lucky, because almost all of them have been good, thanks to life in that little house.
2009. Starring Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto. Directed by J.J. Abrams.
There’s a particularly good episode of Northern Exposure — one of television’s funniest and most-thoughtful series — in which the Native American character played by Graham Greene is studying white American culture for examples of healing and instructive myths. He notes that various tribes have stories that help put the universe in perspective and help explain the often-unexplainable burden of being human. After questioning everyone in town, he finds that no one can name myths in white culture similar to those you find in Native American culture. He then stumbles into a theater and realizes that we Zhaagnaash just call them movies.
I’m encouraged by the recent reset of a few of the action movie franchises — Batman Begins wiped away all the cartoonishness of the earlier attempts, and the Dark Knight was a great, moody followup. I have to admit that I never saw any of the previous big-screen Star Trek movies and I was never a fan of the television show. It was the positive reviews of others and the opportunity to see a blockbuster on a giant screen that drew me to this J.J. Abrams production.
Because he’s working with a cast of relative unknowns (not at the time of this writing, of course; they are all stars now), the burden of success for this important franchise was propped on his youthful shoulders, and it was a wise choice. The mind behind Alias, Cloverfield and Lost succeeds in telling a story that not only honors past storylines and characters, but adds energy and some exciting plot twists.
Replacing the iconic leads of Shatner and Nimoy must have been the greatest gamble, and I think Chris Pine as Kirk and Zachary Quinto as Spock are a suitable update. Nimoy plays a crucial role, as well, cleverly and logically appearing as an older Spock. The story — a genesis story for the crew and the Enterprise’s mission — allows for the introduction of all the familiar characters: Bones (Karl Urban), Uhura (Zoe Saldana), Scotty (Simon Pegg), Sulu (John Cho) and Chekov (Anton Yelchin), and sets up the ascendance of Kirk, Spock and the crew to command of the Enterprise.
Their nemesis in this first chapter are some ticked-off Romulans (led by the villainous Nero, played by Eric Bana) intent on avenging what they see as Spock’s failure to save their home planet. There are many spectacular scenes, amazing special effects, brain-clenching jumps in time and all the science-fiction and action movie twists that make a few hours in a darkened theater so much fun. So I’m going to shut up about the story here.
Except to add this: The metamorphosis of James Tiberius Kirk from fatherless and rudderless rebel to spaceship-commanding savior of the universe is the story we keep telling ourselves, over and over again, despite its unlikelihood. That there is greatness inside each of us, however raw and unrecognized, that can be channeled and that can define our lives. That we are destined to be something better than we are. Star Trek is an explosion-filled summer blockbuster, but this story is told again and again, in more conventional settings, in simpler stories, in the movies we love. Those are our healing myths, and I think we need every one of them.
2008. Starring Michelle Williams. Directed by Kelly Reichardt.
Summer is the time of blockbusters — screen-filling spectacles of ’splosions and sequels. The fantastic and futuristic epics that challenge the stabilizing structures of logic while we suspend our disbelief. Reinterpretation of familiar narratives and remakes of films that were better in their first iteration.
But once in a while, you are reminded that there is drama in everyday life, and a story that will break your heart behind every person with a downcast face you pass on the street. That’s why we need the blockbusters and explosions. There is just too much real pain to witness while we’re struggling to carry on with our own, and we need distraction.
Wendy (Michelle Williams) is carrying her particular burden from Indiana to Alaska, and is accompanied by her loyal pal, Lucy, a golden dog with a “friendly face” who shares her woes. Wendy is hoping to find work at a fish cannery, and is rationing her meager savings to get there, sleeping in her car and bathing in gas-station bathrooms. But when her ‘88 Accord breaks down in Oregon, and Lucy goes missing, Wendy faces disaster on a personal level.
There are really two themes to this simple and incredibly sad film: one, that when you’re poor and alone, you are very vulnerable, while disaster awaits any wrong step; and two, the default approach we take to each other is distrust and defensiveness, even as our natural empathy battles to reach out to another human being in need.
There’s that word, empathy, that’s actually been a matter of debate this summer. As if people shouldn’t be empathetic to each other; as if there is a basis for such a debate. Without empathy, what stops my neighbor for killing me for what’s in my pocket? What stops me from laughing at someone else’s pain and suffering? It seems strange, but there is an actual debate in society whether we should act like psychopaths. (Maybe with this question in mind, the cruelest, least-empathetic character in Wendy and Lucy wears a large crucifix as a sign of moral superiority.)
Michelle Williams is remarkable as Wendy, determined but weary from walking everywhere on her skinny legs, self-reliant but clearly at the end of her rope. A phone call that she makes to her sister, just “to call” but met with suspicion, is heartbreaking. The voice at the other end of the line just wants to hear that everything’s OK, even though it’s clear that things are far from it.
Although there are few details in the story to tell you what brought Wendy and Lucy to this point, I really felt for Wendy, who is hesitant to accept kindness from others, wary of being in their debt. And I feel for Lucy, whining and unable to understand when the dog food bag is empty. As much as I’d like to help the characters, I realize that many real people are in similar situations or worse, and I probably have walked by them, distrustful and defensive. That’s what a tough old world with a limited amount of empathy will do to you.
2008. Starring Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett. Directed by David Fincher.
There are many deaths in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button; that is, there are many lives lived. I say that because, if what this story tells us can be boiled down to a single point, it’s that, in order to live, you must accept that you will die.
To make this point as simply and gracefully as the movie does, it shows us the life of a man born into a physically old body that becomes younger as he ages. In all other ways, he experiences the joys and pains that everyone experiences: the loss of those he loves, the missed opportunities, the chances taken and the regrets carried.
I wasn’t excited to see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button in the theaters. I wasn’t sure I wanted to see it at all. It seemed gimmicky, too much like a movie I really don’t like, Forrest Gump, which shares a screenwriter. Well, this is the movie that Forrest Gump should have been. Instead of putting the lead character at the center of all of our lifetime’s keystone moments, Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt) experiences all the changes of mid-century America, but from the perspective of an average man, however physically unique.
Benjamin is born as his mother dies, and his distraught father, who sees a wrinkled and crooked infant, drops him on the doorstep of a New Orleans old folks home. He is discovered by Queenie (Taraji P. Nelson), who will care for and raise him, as he grows from an invalid baby into a spritely senior citizen. His time in the old folks home is enlightening, as those around him “pass” every day, while others are obsessed with their memories while they can still hold them. He meets people he’ll remember long after they’re gone, and he’ll meet the love of his life, although she is just a girl. Upon reaching 17 years of age, he feels restless and leaves to find adventure and purpose, a young man with stiff bones and receding gray hair. His travels and experiences shape who he is, as they do anyone, and he keeps returning home to find others have passed, or moved on, or changed.
Benjamin’s story is told through the reading of his diary by Caroline to Daisy (Kate Blanchett), her dying mother, the young woman that Benjamin loved, in a New Orleans hospital directly in the path of a hurricane. Caroline makes a point to say goodbye to her mother, and reading the diary seems like a way to pass the time, but there is much to learn in the telling of Benjamin’s story. From the beginning, with the tale of a clock that runs backward, created so that the time and people we’ve lost will come back to us, to the end of the story, when memories bring back to us the times we’ve had and the people we’ve loved before they are washed away forever.
David Fincher gently handles this story within a story, with changing perspectives in time, surrounding characters who move forward and backward in time. The scenes are dark and often quiet, with much of it set during late nights and early mornings, and traveling from New Orleans to the Pacific Ocean to New York and Paris, and back again to New Orleans. The characters who fill Benjamin’s life are colorful and genuine, from the sweet and loving Queenie to the tugboat captain who considers his tattoos as his art, and who helps the elderly youth cross a few of life’s most-memorable thresholds.
One of the characters’ turning points comes through a clever portrayal of how we dance around with fate, illustrating how many small acts can build into events that can knock us off course. Telling that story of missed chances and unfortunate timing enforces my belief that, if fate is real, it must be so complicated and unpredictable that we cannot reliably foresee anything. What holds Benjamin back from being what he wants to be — a lover, a husband, a father — is the uniqueness of his physical condition. For the rest of us, it is our own unique circumstances. But whatever it is, the movie tells us, it’s not too late to “start again.”
This movie struck a surprising chord with me, given the way life has appeared to me over the past few years. Some lines seem like they’ve just come out of my mouth. I know I’ve said, as Benjamin says at a happy moment, “I was thinking how nothing lasts, and what a shame that is.” And whether it’s an optimistic outlook or a threat, I agree with Queenie’s sentiment that “you never know what’s comin’ for you.” You might be surprised, as I was, by what you’ll feel watching The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
Found out late this afternoon that Kill Rock Stars recording artist Jeff Hanson, 31, has died. This tragic news, on a cold and rainy day in Minneapolis, is sad and sobering. I first heard him being interviewed on public radio a couple years ago, describing how he sung his trademark falsetto (forgive me if that’s not the right term) as a child, and utilized the same style when he became a songwriter. I picked up his self-titled LP, and was impressed with the delicate, unconventional songs. If you are a fan of Elliott Smith or Iron & Wine, this is an album you should listen to.
No definite word on cause of death yet — but it doesn’t matter. This was someone with a surplus of talent, who was reportedly excited at how his career was going, who had an unlimited number of songs to write, who has left us too early. I am really saddened by the news. RIP, Mr. Hanson.
Jeff Hanson site