Monday, May 12, 2008

Review of The Visitor

It’s me—Bobzilla—writing a movie review. If you know me, you know I’m a drummer and that drum circle drumming is my main thing. I could pretend to be some “more respectable” type of drummer, but then I’d be writing a completely different type of review of The Visitor.

That’s the main theme of the movie: who we pretend to be versus who we really are. And the simple fact that what we really do is a big part of defining who we really are.

Take Walter for example—the lead character in The Visitor, skillfully portrayed with a restrained, understated dignity by Richard Jenkins. Walter pretends to be writing a book so that he won’t have to put much energy into pretending to teach economics at a college, then in the evening he pretends to be interested in learning to play the piano. All of the “going through the motions” in Walter’s life arise from the simple fact that he isn’t very interested in life after the death of his wife. Walter loved his wife—a concert pianist—and nothing that Walter does really brings her back into his life; not his teaching, not his writing, and he can’t even manage to hold onto her ghost by playing her instrument. Walter’s heart has closed and he only pretends to have a life.

This review will probably have SPOILERS in it. But even if I tell the entire plot, watching the movie is still a much more powerful experience than reading even the best review.

All of the characters in The Visitor are visitors of one kind or another, even though we may not immediately think of them that way. The fun part of the story begins for Walter when he visits New York to give a talk on a paper that he pretends to have co-written. He has an apartment in New York that sits “vacant” most of the time while Walter’s “home” is in Connecticut. Walter’s visit to his New York apartment shows him that “his” apartment hasn’t been quite vacant while he’s been away. In a suspenseful—and very artistically-photographed—scene, Walter discovers Zainab—played by Danai Gurira—soaking in his bathtub. A moment later, Tarek (Haaz Sleiman) is in the scene, pushing Walter against a wall, demanding to know whether Walter has touched Zainab.

It’s quite an amazing piece of movie magic: a complicated stand-off where the viewer isn’t really sure whose side to take. It’s Walter’s apartment, but Walter doesn’t stay there; Zainab is naked and vulnerable in the bathtub, so I couldn’t blame her for being a troublemaker; Tarek responds to the situation with some quick aggression, but he’s protecting his girlfriend.

They’re all visitors in their own ways: meeting in a hallway outside a bathroom. Who OWNS the hallway? Does anyone really OWN the hallways of life? Well, probably so, but this is one of those moments in a movie where you have to ask yourself if there’s a clearly wronged person in this situation or if it’s just people doing what they do, being who they are. It begins to shake Walter out of his…(note to self:: find one of those fancy German words that means the sort of funk you get into when you forget or refuse to feel your own feelings).


It takes this kind of a shock for Walter to discover that he’s able to feel some sympathy and concern for others, a feeling that Walter had lost until that moment.

Now I realize that I don’t need to tell much more of the plot. Tarek helps Walter realize that there is something immediate and present that Walter can actually do with his time; something worthwhile that Walter can do with his hands and with his feelings: he can play a drum.

The drum doesn’t know any pretense. You’re playing it or you aren’t. Walter can tell people that he’s busy with his writing or that he’s busy with his teaching or that he is doing this or that; Walter can make excuses about why he isn’t living his life, but the drum doesn’t take excuses. The drum makes a sound when he plays it and when he’s not playing it, he thinks about playing it.

The movie-viewer is given many other treats in this lovely film. You don’t have t be a drummer to enjoy it, but if you are, you notice the changes in Walter all the more powerfully.

Nor do you have to know anything about Muslims to enjoy this film, but if you do, you will come away with realizations about why Muslims would want to come to America: to drum, to love, to be human beings, to forget about what one pretends to be and to instead BE the person one really is.

I recommend The Visitor to all people who enjoy being people

For more info on The Visitor, see http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1809773648/info

Thursday, May 8, 2008

Post-Armageddon LOLs

The one definite statement I could make about the future is that it hasn't happened yet.

Well, okay, there's one more thing I could say about the future: I hope there is one. I have stuff to do next week and next month. And later today for that matter. I want to believe that there will be a future. That's the fatal flaw in my personal philosophy of life: the current moment is a nice moment. Thank you. May I have a little more, please?

When I was a tiny little zilla-monster many years ago and the big people in my life--my mummy and pappy--put that big fancy-looking book in front of me (which I thought at the time was just there to teach me to read well and to learn something about how to live a good life) I searched through the words as earnestly as a little monster could, genuinely trying to understand what the big fancy book was trying to tell me. It had lots of interesting and mysterious stories in it and several compelling characters, so it was quite a gripping literary experience for my wittle bwain. Over the course of a few years, I managed to read the whole thing. I would have read quicker, but it was written in this funny old-English style that made comprehension rather slow and fitful. Numerous, sundry and several were the chapters therein, and the chapters of it, numerous, sundry and several were.

Eventually--and with a building sense of anticipation--I finally got to the last chapter of the big fancy book with real gold (!) around the edges of all the pages. And the name of that chapter was called Revelations (I looked it up in a dictionary: my other good book) and I found out that a revelation was a revealing; something being shown. I absolutely tingled with excitement!

As I began to read the last chapter of the big important story my excitement turned to dread; the rush of tingling became the sort of goosebumps that begin as an non-specific thrill and then turn into a feeling that is quite clearly fear. The last chapter (or book as they say) was about the end of the world.

Things began to feel very different to me that day. I began to pay closer attention to the sky. Where I had been accustomed to watching the wind blow the clouds around, I now began to wonder if God was in the clouds about to summon the storm that would signal Judgement Day; where I had previously been able to enjoy a pretty colored sunset, I now began to ask myself if the reddish color was a blood-red to presage the examination of all my most private thoughts and feelings for the small impurities that would lead to my spending all of eternity in a place of burning, weeping and teeth-gnashing.

That was all quite too much for me to deal with. I was a nice little monster, far from perfect but I had decent manners, I loved my mummy and pappy, I wasn't selfish with my friends and I wore reasonably clean clothes most of the time. And yet I suspected that God might find things about me that He wouldn't like. What would I say to God if Judgement Day caught me by surprise?

I did what any little monster did when the big questions in life got to be too much: I asked my best friend. He told me that if I noticed Judgement Day coming, I should quickly ask Jesus to forgive me for my sins.

"Do I have to know what my sins were?" I asked, still not quite reassured.

"Um, yeah. You know when you're sinning don't you?" he replied, trying to be helpful. He was a really good friend.

"Well, I never killed anybody and I don't steal stuff. And I don't know what fornification is, so I prob'ly haven't done that either."

"If you don't know what it is, how can you know whether or not you've done it?"

I had to think about that one for a minute. "I guess I would know. If it's a bad sin, I think I would feel bad doing it, like I would feel if I stole something."

We were both about 8 or 9 years old, but we were already very capable theologists.

Still I had this nagging sense of dread that Judgement Day would come and I would be caught with some sin soiling my spiritual raiment (see? I learned lots of interesting concepts from the big fancy book) that would get me a one way ticket to H, E, double hockey-sticks.

I carried that dread for YEARS. Decades even. It weighed on my mind and scared me until I really couldn't cope with the burden of the fear and I pushed it out of my conscious mind to let it fester and swell like a splinter that tweezers can't grab in the shadowy realm of my subconscious mind.

Years went by. After a while, I began to realize a couple more pertinent factors: I actually am a good person. God doesn't hate me any more than I hate myself. And it's actually humanity that has the biggest effect on the hastening of Judgement Day--or the stoppage of it.

It's actually up to us to end the world or not, by how we treat one another; by whether we decide to make big horrible wars or not. My vote is for NOT making the big war.

But it is my understanding that some of the people who share the world with me are people who are still carrying the fear around inside themselves. I found a way to get over my fear. Not every one has been so lucky. They aren't evil people. They're scared. It's hard for them to admit that they're scared. They probably need a hug.

Love conquers fear.

It's been said before, but I really hope I can say it a little more clearly today.

Love might save the world.

Have a good day.